Newmania In Lewes

Take The High Road

2012-01-27T12:53:00.000Z

They must be the world`s nastiest nation. I refer, of course, to the mean thin lipped Pictish hord we call Scotland. The union only happened because their hubristic South American Darien scheme flopped and we had to bail them out. Same with the Scottish banking fiasco and it is mostly Scottish, £197 billion exposure to toxic debt courtesy RBS whose bonkers acquisition of ABN ( personally applauded by Salmon) he is now saying is our problem.( We had a Scottish PM and Chancellor at the time who were busily piling up more debts for us as well as not watching the shop ). What`s the betting that the Pension black hole their years of stale socialism have left will also be ‘British’ not ‘Scottish’
Didn`t take them long ,after our generous union hand out to come down all tartan and "I `m greet m, " with a Jacobite army which got as far as Derby. Typical.
They complain about “English law in Scotland” whilst we put up with Scots Raj for ten years stuffed with Mac MPs treating us like mendicants at the desk of a fat moist lipped bank manager. They are prodigiously over represented in England whilst retaining Scotland for themselves ( *put in own West Lothian Rant to taste* )
They are drunker, more violent and vastly more racist than we are, and the only time they have not been busily starting fights is when we packed the off to profiteer around the world as the chief beneficiaries of Empire
They think of themselves romantic but their one poet is a novelty act of second rank which they don’t read .Their misty eyed Nationalism was a cranky hobby until the first barrel of black stuff turned up and no amount of Barnett Formula hand outs will lance their greedy boil illusory though it is .
No English voice is allowed in Scottish public life whilst we happily submit to Scots infesting even nook and cranny, even our own Scottish MP Norman Mac Baker is always at the fore when it comes to giving up English rights either in Europe or to his fellow Scots . Hadrian’s wall was the most fortified border in the Roman Empire , there is a reason for that !

They want referendum on Devo Max …,fine. I want a referendum where decide whether we want them at all, and if, we do, on what terms will continue to out up with the worlds nastiest Nation.

No Offence intended

Thinking Points

2012-01-24T20:23:00.000Z

Thinking Points

Scotland

2012-01-13T06:56:00.003Z

Lib Con Thread
and more

and more

Welfare

2012-01-04T22:14:00.001Z

Polls

Labour Run For Cover

2011-12-29T22:04:00.001Z

Tax and Spend

Employment Tribunal

2011-12-26T18:26:00.001Z

Employment Tribunal

Employment Law

2011-12-26T18:21:00.000Z

Lib Con some good Trade Union Info

Lib Con Thread On Thatch

2011-12-24T13:25:00.000Z

Thatcher

Finally

2011-12-23T08:34:00.001Z

New Statesman

EU over

2011-12-16T06:10:00.001Z

EU Over

Employment

2011-12-16T06:04:00.001Z

Facts

Lewes Award

2011-12-13T06:43:00.001Z

Here

National Pay Bargaining

2011-12-02T23:55:00.000Z

Got to go

Spanish Socialism

2011-12-02T01:09:00.001Z

Interesting

Union Mandate

2011-11-29T08:13:00.000Z

See Lee Griffin Point

Pensions Disaster

2011-11-28T20:38:00.000Z

Pension paper

Coalition Surrender

2011-11-28T20:29:00.001Z

Surrender on Pensions

Pensions

2011-11-27T22:29:00.001Z

Forum Thread

Workman -It is not a pay cut. There was no career long contract and the problem is increased life expectancy. This is why the privates sector ,who pay for yours, lost theirs, aided albeit by Gordon Brown. That’s why defined benefit index linked and guaranteed pensions, have not been available at any price for years. The worth of your protected benefit has ballooned. Other pensions and working lives have had to be re calibrated. Your Unions and molly coddled position has insulated you leaving you ever further ahead .This offer will not change that only moderate your “Pay rise”
Teachers are not any workforce. The tax payer pays you and their children pay your pensions. Your demands represent a direct attack on our children’s future, much of which will be spent funding your historic windfall.
.The cost of public sector pensions is now around 40%, with contributions from teachers themselves amounting to a pathetic, just over 6 %.Our sons and daughters have been sold out by a weak government who are always ready to spend money that will be repaid by people too young to vote.
Parents and tax payers should be on strike, not teachers

Pensions

2011-11-27T20:32:00.000Z

Teachers Pensions

Teachers Pay

2011-11-27T13:53:00.001Z

Teachers Pay

Tax Avoidance

2011-11-26T21:27:00.001Z

Table of Countries

Climate Change ?

