The Politics Thread

[Guest MattP]

29 minutes ago, Alf Bentley said:

 

Sadly, it sounds as if you're right. Corbyn doesn't seem to be supporting the advertised position - freedom of entry for new arrivals from the EU, but no guaranteed right to work here pending the outcome of Brexit negotiations. He just seems to be saying that improving employment conditions (a good idea) might lead to lower immigration. Presumably the idea is that if employers had to advertise jobs to locals and pay and conditions were better, then more Brits would take the crappier jobs.

 

My guess is that other Labour front benchers like Watson and Starmer twisted his arm to moderate his position on paper, but he wasn't prepared to support that position in personal interviews. What a pig-headed, virtue-signalling narcissist! 

 

Even if he personally sees no objective harm in uncontrolled immigration, there is nothing immoral in moderating his position to bring it closer to the views of those whose votes he needs to ever exert any power in British politics. As usual, I can only assume that, in practice, he views his personal purity as more important than British politics. the state of society or the lives of the people of this country. On a personal level, the scale of immigration doesn't bother me - because it doesn't directly affect me much - but it does affect some people, and many others worry about it affecting them (often without justification, but that changes nothing). Just as Cameron, Boris and the other twats could go down as the people who ruined this country, Corbyn could well go down in history as the man who destroyed the Labour Party....at a time when it could be making a comeback. Labour had its problems pre-Corbyn, but a good Labour leader could have made a lot of the current state of public dissatisfaction with Westminster, divisions in the Tory party, collapse in UKIP/Lib Dems, uncertainty over Brexit etc. I feel angrier at Corbyn than I do at any of the Tories or even Farage. I expect Tories to be undermining the sort of British society I'd like to see, that's their job. I expect Labour leaders to do some stuff that I see as beneficial, even if it's a mixed bag. I'm no fan of Blair, but even he did some good stuff among the crap. I'd rather have him back than have Corbyn!  

It's painful to watch, he's effectively spent the whole morning now denying the speech he was going to make at 3pm, or vice versa, whichever takes your fancy. We aren't wedded to freedom of movement, but I don't want to be misinterpreted, so nor do we rule it out, glad that has been cleared up. I'm still not sure if he has done a U-turn on his maximum wage (talking about ratios now rather than wage), but he has u-turned on his u-turn of a u-turn on immigration from last night and this morning.

 

In this classic video, he's Grandpa Simpson, the burlesque house is the country, his hat is his virtue signalling and Bart is his membership.

 

 

Here's what I've taken from this and the interviews this morning, for a 45 minute speech he could have drafted it into a few lines:

 

Quote

"Government unfit to negotiate Brexit, but I don't have a clue how to do it either, my position on immigration/single market access is exactly the same as Theresa May's, we need more public investment, but don't ask me where the money is coming from, big companies have too much money, NHS doesn't.

 

We need a salary cap, footballers earn too much, I don't know what it is, but it's definitely north of my salary, vote Labour"

I sound like a stuck record but it's beyond belief this man is running the party along with Diane Abbott, John McDonnell and Emily Thornberry while Chukka Umanna, Tristram Hunt, Dan Jarvis, Yvette Cooper, Kier Starmer, Alan Johnson and Hilary Benn are all sat on the backbenches or outside the shadow great offices. The party almost deserves to suffer because of the decisions it's made, I want to want them to suffer, but having a worthy opposition is to important to do that and Tim Farron in his position would just fill the house with inept Liberal Democrats.

 

What a complete utter mess at a time when our country needs the strongest government and opposition it has had for nearly a century.

 

Surely even the most ardent Corbyn fans can't still be happy with this? @cityfanlee23 @Rincewind ?

[Webbo]

I think it's a good bet we'll have an election in the spring. The tories will never have a better opportunity than this.

[cityfanlee23]

Corbyn has made it perfectly clear that it is his personal preference for a salary cap to stop the grotesque earnings some people have in this country (which is at the detriment of everyone) 

but it is not party policy, and will not be party policy until the electorate want it. The policy Corbyn has put forward is a cap on PAY RATIO to stop bosses earning 100x more than their staff. 

