View Full Version : The Green Party's Election video
The Black Adder
08-04-2015, 18:11
lol... this is very good
PPgS7p40ERg
Not bad. But judging by how Joe public likes a lot of guys singing etc it may have the opposite effect:eyebrows:
Works for me and they'll be getting my vote too, I just can't bring myself to vote for any of the other shower. First time I have ever stepped outside the mainstream and I have never not voted.
Plaid Cymru for me, all the way... Leanne Wood talks a lot of sense, as does her SNP counterpart, Nicola Sturgeon. Would love to see them join forces and take on the wankers in Westminster.
Let the girlies have a go at it, I say! Can't be any worse than the mess men have made of running the country in recent years!! :exactly:
Marco.
Plaid Cymru for me, all the way... Leanne Wood talks a lot of sense, as does her SNP counterpart, Nicola Sturgeon. Would love to see them join forces and take on the wankers in Westminster.
.
Oh dear. I'm afraid that what they don't know would fill a warehouse. Country would be bankrupt in weeks.
Okay, even more bankrupt than it already is....
In your opinion, muchacho.... I'm all for more Welsh and Scottish influence in British affairs, instead of the centuries of unfair and biased English rule the rest of us have had to endure!! Let's ring the changes and give the whole dirty and corrupt system a huge KICK UP THE ARSE!! :yesbruv: :yesbruv:
Marco.
well you shouldn't have got yourselves conquered, then ;)
Lol.... Anyway, you can see my point.
For YEARS, the rest of us have had to endure being dealt a rather raw deal by the English, who have tried 'keeping us in our place', and at LONG LAST things are starting to change. That's a major reason to be cheerful for all non-English UK citizens (which cumulatively, represent the majority of the UK population).
Vive la révolution!! :hifive: :hifive:
Marco.
I think you forget we had a Scottish Chancellor of the Exchequer for 10 years and then he was PM for another three. Result: bankrupt country. And you don't get more Scottish than Gordon Brown.
And wasn't Tony Blair a Jock? I think he was, at least by birth.
Not sure when we at had a taffy running the show. Lloyd George?
The problem was that they were all self-serving wankers working for a corrupt system, and represented the 'mainstream', to borrow Tim's terminology.
Plaid Cymru and SNP don't represent the mainstream (at least not yet anyway), and so their 'take' on matters, as far as I'm concerned, is a big breath of fresh air, especially if you're a Celt (with Celt-orientated interests) and wish to see English political influence diluted as much as possible.
Sorry, I know (being English) you strongly disagree, but if you were a Welsh, Scottish or Irish UK citizen, and had been on the receiving end for years of a whole load of diabolically unfair pish from Westminster, you'd feel the same way others and I do!
Marco.
The Black Adder
09-04-2015, 09:13
IMO all of the female speakers on the ITV debate spoke more sense than any of the males. They spoke better and with none of that fake sincerity. Personally I thought they were well out of touch.
The Welsh speaker spoke really well and kicked the dinosaurs down a good few steps back.
I'd vote green but I'm not sure if we have one standing where we are.
Why Farage was even on the debate beggars belief IMO... and that is only my opinion... no wars please... lol
IMO all of the female speakers on the ITV debate spoke more sense than any of the males. They spoke better and with none of that fake sincerity.
Hear, hear! Never a truer word was spoken :clap:
Btw, don't get me wrong, I'm not a rabid Welsh or Scottish nationalist (or anti-English, even). In general, I detest politics. This is about fairness and equality, and at long last non-English UK citizens having more of a say in their future, which fair-minded English people should appreciate and respect.
Therefore, take my support for Plaid Cymru/SNP (for the first time ever in my life) as a 'protest vote', more than anything else, done simply to dilute the influence of Tory or Labour corruption. If for once there wasn't real benefit to be gained in voting Welsh or Scottish nationalist, for reasons outlined, then I wouldn't be voting at all!
Marco.
Oldpinkman
09-04-2015, 11:18
IMO all of the female speakers on the ITV debate spoke more sense than any of the males. They spoke better and with none of that fake sincerity. Personally I thought they were well out of touch.
The Welsh speaker spoke really well and kicked the dinosaurs down a good few steps back.
I'd vote green but I'm not sure if we have one standing where we are.
Why Farage was even on the debate beggars belief IMO... and that is only my opinion... no wars please... lol
I've avoided joining in because it seems to me there is the usual bandwagon element - rather than appreciation of what actually governing involves. I'd cheerfully promise more schools, more hospitals, better welfare, more police, no potholes in the roads, and free tickets to the cop in my manifesto, if I could get AOS members to pay for them all. If you ever did kick the chinless wonders out, and let someone like Natalie Bennet in, either the country would be flushed down the loo in the week, or Bennet would be doing her best Tsipras impression. Tsipras and Varoufakis, in addition to looking more gangster like, and less politician like than any since Berlesconi, are currently doing the fastest shameless U-turn in recorded history.
Lets look at some Brit numbers. Last year the government spent £732bn - 43.1% of GDP (£1698bn). It only raised £641bn in taxes, so, yet again, borrowed £91bn just to pay the gas bill. Actually, £48bn of that £91bn we borrowed was spent on interest payments, because we are lucky enough to borrow at about 3%. If we had policies like Greece, and leaders like Bennet, we would, like Greece before they were just bailed out by the EU, have interest costs of 24%. That would make our interest payments £246bn a year, increasing our borrowings to pay the gas bill to £300bn a year. We'd go bust.
The Conservatives (best my ICAEW can cost their policies) are promising to run an "overall budget surplus" by the END of the next parliament. The most aggressive of the parties on living within its means, is still planning to borrow to pay the gas bill right up until the end of the next parliament - if you can believe anything a politician says.
Labour and the Lib Dems, are both £50bn pa less ambitious than that. Thats £250bn MORE debt with Labour and the Lib Dems than the ???£150bn that Conservatives will have added to the national debt by annual borrowings. (UK national debt is currently £1.56 trillion - although the really scary number is "unfunded liabilities" - all those pensions people are entitled to that we have no money saved up for and will need to pay out of earnings. The Earnings which are not currently enough to pay the gas bill to the tune of £91bn pa)
Of course, the Conservative government annual borrowings to pay the bill, ARE lower than their Labour predecessors were...
So - lets look at the Greens. No details in their manifesto about where they get money from or how they would cut spending. They have promised a "citizens income" of £72 per week for all adults (add £240bn annually to spending - more than the cost of interest rates going to 24%!!!). Nathalie Bennet has also promised to build 500,000 social homes - no financial details about the cost or where the money would come from.
Fortunately for all the hot air on forums these parties will have no real influence. But if we ever did let the lunatics take over running the asylum - Greece would be a model of what to expect - only much worse than that
The Greens think you can power the whole country from windmills. Anyone who thinks that is surely too stupid, by definition, to be put in charge.
Incientally Marco I am Irish on both mother and father's side so technically Celtic but I don't go along with all this Celt power thing because it is esentially racist (in the true meaning of the word).
No worries, but I certainly didn't intend the term to be in any way racist. The Celt thing is something you wouldn't really appreciate if you're English.
In the UK (wherever I've been in Scotland or Wales - unfortunately I haven't visited Ireland), there's a real sense of 'all Celts together', fighting against English oppression/dominance ('get it right up them', as it were), which dismiss/belittle it or not, is genuinely how many Scots, Welsh and Irish people, living in the UK, feel.
Therefore, the Celt thing creates a sense of camaraderie and togetherness that you simply can't appreciate unless you are part of that group, and have suffered at the hands of those who've sought to control you. It's no wonder then, if you've suffered for years from that type of repression, that you'll do anything you can to fight against it or break free from it, and display a passionate desire to be more in control of your own destiny.
The English have to acknowledge and accept the fact that the vast majority of Scots, Welsh and Irish people, living in the UK, feel Scots, Welsh and Irish FIRST, and British second. In fact, many of them don't feel British at all, and as such have no affinity whatsoever with England or English ways, and how the powers that be there seek to impose their authority over them.
That has caused very deep-rooted resentment over the years, amongst the Scots, Welsh and Irish, and the feeling will never go away until those people consider that greater equality and division of wealth exists in the UK, and they have a more influential say in what's best for THEM, instead of so much money being wasted on, and privileges being given to, fat cats and chinless wonders in London and the 'home counties', who simply don't need it.
The whole bloody nation needs a right good shake up, from top to bottom, and a FAIRER and MORE EQUAL system introduced. I'd love to see that happen, as it's LONG overdue! If not, bring on the revolt.... :exactly:
Marco.
As a halfblood Roman/Reiver I wonder who I should vote for?
If the Scots ever get their way can they annex everything North of Teeside and Cumbria please.
The Black Adder
09-04-2015, 16:47
The Greens think you can power the whole country from windmills. Anyone who thinks that is surely too stupid, by definition, to be put in charge.
Incientally Marco I am Irish on both mother and father's side so technically Celtic but I don't go along with all this Celt power thing because it is esentially racist (in the true meaning of the word).
lol.. does that go with the olde rhyme that they think everyone should eat lentil's and hug trees?
Regardless of what people think. My thoughts are that Labour, Conservatives and Lib Dems (UKIP...? Give me a break) are all aged old sticks... they roll out the same w@nk every time with almost a comic laughable parody of false sincerity, yet people still vote for them.... Then again, 4million people tune in to The Voice and Strictly come Dancing too... :doh:
What I'm getting at is that (for me) they mean nothing... they are in it for the money. They have no passion for this country, only for their own people, it's all spin. They are egotesticalic fart brains with one priority... themselves.
I will never vote for any of them.
Nuff said...
Nuff said...
Nicely put Jo and I agree.
My thoughts are that Labour, Conservatives and Lib Dems (UKIP...? Give me a break) are all aged old sticks... they roll out the same w@nk every time with almost a comic laughable parody of false sincerity, yet people still vote for them....
What I'm getting at is that (for me) they mean nothing... they are in it for the money. They have no passion for this country, only for their own people, it's all spin. They are egotesticalic fart brains with one priority... themselves.
I couldn't agree more, Jo!!
Marco.
Oldpinkman
09-04-2015, 17:18
lol.. does that go with the olde rhyme that they think everyone should eat lentil's and hug trees?
Regardless of what people think. My thoughts are that Labour, Conservatives and Lib Dems (UKIP...? Give me a break) are all aged old sticks... they roll out the same w@nk every time with almost a comic laughable parody of false sincerity, yet people still vote for them.... Then again, 4million people tune in to The Voice and Strictly come Dancing too... :doh:
What I'm getting at is that (for me) they mean nothing... they are in it for the money. They have no passion for this country, only for their own people, it's all spin. They are egotesticalic fart brains with one priority... themselves.
I will never vote for any of them.
Nuff said...
For your sake, I hope enough other people do, or we will be in the Greek mess. Don't trust promises - trust track record, and be aware of the dangers of complacency about failing to control government spending and debt. I'd say I can't wait to bail out to France and leave you all to stew in it, but the French economy and government are an even bigger mess... :(
Don't trust promises - trust track record...
And if you live in the UK outside of the wealthy areas of England that are targeted to benefit most from the policies of the self-serving wankers you support, what "track record" of any use to the common man is there to speak of??
The only "track record" folks there are aware of from the Tories is years of suffering from the effects of unfair southern English bias, and the 'haves' being given far more than they deserve, compared with the 'have nots' - all to the benefit of the 'elite' and chinless wonders of this world.
If you lived in Glasgow, Newcastle, Swansea or Belfast (and had been brought up there), Richard, instead of Kent, trust me, you'd have a rather different outlook on matters!! ;)
Marco.
BTH K10A
09-04-2015, 19:51
I've avoided joining in because it seems to me there is the usual bandwagon element - rather than appreciation of what actually governing involves. I'd cheerfully promise more schools, more hospitals, better welfare, more police, no potholes in the roads, and free tickets to the cop in my manifesto, if I could get AOS members to pay for them all. If you ever did kick the chinless wonders out, and let someone like Natalie Bennet in, either the country would be flushed down the loo in the week, or Bennet would be doing her best Tsipras impression. Tsipras and Varoufakis, in addition to looking more gangster like, and less politician like than any since Berlesconi, are currently doing the fastest shameless U-turn in recorded history.
Lets look at some Brit numbers. Last year the government spent £732bn - 43.1% of GDP (£1698bn). It only raised £641bn in taxes, so, yet again, borrowed £91bn just to pay the gas bill. Actually, £48bn of that £91bn we borrowed was spent on interest payments, because we are lucky enough to borrow at about 3%. If we had policies like Greece, and leaders like Bennet, we would, like Greece before they were just bailed out by the EU, have interest costs of 24%. That would make our interest payments £246bn a year, increasing our borrowings to pay the gas bill to £300bn a year. We'd go bust.
The Conservatives (best my ICAEW can cost their policies) are promising to run an "overall budget surplus" by the END of the next parliament. The most aggressive of the parties on living within its means, is still planning to borrow to pay the gas bill right up until the end of the next parliament - if you can believe anything a politician says.
Labour and the Lib Dems, are both £50bn pa less ambitious than that. Thats £250bn MORE debt with Labour and the Lib Dems than the ???£150bn that Conservatives will have added to the national debt by annual borrowings. (UK national debt is currently £1.56 trillion - although the really scary number is "unfunded liabilities" - all those pensions people are entitled to that we have no money saved up for and will need to pay out of earnings. The Earnings which are not currently enough to pay the gas bill to the tune of £91bn pa)
Of course, the Conservative government annual borrowings to pay the bill, ARE lower than their Labour predecessors were...
So - lets look at the Greens. No details in their manifesto about where they get money from or how they would cut spending. They have promised a "citizens income" of £72 per week for all adults (add £240bn annually to spending - more than the cost of interest rates going to 24%!!!). Nathalie Bennet has also promised to build 500,000 social homes - no financial details about the cost or where the money would come from.
Fortunately for all the hot air on forums these parties will have no real influence. But if we ever did let the lunatics take over running the asylum - Greece would be a model of what to expect - only much worse than that
Unfortunately the lunatics are already running the assylum and have been doing so for quite a considerable time.
lol.. does that go with the olde rhyme that they think everyone should eat lentil's and hug trees?
...
Sadly it is actually their policy - I believe they have a target date of 2025 by which the whole country will be powered (or in reality not powered) by 'renewables'.
Here it is on their own website:
http://policy.greenparty.org.uk/safe-climate.html
•Phase out fossil-fuel based energy generation and nuclear power
If you actually speak with some of these people you will discover that quite a few of them really want to go back to living in caves and eating berries. The others tend to be middle class - middle income ivory tower types who think that they will be able to carry on living as they always have done but in some sort of pastoral new age post industrial paradise.
Not sure who is more naive.
No worries, but I certainly didn't intend the term to be in any way racist. The Celt thing is something you wouldn't really appreciate if you're English.
In the UK (wherever I've been in Scotland or Wales - unfortunately I haven't visited Ireland), there's a real sense of 'all Celts together', fighting against English oppression/dominance ('get it right up them', as it were), which dismiss/belittle it or not, is genuinely how many Scots, Welsh and Irish people, living in the UK, feel.
Therefore, the Celt thing creates a sense of camaraderie and togetherness that you simply can't appreciate unless you are part of that group, and have suffered at the hands of those who've sought to control you. It's no wonder then, if you've suffered for years from that type of repression, that you'll do anything you can to fight against it or break free from it, and display a passionate desire to be more in control of your own destiny.
The English have to acknowledge and accept the fact that the vast majority of Scots, Welsh and Irish people, living in the UK, feel Scots, Welsh and Irish FIRST, and British second. In fact, many of them don't feel British at all, and as such have no affinity whatsoever with England or English ways, and how the powers that be there seek to impose their authority over them.
That has caused very deep-rooted resentment over the years, amongst the Scots, Welsh and Irish, and the feeling will never go away until those people consider that greater equality and division of wealth exists in the UK, and they have a more influential say in what's best for THEM, instead of so much money being wasted on, and privileges being given to, fat cats and chinless wonders in London and the 'home counties', who simply don't need it.
The whole bloody nation needs a right good shake up, from top to bottom, and a FAIRER and MORE EQUAL system introduced. I'd love to see that happen, as it's LONG overdue! If not, bring on the revolt.... :exactly:
Marco.
I think you'll find that most English people consider themselves English rather than British in the same way - insofar asmuch as these things actually matter in the real world which is not a lot if any.