2011-11-26T08:04:00.000Z

There are more questions than answers

Comment I Made

2011-11-24T20:11:00.000Z

USB and Credit Suisse are much admired Companies, as is Nestle, Swatch and many more in the high tech Swiss Manufacturing and pharmaceuticals sectors.It is a low tax, low immigration, ultra Free Economy, that looks well set to maintain a Comparative advantage with the merging low cost Countries.It has an independent and democratic tradition as do we. Could be worse as a model .

Sweden also has a low population and huge resources, it has industries established by ferocious Capitalists but I agree it has lessons for us. Free Schools,a more regressive tax system than we have more property rights, business, labour, and financial freedom.

Labour`s supposed wish to make us like Nordic heaven lacked, shall we say, consistency.

Cameron Betrays Us Again

2011-11-22T11:36:00.002Z

Getting to the end of my tether with that smoothy

Left reaction as expected

Wage Stagnation data

2011-11-22T09:24:00.001Z

Wage Stagnation

EU Break Up

2011-11-21T14:07:00.001Z

John Redwood

Robin Hood

2011-11-21T09:28:00.000Z

Illiberal Con Artists Post - I attack

That would be Seamus Milne, son of Alistair Milne Director General of the BBC, ex Communist and still defender of Stalin, who recently supported looting mobile phones, on the basis that the Banks had “Looted the country`s wealth “…that prattling public school parasite Seamus Milne ?
Even fatuous loon Milne , admitted that the City created huge profits and revenues to the Exchequer which you have no plans to replace in an article where he blamed banks for bond attacks ( Bonds are not much traded so its a disingenuous attempted to conflate to entirely different subjects ).
His answer was to have Nationalised Banks forced to invest in some Five Year Tractor Plan an idea Oswald Mosley was an enthusiastic proponent of .

ROBIN HOOD Stole from the State who had taxed its citizens into penury to finance their vainglorious international projects. The Poor were poor because the Sherriff of Nottingham kept increasing taxes which he could as an officer of what was the most centralised state in Europe
This is a bizarre name for a Tax which will similarly impoverish the English again in furtherance of some idiotic international dream sponsored by our enemies.

Impressed I am not

Health and Safety

2011-11-20T17:24:00.000Z

Examples

And Yet...I Live !

2011-11-18T10:32:00.003Z

I see the BMA are once again invading that land we call, “None of your business”, suggesting that the state prescribes smoking in your own car. As ever their supposed concern for children is the Trojan horse to boss around adults.
My dad smoked in the car and yet I am ALIVE, perhaps I was lucky, most of my friends survived mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried them. Mine didn`t .She took aspirin, ate blue cheese, raw egg products, loads of bacon and processed meat, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes or cervical cancer. Ye gods ! Then, this evil woman put me in a cot covered with cheerful lead-based paint in a house made of asbestos.
I went on to survive ,no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets no bike helmets riding in the dad drivingOVER 20 MPH Matt Kent, with no booster seat ,or even seat belt, .
I survived a diet of white bread , real butter ,soft drinks with sugar in it, artic rolls chips ands sweets made of industrial colouring fizz and more sugar.
I left leave home in the morning and came back for tea .No one was able to reach me all day…and yet ..I LIVE. A day usual spent in trees, jumping bikes, eating worms fighting and yet … .
I survived a catapult for my 10th birthday and a Webley air gun pistol when I was about twelve. Despite all this and to the evident irritation of many people . PAUL NEWMAN appears to have suffered no ill effects. I live ,I breath, I speak, and I say .BMA…SOD OFF ! I `ll decide what I do in the car ,( or rather Mrs. Newman will and she won`t let me smoke …sigh…)
Mornin’ heroic members of the "I survived" club.Think what I `ll do next is go out , drive at over 20MPH and LOOK WHERE I AM GOING!