From the racism point of view this whole celtic thing is quite disturbing. I mean how are you going to distingush who is a real Celt? is it anyone who says they are or are you going to ask for DNA tests? it is all too close to the Nazi Aryan master race thing for me. And that is real racism, as opposed to what gets called racism these days, like making jokes about the French or something.
There is also the implication that Celts have been deliberately targeted by non-celts, purely becasue they are Celts, in amanner similar to the persecution of the Jews. History just does not bear this out.
Why is everything in this country concentrated in the South East? Geography, mainly, it is the bit of the country that is closest to all the other countries and it is warmer, flatter and has a lot of rivers and farmland, things which mattered back in the olden days. Like a snowball rolling down hill it has gatherered a lot of mass since. But there has never been a deliberate conspiracy to 'keep the north down' as you seem to be implying.
Oldpinkman
10-04-2015, 08:39
Perhaps instead of chanting tribal chants Marco could explain 3 policies from Westminster which create an advantage for Kent, and a disadvantage for Wrexham and other Celtic centres, and what alternative policies he proposes
The comment about track record was exclusively about what I believe is the terrifying fundamental (only important) issue at the moment, which is defecit management. There is a feeling of cozy complacency that we will trade our way out of this as the economies world wide pick up on the back of the massive quantative easing of the last few years. If that is not true, and tanking oil prices suggest it may not be true, then if anyone decides that loans to government are a bit whiffy and interest rates rise there is going to be economic chaos of the kind glimpsed in Ireland and Portugal, and seen in Greece and Spain. But this time, there will be no kindly Uncle offering a €240bn bailout. The UK needs over €2 trillion.
Forget promises. Look at history. Who MIGHT reduce our dependence on racking up the credit cards every year to pay the bills? And if we don't stop borrowing on credit cards - how long before we go broke? With the Greens, about 10 minutes - well, OK a year for them to run up that £240bn bill for the £72 per week social payment.
But there has never been a deliberate conspiracy to 'keep the north down' as you seem to be implying.
On that, we'll have to agree to disagree.
Not so much a conspiracy but a desire by the 'powers that be' in Westminster to look after No1 (and 'the elite' who are controlling them), first and foremost, to the detriment of normal people who aren't in a position to benefit from the policies created to provide for the greed of the 'chinless wonders' and the wealthy, thus in the process creating a HUGE north/south divide in the UK - and when you're living in the wrong side of that divide, and feel that you're being unfairly treated and controlled, that's what breeds deep-rooted resentment and a passionate desire to do whatever is possible to effect change.
Also, please understand I'm mainly talking about the best interests of the Scots, Welsh and Irish. English people, living in the north of England are still rather better catered for by mainstream party policies than any of those living in Scotland, Wales or Ireland.
I think you'll find that most English people consider themselves English rather than British in the same way....
I'm sure they do (and rightly so), but the big difference is that, in the UK, if you're English (and living in England, especially in the south of the country), governmental policies will usually go much more in your favour, than would happen if you were Scottish, Welsh or Irish, living in those respective areas of the UK.
Therefore, what we're after is PARITY, in that respect, and thus greater equality, so that 'Bob Smith', from Glasgow, is apportioned the same level of consideration by a UK government, as 'Bob Smith', from London. You can argue to the contrary until you're blue in the face, mate, but that simply doesn't happen at the moment.
Marco.
Perhaps instead of chanting tribal chants Marco could explain 3 policies from Westminster which create an advantage for Kent, and a disadvantage for Wrexham and other Celtic centres, and what alternative policies he proposes
Richard, it's well known (but of course never admitted by those responsible) that most governments, especially Tory ones, have a primary focus of keeping 'London and the home counties happy', first and foremost, and whilst never showing it outwardly (although Thatcher did a bloody good job of making it obvious), having complete contempt towards 'those in the north', and especially those who live outside of England.
That's just the way it has always been, and why there is much resentment from those 'in the north' (especially the Scots) who feel that they've been downtrodden for years and not given what they rightly deserve. The biased division of wealth and treatment they've received for years, at the hands of successive English-controlled/orientated UK governments, was totally unjust and unfair. Times, though, are changing....
Now, for the first time ever, with this upcoming election, it's looking likely that there will be more Scottish and non-English MPs in Westminster than there ever has been, and thus we (the Scots, Welsh and Irish) will have greater control of our destiny, and a rightful and more powerful influence over policies that directly affect OUR lives, not just what's best for those 'in the south'.
So, BRING IT ON, I say! :yesbruv:
Marco.
Oldpinkman
10-04-2015, 09:49
Marco, with regard to both of your last 2 posts -and the "well known policies" of the chinless wonders. Name 3. And what alternative policy Celt power will introduce.
72 a week...scrooge will turn over in his grave! surely the plebs can survive on half of that
Marco, with regard to both of your last 2 posts -and the "well known policies" of the chinless wonders. Name 3. And what alternative policy Celt power will introduce.
Richard, I'm not into politics (detest it), and so don't follow the minutiae of the policies introduced by various parties. I don't need to, for a number of reasons. The 'proof of the pudding', in terms of what I'm referring to, comes from watching what goes on in the world and living life, in the UK, in areas outside of those Tory governments, and others like them, pander to.
That's the REAL evidence, which one has directly experienced, especially having grown up in Glasgow during the Thatcher era (need I say more?), and if you think the sentiments she showed then towards 'those in the north' don't still prevail to some degree today at Westminster, then I'm afraid you're living in cloud-cuckoo land!!
:exactly:
*THAT* is why we want to (and will) be doing something about it.
Marco.
Oldpinkman
10-04-2015, 10:39
72 a week...scrooge will turn over in his grave! surely the plebs can survive on half of that
If implemented, as published by the Greens, that would cost £240bn a year. That's £240bn more to borrow from someone to pay for it. OK - only £240bn. But a hundred billion here, and a hundred billion there, and pretty soon your talking serious money.
£240bn more than the £91bn we had to borrow last year. In 4 years , with nothing else changed that would be another £1.3 trillion of borrowings to add to the £1.56 trillion we currently owe, taking our total national debt to £2.8 trillion. GDP is about £1.9 trillion. So debt would be 147% of GDP. Yup - that's in the Greece category. So interest costs would increase to 25% from 3%. Annual interest costs would increase from £48bn to £240bn. Guess what - another trillion on the national debt
But hold on £2 trillion extra debt at our new borrowing rate of 25% is £500bnpa interest to add. Over 4 years, another £2 trillion in debt. So now we are at £4 trillion debt.
Keep spinning the numbers - in practice, once "the market" pushes the cost of government borrowing much over 7% you either need a lovely cuddly EU commissioner to give you all the money you need, or to jump off a cliff. And lovely cuddly EU commissioners could afford €200 billion for Greece as a one off to keep their precious Euro intact. They don't have £2 trillion knocking around as petty cash in quite the same way. Nor any Euro to protect. But if they did, you would have Greek style austerity and unemployment rates as conditions of the bail out. Conditions which only really say "live within your means, and stop poncing off us"
It's funny calling slogans - but it won't be funny if anyone really tried implementing policies like that.
I think there is a danger here of a 'loser mentality' - blame the government for all our problems because we don't want to accept responsibility for our own actions.
I grew up in Liverpool in the Thatcher era and we had it a lot worse than Glasgow. At the time Liverpool was the poorest city in Western Europe.
As Richard says there are not any specific government policies that benefit the South East at the expense of the rest of the country. The South East is always going to be wealthier for historical reasons, on the flip side of the coin it is a crowded and expensive place to live.
The only policy that I can recall that you could argue targeted the Scots was the original Community Charge (poll tax) that was tested out there before being inflicted on the rest of the nation. That was 30 years ago.
Like I said, those sentiments and attitudes STILL prevail today within the current government and in English MPs at Westminster. If you don't think so, then you're either blind, or blinkered because you're benefitting from them!
The bottom line here is this: why on earth would you ever vote for a political party (and system) you believe is fundamentally corrupt, unfair, holds you (and your values) in utter contempt, and whose policies don't cater for the best interests of your family or you???
Just because whichever party it is (the Tories) are claimed as being 'super-duper accountants', because they're apparently doing a wonderful job of managing the country's finances?? Fuck that!! That is NOT enough! :nono:
When I see someone or something treating me with contempt, regardless of anything else, I'll return the favour with interest, rebel against it and them, and do what's BEST FOR ME. I've never been one, once having being subjected to gross unfairness or inequality, for just 'sitting back and taking it'. I *will* FIGHT back and seek just recompense!!
That's precisely what Scottish independence was all about: robbing the self-serving Westminster chinless pricks of their ridiculous and unjust 'perks' and instead giving the Scottish people a fair share of what they rightly deserve as a nation, especially considering how much Scotland contributes financially to the running of the UK! Hopefully, the Welsh nationalists will pick up the baton and run with it in the same way.
However, it looks like we're going to come up trumps and benefit perhaps as much as we would've done had we won the referendum, by chucking out more chinless wonders from Westminster than ever, and filling their seats with Scots and Welsh MPs instead, who care about what's best for Scotland and Wales, more than what's best for the south of England :yay:
In the end, the good guys always win....... ;)
Marco.
Richard, I'm not into politics (detest it), and so don't follow the minutiae of the policies introduced by various parties. I don't need to, for a number of reasons. The 'proof of the pudding', in terms of what I'm referring to, comes from watching what goes on in the world and living life, in the UK, in areas outside of those Tory governments, and others like them, pander to.
That's the REAL evidence, which one has directly experienced, especially having grown up in Glasgow during the Thatcher era (need I say more?), and if you think the sentiments she showed then towards 'those in the north' don't still prevail to some degree today at Westminster, then I'm afraid you're living in cloud-cuckoo land!!
:exactly:
*THAT* is why we want to (and will) be doing something about it.
Marco.
nice to see a well thought out argument with points no one can argue with.
oh hang on ...........
Marco You've been to my place and seen where I live. Does it look like I'm benefitting from anything? :)
I agree re the corruption and that is one of the reasons I have not voted since 1987. Richard's point is, I think, that although the Tories look after their own and are just as corrupt as the rest they at least don't do anything crazy with the economy (something that screws everyone equally) and they aren't interested in social engineering or preaching to folk about how they should live their lives.
The problem with these national parties (and isn't it odd how Wales and Scotland can have nationalistic parties who are given full credibility by the media wheras English nationalists are automatically nut cases?) is that if they do get power they will become just as corrupt as the rest of them.
I don't see the point in participating in a game of 'musical chairs at the trough', so to speak. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
Well, for me, it's either a case of casting a 'protest vote', by supporting Plaid Cymru, or not voting at all, because I wouldn't give the rest of the wankers the time of day!! Simples :)
As for this:
Richard's point is, I think, that although the Tories look after their own and are just as corrupt as the rest they at least don't do anything crazy with the economy (something that screws everyone equally)...
...I invoke the 'cocooned in our own little island, largely divorced from the system'/'fuck'em all' clause, I've outlined before.
We're at the stage now (after having worked extremely hard for it) where we're pretty much 'sorted' for the likely remainder of our existence on this planet, so whatever happens now, or after that, happens..... I guess that in these situations, achieving security breeds apathy ;)
Selfish? Perhaps, but no more so than the 'fat cats' and chinless wonders have always been in Westminster towards THEIR best interests. Therefore, I'm simply doing the same and protecting ours!!
Marco.
Well I'm sure you will be fine until the Government confiscates the contents of your bank account in order to pay its debts. Never happen? Already has in Cyprus.
Well, we'll probably be living in Italy by then [or perhaps Switzerland - I have a passion for Swiss cheese, lol]! :D
There's nothing really stopping us doing that now (as we already own property in Tuscany), but I have to make sure first that my dad is looked after in his old age (Italian families are very close). After the old man goes, the world's our lobster... ;)
Marco.
What I predict is that the Tories will win with a marginal number of votes, but not enough to secure them the amount of seats that they need in Westminster to form a government. Therefore it's coalition time again...
However, I can see SNP joining forces with Labour, as the SNP vote in Scotland will be the largest ever (and is growing stronger all the time), so their combined influence should ensure the existence of enough SNP/Labour seats in Westminster to put paid to any chance of the Tories being able to implement their totally unfair and unjust 'penalise the poor and reward the rich' policies, which will cause others and I to dance with joy...! :eyebrows:
Marco.
Audio Advent
11-04-2015, 20:36
Oh dear. I'm afraid that what they don't know would fill a warehouse. Country would be bankrupt in weeks.
Okay, even more bankrupt than it already is....
I hear that fairly often about any non-mainstream party. To be honest I think it's because people glean all their understanding of economics from the very same policies which have got us in this mess, that of neo-liberal economics, that which has been rammed down our throats by every government since the beginning of the 80s.
Not coincidentally did the neo-liberal, extreme free-market thinking take over the world at that same point, leading to eventual deregulation of investment banks and derivative markets by the same ideologies and then directly to the massive crash and derivative market black hole and bank insolvency which we have today (even if the banks hide that insolvency by fraudulent mark-to-market accounting on all their "assets").
The austerity part is promoted on a bunch of completely false ideas, the main one being that state finances should be thought of like household finances and that all public debt is bad. Well, we've only just paid off the debt from WW2 (or was it WW1?) and did it bother us taking 70 years to pay it off? States can make money out of thin air, exactly what households cannot do.
As long as that money is invested and has a long-term return on it or invested in shoring up the popluation so they are able to live healthily and therefore work prosperously, it will pay itself back in no time! What instead we have is public money being shoved in the pockets of banks and institutions to then go gamble on already over-valued assets or short-term market bubbles in the hope that the ball might land on their number.. It's the latter which might look good on big businesses balance sheets today but tomorrow we'll see the draining effect it has had on the working population and subsequent economic output. And austerity as outlined by the main parties still hasn't kicked in yet!
Audio Advent
11-04-2015, 21:06
If implemented, as published by the Greens, that would cost £240bn a year. That's £240bn more to borrow from someone to pay for it. OK - only £240bn.
It has been quite clear that this is a long-term aspiration of the Green party, not necessarily one which would be implemented whilst we currently have a poor economy. Where are ANY long-term aspirations of such social benefit and change from any of the main parties?
There aren't any because all they do is try to say the right things to get in power today! That's why the main parties play on people's fears too. In many ways that is a reflection on their motivation, to simply put themselves in power and help themselves.
The austerity part is promoted on a bunch of completely false ideas, the main one being that state finances should be thought of like household finances and that all public debt is bad. Well, we've only just paid off the debt from WW2 (or was it WW1?) and did it bother us taking 70 years to pay it off? States can make money out of thin air, exactly what households cannot do.
As long as that money is invested and has a long-term return on it or invested in shoring up the popluation so they are able to live healthily and therefore work prosperously, it will pay itself back in no time! What instead we have is public money being shoved in the pockets of banks and institutions to then go gamble on already over-valued assets or short-term market bubbles in the hope that the ball might land on their number.. It's the latter which might look good on big businesses balance sheets today but tomorrow we'll see the draining effect it has had on the working population and subsequent economic output. And austerity as outlined by the main parties still hasn't kicked in yet!
the more fiat currency you create the more inflation you have and pretty soon you need a wheelbarrow of money to buy a loaf of bread, The reason it took until 2004 to pay off the WW2 debt is because these debts are real and the interest on them is a lot of working output. Ask yourself why we don't just invent 70 million million pounds and make everyone in the country a millionaire.
Audio Advent
11-04-2015, 21:18
As Richard says there are not any specific government policies that benefit the South East at the expense of the rest of the country.
Not explicitly perhaps (but I wouldn't be surprised if there were explicit ones) but it's all about favouring certain sectors of the economy, like the influence the City of London has over parliament, how the banks bend economic policies to suit them at the expense of genuine profit-making industry (as opposed to phantom-profit making as the banks do). Airport expansion, infrastructure etc. Privatising Royal Mail is also one which has no effect on heavily populated areas like London and the South-East but all other, more sparsely populated areas like Scotland, Wales and parts of the North of England are disproportionately effected by ending publically subsidised services like that.
There are loads of policies over the decades which disproportionally negatively effect everywhere but the south-east but the politicians don't really pay much attention to simply because they base themselves in London and that's all they know and immediately care about.
I'm a Londoner by the way, born and raised, man and boy.
Not sure what your point is with the Royal Mail. A stamp is still the same price wherever you live and all they deliver to me is junk mail and bills. and I suspect it is the same for most people. No-one sends letters anymore.
Audio Advent
11-04-2015, 22:00
the more fiat currency you create the more inflation you have and pretty soon you need a wheelbarrow of money to buy a loaf of bread, The reason it took until 2004 to pay off the WW2 debt is because these debts are real and the interest on them is a lot of working output. Ask yourself why we don't just invent 70 million million pounds and make everyone in the country a millionaire.
They say that a little information is a dangerous thing and that post looks like a small amount of information conflated into a confused mess.
I don't know where to start.. Just get yourself on the internet to see how the world economy works, realise how much money HAS been created since dereguation of the 70s, 80s and 90s, where it has gone and how it has effected the world.
What do you mean by "these debts are real"? Do you mean then that the debts that are talked about today aren't real and so different? Well that's good news then, we don't have to bother, it was all a dream.
Yes, there's a lot of working output to pay off debts. That's why money should be invested in that very same working output such that the working output is more than the interest over time.
What we have today is debt being accrued and then that money going to massive massive black hole to try to cover the trillions and trillions and trillions of bad derivative assets (you will know all about this after completing the first task) the vastness of which has not yet been either admitted by banks (but is there to see indirectly) nor comprehended by the political class.
Aside from QE and post-crash deregulation of the markets, we also have effective 0% rates. When banks borrow on 0%, money is again created out of thin air. We may not be pushing wheelbarrows of cash to buy bread, but metaphorically people are pushing wheelbarrows of cash to invest in the inflated stockmarket, to pay inflated house prices, to buy luxury real-estate, to buy commercial real-estate, to buy art, classic cars - any high-value asset you can think of.
The lay-person isn't seeing the inflation because the 70 million million which IS being created is not going to the general population (and pushing up the price of bread), it is going to the super-rich, the financial institutions etc and pushing up the price of assets. It's selective inflation - inflation is relative and so if one section of society sees no inflation, then the inflation which IS taking place looks just like an increase in "value". (Hey! My loaf of bread is now worth £50,000! It's going on ebay...).
So where is the practical economic experience that shows £70 million million is ok to create and distribute to the financial institutions whilst at the same time slashing public spending, calling it austerity? There may be economic "theory" which says there's some kind of trickle-down effect of QE, zero interest rates and asset inflation, but that same theory also says that debt doesn't have an effect on the economy and should be completely ignored ..
Audio Advent
11-04-2015, 22:08
Not sure what your point is with the Royal Mail. A stamp is still the same price wherever you live and all they deliver to me is junk mail and bills. and I suspect it is the same for most people. No-one sends letters anymore.
A private company competing with others can't afford to deliver to the Highlands and Islands for the same price as delivering down the road from the depot whilst any competitor delivers on a sliding scale - the competitor will win the mass of the market by being cheaper. Competition like that means that hard to reach areas will end up costing more to deliver to as per any economy of scale. It might be the same price today but down the road it cannot carry on, unless a government steps in to subsidise.
They say that a little information is a dangerous thing and that post looks like a small amount of information conflated into a confused mess.
I don't know where to start.. Just get yourself on the internet to see how the world economy works, realise how much money HAS been created since dereguation of the 70s, 80s and 90s, where it has gone and how it has effected the world.
What do you mean by "these debts are real"? Do you mean then that the debts that are talked about today aren't real and so different? Well that's good news then, we don't have to bother, it was all a dream.
Yes, there's a lot of working output to pay off debts. That's why money should be invested in that very same working output such that the working output is more than the interest over time.
What we have today is debt being accrued and then that money going to massive massive black hole to try to cover the trillions and trillions and trillions of bad derivative assets (you will know all about this after completing the first task) the vastness of which has not yet been either admitted by banks (but is there to see indirectly) nor comprehended by the political class.
Aside from QE and post-crash deregulation of the markets, we also have effective 0% rates. When banks borrow on 0%, money is again created out of thin air. We may not be pushing wheelbarrows of cash to buy bread, but metaphorically people are pushing wheelbarrows of cash to invest in the inflated stockmarket, to pay inflated house prices, to buy luxury real-estate, to buy commercial real-estate, to buy art, classic cars - any high-value asset you can think of.
The lay-person isn't seeing the inflation because the 70 million million which IS being created is not going to the general population (and pushing up the price of bread), it is going to the super-rich, the financial institutions etc and pushing up the price of assets. It's selective inflation - inflation is relative and so if one section of society sees no inflation, then the inflation which IS taking place looks just like an increase in "value". (Hey! My loaf of bread is now worth £50,000! It's going on ebay...).
So where is the practical economic experience that shows £70 million million is ok to create and distribute to the financial institutions whilst at the same time slashing public spending, calling it austerity? There may be economic "theory" which says there's some kind of trickle-down effect of QE, zero interest rates and asset inflation, but that same theory also says that debt doesn't have an effect on the economy and should be completely ignored ..
Firstly you need to drop the assumption that I know nothing about economics and need to read about it on the internet. That doesn't help your argument. All debts are real, those present, those in the past. You can't solve economic problems by printing money, as you seem to think (perhaps you should read up?) If it were that easy why not do it?
I take your point about the banks. Personally I would have let them fold because that is how it is supposed to work.
The Government could have stepped in under the emergency powers act, taken over the banking sector and guaranteed all deposits. The debts that the banks could not afford - well the bank has gone bust so they default.
This would lead to a world banking collapse but if every government stepped in to guarantee deposits all that would happen is that senior staff would have lost their jobs with no recompense - because that is what h when a firm goes broke - some junior staff would be kept on to run the day to day operations - domestic banking.
The lender of last resort would become the only lender.
At some point the government could sell the now state owned banks once they were back in profit.
All those billions of debts would then have disappeared - since there was no real money to back them.
There are a number of reasons why they didn't go down that route - political expediencey is the main one, the old pals act is another.
£70 million QE is a drop in the ocean. and I agree none of it got to ordinary people. But then it wasn't intended to. If it was they would have dropped it in bundles from helicopters, as I think Bernanke suggested.
A private company competing with others can't afford to deliver to the Highlands and Islands for the same price as delivering down the road from the depot whilst any competitor delivers on a sliding scale - the competitor will win the mass of the market by being cheaper. Competition like that means that hard to reach areas will end up costing more to deliver to as per any economy of scale. It might be the same price today but down the road it cannot carry on, unless a government steps in to subsidise.
A letter costs the same wherever you are . If that ever changes then you will have a point. It is already more expensive to send or ship a parcel to the highlands and islands. That has been the case forever. If you live in a remote area you have to pay more for such things, that is common sense not some sort of unfair punishment.
Edit: the government never subsidises anything because government has no money of its own. What you are really saying is thet the taxpayer subsidises it. That's me. Do I want to subsidise someone who lives on Shetland so they can pay a fiver for delivery instead of a tenner? No. They want to live on Shetland they take the rough with the smooth same as the rest of us.
BTH K10A
12-04-2015, 18:01
A letter costs the same wherever you are .
I think that is Audio Advents point. The Royal mail has to offer a service to all parts of GB at fixed costs for types of service and therefore the pricing has to be a composite sufficient to cover all areas. The competition can offer different rates on location i.e. cheaper in the cities and more expensive in the provinces. As logistically the provinces are more diffiucult to service, these competitors concentrate on the cities where they will compete for and win business and other postal services with their more competitive pricing,thus starving the PO out of the profitable markets and into the downward spiral to debt and oblivion. With no PO the people in the provinces will have to pay premium rates.
Oldpinkman
12-04-2015, 19:31
Boy there has been too much going on here to catch up now from sunny languedoc. Sam, I agree with much you say. Certainly qe for me has only kicked the can down the road, and bailed out the corrupltly wealthy from facing the consequences of their reckless decisions. I think this borrowing surge at low rates to defeat inflation fuels asset bubbles and will end in tears, with Joe soap picking up the tab for the speculation of hugely overpaid city types. And an economy is not Mrs thatchers housekeeping. We have to borrow, as you say to promote growth, to make a bigger cake, so we can argue over what to do with the cake. I have had that discussion with macca on another thread.
However I also believe in the importance of economic cycles, particularly kondratieffs long wave, and the deflationary consequences. Deflation makes growing your way out of debt tough (impossible). And the borrowing has to avoid being excessive and pushing rates past 7%. And £240 billion of additional annual cost for the social charge would do that. If long wave cycles bite, Deflation grips - maybe even our current debt levels will drive rates past 7%.
To avoid suffering greeces fate, this country at the very least has to stabilise debt and manage a balanced budget over a parliamentary term. At this phase of the long wave cycle.
I'm stifling another big yawn.......... ;)
Marco.
I think that is Audio Advents point. The Royal mail has to offer a service to all parts of GB at fixed costs for types of service and therefore the pricing has to be a composite sufficient to cover all areas. The competition can offer different rates on location i.e. cheaper in the cities and more expensive in the provinces. As logistically the provinces are more diffiucult to service, these competitors concentrate on the cities where they will compete for and win business and other postal services with their more competitive pricing,thus starving the PO out of the profitable markets and into the downward spiral to debt and oblivion. With no PO the people in the provinces will have to pay premium rates.
Yes and I pointed out that at the moment it costs the same for everyone. If that ever changes then he will have a valid point.
I'd also like to point out that just because a service is state owned that does not necessarily mean that it is run at cost and is therefore as cheap to the end user as it possibly can be. That has rarely been the case. For example look how much cheaper telephone communication is nowadays compared to under the GPO/British Telecom monopoly.
. And an economy is not Mrs thatchers housekeeping. We have to borrow, as you say to promote growth, to make a bigger cake, so we can argue over what to do with the cake. I have had that discussion with macca on another thread.
.
I think you are confusing fractional reserve banking/fiat currency with government borrowing. Or at least it seems like you are.
The government does not need to borrow in order to promote growth. Why would it if it can balance the books? I can't ever recall an incidence where the government has said 'hey look we have a balanced budget but lets borrow say 4 billion and invest it.' Either they run a surplus, balance the books or they borrow to cover their current-account shortfall.
As a business owner if I go to a bank and borrow 10 million to build a new factory, the bank is not giving me 10 million it has sat around in deposits. It creates the money out of thin air and loans it to me. Hence the 'all money is debt' thing you see bandied around. If banks needed to cover every loan with a deposit on a pound for pound basis then they would probably not be able to lend me the 10 million so no new factory and no economic growth.
So we do need fractional reserve banking to enable growth but we do not need government borrowing to enable growth. Indeed, as I have argued previously, there are no positives to the government being in debt.
Audio Advent
13-04-2015, 15:46
I'm stifling another big yawn.......... ;)
Marco.
Haha... I sympathise but sadly find it all interesting myself.
Through that I've ended up listening to a lot from non-mainstream economists (a mainstream anything is pretty much anyone who agrees with the status-quo and so is promoted and headhunted for saying what people already believe and think, even if they are wrong! And so falsehoods become all pervasive and unquestioned) and I guess the alternative part has made a LOT more sense than your average Mainstream Economics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainstream_economics) as spouted on TV etc which is also , deliberately I think, pretty damned boring.
Keep it boring and the masses won't pay it any interest and then you can get away with what you want, they'll just say "Whatever! You do what you think's best.." and then they go ahead and stick their hand in the jar cos it's "what's best".
Audio Advent
13-04-2015, 16:25
However I also believe in the importance of economic cycles, particularly kondratieffs long wave, and the deflationary consequences. Deflation makes growing your way out of debt tough (impossible). And the borrowing has to avoid being excessive and pushing rates past 7%. And £240 billion of additional annual cost for the social charge would do that. If long wave cycles bite, Deflation grips - maybe even our current debt levels will drive rates past 7%.
To avoid suffering greeces fate, this country at the very least has to stabilise debt and manage a balanced budget over a parliamentary term. At this phase of the long wave cycle.
Belief! That's all it is!
Kondratieffs long wave for example - it's a simplification of reality because he saw a pattern in something short term and believes he can predict the future from it's extrapolation. Mainstream economics is full of those extrapolations and nice neat cycles and people religiously believing they are in control of chaos. Then in trying to exercise that control, they make more and more grand and wild gestures, adding more energy into an already chaotic and out of control system.
It's like seeing people argue over the control of a ship on a stormy sea, basing their dillusions of control on where the ship went last when they turned the wheel... only the ship's rudder broke off ages ago and the propeller fell off too. A good example of that is the blaming of the Labour government for the effects of the global financial crisis on this country - there was a god-damn massive global crisis FFS!! Doesn't matter who was at the wheel.
I borrow and share that exasperation about who's to blame for the UK's finances with Caroline Lucas who also wants to scream out when on Question Time every time it's brought up (as she stated in an interview about her recent book about the the undemocratic and old boys club workings of Westminster)
So, back to the £240billion you talk about; Given a recovered and stable global economy with the defecit tamed and the economy doing well, you'd concede then that the £240billion on a social insurance against poverty in this country would be money well spent?
Seems your problem is about implementing that now... and yet it is quite obviously clear that the Green Party has this as a long-term future aspiration, not as something to implement today or even in the next term. Either you're deliberately twisting that to make an false point or you haven't taken any time to understand Green Party policy - perhaps if you did, you'd be more enlightened!
I think the problem is that people are programmed by past politics to only think of the short term, mainly via the use of fear and negative campaigning ... and well, that leads to short term "solutions" with long-term problems. We're already suffering the long-term problems of the Thatcher era and also even of the Blair era so many people are seeking more long term, socially viable long-term thinking which we ONLY get from the smaller parties.
Audio Advent
13-04-2015, 18:13
As a business owner if I go to a bank and borrow 10 million to build a new factory, the bank is not giving me 10 million it has sat around in deposits. It creates the money out of thin air and loans it to me. Hence the 'all money is debt' thing you see bandied around. If banks needed to cover every loan with a deposit on a pound for pound basis then they would probably not be able to lend me the 10 million so no new factory and no economic growth.
So we do need fractional reserve banking to enable growth but we do not need government borrowing to enable growth. Indeed, as I have argued previously, there are no positives to the government being in debt.
I disagree.
You have £10 million created out of thin air for you, but you have to eventually pay this created money back out of your profits plus interest. If the money is created out of thin air, where does the real, existing money come from to pay it back plus interest? Where is the growth in the economy if you're in debt to the tune of about £15 million whilst only making small yearly profits? There is none in reality, the ONLY growth is the creation of money out of thin air.. Economic growth becomes an illusion, that only of asset "value" and not of real cash or overall productive, tangiable output.
On a global scale, every country wants economic growth. If your company is exporting to say Germany, in isolation it looks like the UK economy is growing due to the flow of money from Germany to the UK. But that is money OUT of Germany from it's point of view so the German economy shrinks in response...
Germany wants to grow too, so its banks make loans to businesses who then spend that "created from thin air" money on your UK goods. It does something with those goods to export and money flows into Germany and so the German economy grows. But where is THIS money coming from? Banks all around the world are creating money out of thin air for each and every economy of the world to "grow" !
So.. the banks have to essentially create new, larger loans to new companies around the world to then spend so the older companies can pay off their old loans plus interest. It essentially becomes a massive Ponzi scheme, all founded on the premise of eternal economic "growth". As time passes, you need ever increasing debt to make sure the old debt isn't defaulted on.
One way to appear to create real money is to increase industrial output, dig up more minerals, find more oil etc and sell it to create more and more products to export. So, hand in hand with spiralling private (i.e. company) debt, we get spiraling industrialisation globally, destroying the environment and causing massive long-term problems both envronmental and economic and therefore social unrest as living global living conditions deteriorate and war becomes more likely as resources are fought over to aid growth.. Not only that, it also pulls forward this industrial output from the future to today, meaning there are fewer options longer term.
Sovreign debt on the CAN be kicked down the road again and again and it's impact controlled via a myriad of tools up a country's sleeve. Meanwhile, private debt such as company borrowing cannot and is either paid back or bankrupcy ensues, everyone looses their job, the banks have a load of bad debt on their books, other investment bank's derivatives (bets) on these debts go bad, the insurance taken out multiple times on these derivatives is revealed to be worthless as there's no money to pay it and those insurance dealing institutions go down.... etc etc etc, replay the 2007/8 global crisis caused by PRIVATE debt, not sovreign debt.
In other words, private debt which the fractional reserve was conceived to facilitate at ever increasing rates is absolutely toxic whilst a country's public debt is not.