Timmy Does Milney

2011-11-18T06:48:00.000Z

Milne is Truly Hateful

I Beg To Differ

2011-11-17T13:41:00.001Z

Comment here

Oborne approved of Liberalising Public Sector supply, in Education, for example, and welfare reform. The Laws / Clegg /Orange Liberals were intitially keen to reclaim Liberalism for their Party. They were also,initially ,converted to fiscal conservatism
Perhaps Oborne was overly effusive , but then he is a collumnist. Polly Toynbee flip flopped far far more about Brown, but she said she reflected the way she and other people felt, which was her job. True, an entertainer and scribbler. Oborne is not a figure on the right in the way a Toynbee is ,supposedly ,a serious voice. He has more latitude and vastly less inconsistency
Like all Parties, as time has gone on, the raw facts of Lib Dem support (Public Sector Pinky and Skittish) have predominated . The same thing happened to New Labour, whose first three years I supported ,and voted for. That good start was followed by the the house arrest of Blair, and the disastorous period of overspending, in an over heated boom on unreformed public services. The Liberals have wobbled quicker, but the times are worse and their support is less steadfast. The Polls are killing them.
It was inevitable that a process of distancing would begin even in the best of circumstances, as it is, we approach a crisis point . Those old "Siren-voices…." are cooing "Spend spend spend " , the markets are dangerous and the Libs are shirking .
Osborne has to be bold and take the actions necessarry to reassurre the markets whilst increasing competitiveness. It could be that the country will prove ungovernable, with the help of the public sector union backed left, and its Greek sectional irreponsibility . I do not believe it .I think the country knows what we have to do .We will roll up olur sleeves and back a strong Chancellor willing to take the flak form the usual suspects.

Euro Crisis

2011-11-15T21:29:00.002Z

Lazy South

EU

2011-11-14T22:13:00.000Z

John Redwood

Immigration

2011-11-14T20:36:00.000Z

David Davis this year:

The first reason for Labour’s commitment to mass immigration was obvious. If you bring vast numbers of immigrants into the country, this inflates economic growth figures, even if they all only earn a minimum wage. This of course flattered Gordon Brown’s performance as Chancellor, even though it did not increase the income per person of the population at all.
The second reason was even more cynical. A combination of measures, from the minimum wage to Brown’s easy credit and low interest rate policy, all threatened to increase inflation, particularly wage inflation. Bringing in large numbers of immigrants depressed wages, particularly for unskilled workers. For low skilled jobs in places with high immigrant populations, like London, the minimum wage almost became a maximum wage. In the high immigration years from 2004 onward, the income of the bottom 20% fell despite the economic boom.
Third, Labour’s immigration policy helped disguise a serial failure in the education system. Britain was simply not providing enough young people with the range of skills and personal attributes a modern economy needs. The answer was simple; plug the gap with recruits from everywhere from Poland to Pakistan, from Estonia to India.
Finally, it also covered up another even more serious problem, largely created by Brown himself. When he became Chancellor, Brown imposed complex welfare schemes that undermined our national work ethic. All too often it paid more to stay at home than go to work. As a result we have created a generation where many accept life on welfare.
During the boom years of 2004-2008, youth unemployment grew by 100,000. Labour’s welfare and immigration policies combined to institutionalise a generation into the habits of unemployment.

http://conservativehome.blogs.com/platform/2011/07/david-davis-mp-labours-mass-immigration-policy-inflated-growth-figures-and-depressed-the-wages-of-un.html

Chat chat

2011-11-14T07:10:00.001Z

Interesting Matt , and interesting who your new best friends are. I work in Insurance primarily of construction and in the last two years have acquired a couple of large clients who revenues form this Solar Panel give-away have ballooned. The bonanza for those who cornered this market have been staggering so I have some idea of the power and money behind the lobby to keep the cash flowing.

Given what I know about the profits being pocketed and market distortion I would take a lot of convincing that this was wise use of borrowed tax payers money and my instinct says lose it.