The Green Party appear to be the only party which recognises the long-term consequences of this obsession with impossible eternal economic growth and so want to move away from it as being the mainstay of economic policy. Instead they want to move towards long-term sustainabilty of the economy and the environoment from a more holistic perspective, one which also tries to ensure the population are looked after.
Oldpinkman
13-04-2015, 19:52
Belief! That's all it is!
Kondratieffs long wave for example - it's a simplification of reality because he saw a pattern in something short term and believes he can predict the future from it's extrapolation. Mainstream economics is full of those extrapolations and nice neat cycles and people religiously believing they are in control of chaos. Then in trying to exercise that control, they make more and more grand and wild gestures, adding more energy into an already chaotic and out of control system.
It's like seeing people argue over the control of a ship on a stormy sea, basing their dillusions of control on where the ship went last when they turned the wheel... only the ship's rudder broke off ages ago and the propeller fell off too. A good example of that is the blaming of the Labour government for the effects of the global financial crisis on this country - there was a god-damn massive global crisis FFS!! Doesn't matter who was at the wheel.
I borrow and share that exasperation about who's to blame for the UK's finances with Caroline Lucas who also wants to scream out when on Question Time every time it's brought up (as she stated in an interview about her recent book about the the undemocratic and old boys club workings of Westminster)
So, back to the £240billion you talk about; Given a recovered and stable global economy with the defecit tamed and the economy doing well, you'd concede then that the £240billion on a social insurance against poverty in this country would be money well spent?
Seems your problem is about implementing that now... and yet it is quite obviously clear that the Green Party has this as a long-term future aspiration, not as something to implement today or even in the next term. Either you're deliberately twisting that to make an false point or you haven't taken any time to understand Green Party policy - perhaps if you did, you'd be more enlightened!
I think the problem is that people are programmed by past politics to only think of the short term, mainly via the use of fear and negative campaigning ... and well, that leads to short term "solutions" with long-term problems. We're already suffering the long-term problems of the Thatcher era and also even of the Blair era so many people are seeking more long term, socially viable long-term thinking which we ONLY get from the smaller parties.
You know, it could have been interesting to discuss, but your support for kondratieffs exile to the salt mines for failing to give the party answer, and the fact the greens won't get 3 seats, means I've lost interest. You can follow the kondratieffs pattern back beyond the south Sea bubble, admittedly with patchier data, but nonetheless with the same 70 year cycle to the end of roman times.
I respect your sincerity, but am content that the green party are likely to have negligible influence at the election, and consequently inflict minimal damage on the nations finances.
...am content that the green party are likely to have negligible influence at the election...
Shame the same cannot be said with the SNP, when they join forces with Labour... ;)
SNP + Labour = less money-grabbing, chinless wonders in Westminster... Bring it on! :hifive: :yesbruv:
Marco.
I disagree.
You have £10 million created out of thin air for you, but you have to eventually pay this created money back out of your profits plus interest. If the money is created out of thin air, where does the real, existing money come from to pay it back plus interest? Where is the growth in the economy if you're in debt to the tune of about £15 million whilst only making small yearly profits? There is none in reality, the ONLY growth is the creation of money out of thin air.. Economic growth becomes an illusion, that only of asset "value" and not of real cash or overall productive, tangiable output.
On a global scale, every country wants economic growth. If your company is exporting to say Germany, in isolation it looks like the UK economy is growing due to the flow of money from Germany to the UK. But that is money OUT of Germany from it's point of view so the German economy shrinks in response...
Germany wants to grow too, so its banks make loans to businesses who then spend that "created from thin air" money on your UK goods. It does something with those goods to export and money flows into Germany and so the German economy grows. But where is THIS money coming from? Banks all around the world are creating money out of thin air for each and every economy of the world to "grow" !
So.. the banks have to essentially create new, larger loans to new companies around the world to then spend so the older companies can pay off their old loans plus interest. It essentially becomes a massive Ponzi scheme, all founded on the premise of eternal economic "growth". As time passes, you need ever increasing debt to make sure the old debt isn't defaulted on.
One way to appear to create real money is to increase industrial output, dig up more minerals, find more oil etc and sell it to create more and more products to export. So, hand in hand with spiralling private (i.e. company) debt, we get spiraling industrialisation globally, destroying the environment and causing massive long-term problems both envronmental and economic and therefore social unrest as living global living conditions deteriorate and war becomes more likely as resources are fought over to aid growth.. Not only that, it also pulls forward this industrial output from the future to today, meaning there are fewer options longer term.
Sovreign debt on the CAN be kicked down the road again and again and it's impact controlled via a myriad of tools up a country's sleeve. Meanwhile, private debt such as company borrowing cannot and is either paid back or bankrupcy ensues, everyone looses their job, the banks have a load of bad debt on their books, other investment bank's derivatives (bets) on these debts go bad, the insurance taken out multiple times on these derivatives is revealed to be worthless as there's no money to pay it and those insurance dealing institutions go down.... etc etc etc, replay the 2007/8 global crisis caused by PRIVATE debt, not sovreign debt.
In other words, private debt which the fractional reserve was conceived to facilitate at ever increasing rates is absolutely toxic whilst a country's public debt is not.
The Green Party appear to be the only party which recognises the long-term consequences of this obsession with impossible eternal economic growth and so want to move away from it as being the mainstay of economic policy. Instead they want to move towards long-term sustainabilty of the economy and the environoment from a more holistic perspective, one which also tries to ensure the population are looked after.
This is fantasy, particularly your last paragraph.
Firstly you are missing the point that although I am now servicing the debt to the bank I do have a brand new factory - an asset - which I have to employ people to build and to work in, employment being a welcome side effect of sucessful business. The debt will eventually be paid off, perhaps at that point I take another loan and build another factory - a virtuous cycle.
Wealth creation ultimately comes down to two things - digging stuff out of the ground or growing it, and taking that stuff and adding value - making a sheet of metal into a fork as a simple example. All other economic activity is just moving the same money around. Now you want that money to move around, you don't want it locked up, but you don't want it moving aroound too fast or you get 'bubbles' and financial crisis.
If you want the world as a whole to get wealthier you need to keep digging and growing and adding value.
Yes that does have some environmental impact. That is inevitable. We are in the place that we are and it is not possible to turn the clock back to some agrarian paradise no matter how much you would like that.
Nor can you continually pile up soverign debt as though it doesn't matter. Eventually you end up with a soverign debt crisis where no-one will lend you any more money even at high rates. Trying to plough through that by printing your own money and you have hyper-inflation, as happened in Weimar Germany and more recently in the former Southern Rhodesia. Your currenty collapses and everyone suffers. No need for economic theory here, it has been tried more than once and it results in a disaster.
Economics is not a zero-sum game as you seem to think. If you are creating genuine wealth by the methods described above then that makes everyone wealthier. This has been happening globally, in fits and starts, since the industrial revolution. Everyone, on average, is a lot wealthier than their ancestors were 100 years ago.
you are correct in that the finacial crash was not the fault of the Labour Government, although their reckless handling of the economy certainly made things more painful than they needed to be when it happened. That crash was the result of the abandonment of the stipulations for the global economy laid down at Bretton Woods after WW2. I predicted it, although I didn't think it would happen quite so quickly as it did.
What the 'Green' party are advocating is essentially a communist system. Again this is many times a road tested and failed economic system. If it was implemented globally it *might* have a chance of succeeding but it would mean a wholesale reduction in living standards and personal liberties for everyone (except the ruling elite of course, since in any system there is always one of those). There could be no private ownership of houses or vehicles and certainly we could not be devoting resources to making frivoulous products like hi-fi equipment. The idea that we can build thousands of windmills and carry on pretty much as we were but with zero environmental impact is a complete fantasy and I struggle to comprehend how anyone with even a basic education can imagine that it is possible.
Oldpinkman
14-04-2015, 17:57
Shame the same cannot be said with the SNP, when they join forces with Labour... ;)
SNP + Labour = less money-grabbing, chinless wonders in Westminster... Bring it on! :hifive: :yesbruv:
Marco.
Absolutely. And I have every confidence an enquiry into the Scottish independence vote rigging will be launched as a result of your petition, and a new vote held any day.
And I have ordered wing of pork for dinner ;)
Audio Advent
14-04-2015, 18:23
What the 'Green' party are advocating is essentially a communist system. Again this is many times a road tested and failed economic system. If it was implemented globally it *might* have a chance of succeeding but it would mean a wholesale reduction in living standards and personal liberties for everyone (except the ruling elite of course, since in any system there is always one of those). There could be no private ownership of houses or vehicles and certainly we could not be devoting resources to making frivoulous products like hi-fi equipment. The idea that we can build thousands of windmills and carry on pretty much as we were but with zero environmental impact is a complete fantasy and I struggle to comprehend how anyone with even a basic education can imagine that it is possible.
Where do you get all that rubbish from?? THAT is fantasy land, albeit a negative fantasy..
You don't seem to understand that evironmental effects of the industrial status quo is resulting in a wholesale reduction in global living standards TODAY! NOW! I guess you're ok Jack so it is of no concern to you. And how the hell do you work out that there could be no private ownership of anything nor manufacture of any products?? You're just being deliberately rediculous surely?
Audio Advent
14-04-2015, 22:02
This is fantasy, particularly your last paragraph.
Firstly you are missing the point that although I am now servicing the debt to the bank I do have a brand new factory - an asset - which I have to employ people to build and to work in, employment being a welcome side effect of sucessful business. The debt will eventually be paid off, perhaps at that point I take another loan and build another factory - a virtuous cycle.
You have a brand new factory which effectively belongs to the bank unless you can pay back the loan plus compound interest! What you are doing is bringing forward your future profits by promising to give them away in advance. Those new employees are only there for as long as that you can do that. If you have increased your output, where is the money coming from to buy that increased output? Perhaps it's from destroying competition (so people somewhere else are loosing their jobs) or perhaps it's to a growing new market. How did that new market get the money? From new loans, new money creation - even if those loans were to prospect for stuff in the ground which were sold on for profit, that growth is based on an increase in debt. So you have a loan paying off your loan.. but on both loans there is interest to pay. If the new market goes tits-up, so does your loan repayment and all the new jobs you created.
Let's not forget also that QE and zero interest rates have caused all sorts of asset prices to become over-valued and so the loan quite likely will be underwater should interest rates
In isolation that is all fine, don't get me wrong - it has been a tried and tested way to grow... in the past! But what we have today - and is startlingly apparent when you say "a virtuous cycle" as if you think you've discovered a perpetual motion machine - is TOO MUCH debt because the amount of debt created has accellerated beyond control and beyond all means for the debt to be paid back given the finite energy resources of the planet (and that is all the debt held TODAY, let alone future debt expansion). We have people looking for an easy way to grow in the short term by taking on massive loans instead of the older route of slow growth and expanding on saved profits.
Sadly it's been going on too long, has accellerated since the 90s and the 2007/8 crisis was, if you like, a shift in foundations of the global debt system straining under it's weight - it has been temporarily sured up by transfering private debt to public debt and that is why the UK's public debt is so high. Ideology that the markets are more important than the long-term prospects of the population of a country have sadled many countries with high public debt so that then austerity is put in place, again via ideology which reduces living standards especially of the poor!
Wealth creation ultimately comes down to two things - digging stuff out of the ground or growing it, and taking that stuff and adding value - making a sheet of metal into a fork as a simple example. All other economic activity is just moving the same money around. Now you want that money to move around, you don't want it locked up, but you don't want it moving aroound too fast or you get 'bubbles' and financial crisis.
That's true if you're only looking at the immediate surroundings. Look globally and long-term ALL economic activity is about moving money around! Money is created out of thin air in one place to pay people to dig stuff out of the ground. Money is created in another part of the world to expand a business via debt and that money flows to buy the stuff dug out of the which they import, turn into something else and sell on, purchased by a company expanding by taking out a loan, money again which has been created out of thin air.. All the money created out of thin air pays for everything and there is an equal and opposite amount of debt on the books - it is totally a zero-sum game! However, what is NOT zero-sum (it is negative sum) is the payment of interest on top and hence there is a limit to it's success.
If the money used to buy the stuff dug out of the ground is not simply debt based, then it must come from the finite cash reserves already in the world - it is money flowing around, perhaps money away from one business and towards another. Again zero-sum but at least is not negative sum as the debt-based method is.
If you want the world as a whole to get wealthier you need to keep digging and growing and adding value. Yes that does have some environmental impact. That is inevitable. We are in the place that we are and it is not possible to turn the clock back to some agrarian paradise no matter how much you would like that.
As I say, it is a negative-sum game because the new "wealth" is created via debt on which must be paid interest. So, to keep up, you have to increase output year on year and increase debt year on year in order to increase that output. You're bringing forward tomorrow's digging and growing at a faster and faster rate just to keep your head above water.
The environmental impact of that in turn increases costs to country's economies but pushed into the future - look at the clean-up costs of abandoned fracking sites in Pennsilvania for example. The drilling companies have simply walked away from many sites and have no intention of paying the cleaning up costs, cleaning up toxic waste - it wasn't in their overall costings because they knew it would effectively make fracking unprofitable! Yet the country as a whole has to clean up and the public takes on the cost. Again that means the economy will be hit by these costs in the future whilst the fracking companies walk away claiming they've created wealth.
These immediate environmental costs pop up everywhere be it in China and the vast pollution clean-up problems they hide there, or via negative effects on health (costs bourne by public finances) or loss of land which can't be used for any economic activity etc etc.
That also ignores the costs of long-term global warming. Perhaps you don't believe industry has caused it? I think the evidence is overwhelming personally. We are already seeing countries suffering from the effects of global warming which is having massive impact on global economies in certain industries like agriculture. Take the Russian drought in 2010 destroying wheat crops and California's current drought problem and it's water restictions (whilst fracking sites are exempt from these restrictions - using millions of gallons of water each).
For all the short term financial gains, there are much larger future losses
Nor can you continually pile up soverign debt as though it doesn't matter. Eventually you end up with a soverign debt crisis where no-one will lend you any more money even at high rates. Trying to plough through that by printing your own money and you have hyper-inflation, as happened in Weimar Germany and more recently in the former Southern Rhodesia. Your currenty collapses and everyone suffers. No need for economic theory here, it has been tried more than once and it results in a disaster.
No-one is saying we should pile up sovreign debt as though it doesn't matter - not even the Green Party! Again, that's a rediculous and unfounded position to take.
The policy of the neo-liberal parties (Labour, Tory, many parties in the EU) is to do EXACTLY that. Print print print! Look at the ECB announcing the printing of €1.14 trillion .
The Green Party's general take is to stop this futile, arbitrary desire for eternal economic growth which necesarily NEEDS the printing and printing and printing of money to achieve - it's not sustainable, it's not even possible and the negative effects of trying to achieve it are dire.
Read this and weep from 2011: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/davos/8267768/World-needs-100-trillion-more-credit-says-World-Economic-Forum.html
The world's expected economic growth will have to be supported by an extra $100 trillion (£63 trillion) in credit over the next decade, according to the World Economic Forum.
Economics is not a zero-sum game as you seem to think. If you are creating genuine wealth by the methods described above then that makes everyone wealthier. This has been happening globally, in fits and starts, since the industrial revolution. Everyone, on average, is a lot wealthier than their ancestors were 100 years ago.
See above. What you see as "wealth" is nothing more than technological advancement increasing general living standards via efficiency, mechanisation, healthcare etc etc.
The Green Party position is that we raise living standards (i.e. "wealth") DIRECTLY by encouraging technological advancement, efficiency, healthcare, reducing poverty and inequality and reducing the negative effects on living standards caused by environmental destruction among other things.
This in stark contrast to the theory of trickle-down, debt-based economics whereby such a tiny fraction of the money sloshing around serves to increase living standards short-term whilst is a long-term complete, toxic, nightmare.
Audio Advent
14-04-2015, 22:04
If anybody reads that, then I congratulate you! :lol:
Think I'll have to give this thread a rest as it's taking longer and longer posts to express myself.
Sorry Sam, I did read your entire post but I can't take seriously the views of anyone who thinks man-made global warming is real. If you want to take squandered resources as a subject that is the number one culprit of the past twenty years. 'There has been a drought in Russia' - yes, and there has never, ever been a drought in Russia before in the whole previous existence of the planet...
Remember the drought in Australia? that was supposed to be man made climate change as well so they stopped spending on flood mangement and built de-salination plants instead. Then of course weather patterns changed, the drought stopped and they had catastrophic flooding. But I suppose that is all 'global warming' again despite the incontrovertibale fact that the global temperature has not risen at all for almost twenty years.
I'd also like to see some real evidence for your claims that fracking is runing the environment and that the public sector is picking up the bill for the clean up. You do realise that film 'Gasland' was a complete fabrication and has been totally discredited don't you?
Your economic analysis is fundementally flawed because you seem to be basing it on the old mantra of 'the gap betwen rich and poor is growing'. Facts do not bear that out, the majority of the world population are wealthier now than they have been on the past, China being an excellent example.
Let me ask you one question pertinent to the O/P - do you really believe that you can supply the electricty needs of a country of 65 milion people using windmills? Because that is what the Green Party believe and, frankly, if that is what someone believes then they are either very badly informed or crazy. Either way I wouldn't be voting for them unless you put a gun to my head..
Audio Advent
15-04-2015, 13:28
Sorry Sam, I did read your entire post but I can't take seriously the views of anyone who thinks man-made global warming is real. If you want to take squandered resources as a subject that is the number one culprit of the past twenty years. 'There has been a drought in Russia' - yes, and there has never, ever been a drought in Russia before in the whole previous existence of the planet...
Remember the drought in Australia? that was supposed to be man made climate change as well so they stopped spending on flood mangement and built de-salination plants instead. Then of course weather patterns changed, the drought stopped and they had catastrophic flooding. But I suppose that is all 'global warming' again despite the incontrovertibale fact that the global temperature has not risen at all for almost twenty years.
I'd also like to see some real evidence for your claims that fracking is runing the environment and that the public sector is picking up the bill for the clean up. You do realise that film 'Gasland' was a complete fabrication and has been totally discredited don't you?
Your economic analysis is fundementally flawed because you seem to be basing it on the old mantra of 'the gap betwen rich and poor is growing'. Facts do not bear that out, the majority of the world population are wealthier now than they have been on the past, China being an excellent example.
Let me ask you one question pertinent to the O/P - do you really believe that you can supply the electricty needs of a country of 65 milion people using windmills? Because that is what the Green Party believe and, frankly, if that is what someone believes then they are either very badly informed or crazy. Either way I wouldn't be voting for them unless you put a gun to my head..
Seriously Macca, everything you say there is pretty much imaginary! You see things which are not there and then make some grand action or statement on that imaginary thing..
- Your question isn't pertinent to the O/P, that's an imaginary O/P you have there. It simply posted up a funny video involving the Green Party.
- The Green Party says nothing about believing that the country can have all of its electricity needs met using windmills - you've made that up, imagined it. Show me where you've seen that ( some UKIP propaganda?).
- I haven't based anything on the "old mantra of 'the gap betwen rich and poor is growing' " - you've imagined that, brought it in from somewhere else.
My assessment of the neo-liberal ideology of how to run the global economy, including sadling countries with high public debt to "free up markets" and reducing economic output via austerity measures and the need to sadle the EU alone with €100 trillion more debt just to keep up fake economic growth.. is based on years of reading articles by economic academics and experts, many of whom predicted the 2007/8 crash. I've read articles which balance out from the other perspective and the former are far more logical and make more sense. The latter read like religious texts.
As an aside, it is a fact that over the last 25 plus years, inflation adjusted wage growth has been virtually zero! That is unprecidented for so much economic growth, that wages have remained stagnant. It is further proof that, since the financial deregulation that has allowed the exponential growth in private debt, the economic growth has entirely been driven BY this debt and not through solid increase in economic productivity. That debt has to be paid back rather than continually rolled forward and when that time comes (2008 saw a just a small fraction paid back at once and see what that paying down of debt did to the global economy.. ) so that associated growth will have to be wound back too. Of course, states and powerful private institutions like the IMF won't let that happen and so why we're moving into negative interest rate territory now - never ever been done before, so all economic cycles go out the window - we are at the limits of the economic control mechanisms and yet still more needs to be done!
- Man-made global warming is a myth: well, you're rejecting most of the scientific community who see its real effects in all sorts of fields but I guess if you're imagination is strong enough, you will be confident in knowing better than them?
Global warming debate is for another thread other than to say that yes, droughts happened before but global warming increases frequency of these events so their economic impact becomes worse and worse. And that happens whether it is man-made or not! Makes no difference, but blows a hole in the plan of continued, eternal economic compound growth.
My point of mentioning droughts is not even necessarily involving global warming! I'm saying environmental impact of keeping "digging and growing", even on just a local pollution level, dustbowl effect of diverting so much water in already arrid lands like California to industrial "digging" processes like fracking causes real harm to the economy on a scale which wipes out any gains made by the digging stuff out of the ground! The total economic effect of continued exploration for hard and harder to find resources is negative over time! Of course it looks positive because those industries are sloshing around with debt money for a long time, long before a single profit is on the books.
I've not seen Gaslands and had to think to remember where I'd heard of it before. But here are some articles about abandoned fracking wells in the US (and their economic unviability)... But why do I mention fracking at all? Because it is touted (mainly by the Tory party) as an answer to providing economic growth by digging stuff out of the ground whilst much independent analysis of the industry say's that's bollox and will have a negative effect on the economy (other than another increase in debt for the financial industry to profit off).
Firstly, an overview of what I've been saying regarding asset pumping by zero-interest rate investment and how this gives a false sense of economic growth from digging stuff out of the ground (but really has a real risk of financial losses):
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/investing/11006723/fracking-for-Shale-gas-the-dotcom-bubble-of-our-times.html
Shale gas: 'The dotcom bubble of our times'
Comment: output from shale wells declines so quickly that they will never be profitable – when investors realise this, the industry will collapse, writes Tim Morgan
The abandonement of wells and how local authorities are picking up the clean-up tab as the drilling companies go bankrupt:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/25/us/state-may-act-to-plug-abandoned-wyoming-wells-as-natural-gas-boom-ends.html?_r=0
The companies that once operated the wells have all but vanished into the prairie, many seeking bankruptcy protection and unable to pay the cost of reclaiming the land they leased....
...Wyoming officials are now trying to address the problem amid concerns from landowners that the wells could contaminate groundwater
How abandoned wells are releasing serious greenhouse gasses long after being abandonded - i.e. this long-term effect on the economy, including plugging old wells better hasn't been factored into the profit/loss of this particular "digging stuff out of the ground" industry:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/abandoned-wells-leak-powerful-greenhouse-gas/
http://rt.com/usa/167388-pennsylvania-fracking-wells-leaking-methane/
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/sep/18/pennsylvania-abandoned-fracking-wells-methane-leaks-hidden
And finally just a pretty picture of abandoned wells:
https://independentaustralia.net/sc/default/abandoned%20fracking%20wells%20U.S.%20.jpg
https://independentaustralia.net/environment/environment-display/scientists-refute-lower-emissions-claim-for-fracking,7009
Audio Advent
15-04-2015, 13:59
Just for Macca, here's a brief excerpt from the Green Party manifesto released yesterday. It debunks this crazy statement you made about there being no private property under a Green government (sounds more like a statement from the Mccarthy era US to be honest...):
... With all that, you’re getting by pretty comfortably, and managing to save up a bit to buy a house.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/generalelection/general-election-2015-the-passage-in-the-green-partys-manifesto-that-sounds-like-something-from-a-fairy-tale-10176533.html
Comes from a section giving an idea of what you'd experience in an imaginary world of Green government, obviously that does stretch the imagination but you have to get your points across somehow and this is a creative one you don't normally get in a manifesto.
Sam
A comprehensive response and I havm;t got time to give it a deserved response right now (but i will)
re the powering the 'country with windmills' issue - I did post earlier in the thread a link to the Green Party website that does clearly state that they intend to power the entire country from renewable energy. No target date is mentioned but I was told by a parrty member that it is 2025.
If the renewables in question are not windmills then what are they?
No worries, but I certainly didn't intend the term to be in any way racist. The Celt thing is something you wouldn't really appreciate if you're English.
In the UK (wherever I've been in Scotland or Wales - unfortunately I haven't visited Ireland), there's a real sense of 'all Celts together', fighting against English oppression/dominance ('get it right up them', as it were), which dismiss/belittle it or not, is genuinely how many Scots, Welsh and Irish people, living in the UK, feel.
Therefore, the Celt thing creates a sense of camaraderie and togetherness that you simply can't appreciate unless you are part of that group, and have suffered at the hands of those who've sought to control you. It's no wonder then, if you've suffered for years from that type of repression, that you'll do anything you can to fight against it or break free from it, and display a passionate desire to be more in control of your own destiny.
The English have to acknowledge and accept the fact that the vast majority of Scots, Welsh and Irish people, living in the UK, feel Scots, Welsh and Irish FIRST, and British second. In fact, many of them don't feel British at all, and as such have no affinity whatsoever with England or English ways, and how the powers that be there seek to impose their authority over them.
That has caused very deep-rooted resentment over the years, amongst the Scots, Welsh and Irish, and the feeling will never go away until those people consider that greater equality and division of wealth exists in the UK, and they have a more influential say in what's best for THEM, instead of so much money being wasted on, and privileges being given to, fat cats and chinless wonders in London and the 'home counties', who simply don't need it.
The whole bloody nation needs a right good shake up, from top to bottom, and a FAIRER and MORE EQUAL system introduced. I'd love to see that happen, as it's LONG overdue! If not, bring on the revolt.... :exactly:
Marco.
Reall Marco?
I was brought up during the troubles in N Ireland and am half Irish.
I spent a good deal of my youth in Ireland and also lived in Scotland for two years.
I can tell you without equivocation that the most racist and vile treatment that I have ever suffered was at "the hands of my own" in N Ireland as a young child, and laterly as an adult in Scotland where I was hospitalised for no better reason than being heard to speak with an English accent by a group of nationalist thugs in Aberdeen. I have also witnessed first hand the atrocities committed in the name of Nationalism by those who keep looking back and not forwards for the sake of future generations. I have never suffered anything like that in all my time in England, so I do take issue (in a non personal way) with your unique view of the world and with others that consider that the be all and end all is simply down to division of wealth and money. FYI, per capita subsidies have been far greater for those living in Wales and Scotland than for us here living in England. Whilst there are some serious issues with NHS funding in Wales which demands a skewed subsidy investment into that pot, things are equally difficult for many of us this side of the border, both financially and for NHS treatment. It's a lottery.
Nationalist politics is as much of a dinosaur outlook as mainstream politics, and the Union will be far weaker apart than together, speaking with one voice. You're quite right in that it's time for a change, but that change needs to be away from the rhetoric and corruption and lies of party politics and towards something more unified for the nation (and by "nation" I mean Great Britain). Nationalistic politics seems every bit as divisive as mainstream party politics. It's all about control and having a one group we care little for in westminster replaced by another isn't the answer to anything. Politics itself has to change.
Back on track to the OP and the Green Party. Woe betide they ever get into power. We'll be left bankrupt and defenseless. For those who may think that the Greens are all about bunnies and fair treatment for all, perhaps this give an insight into what their deputy leader thinks:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=4EYX8WxpmJw (https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=4EYX8WxpmJw)
ive said it before and i'll say it again.the greens have destroyed brighton with their stupid bus and cycle lanes.
Audio Advent
15-04-2015, 16:55
ive said it before and i'll say it again.the greens have destroyed brighton with their stupid bus and cycle lanes.
Hmm... Can't have been much going for Brighton if it can be "destroyed" by re-appropriation of carriageways! It is loved by many people too.
You should come to London and see all the bus and cycle superhighways here - and we don't have a single Green party member controlling anything. If Tory mayorship, Tory councils, Labour councils and Lib Dem councils ALL promote the expansion of bus and cycle lanes then you'd better get used to the new way of things. Nothing to do with the Green Party necessarily.
all the changes to the main roads in and out of brighton were done by the green party,the lay-outs are stupid,they have also gone as far as putting latge planters in the road. you try coming here in summer and you'll see how bad it is. parking charges are very high too. i guess the clues in the council leaders name, jason kit cat, total prat imo.
Audio Advent
15-04-2015, 17:15
re the powering the 'country with windmills' issue - I did post earlier in the thread a link to the Green Party website that does clearly state that they intend to power the entire country from renewable energy. No target date is mentioned but I was told by a parrty member that it is 2025.
If the renewables in question are not windmills then what are they?
:doh: :doh: :doh:
If you're serious that the only renewable energy source is the windmill, then there's not much point responding to the rest of the post.
Again, 100% renewables is an aspiration and includes moving British industry and homes to much higher efficiency. Look at the gains in audio via class-D; 20% efficiency if that from class-A, 94% from class-D... in non-subjective applications, shouldn't audio industries move to a 94% efficient technology where it can? So much tech out there which could be used to massively increase energy efficiency but it needs investment and incentives to move to it. It's not on the agenda for other parties.
For this term's Manifesto it is only about increasing investment in renewables - I guess your take is that you don't want ANY investment in renewables? You want full investment in coal, gas and nuclear?
Audio Advent
15-04-2015, 17:29
all the changes to the main roads in and out of brighton were done by the green party,the lay-outs are stupid,they have also gone as far as putting latge planters in the road. you try coming here in summer and you'll see how bad it is. parking charges are very high too. i guess the clues in the council leaders name, jason kit cat, total prat imo.
I sypathise about the name! Doesn't inspire confidence.. :lol:
There are hundreds of road narrowing traffic calming measures of the very same type here in London, except marked out with curbing and ugly bollards - I'd rather have a nice planter than the ugly bollards! And that's hundreds of them around London, not just 4 FFS... Brighton has been "destroyed" by four plant tubs! Again, that's nothing to do with Green Party - it's a common calming measure used by ALL councils around the country.
Parking charges are EXTREMELY high in London all over the place. Much higher than Brighton from memory of last time I was there 8 months or so ago. In Brighton, most roads are so narrow, it makes sense not to take your car in if can be helped - towns with narrow roads need different sollutions, the car is not it.
You can take a look at all the padestrianisation and bus and cycle priority lane schemes all around the country - and there are a lot of them - and see it is a general trend and nothing to do with the Green Party, although sure it would be more likely with a Green Party council.
I'd guess you are seeing something unusual (the Green Party in control at Brighton) and then equating some very common council grevences as being caused by this unusual thing. It's human nature to do so but I bet there is no REAL correllation and that public satisfaction with such schemes is no different to any other place.
Also, the idea that ANY council uses it's own elected members to plan the details of a new road layout is absurd - they'll use a team of civil engineers, likely the very same civil engineering team as every other previous council. All that changes is the general goal of the new layout.
when i say destroy i obviously dont mean it literally seeing as you keep quoting it. you can write whatever you like mate,its your opinion just as this is mine,you wont change it.
end off.
Used to go holidays to Brighton. Always liked the place. Long time ago though and I guess its changed completely today sadly.
it has grant,it seems to be all coffee bars these days, i personally don't go into town a lot. i got the cartridges today mate.
it has grant,it seems to be all coffee bars these days, i personally don't go into town a lot. i got the cartridges today mate.
Good stuff Jamie, thought it might be tomorrow.
Everywhere's changed tbh, and all the places I go to now look the worse for it...a sign of the times I guess
:doh: :doh: :doh:
If you're serious that the only renewable energy source is the windmill, then there's not much point responding to the rest of the post.
For this term's Manifesto it is only about increasing investment in renewables - I guess your take is that you don't want ANY investment in renewables? You want full investment in coal, gas and nuclear?
Geothermal and hydroelectric are the only renewables that actually work. And in the UK we do not have the required geography for those. So it's windmills or nothing which is why they are building so many of them. And it is not a case of investment it is subsidy because without subsidy no-one would build them since they don't work!
Even the Romans knew that 2000 years ago and always used hydro where they could.
Yes we need to build coal, oil and gas power stations - we need to anyway because you have to have them running 24/7 in any case no matter how many windmills you have because wind is not a constant source of energy and you can't just stop and start a conventional power station as and when you need it.
You seem to be typical of the other Green party supporters I have met in that you think we can have our cake and eat it when it comes to energy, that we can carry on exactly as we are with no loss of living standard (indeed according to the ridiculous little story in the manifesto living standards will actually increase!) and at the same time preserve the environment when in fact it is all ivory tower, wishful thinking of the highest order.