This piece looks like something cobbled together by some lobbying Company on their behalf .Of the trivial issues jumbled together I can think of many many many more serious cuts and the only one that I have serious objections to is the planning reform. That is not a Green issue, the Green Party have no special interest in the countryside in fact they have been responsible for covering it with ugly wind farms.

But, the population swelling on a flood of immigration towards 70,000,000 homes must be built somewhere. The solution is to take control of the our border and stop it as was promised. The Green Party will not hear of it of course.One way to release funds would be to stop the crazy increase of International AID now accounting for about 7% of our deficit contributing nothing to demand in our Economy , set in a boom time and almost universally resented. The amount is some £12 billion . You want your luxury Green play things?. How about making some choices then and supporting the immediate reduction of International AID

No need to respond . I already know your policies and while I have nothing against Environmentalism its worst enemy is the Green Party.

Immigration

2011-11-13T22:47:00.001Z

Mirage of Economic Good

Immigration

2011-11-13T22:39:00.001Z

Pinch and more

Immigration

2011-11-13T22:03:00.001Z

Well you could work in Europe

2011-11-13T22:00:00.000Z

Balls-o-nomics

Immigration

2011-11-13T16:26:00.000Z

HOL Report

Chatting to Myself

2011-11-12T09:34:00.000Z

Mercian -Do you suggest the North Sea Oil Revenues stopped with the end of John Major? It always interests me this wish to locate problems at the right time. Returning to your ,frankly pathetic, suggestion that the Conservative Party were culpable in the creation of the asset bubble, and associated banking crisis , (now sovereign debt crisis) and other issues above.

Firstly the Labour ‘line to take ,“They promised to match our spending plans” ( CM 7) I could easily repeat the endless warnings given by such "political failures" as Howard, Letwin and many many more about the level of our spending in a boom. The final capitulation was staggering late and only following Thatcher Blair (et al) .Both promised to honour spending ( or lack of spending) commitments, it is not ,shall we say, quite what it seems. The Lady is rather amusing on the subject.

The Conservative Party could not have plausibly registered any stronger protest against New Labour mirage, but we agree on that I gather. Unlike you however I was scathing at the time.

It is more plausible to suggest they would have allowed the housing bubble to let rip but we will never know. The Labour Party would definitely have dragged us into ERM. They didn’t.

The Big bang - This is the dimly understood year of badness isn’t it. Makes me laugh to hear people intone it l without any idea what it was.

In fact the regulation industry has expanded exponentially since 1986 ,was reformed domestically under New Labour and grew in the EU and globally under largely left wing guidance. We did not suffer from under regulation or Conservative deregulation. We suffered from stupid regulators governed by stupid politicians of the left. It was fairly said of the fsa AT Northern Rock that they were checking the stereo when it was going off a cliff.

The entire edifice failed to see that there was too much credit on to small a foundation, the market jolted .They do that. We cannot expect politicians to know other people`s business. We can expect them to avoid acquiring spending commitments that only work in low inflation high growth full employment years.

Labour failed the Nation.

As for you idea about promising to be good later ... whatever.

I leave it to the great wisdom of the people to judge that line along with "Left my homework in the draw' and "It was only once !" and "I never inhaled"

If it makes you feel any better it could have been worse the Liberal Party were demanding even more spending for the entire period. Still lets give you a shot .

How big would you like our deficit to be now then?

Just tell me Mercian ,15% , 20% ? You do appreciate that the setting of debt against GDP is quite an artificial measure The proper measures are your historic tax base. We are currently collecting about 38% of GDP in taxes and spending about 50%.

It would better to out tit this way , we are overspending by 30-%

What do you feel that figure should be ? ..40%..

Do you really ?

I`ll give you this bone . If you suggest that Osborne has much more on his plate than the current market position would suggest you are dead right . Your solutions however , the Balls line , is one the British have looked at and laughed at.