How can everyone have an electric vehicle? How can windmills power all those millions of electric vehicles on charge? What happens in the depth of winter, high pressure for days, no wind, so no power, no-one can go to work because their cars won't charge up? Even if there was wind how many windmills would be required to charge all those vehicles? As well as power everything else. You would need literally millions of them to even make a start. Absolutely raving mad and I can promise you that future generations will look at the remains of those turbines rusting away on the hilsides (which is what will happen when the subsidy stops, as it did in California) and curse the idiots who built them.
Incidentally, UKIP policy is to have them all dismantled at the owner's expense. That alone would get them my vote.
Peppering the UK's countryside (what's left of it) with unsightly wind turbines to supply 65 milion people and 15 million vehicles? :scratch::mental:
The main issue is to reduce our dependance on fossil fuels, firstly and most importantly by efficiency savings. Not using cars to pop to the local shops, not leaving electrical goods on standby, better home insulation etc etc. If every household practiced even a little of that consistently, the Uk's energy needs would probably plummet significantly.
The next common sense thing to do is to make good use of renewables where appropriate and efficient in terms of whole project life. Hydro in the highlands, photoelectric farms in selected parts of the lowlands, atop every high rise building where they can't by and large be seen, in the odd field (we have a local 20 acre field turned over to photo electric generation), and the odd wind powered generator only where appropriate and where it stacks up without requiring subsidies which might otherwise be invested back into our weakening supply infrastructure. We have nuclear and the means to make modern more efficient nuclear generation, so why not? It is the only long term solution that will work without (ironically) destroying the environment we live in. We are also an island surrounded by tidal waters and not just any old tides, but some of the largest in Europe, so more could and should be made of wave power generation except that the UK Govt refused to fund ongoing research and most of the UK tech learned over the years is going abroad. Belfast Uni amongst others were forerunners in some innovative wave power generation studies but it needs the power companies themselves to fund and back the research otherwise it wont happen. I guess it has been looked at (why would it not have been?) and cost benefit just isn't there for the amount we require, but not to say that inverted turbine platforms (like the one in the Bristol Channel) cannot be made to work to contribute effectively and there's no danger of tides stopping to be tidal any time soon. Point is though it's a drop in the ocean (pardon the pun) for what we really need.
I read somewhere that the UK has only used about 2% of all current known coal reserves, so we are resource rich. Coal mining stopped when it was no longer efficient, but times have moved on and recent studies suggest that modern, safer and more efficient mining methods can actually exploit the significant resources we have. if it were possible to come up with emission scrubbing devices that recirculated burnt gases and strip out the harmful bits, then that could be re-evaluated. There's no shortage of tech or ideas. Successive governments however have failed to act on any meaningful energy security strategy, so we are where we are. But come on Greens...pepper every square inch of land we have left in turbine generators? Get real.
Britain in general dont back innovative ideas and have a history of it in the 20th century. seriously foolish but there you are.
As said earlier we need to have a good mix of differing systems or we will just be at the beck and call of other countries whims.
improved insulation and more solar on homes roofs would be a start. every little makes a whole but to right off nuclear is foolish bordering on the criminal..
Trouble is nuclear is nuclear and you only have to say that word and anyone with any green sympathy runs a mile because their whole ethos is built on thinking with the heart and not the head.
Solar, like wind, only exists because of the subsidy. Take that away and once you factor in the cost of the panels and the cost of maintaince and replacement (since like the windmills they don't last very long) it is useless as a power generator. Their only practical use in the UK climate is to heat a bit of water in an individual's home but that is not the same as using them to make electricity.
Coal can be reasonably clean but UK coal is expensive to dig up unless it is opencast, it would still be cheaper - at the moment, anyway - to buy it overseas and ship it in than to re-open deep mines.
Even if everyone cut their power useage and insulated to the max it would only drop overall useage by a few percent. There is no magic bullet there.
Tidal is very expensive to implement, very expensive to maintain and generates tiny amounts of power. You would need to barrage almost the whole coastline to make asignificant contribution to the UK energy needs. And that is before you consider the impact it has on the marine environment.
The irritating thing for me about parties like the Greens is that they think they have found easy answers that have eluded everyone else for decades. Do they really think no-one has ever considered these things before?
There is no such thing as a free lunch!
Audio Advent
17-04-2015, 00:56
Trouble is nuclear is nuclear and you only have to say that word and anyone with any green sympathy runs a mile because their whole ethos is built on thinking with the heart and not the head.
Where do you get that from? I have a lot of Green Party sympathy and will be voting Green this election. I think nuclear has a lot of potential for low-carbon energy generation from Generation IV reactors onwards. It's the current load of reactors which are the danger. You will find a LOT of green symphathising people of all sorts who see nothing wrong with nuclear when done right.
You do seem to have a fixed view on what it means to be a supporter of green policies and issues and it's out of whack with reality - a bit too Jeremy Clarkson!
A big problem with nuclear is the cost and time it takes to build new, safer reactors - renewables can pop up and pop down and be upgraded on a relative whim. Renewable energy generation already globally outstrips that supplied by nuclear so may as well continue with that as it's so much easier to implement. All about the practicalities..
The rejection of nuclear and a move towards renewables is the majority view! It is NOT a Green issue! However, there is a large disparity between what the population thinks and what the political parties say and do. Read this :
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15864806
Solar, like wind, only exists because of the subsidy. Take that away and once you factor in the cost of the panels and the cost of maintaince and replacement (since like the windmills they don't last very long) it is useless as a power generator. Their only practical use in the UK climate is to heat a bit of water in an individual's home but that is not the same as using them to make electricity.
Coal can be reasonably clean but UK coal is expensive to dig up unless it is opencast, it would still be cheaper - at the moment, anyway - to buy it overseas and ship it in than to re-open deep mines.
Even if everyone cut their power useage and insulated to the max it would only drop overall useage by a few percent. There is no magic bullet there.
Tidal is very expensive to implement, very expensive to maintain and generates tiny amounts of power. You would need to barrage almost the whole coastline to make asignificant contribution to the UK energy needs. And that is before you consider the impact it has on the marine environment.
The irritating thing for me about parties like the Greens is that they think they have found easy answers that have eluded everyone else for decades. Do they really think no-one has ever considered these things before?
There is no such thing as a free lunch!
If everyone, including industry, cut their power usuage by 25% percent, then overall use would drop by.... 25%! How would it only be a a few percent if everybody did it? Overall = everybody. Perhaps you're using a different definition of "everybody" meaning only a few people.
Solar and any small industry currently require subsidies simply because we live in a world based on cost and profits.
The scale of economy, globally, means fosil fuels are cheapest. Irresponsible and wasteful industries are always cheaper too because less money is spent on guarding against evironmental damage and costs bourne by other people. New technology is much more costly to implement than technology that has been in widescale use for decades.
So how does one make a deliberate effort to push industry in a particular direction because the long-term benefits society more than the short term status-quo? One way is to provide incentives for greater uptake. If you're against subsidies for renewables which makes the country more self-sufficient, then you surely must be against farming subsidies which encourage the food supply to be self-sufficient?
That's where reliance on global markets to dictate everything falls down, suddenly it's cheaper to import all your food and your nation can be brought to it's knees by outside influences. Practically all our non-renewable energy sources rely on imports and who knows what global events will do to the supply or price in the future?
Then we have the companies who profit from fossil fuels and don't want to lose income from those resources they've already spent so much money building reserves of and invested in new discoveries. So what do they do, they suppress their very own research into renewables and efficiency! Presumably to pull it out when it suits them, when they've exploited the fosil fuels to maximum profitability? Solar could well be far far advanced and cheaper and viable for mass adoption without subsidies had research been state-funded and not under lock and key as a future profit-making asset.
See this recent story: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/apr/16/bp-dropped-green-energy-projects-worth-billions-to-focus-on-fossil-fuels
Audio Advent
17-04-2015, 01:03
See also this: http://blog.rmi.org/blog_2014_11_06_small_german_town_becomes_testing_ ground_for_smart_grid
A small German town in southern Bavaria is participating in an interesting experiment proving that a high-renewables future is viable. Wildpoldsried (pop. 2,600) currently produces 500 percent more energy than it needs through renewable energy systems, and sells the surplus power back to the grid. Though this is celebrated as a huge success in many circles, it’s not without its challenges, including how to integrate such a large local surplus of renewable energy into the greater grid while maintaining network stability. Which is why regional utility AÜW and Siemens chose Wildpoldsried to test out a smart grid that automatically stabilizes the power network.
So this one town produces 500 times it's own needs via it's renewables - far from the tiny percentage in savings you speak of. In other words, this town only needs to implement 0.2% of it's current scheme to be self-sufficient.
Interesting thing, is that these renewables in a small farming town, provide 80% of the farm's earnings!
Things happened much faster than planned—17 years later, the town now has five biogas plants, almost 5 MW of solar PV, 11 wind turbines with a total capacity of more than 12 MW, a biomass district heating network, three small hydro power plants, and 2,100 square meters of solar thermal systems. While the first two wind turbines were partly financed by a small grant from the state of Bavaria, local residents—many of them dairy farmers—have financed all following turbines. Those turbines, which generated over 17,000 MWh of electricity in 2013, have a payback of 10 years, and then generate 80 percent of the earnings of the dairy farms.
Far more than just windmills..... But hey, who wants to wait 10 whole years to start earning that money? Could just consume consume, buy a house and get free money from it's guaranteed increase in price! That's the UK way of thinking.
Where do you get that from? I have a lot of Green Party sympathy and will be voting Green this election. I think nuclear has a lot of potential for low-carbon energy generation from Generation IV reactors onwards. It's the current load of reactors which are the danger. You will find a LOT of green symphathising people of all sorts who see nothing wrong with nuclear when done right.
You do seem to have a fixed view on what it means to be a supporter of green policies and issues and it's out of whack with reality - a bit too Jeremy Clarkson!
My views are based on reading their literature and talking with Green Party members. i can assure you that they are dead against nuclear.
If everyone, including industry, cut their power usuage by 25% percent, then overall use would drop by.... 25%! How would it only be a a few percent if everybody did it? Overall = everybody. Perhaps you're using a different definition of "everybody" meaning only a few people.
Why don't we just cut our usage by 100% then and achieve perfection? People and industry use the power that they need to. I am sure almost every business and household would like to cut their power use by 25%, everyone wants to save money. Ask any businessman or housholder if they would like to cut their power bills. No-one will say no. Actually doing it without affecting your business or life is a different matter.
So how does one make a deliberate effort to push industry in a particular direction because the long-term benefits society more than the short term status-quo? One way is to provide incentives for greater uptake. If you're against subsidies for renewables which makes the country more self-sufficient, then you surely must be against farming subsidies which encourage the food supply to be self-sufficient?
That's where reliance on global markets to dictate everything falls down, suddenly it's cheaper to import all your food and your nation can be brought to it's knees by outside influences. Practically all our non-renewable energy sources rely on imports and who knows what global events will do to the supply or price in the future?
This country has not been self-sufficient in food since the sixteenth century. There are too many people and not enough arable land. Nevertheless we managed to get by in WW1 and WW2 when there were fleets of U boats trying to sink every incoming ship. We have been and always will be dependant on imported food. It is a non-issue.
Subsidies for solar and wind exist because without them they would cost more to implement than the value of the power they generate. By food subsidies I am guesing you mean the Common Agricultral Policy? We don't need it, that exists so that the French can continue their traditional farming methods i.e farming inefficently.
It is a general rule in life that there are no easy answers. If someone tells you they have easy answers to problems that have proved intractable for generations then my advice is to run the other way.
Audio Advent
26-04-2015, 19:32
Your economic analysis is fundementally flawed because you seem to be basing it on the old mantra of 'the gap betwen rich and poor is growing'. Facts do not bear that out, the majority of the world population are wealthier now than they have been on the past, China being an excellent example.
Although I wasn't making that point, this article from today reminded me of this thread:
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/apr/26/recession-rich-britains-wealthiest-double-net-worth-since-crisis
The super-rich are definately getting richer and richer because of the economic policies which encourage QE and zero interest rates which boost the values of assets which the rich hold a massive percentage of. That creates much much larger wealth and income gaps between the rich and poor. As I'm sure you know, if you have money and assets you can then use it to make yet more money or borrow against those assets to make money - and so the gap accellerates as this doubling of wealth since about 2009/10 shows.
Meanwhile, the UK deficit is being (claimed to be) reduced not by taxing these inflated assets of the rich (wealth gained directly from government policy so you'd think they owe something back to the govenment in return, at least a thankyou.. ) but by cutting the wellfare state, taking help away from the poor, taking vital services away from the poor. If you're not being helped through life's problems (poverty, health etc) it is even harder to earn money or improve your living standards let alone keep your income the same when you have to end up paying for once free services.
And so the poor's wealth and middleclass's disposable income plummets whilst the super-rich can monetise and enjoy the fruits of their inflated assets!
Not only does that ruin the long-term prospects of the country's economy (the rich take money out of the country, don't buy local goods - the poor and middleclasses spend less or rack up debts which take away future spending and so liquidity of the money supply plummets) but it causes real social harm to real people, increases violence, crime, extremism like right wing nationalism. In other words, that's the effect of austerity and the QE and zero interest rates which go hand in hand with that.
I think any party advocating austerity in the same vein as we've seen the Tory government push for in this last term, is irresponsible if not corrupt and self-serving. Sadly so many people are economically illiterate that they just swallow a bucket of crap about deficit this and that until they are befuddled and repeat it like parrots.. and then vote accordingly.
Although I wasn't making that point, this article from today reminded me of this thread:
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/apr/26/recession-rich-britains-wealthiest-double-net-worth-since-crisis
The super-rich are definately getting richer and richer because of the economic policies which encourage QE and zero interest rates which boost the values of assets which the rich hold a massive percentage of. That creates much much larger wealth and income gaps between the rich and poor. As I'm sure you know, if you have money and assets you can then use it to make yet more money or borrow against those assets to make money - and so the gap accellerates as this doubling of wealth since about 2009/10 shows.
Meanwhile, the UK deficit is being (claimed to be) reduced not by taxing these inflated assets of the rich (wealth gained directly from government policy so you'd think they owe something back to the govenment in return, at least a thankyou.. ) but by cutting the wellfare state, taking help away from the poor, taking vital services away from the poor. If you're not being helped through life's problems (poverty, health etc) it is even harder to earn money or improve your living standards let alone keep your income the same when you have to end up paying for once free services.
And so the poor's wealth and middleclass's disposable income plummets whilst the super-rich can monetise and enjoy the fruits of their inflated assets!
Not only does that ruin the long-term prospects of the country's economy (the rich take money out of the country, don't buy local goods - the poor and middleclasses spend less or rack up debts which take away future spending and so liquidity of the money supply plummets) but it causes real social harm to real people, increases violence, crime, extremism like right wing nationalism. In other words, that's the effect of austerity and the QE and zero interest rates which go hand in hand with that.
I think any party advocating austerity in the same vein as we've seen the Tory government push for in this last term, is irresponsible if not corrupt and self-serving. Sadly so many people are economically illiterate that they just swallow a bucket of crap about deficit this and that until they are befuddled and repeat it like parrots.. and then vote accordingly.
Good post. I agree:)
Audio Advent
26-04-2015, 19:59
My views are based on reading their literature and talking with Green Party members. i can assure you that they are dead against nuclear.
Why don't we just cut our usage by 100% then and achieve perfection? People and industry use the power that they need to. I am sure almost every business and household would like to cut their power use by 25%, everyone wants to save money. Ask any businessman or housholder if they would like to cut their power bills. No-one will say no. Actually doing it without affecting your business or life is a different matter.
This country has not been self-sufficient in food since the sixteenth century. There are too many people and not enough arable land. Nevertheless we managed to get by in WW1 and WW2 when there were fleets of U boats trying to sink every incoming ship. We have been and always will be dependant on imported food. It is a non-issue.
Subsidies for solar and wind exist because without them they would cost more to implement than the value of the power they generate. By food subsidies I am guesing you mean the Common Agricultral Policy? We don't need it, that exists so that the French can continue their traditional farming methods i.e farming inefficently.
It is a general rule in life that there are no easy answers. If someone tells you they have easy answers to problems that have proved intractable for generations then my advice is to run the other way.
As I say, the majority of UK citizens oppose nuclear and a high percentage of those are absolutely dead against it. It's not a uniquely Green issue. How many people outside of the Green party have you discussed nuclear energy with by comparison? Then why are the Green party members dead against it? According to the Green Party general website (not their Manifesto for this election) the main reason against it is immense cost and long potracted build times with foreign companies who may or may not be around by the time the project might be completed - it's a massive economic gamble just getting the reactors built, let alone any of the following dangers of operation.
In other words, being against nuclear as a serious option for powering the country in the future also has it's foundations in logic and is not simply ignorant people being all emotional and reactive as you seem to imply. Here is a good example of the problems - everything built and paid for for Hinkley may have to be scrapped, and financial backers might be forced to litigate to prevent massive losses which could possibly bankrupt the company building it. Ask yourself, could such a problem happen with any renewables you can think of? :
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/11546271/New-UK-nuclear-plants-under-threat-as-serious-anomaly-with-model-found-in-France.html
"cut our usage by 100%" that's a bit ridiculous. People and industry do NOT use the power they need to. We waste it. I'm wasting some now - I could have turned my hifi off days ago but it's stayed on all weekend and is on now even though it's not doing anything, human nature!
If the cost of an inefficient plant is cheaper to buy and run than an efficient plant because the new efficient plants are only sold in small quantities, then we have a chicken and egg situation. The only way to solve that is either to force the purchase of efficient plants via legislation or to help with the costs of bringing the new plants into the mainstream and therefore enjoy the economies of scale. I'm sure there are other ways too.
But that would require government policy to make it happen..
It is beneficial in the long term for the country and it's economy (especially if those efficient plants are manufactured here) to be more efficient, not least of all because of the lower dependence on imports because you're importing less energy or resources AND you have a greater chance of becoming energy self-sufficient due to lower requirements. BUT industry in the main looks at short-term economic forcasts because they've their shareholders to think about and rocking the boat of dirty, inefficient growth to become cleaner and efficent in the long term is going to destroy your share price as investors want immediate profits else they'll get them elsewhere instead. Households are similar - people in the main don't spend more today in order to save tomorrow, they will look at buying the cheapest and more inefficient goods even if it will cost more in the long run.
walpurgis
26-04-2015, 20:08
Nuclear power does not bother me as much as having all our essential services such as power, in the hands of foreign private companies. That is just insulting. No essentials should be privately controlled at all. Contracted out to an extent maybe, but to British business. Tell the foreigners to sling their hooks.
Personally I am not a big fan of nuclear power. It is not a panecea. The leader of the Green party was asked directly about this on the BBC the other day. She stated they were against nuclear because (this is her order):
Too dangerous
Too long to build
Problem of storing the waste
There is nothing wrong with gas, oil and coal, there is plenty of it my suggestion would be to carry on as we are.
Privatisation - I think the government should control as little as possible with regard to industry/business. However I agree that health, water and power should be publically owned and operated concerns. Although the 'foreign ownership' thing is not as big a deal as some make out. It is not a security issue, for instance.
gap betwen rich and poor - there are always going to be rich people. Life is always going to be unfair. There is never going to be a level playing field. The sooner people understand this and just get on with their lives instead of this childish 'he's got an ice cream I want one too!' crap the better.
gap betwen rich and poor - there are always going to be rich people. Life is always going to be unfair. There is never going to be a level playing field.
Indeed, life isn't fair - and it never will be.
However, we *can* try and make it fairer; and I'm all for anything that can be done to facilitate that goal. What's certainly not fair, and indeed completely unreasonable, is asking the less well off, currently suffering under the present regime, simply to 'sit back and take it'.
No-one is asking for a level playing field; merely a fairer and more equally distributed slice of the pie.
In that respect, action should be carried out to fight against the unjustness that currently prevails - and, by golly, it *will* be... :trust:
Marco.
This is one of a handful of countries in the world where able bodied people can live their entire lives without ever working, all paid for by someone else's efforts: get free housing, health care, education and some walking around money, (don't forget to register as an alcholic for your additional weekly booze money) and yet there are still romantics out there who see it as a wicked, unjust place, where the downtrodden yearn to be free.
Compared to almost eveywhere else it is a bloody paradise, why do you think half the world is trying to come here to live? People in this country don't know they are born especially those who are always banging on about 'inequality' and 'poverty'. Someone living entirely on benefits in the UK is still in the top couple of percentiles of wealth when you take it globally. A big percentage of the global population live on one US dollar a day or less.
I don't disagree with any of that, but that doesn't excuse the fat cats (under Tory rule), getting huge tax benefits and perks, and pandered to left right and centre, whilst there are people here in the UK trying to survive daily without a roof over their heads!!
It's all wrong, and something should be done about it. Personally, I'd bring in a law that says if you earn any more than, say, £2m a year, you're forced to give a percentage of it to charity.
Marco.
No-one in the UK is trying to survive without a roof over their heads. That was the point I was making. We have a benefits system that will pay your rent and council tax for you if you have no income.
The rich (or 'fat cats') contribute the vast majority of the personal income tax revenue that pays for everything. Big corprations pay the vast majority of corporation tax that again, pays for everything.
I suspect you would struggle to find a muti-millionaiare who does not already contribute substatially to charity. I suppose there will be a few. But forcing people to contribute? It is their money and no-one else ahs the right to tell them how they should spend it.
What are these tax breaks for the rich you are talking about? Do you mean corporations avoiding tax? Or private indviduals? or both? If it is corporations then nothing has changed substantively in the way they are taxed for many years. They were avoiding tax for the last 13 years of Labour Government, it is not via new loopholes the current administration brought in.
No-one in the UK is trying to survive without a roof over their heads.
So there are no homeless people in this country? I think not! Check the stats.
Quite simply, I think that it's utterly obscene that there are people, here in the UK (many of whom simply have fallen on hard times - I'm not talking about the druggies or the scroungers) without a roof over their heads, and at the same time, other folk living in mansions with more money than they know what to do with.
That level of division of wealth should not exist in a civilised society. Simples!
I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on this.
Marco.
Oldpinkman
29-04-2015, 16:35
No-one in the UK is trying to survive without a roof over their heads. That was the point I was making. We have a benefits system that will pay your rent and council tax for you if you have no income.
The rich (or 'fat cats') contribute the vast majority of the personal income tax revenue that pays for everything. Big corprations pay the vast majority of corporation tax that again, pays for everything.
I suspect you would struggle to find a muti-millionaiare who does not already contribute substatially to charity. I suppose there will be a few. But forcing people to contribute? It is their money and no-one else ahs the right to tell them how they should spend it.
What are these tax breaks for the rich you are talking about? Do you mean corporations avoiding tax? Or private indviduals? or both? If it is corporations then nothing has changed substantively in the way they are taxed for many years. They were avoiding tax for the last 13 years of Labour Government, it is not via new loopholes the current administration brought in.
And to pile in and support Martin here, there are a couple of obvious flaws in the "tax the rich" approach. Generally - its the rich that create the wealth (Richard Branson, Alan Sugar, take your pick).
They donate to charity - roughly 50% of their income in taxes to that great redistributor the state.
They are inherently mobile internationally -a bit like the Japanese lady in my earlier post. If you treat em rough, they can up sticks and move somewhere else. The French have a major problem with this at the moment. "Good riddance" I hear you say, but they take their income, the taxes paid on it, their charitable donations elsewhere. They create jobs, spend their money on other peoples businesses etc elsewhere
Taxing the very rich is the simplistic solution for those without money. But its a shot in the foot when you drive away the people who make the jobs for everyone else. Of course there are the wealthy who are less obvious contributors. But who is going to start judging what's worthy. Personally I wouldn't pay a penny to Wayne Rooney. But I wouldn't expect to interfere so much in other peoples business that I stop people going to football matches and in effect doing just that.
"I'll fix the bastards" "make the rich pay" sounds like tough talking gun-slinging heroism, but it looks pretty daft when it kills the goose that lays the golden eggs. That's why countries like Ireland allow obscene tax breaks to companies like Apple and Dell - because it means they locate there, and employ people there, and spend money there - which gets taxed. The fact that the company is not paying taxes (much taxes) doesn't detract from the wealth and prosperity they bring to the country. Those are examples of abuse. The companies should pay fair taxes (and international law has recently forced Ireland and Luxembourg and others to clean up their worst abuses). But the principle remains - if you "plunder" the rich, they move on to somewhere that won't plunder them. Because they can afford to. It's the poor who are stuck with living where they are.
Tax fairly, and effectively - but internationally competitively - or you run out of wealth to tax.
Again, I don't necessarily disagree with that - in principal. However, it still doesn't address my earlier point, and the heart of the matter, which is this:
What do we do to tackle the issue of the homeless and starving people living in this country, whilst the super-rich sit back and munch foie gras in their mansions, and (in most cases) do nothing to help address the problem?
I don't believe for one second that, other than some celebrities, many of them contribute in any significant way to charity, simply because the majority are too self-centred and keen on lining their own pockets, to give a damn about anyone else.
There's something very strange if you don't think that, morally, that situation sucks. Quite simply, it's not one that should exist in a civilised society.
Marco.
Anthony K
29-04-2015, 16:45
The Government has ignored the homeless problem in this country for too long.
I worked with the sick and homeless for 18 years within the then DWP , yes there are some lazy people but the vast majority of 'druggies' I encountered came from rather unpleasant backgrounds, especially care homes. Believe me I have heard some gut wrenching stories from youngsters.
We now have the controlled elite paedophile snuff ring being exposed in Parliament. Not to mention the likes of Asda, M&S, Next and the NHS advertising jobs ( that the average Brit could quite easily do ) in Eastern Europe before the UK.
New build posh housing along the Thames and all Around London without the slightest sniff of affordable builds.
Now the Slags want to sell off the housing association blocks ( how this will help? it bloody wont ) just build more of them to keep the good people off the streets.
As I said I worked with the homeless for 18 years, I cannot get a job now as most positions require a second language , Polish or Lithuanian.
But dont worry it will get worse
Now there's a sensible post amongst all this Capitalist clap-trap! :clap: :clap:
The insular and selfish inability of some to consider the world outside of those who are fortunate, boils my piss.
Marco.
Anthony K
30-04-2015, 07:41
The insular and selfish inability of some to consider the world outside of those who are fortunate, boils my piss.
This sums it up
The official figures[6] from the Department for Communities and Local Government for England are that on average 498 people sleep rough each night, with 248 of those in London.
Source: 6.Jump up ^ "Homelessness Statistics September 2007 and Rough Sleeping – 10 Years on from the Target" September 2007 Department for Communities and Local Government: London
498 out of 70 million; okay 498 too many but hardly enough to describe this country as 'uncivilised' or to suggest that cause exists to drag the rich from their mansions.
I never said that the country was uncivilised; merely that to continually reward the rich and penalise the poor are not the actions of a civilised society. I would also seriously dispute the figures you've quoted for the homeless (although can't officially prove otherwise), as I've probably seen more than that myself under cardboard boxes in Glasgow!!
The basic point here is that there is currently way too much focus on what's best for 'big business', and those connected with it (the reasons for which I fully understand and appreciate), and not enough on helping the common man, and the poor out of living an inhuman existence. The balance, in that respect, is WAY, WAY out of sync, my friend, and consequently needs rebalancing to some significant degree, in order to make for a fairER and more caring, civilised society.
That [a more just redistribution of wealth] is precisely what *will* happen after 7th May, when the SNP (in conjunction with Labour) kick out the crusty old pee-soaked codgers in Westminster, and their antiquated and self-serving ways, and introduce a more progressive form of politics... SO BRING IT ON!! :yay:
Marco.
walpurgis
30-04-2015, 08:55
on average 498 people sleep rough each night.
I don't believe that figure for a moment. There are droves of 'rough sleepers' and probably that many just in this area. You'll see the evidence if you look under bridges, behind hoardings, in the parks, along railway land and the like.
Precisely!!
Have a look at the 'Rough sleeping' statistics here for a more accurate and less 'misguided' picture of reality: http://www.crisis.org.uk/pages/homeless-def-numbers.html
In reality, there are probably TENS (possibly hundreds) OF THOUSANDS of homeless people in the UK [but the government don't want you to know that, hence no official statistics exist], and quite simply, if I were a millionaire, with plenty of disposable income, I couldn't sleep well at night without knowing that I was doing something to alleviate their suffering. Perhaps I'm just too much of a Christian?
Anyway, something drastic *needs* to be done about the situation, as it's a bloody disgrace, when there are others living here in luxury, in their mansions, and indeed could be done, if the government really wanted to. This article in particular makes for some sobering reading: http://www.crisis.org.uk/data/files/publications/Homelessness%20briefing%202015%20EXTERNAL.pdf
We need to reward the rich LESS in this country (but not not at all), and use some of that money instead to make the lives of our most disadvantaged citizens more bearable. That's a policy I would vote for!!
Marco.
I live in one of the poorest areas of one of the poorest cities in the UK and I canl't recall the last time I saw someone sleeping rough.
I have seen it in London fairly recently, though.
You should also bear in mind that a lot of people pose as vagrants in order to beg for money. They are not actually sleeping rough they just give that impression.
Quite few charities are set up for the homeless. You should consider that they are very keen on making the problem seem a lot larger than it is since without a problem there is no need to have a charity and they would all be out of work.
Marco - your suggestion that there are tens of thousands, let alone hundreds of thousands of homeless people in this country is utterly risible. I think you are being taken for a sucker by people who have their own, sinister agenda for painting a picture of this country as 'broken' and 'failed' when it is nothing of the sort.
Marco - your suggestion that there are tens of thousands, let alone hundreds of thousands of homeless people in this country is utterly risible. I think you are being taken for a sucker by people who have their own, sinister agenda for painting a picture of this country as 'broken' and 'failed' when it is nothing of the sort.
Think what you like, mate. There's certainly a damn sight more than the 498 you quoted, which is ridiculous and utterly delusional. If you believe that nonsense, it's YOU who's being taken for a sucker!!!
Listen to what Geoff is telling you, as he lives in London and sees the amount of homeless people there daily, as indeed I have in Glasgow. Anthony has also got some good inside insight on this matter.
I think your view of 'how things are' in the UK is blind, utterly superficial, deeply misguided and totally risible, especially as given the conditions you're living in, you're one of the people who would benefit greatly from the type of policies (fairer and more just division of wealth) that I'm advocating is put into place!
How you can be so stubbornly 'for' a political system, living where you are (as you've just outlined), that clearly doesn't cater adequately for your needs, is beyond risible, and indeed utterly unfathomable..... :mental: :mental:
And now, I shall pull out of this this discussion and let you have the last word, as quite clearly, we are POLLS APART in our views, and thus are never going to agree.
Marco.
Anthony K
30-04-2015, 12:07
498 :lies: Shelter reported that in the last year alone 70,000 families were made homeless ok they may not all be rough sleepers but even so the figure of 498 is complete and utter colon nectar. They recently claimed there were more than 400 Polish rough sleepers in waterloo alone
Having worked for the government take my word for this......they are full of wind and lies
Marco - Fair enough.
But I should point out that as far as I am concerned my own position is entirely of my own making. I am able -bodied, had a good education and I should really live in a better house, in a better area, and make more money than I do. Not that I am at all unhappy with my lot, but then I did spend the best part of a decade as poor as a church mouse and then several years after that earning more money than I could spend and so I know from experience that money and happiness are entirely unrelated and that the truly worthwhile things in life (love, affection, friends, family) simply cannot be bought.
I take sole responisbility for my life and it frustrates me that rather than accept that their problems are pretty much of their own making - which is the first step required for them to start fixing those problems - people are encouraged to lay the blame on 'Thatcher' or 'The Government' or 'The Rich' thus reinforcing their narrative that it is all beyond their control and beyond their ability to do anything about it.
I don't want a nanny state that looks after me from cradel to grave, tells me what to do what to eat, how to live, how to think, how to behave. I don't want to live my life like a child, wholly dependant on others.
I don't want handouts, I don't want money to be taken from other people and given to me; if a man is able ( and granted some are not and there is no shame in that) he should be self-reliant and stand on his own two feet, not be in the pocket of governments or charities or benefactors. I'd much rather be poor than lose my self-respect.
Anthony K
30-04-2015, 12:25
Unfortunately we are living in different times now Martin , a time when being fit and able bodied is not enough. I left school with a good education and the worked for 24 years continuously. I have never been lazy when it comes to work , whatever job I do , I do well.
I consider myself lucky that I could afford to enjoy my younger days. Going to the movies , buying music , I saw the world.