Sovereign Debt

2011-11-11T20:29:00.000Z

Good article this

Immigration

2011-11-10T09:29:00.001Z

Schengen

George Moonbat

2011-11-08T15:17:00.001Z

Quite a good article actually

Green Party

2011-11-06T16:59:00.000Z

Go Blackshirt

International AID

2011-11-03T06:49:00.000Z

Speccy - See Links

Economics

2011-10-28T17:27:00.001+01:00

Worstall On Form

Euro RIP

2011-10-27T00:13:00.000+01:00

Lib Con thread

Doom For Labour

2011-10-25T14:12:00.002+01:00

Just thought I `d look this up

Notes

Neil Kinnock and Michael Foot both got Labour up to 47% in the polls

Labour`s 2010 election result was 257 seats for 29.7% of the vote. In 1997 John Major got 165 seats for a percentage point more.

A majority Labour government has left office as a result of an election defeat four times – in 1951, 1970 and 1979 – and 2010.In two of the next three elections – in 1955 and 1983 - Labour lost significant ground. Only in 1974 did Labour win back seats.

Tories- similar picture. Since Attlee’s landslide, a Tory government has lost office three times – in 1964, in Feb 1974, and in 1997. In each case they did no better, or significantly worse, in the next election – in 1966, in Oct 74 and in 2001.

Comment I made

2011-10-25T09:16:00.000+01:00

Leon I love adore idea that the only thing that stops the might of your intellect prevailing is the bias of the media . Could it be, Leon, that you are wrong, and not only wrong, but neither especially well informed or intelligent ?
Lets see shall we, there is no bias here .

Firstly think about the issues. Has there ever been a majority in this country for being ruled by Brussels just for the sake of it ;you know, so they can make us allow prisoners to vote and be unable to control our borders, popular stuff like that? Absolutely not.

Lets be clear then.That is the true position of the pro EU nuts here, for god knows what utopian anti national reasons. And no-one supports it .

Aside from the Lib Con loons, there is the pragmatic problem that concerns the majority. The key question is this ” Would you leave the EU if a viable alternative trading relationship was possible?”

That proposition has near unanimous support for leaving not to say its own political Party currently on 6% not far off half the current Lib Dem Support. How anyone with a any residual belief in democracy weasel out of a referendum, at the very least with a pathetic “It might not be fair” excuse defeats me. A referendum ?! There should be immediate action taken by our elected representatives on our behalf , they already know what we want, why do you think they are avoiding the referendum?

On the media ,don`t get me started on the surveyed and proven bias of the BBC on Europe. I will simply have to quote the evidence again as if it were not obvious. The role of the Financial Times in the Euro debate gives you some idea of the power behind the yes lobby and thats not counting the non stop use of our money to persuade us by the EU itself
Who do you think finances and supports the Welsh and Cornish separatist movements and border regions, designed to undermine the integrity of the Nation.. go on ..ask me.

The question is not, do we stay in, or can we think for ourselves without the assistance of arrogant students .The question is ” Do we fear an protectionist assault by our Franco German enemies sufficiently that we dare not refuse their rule over us ?” In essence the suggestion of the pros is that we ought to.

Its a big scare story

1 Firstly the real problems of tarrifs in the 60s and 70s no longer exist and are better dealt with along global lines WTO and GATT , this will never be resolved but it is clearly not assisted at this point by an organisation whose purpose is to protect mighty whitey from cheap imports.

2 The EU has 53 Free Trade Agreements which will soon expand to 74 more . Other options are EFTA or the EEA which have costs but are still vastly better.

3 We would get the best agreement ever .They have more to lose than we do .Our trade deficit in manufactured good s is £34.9 billion including iconic brands in their biggest markets. BMW , Audi , Bosch Fridges Hi Fi its endless and then wine food and so on, we are a bigger customer to them than they are to us.The suggestion they refuse to sell us their cars and washing machines is childish. It will not happen.

3 One good reason why not is the fact that Europe and it high tax ultra regulated model is declining in relative terms . It was at 36% of world output in 1980 and is headed for 15% in 2020 much of which is only debt acquired form the real productive centres of the word who we have foolishly ignored.

(The parasite of rewarding failure has flourished in the post war European hot house because it could its time is no running out as the retreat of the left across Europe shows.)

4 -80% of British trade is internal of the 20% which we allow to ruin the rest 10% is EU bound which ,as we see is highly unlikely to e affected . Lets us say there is a 1 or 2% reallocation of our export to our better markets China India the US ,,..its all good, and the long term advantageous of engaging with the growing world economies are advantages we cannot afford not to capture anyway.