The youngsters are having a tough time now , and alot has to do with the government lowering the education system. Competition for jobs is now ridiculous and it seems you have to be an out & out bastard just to stay in a job.
This is the reason the UK has the highest single mother rating in Europe , girls will rather get pregnant and have a flat paid by the state. Goddamn if they space them out well they may never have to work this side of 50.
The immigration policy needs to be changed.
The Home Office cannot keep track of non euro applications let alone the expanding free movement through Europe.
Fair points Anthony but times were tougher 25 years ago than they are now. At least now there is a minimum wage and there are jobs available if you want to work which wasn't the case back then. It was almost impossible to get even casual labouring work. Or you could be a security guard on £1 an hour, (must have own car and dog). I was unemployed for the best part of 4 years. Then worked in a warehouse for a year. Eventually got an office job with a company a friend was working for - temporary to start of course but I got a permanant contract after about five months.
Some of the youngsters I have met won't work because they don't want to start at the bottom. They have some mickey mouse qualification from an ex poly and think they are entitled to walk into a £30K job. Won't even consider labouring or temping.
I've no sympathy for that attitude.
walpurgis
30-04-2015, 14:03
Anthony, I agree with everything you've said.
The blinkered, 'head in the sand' take so many people have amazes me. It's all very well living in a nice suburban or rural area and not ever having to be confronted with the real state of the country and supposing that people (like myself) are just scaremongering and aiming for dissent. But just try living around here or in many other similarly afflicted parts of London and other big towns. It's a total mess and has been out of control for years.
Anthony K
30-04-2015, 14:20
Geoff - you fully understand.....as Buddha said 'lessons will be learned in times of poverty'
Martin - as Hall & Oates said 'your outta touch'
25 years ago the average worker could get on the property ladder
25 years ago you didn't have to pay the best part of a weeks earnings for a monthly travel card
25 years ago there was no government cover up of banking negligence to the tune of 7 billion quid
25 years ago people could look forward to a pension
As I said the education system was lowered so yes there are a number of disillusioned youths out there that think their degree means something, but they didn't dumb down the system so cannot be held responsible.
The minimum wage is pitiful....this is why employers flay the hell out of migrants , pitiful though it is I am happy to take it but employers see my CV and make the decision I am over qualified.
25 years ago the average worker could get on the property ladder
25 years ago you didn't have to pay the best part of a weeks earnings for a monthly travel card
25 years ago there was no government cover up of banking negligence to the tune of 7 billion quid
25 years ago people could look forward to a pension
.
Ah! I notice your location is London SW, Anthony.
Yes everyone in the whole of the SW is screwed unless they are earning £100K plus, totally agree.
But come up here to sunny Stoke and you can still buy a house for £50K. I use a car service to get to work everyday, the price has not increased in 8 years. A pint of beer in the pub can still be had for £2.00.
But if I was doing my job in central London at best I would make an extra £5K - that wouldn't even cover the additional rent.
London and the SE is not the whole of the UK, it is a complete abberation compared to the rest of the country and absolutely the worst place to live if you are on a low income.
Pensions? You give your money to someone else. They gamble with it on the global, unregulated casino called the 'stock market'. If they win they give you a little taste. If they lose it all then it's 'tough luck, buddy'. Mug's game. if I was going to gamble with my money might as well do it myself at least win or lose I get the thrill that way.
As for the banking negligence that has been going on for years and years. I would say since at least the late 1980s and possibly before. It went bad in 2008 but it is not like it was something that had just begun a few years previously. Everyone with any knowledge of the financial sector knew it would eventually fall over, so don't believe all that crap about 'nobody saw it coming'. They saw it allright they just couldn't stop it so they all tried to get as much for themselves as they could before it finally crashed.
Anthony K
30-04-2015, 22:50
so don't believe all that crap about 'nobody saw it coming'.
I never stated that I believed it....I too talked of it coming since about 1999 when the house prices started to rise ridiculously
but you Sir have just proved the point that myself Marco and Geoff have been trying to instill......THEY DONT CARE ABOUT US
walpurgis
30-04-2015, 23:01
THEY DONT CARE ABOUT US
Realistically. The world and its countries are becoming 'globalised' at the whim of BIG business. They don't care about anybody!!
If you are not part of the profit generating machine, they'll let you rot!
Capitalism at its finest.
The thing is, Global control will have its limits. There will eventually be a backlash when things go too far. As they will. An enslaved world population (which is what seems to be intended) will, when push comes to shove, bite back. The resulting mayhem is horrific to contemplate, but the way things are going, it seems inevitable.
Realistically. The world and its countries are becoming 'globalised' at the whim of BIG business.
That's the problem, Geoff, as I said before: WAY, WAY too much focus on 'big business', to the severe detriment of the 'bread and butter' needs of the nation. That's why I hope and pray that the Tories are kicked out next Thursday and replaced with *something* that has the needs of ordinary people much more at heart.
Like you say, if it continues like this, a revolt is on the cards, as folk can only take so much! I'll gladly accept the role as ringleader, too ;)
Marco.
but you Sir have just proved the point that myself Marco and Geoff have been trying to instill......THEY DONT CARE ABOUT US
Of course they don't care about you. and that goes for the whole lot of them , Labour SNP included. That is my point, you have to be self-reliant and work whatever system is in place to your own best ends. Nothing is ever going to change, get used to it.
people will act in their own rational self-interest. That is hard wired into us. Who does care about you? Well, you, and your wife if you have one, your children, close family and friends. And that is it. Doesn't matter what social or political or economic system you are working with. That is either very depressing thought or very liberating. I find it to be the latter.
Of course they don't care about you. and that goes for the whole lot of them , Labour SNP included. That is my point, you have to be self-reliant and work whatever system is in place to your own best ends.
I agree, which is why, as I've mentioned before, we've built our own 'little bubble'. Thing is, some bastards are worse than others, so you choose the ones you think are the least worst - and that most certainly ISN'T the Tories!!
However, what you don't seem to grasp is that whilst what you've written is right, when folk reach the end of their tether and refuse no longer to just 'sit back and take' being shat upon from a great height, that's when revolts occur (power to the people) - and if things keep on going the way they are, that's what will happen!
When it happens, I hope it's a big one.
Marco.
I suppose the bit about your argument that I don't get is who is being shat upon and how? If you can explain that then I might understand where you are coming from. And I mean be specific.
Oh, for goodness sake, Martin. Isn't that bloody obvious?
If the government don't care about you, as you correctly say, then EVERYONE is being shat upon (to a greater or lesser extent), unless that is, you're part of the elite (like Geoff says: 'the big business profit generating machine')!
That most certainly doesn't involve you, so wake up and smell the coffee.
Marco.
Well I work for a big business, in return they pay me money I get to live and do things I want to do. I can't go along with all of this empty rhetoric. Evil Tories, evil big business and so on. it is business that pays for everything we have. No business, no welfare, no NHS, no money for any government provided service. So at what point does it move from good to evil?
Okay let me rephrase the question - let us say you get your wish and Labour/SNP take control. What specifically would you like to see changed? Concrete, practical examples.
Martin,
I'm losing the will to live with this, and so should've left the discussion earlier, as I said I would. Quite simply, if the government doesn't care about you, unless you're part of the 'elite' (as is undoubtedly the case, and you agree), then by definition, you're being shat upon from a great height. That's common sense, and needs defining no further.
However, the truth is coming out now, in terms of why you're being so pig-headed about this. You work for a big business, which is part of the 'system' described above, and they pay your wages, ergo you vote for the Tories, who first and foremost, pander to the needs of 'big business'.
Therefore, your support for them is understandable, but nonetheless rather shortsighted, simplistic and self-centred. Essentially, 'I'm all right, Jack, so fuck you'. Let's hope that you'll always be in the fortunate position to think that way... When you're only ever the tiniest cog in the wheels of 'big business', you'll always be seen as dispensable.
Over and out.
Marco.
No workers, No big business!
Anthony K
01-05-2015, 09:22
Martin you have summed it up for me........the fact that you cannot grasp what is being put forward is the reason why this great country is going down the Armitage Shank.
You see it .......yet you deny it
You agree........but then find excuses
I hope that big business you work for dont sell themselves to the highest international bidder and burst your rose tinted bubble
Then again when the rose tint is removed you may see all too clearly
Just for the record I don't vote Tory. I don't vote at all.
And I don't disagree that things could be improved for people at the bottom end. It can and should be done. All we really disagree on is the method.
I will give you a personal example of where I am coming from so perhaps that will ease understanding of my position even if it does not lead to agreement.
Twenty years ago to the day, pretty much I was working in a warehouse taking home about £100 a week. Temporary job, that finished, I was back on the dole. I was renting a house, I had no possessions except the stereo, no money, about 2 grand in debts. In the local area all of the traditional industries had shrunk or had gone completely. Unemployment was around 40%.
A friend was working in IT for a small local company, a new company that had started as a one man band and had built up to about 60 employees. They needed some temps for an indeterminate period. £3.50 an hour but you could work as many hours as you wanted. I signed up and was putting in 70 hour weeks, working 7 days. In three months I cleared my debts. In the meantime the company grew further and gave me a full time job. With the continual expansion I moved up the food chain a bit, I was getting more money per hour plus a £2K annual bonus. I saved a deposit from the bonus and bought a house. That was £100 per month cheaper than renting.
Now I could afford to buy things and go on holidays. I had also picked up skills and experience that meant I was now highly employable.
It was hard work and the company was highly demanding in terms of performance levels. It was not unusual for people to quit, after a month or a week or even half way through their first day. I got a couple of long term unemployed friends work there but they couldn't hack it. They were used to dossing around al day watching the racing on Channel 4 and they couldn't see beyond the fact that although they were on the bottom rung if they stuck at it they could work up. They felt they were entitled to get something for nothing and they were not going to be 'exploited'.
20 years on one of them is still unemployed and has to rely on handouts from his mother. At fifty years old. Hell of a price to pay for your principles.
Anyway the business grew to a large size, employed thousands of local people. Had numerous local suppliers, the effect on the local economy was quite marked. I saw first hand how the lot of my co-workers improved as they too were able to buy houses and establish some financial security for themselves.
Cost to the taxpayer of all of this improvement? Nil.
That is how you improve life for ordinary people. Get out of the way and let people make money in business and everyone involved will get well. Okay so some will get 'weller'. than others, but that is capitalism: 'the unequal sharing of blessings' as Churchill so aptly put it. The bloke who started the company ended up selling it for £2.4 billion. A lot of people were bitter about that. For me I am eternally grateful to him and wish him well.
Oldpinkman
01-05-2015, 10:15
Marco thinks you're selfish Martin.
But I think he and the others are just in denial about how wealth is created. Wealths a bad word here. How a living for most ordinary people is created. Most ordinary people are employed. Somebody else works out how to make money, and some of it gets paid to the employed worker. Most of that employment either comes from big businesses or from the government, who get their money from the taxes on those businesses.
The only way you get taxes, is if people who are not paid out of taxes create wealth. The likes of Ireland seek to attract big business like Dell or Apple because having those big businesses in their country means there are jobs there for ordinary people in their country.
If it were possible to get rid of all the evil big businesses in this country - where would our tax revenue come from, and who would have a job
(Bear in mind, even the evil businesses who avoid tax on their income due to international structures and transfer pricing pay rates, VAT, and employers national insurance. It's only corporation tax they are not paying - or paying an unfairly small amount of)
If there is no cake, then any discussion about how to share it out is pointless.
Richard - thank you - at least there is someone else here who gets it.
The only problem with genuine wealth creation is that is does not get shared out equally. Those on the bottom get a little, those on top get a lot. For it to work it has to be that way. That is what it is hard for people who have as their ideals 'fairness' and 'equality' find objectionable. That is why they try to find other ways of doing things, other social/economic models. The problem is they don't work, it proves to be impossible to engineer fairness and equality, and the end result is everyone suffers. 'The equal sharing of misery' to complete the Churchill quote.
Anthony K
01-05-2015, 11:39
We are all different .... we come from differing backgrounds and have different life experiences. Not everyone has or had the same opportunities as you.
Thats the last I am gonna say as I believe you hijacked this thread just to blow your own flugelhorn
Pat yourself on the back mate.....you did good, lucky you.
:clapclapclap:
Sorry you feel that way Anthony it wasn't my intention. I was just trying to illustrate a point. And no, I don't do well but I do get by which is enough for me.
Anthony K
01-05-2015, 12:38
Most of us , working or not, are ' just getting by' Martin, that is the problem. We should be living full lives. There is a lack of Humanity and Empathy running through this thread which is quite frankly f--king unacceptable, but this is what our future adults are now being taught in school. A recent paper came out stating that kids that learn to lie from an early age will be more successful in their working lives.
Great we are prepping a new generation of selfish sociopathic ' fuck u the suns shining on me bitch ' minded youths.
20 years ago I was working , not a highly paid job but I loved I was doing and this was more important to me. Then the rules changed and its been a downward slope into unforeseen shit since. We are just cogs turning the wheels for the system. We support the system willingly or unknowingly yet time after time the system fails to support our well being.
Some people have even placed their lives on the line in order to upkeep the system (shit-stem)
I saw a recent newsfeed regarding a young man who lost both legs whilst serving in Afghanistan , he put his life on the line for this country and the system did not have the courtesy to pay for prosthetic limbs for him, his fellow servicemen clubbed together £90,000 for him so he could stand tall and walk again.
How many pensioners will die this year because they cannot afford heating bills or food this winter coming? they are already estimating upto 4000
Why doesn't the system provide for these good people?
There is a lack of Humanity and Empathy running through this thread which is quite frankly f--king unacceptable...
I agree (and as you say it's a disease endemic in today's 'look only after No1' society), which is why after acknowledging that point, I'll be saying no more on the matter.
Marco.
Anthony K
01-05-2015, 13:00
Me too.......:peace:
walpurgis
05-05-2015, 21:00
Did anybody see this bit on the young Milliband?
http://www.itv.com/news/meridian/2015-05-05/exclusive-ed-milibands-first-ever-tv-appearance-as-a-fresh-faced-student/
Bet he kept his head down in pubs. He looks just the type of dweeb the 'nasty lads' would have clumped for the sake of it.
Typical geek! A face only a mother wouldn't want to slap... :rolleyes:
Marco.
Surprised it wasn't Cambridge ;)
Lol.... He doesn't exactly look like he was one of the 'cool kids' at School, does he? ;)
Marco.
Lol.... He doesn't exactly look like he was one of the 'cool kids' at School, does he? ;)
Marco.
Wouldnt have got in your gang Marco :lol:
Defo not. We used to leather the geeks all the time and steal their homework! :eyebrows:
Marco.
We used to get them on the rugger field and abuse them :D ...that way it was semi legal:rolleyes:
Lol - that's just wrong! Especially as I'll be taking that thought with me to bed.....
Marco.
Lol - that's just wrong! Especially as I'll be taking that thought with me to bed.....
Marco.
We used to take turns :rfl::rfl::rfl::rfl:
...at tackling them...lol one flung the ball and the rest hit him hard b4 he could get rid.....;)
Audio Advent
17-05-2015, 15:47
We used to get them on the rugger field and abuse them :D ...that way it was semi legal:rolleyes:
See, that's the social in-fighting of the middle and lower classes which keep each other down.
Meanwhile the real rugger buggers at Eton practically stroke each other in the scrum and massage each other's "egos", before going out with the Bullingdon Club to smash up a poor person's restaurant business. And that arrogant confidence leads them to want powerful positions in society.
Shame you can't get kids and young men to think of the wider societal consequences of bullying .. comes back to bite them 20/30 years down the line when their jobs are destroyed by Eton boys because the sensitive geeks who might be fighting for social justice in politics have instead decided to keep their heads down in society and go into IT.
Audio Advent
17-05-2015, 15:51
Anyway..
It seems to me that it is the fossil fuels market which needs government subsidies too! £100m of public funds granted to the coal industry alone..
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/may/15/activists-call-on-eu-to-shut-down-100m-slush-fund-for-coal
Audio Advent
18-05-2015, 20:04
And another one: Fossil fuels subsidised by $10m a minute, says IMF. (http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/may/18/fossil-fuel-companies-getting-10m-a-minute-in-subsidies-says-imf?CMP=edit_2221)
‘Shocking’ revelation finds $5.3tn subsidy estimate for 2015 is greater than the total health spending of all the world’s governments
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