Norway only has to make a few changes to its laws to make its exports EU complaint and oddly enough this was precisely the deal that was sold to the British people the last time they were allowed a say in 1975. Its just a lie that we will have to do it all but have no sa ,( not that we have as say anyway )
Mean while under the coalition powers are continually flowing from Parliament , I can give you a list since the last election. Far from moving our way the flow is in the other direction costing jobs competitiveness and livelihoods at every turn.

We can no longer afford not to leave te EU and a referendum is required immediately from which the mandate will emerge. A decision now to confirm membership would be a disaster or ERM or Euro proportions .

Right then Leon , you were saying how clever you were .
Over to you.

Euro

2011-10-24T09:16:00.001+01:00

Why we should join the Euro by idiots

Out of Europe

2011-10-23T21:21:00.000+01:00

Fraser Nelson

EU OUT

2011-10-22T09:19:00.001+01:00

Out of the EU

Euro

2011-10-21T22:34:00.001+01:00

Why do we save it ?

2011-10-21T22:10:00.000+01:00

Austerity Myth

Constitutional History

2011-10-19T23:15:00.000+01:00

Interesting stuff

What Cuts

2011-10-19T20:53:00.001+01:00

What cuts

Free Schools

2011-10-18T05:49:00.000+01:00

Twigg gives in

Seamus Milne

2011-10-18T05:44:00.000+01:00

Wanker of this parish

Tax

2011-10-17T06:44:00.001+01:00

Complexity of Tax Code

Immigration

2011-10-17T06:26:00.000+01:00

immigration Poll

Electoral Register

2011-10-12T22:43:00.001+01:00

Hmmm

Corporate Tax

2011-10-12T21:36:00.001+01:00

Who Pays

Devolution

2011-10-12T00:19:00.000+01:00

Simon Jenkins on Devolution

Unemployment

2011-10-11T21:05:00.002+01:00

Firing costs increase unemployment

Fake

2011-10-11T21:01:00.000+01:00

Oxfam Politics Charities

Poverty

2011-10-11T19:32:00.001+01:00

Poverty

Banks

2011-10-09T22:55:00.001+01:00

Should we.. .could we ( Tim Congdon)

How down are we ?

Winter Fuel Allowance

2011-10-07T14:59:00.001+01:00

Hilarious

Growth

2011-10-02T21:57:00.001+01:00

Summary by John Redwood

Growth

2011-10-02T21:57:00.000+01:00

Summary by John Redwood

Europe

2011-09-30T23:28:00.002+01:00

Hannan

Forum Thread 1

Forum Thread 2

How Generous are benefits

2011-09-30T20:12:00.001+01:00

Good Thread

Capitalism

2011-09-28T19:56:00.000+01:00

Creative Destruction

Milliband Narrative

2011-09-25T18:47:00.001+01:00

How is he wrigglin'

Nice comments on when he turned on Murdoch and Milne

Why Spend

2011-09-21T22:50:00.001+01:00

Funny

Why Keynes Will Not Work

2011-09-21T21:08:00.000+01:00

See comment

EU Survey

2011-09-20T20:58:00.001+01:00

EU Survey

Social Mobility

2011-09-17T21:51:00.004+01:00

Study

Dominic Lawson

Changing social Status

Private Versus Public Education

2011-09-13T11:45:00.001+01:00

Lib Con stats and inf

Abortion Law

2011-09-04T22:49:00.000+01:00

Abortion Law

NHS

2011-09-02T22:21:00.003+01:00

NHS

Debt In Simple

2011-08-30T21:16:00.001+01:00

Redwood

Riots Black and White

2011-08-29T23:36:00.001+01:00

Interesting Stuff From Bob B

British Jobs For British Workers

2011-08-29T23:26:00.000+01:00

Bob B as full of data as ever

Foot

2011-08-07T17:59:00.000+01:00

useful idiot

Comment I Made

2011-08-05T05:50:00.001+01:00

NHS
Leon the UK does not spend an inordinately large part of its GDP on Healthcare , it does have a uniquely state dominated health sector. Furthermore the vast increase in cash thrown at it has not achieved commensurate benefits .It has killed off alternative private health provision. The results of this are two fold , while we get good health results per buck( which, true to form, the state takes credit for, a highly dubious contention ) we get poor results on things that may matter to individuals, like cancer recovery. Britain has always been somewhat health orientated and health is delivered to the population by reliable low level jobsworth stuff . The NHS provides good coverage but thats about it .
For ordinary people you cannot say it is a good deal the taxes spent on the NHS would buy you about £500,000 of health insurance . I know what I would prefer , many people whose parents, say,do not fit the Soviet view of whose life matters would agree.
The reason this international absurdity is able to continue is not, as you might think the fundamentally socialist nature of the Brtiish but the fact that it redistributes from young to old and poor to rich and from ill-educated to educated ensuring that class advantage tells as much if not more than it would have done anyway. Life expectancies in poor areas remain a standing indictment of the post war socialist model . Thus it was easy for Cameron to sell ” Don`t touch the NHS” to his older voters.
Your simple attitude is awfully handy to vested interests , but then the naturally bovine have always been handy to power brokers; always will be .

On the situation of the Laffer curve the research was done by the IFS under Robert Chote and it is a matter of projecting actual empirical results not imagining what would in a vacuum. On this subject the answer is simple. You don`t know what you are talking about .Sorry but there it is .

Left wingery in Europe stands at a point of crisis having been in retreat for years and David Milliband ( The PLP `s leader over the water ) pointed to the fact that Social Democracies failure was not just a British phenomena . It has not had universally good results, Norway sits on a Lake of Oil so ignore that . Sweden established its industries under conditions of ruthless capitalism, has a tiny population vast resources and a legendary habit of social obedience . For example they changed the side of the road they drive on in one day. Imagine that here. Imagine Italy ( another large state ) or Greece , (another triumph for the left ) .Nonetheless its tax code is less redistributive than ours if greater in magnitude

The really sad thing is that government spending as a % of GDP is now getting over 50% in this country whilst taxes are about 38/9%… what does that tell you ?
Government spending in Sweden and Denmark , your top lefty heavens is hardly any more.

In other words you are living in your socialist paradise without as yet paying for it , how do you like it ?

Australia achieves social mobility reasonable equality prosperity ,fiscal sense and a lively democracy with out having East Germany inflicted on it. Why not take that as the model ?
PS
Do you know what you have become Leon …a conservative . We need reform and your backward looking sepia tinted crackly radio nostalgia is running out of time.

Stats

2011-08-01T13:43:00.001+01:00

100 years

Polly Pot Shot

2011-07-26T23:12:00.000+01:00

Worstall shoots , Worstall scores

Best Song Ever

2011-07-19T23:41:00.000+01:00

Van Morrison " Will you be my baby ...yes I will"

Fascism and The War

2011-07-17T14:06:00.001+01:00

Bob B links in the thread are ace

Fasscim and The War

2011-07-17T14:06:00.000+01:00

Freedom

2011-07-16T13:08:00.001+01:00

If Lewes stands for anything it should be standing up for the Daily Mail.The Guardian and its tribe are having an orgy of self congratulation at their defeat of Murdoch. The prominence of local left wing campaigner Nick Davies gives us a special interest

OK,they broke the law but they were not alone. In “What Price Privacy Now“, the information Commissioners reports on a ubiquitous trade in illegally obtained information. In the league table of offenders the Mirror is prominent. The News of The World was better than many.

Is i , in any case, a simple issue? Many MPs of ,still sore about expenses, are delighted to shut that window on the truth. Nixon would have liked a bit less pilfering and while there is a debate to be had I question whether a howling mob, justifiably enraged by the sick making treatment of the Dowler family, have much to add to it .

Lets not waste sympathy on the digger. His acolytes colluded in the corrupt relationship between the political power brokers and the media through the Blair and Brown period. Parliament was replaced by a media obsessed entourage of self delighted courtiers like Alistair Campbell. An end to that would be welcome and Cameron seems to be gasping the opportunity

On the other hand Polly Toynbee wants to neuter the Mail with some sort of supercharged PCC and who knows what Fascist legislation .Liberal Conspiracy the top leftwing blog , carried a post recommending we enforce political ”neutrality” on the printed media. In whose opinion? The same people that entrusted Polly Toynbee with editorship of social affairs at the BBC no doubt .

I fear an unholy alliance of would-be troughers, corrupt elitists, and freedom hating socialists turning the blood lust on all their enemies. Danger, Will Robinson; danger !

That’s why Lewesians of all shades of opinion must defend the Mail. Put it this was “He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from opposition; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach himself” (Tom Paine .)

Nowt

2011-07-15T14:28:00.001+01:00

Ha! That housing bubble has been about to pop for two years now. In fact every time anyone mentions that a fiscally conservative administration could have guided this country through the last ten years vastly better than the spend -o -maniacs we foolishly trusted.

Despite Australia’s supposed dependence on minerals it was able to sail through the Asian recession as well as this one. Oops

Yes Sweden is a high tax state but it is less redistributive because there is much less to redistribute from and to. They start off much more equal ( as do Australians to whom your objection is what exactly ? )

Swedish prosperity is based on huge resources and space per head and industries established under conditions of ferocious capitalism. Its wealth was not caused by the state it happened despite the state. The fact it was the extremely fortunately placed and socially compliant allowed collectivism to flourish as a parasite does on the healthiest body. That phase of history is now ending as Europe sinks into relative torpor and indebtedness .

Nonetheless both countries are interesting and much at the heart of coalition thinking, on education for example ( Sweden) which you forgot .

Finally on Sweden you have to realize quite how bovine and tedious they are. The fans of Nordic social democracy (now in retreat) never actually want to go there.

Do you know they changed the side of the road they drive on one day. Imagine that here ..imagine it in Italy. They just like the life of a battery chicken. It would not suit me and I daresay I would soon be off somewhere chilly for a long vacation courtesy of New Labour.

Don`t get me started on the BBC I just assumed no-one else would put up with a near monopoly state broadcaster....

2011-07-12T01:02:00.002+01:00

What Price Privacy

What Price Privacy Now

Public Sector

2011-07-06T15:05:00.000+01:00

Ok I `ll bite .... It is fairly shocking that day or two after Lord Patten described BBC pay levels as, "..one of the most toxic reasons for the public’s lack of sympathy with the BBC", that they publish, on what is tax payer funded web site, a piece that virtually quotes TUC Press releases on the same subject.

Comparisons are difficult true but that misses the point entirely. The Public Sector have been better paid for years. The point is, that at a time when we are supposedly pulling in our spending belts the wealth creating side of the country is the one taking the hit while the Union protected tax eating side is the one having an easy ride. That is after rises of an additional 15% during the Blair/ Brown period. That cannot be right for the country.

The unions have been defending their better deals on the basis of grads for a long long time. Whether the reward given a teacher as compared to an executive in a competitive industry is really determined by possession of a degree is .... ahem.. questionable but it is not questionable that whilst more money has poured into the client state it has spawned ever bushier management structures (the private sector has flattened out .)

Not only do we now have 40% of graduates going into the dependent sector ( thats about 20% of the work force) but 50% of top grads as more and more supposed higher level jobs are divided up

If you include employers Pension contributions ( and this is from the ONS) the media Public Sector employee gets a full 30% more and if you put in the true cost *(including future treasury balances to the fund) the Premium is more like 50% overall.

The reason for the surplus is basically the Unions and lack of competitive consequences. Same as the tube drivers and it matters not if they have a degree or press a button and have a sandwich.

Lewes has a lot of public sector work and many will no doubt disagree . OK I value teachers and so on and lets talk about it .

Surely even those people can see that having the BBC`s 24 hour a day disinformation is absurd at such a time when their interest is so obvious . We cannot have Pavda news in a free country

Public Sector Pay

2011-07-06T13:57:00.000+01:00

Public Sector Pay

Overseas Aid

2011-07-06T06:54:00.001+01:00

Aid

Euro

2011-07-04T06:56:00.000+01:00

Euro ..who was wrong

Public Sector Pay

2011-07-01T22:58:00.001+01:00

BOM Rocks