This was proposed by David Cameron originally, Corbyn has just been asked live on TV by Robert Peston if his plan is to impose a top wage cap and he has dismissed the idea, saying we should look to tackle ratio of pay, this is a completely sensible idea.

If a CEO wants to give himself a massive pay rise, he must first give the staff that made him the profit a pay rise to keep a ratio. 

 

Compltely sensible, the irony is the people who reject it are the ones that have nothing compared to the megarich. 

[Webbo]

4 minutes ago, cityfanlee23 said:

Corbyn has made it perfectly clear that it is his personal preference for a salary cap to stop the grotesque earnings some people have in this country (which is at the detriment of everyone) 

but it is not party policy, and will not be party policy until the electorate want it. The policy Corbyn has put forward is a cap on PAY RATIO to stop bosses earning 100x more than their staff. 

This was proposed by David Cameron originally, Corbyn has just been asked live on TV by Robert Peston if his plan is to impose a top wage cap and he has dismissed the idea, saying we should look to tackle ratio of pay, this is a completely sensible idea.

If a CEO wants to give himself a massive pay rise, he must first give the staff that made him the profit a pay rise to keep a ratio. 

 

Compltely sensible, the irony is the people who reject it are the ones that have nothing compared to the megarich. 

Why is it to the detriment of everyone for some people to be paid more than £1million? And why do you have to be megarich to reject it?

[Barky]

1 hour ago, Jon the Hat said:

Why are rail prices in this country shocking?  Why should those of us who pay for a car to drive to work subsidise the commute by train of those who dont have to have a car to get to work?  They should be higher.

 

"Oh my god it costs me £3000 a year to get to work in London!"

 

Takes out phone, opens calculator: cost of running a half decent car for a year, call it 30p a mile, average mileage 10k, OH MY god it costs me £3000 a year to get to work!

 

Before someone tells me the operating companies make a fortune, they earn approximately 3.5% margin on average, as they pay back to the government excess profit.

Your own half decent car is a much better form of transport than being sat in an overcrowded tin box bouncing along 80-year-old tracks, occasionally getting to the next station within ten minutes of the scheduled arrival time. I think it's entirely sensible to expect public transport to work out cheaper than your own half decent car.

[cityfanlee23]

Just now, Webbo said:

Why is it to the detriment of everyone for some people to be paid more than £1million? And why do you have to be megarich to reject it?

I did not say £1m, Some people earn 20m a year. 

The reason it is a detriment is that money is the grease for the wheels of the economy, if one person earns 20m its the detriment of the economy unless they spend it. 

Sir Alan Sugar has claimed he could write a cheque out for something like 150m and it would get paid on time, If someone has 150m in their bank, thats 150m cash not being spent.

 

Don't get me wrong, Im not at the stage where I am saying nobody should have any wealth, what i'm pointing out is that we need a grown up, broad discussion on money and wealth.

 

The richest 62 on earth have more accumulated wealth than the poorest 3.5 billion, they have worked hard, but not harder than the combined billions.

If the worlds billionaires made their own country, it would have a population of about 2,500, and would be the 3rd richest country on earth.

 

This is NOT sustainable, money is a tool for trade, not accumulation.  

In a debt based economy, money is debt, the only way for the economy to grow is for debt to grow with is, all this talk about "living within our means" is mathematically impossible as an economy, if someone pays off their debt, someone else has to go into debt to the same amount, this means the bottom of the earners hold more debt than the top, leading them to further borrowing, which turns the economy. This system is completely outdated and should have been abolished in 2008. 

We are relatively no better off today than we were around 1980, evergrowing debt which stifles prosperity, everything we have today is at the expense of a debt to gdp ratio of about 500% 

It can never be fixed whilst some CEO's give themselves payrises whilst cutting their staff and costs in order to keep paying themselves and shareholders. 

[Innovindil]

4 minutes ago, Barky said:

Your own half decent car is a much better form of transport than being sat in an overcrowded tin box bouncing along 80-year-old tracks, occasionally getting to the next station within ten minutes of the scheduled arrival time. I think it's entirely sensible to expect public transport to work out cheaper than your own half decent car.

It is indeed sensible to expect that. It's still not sensible to have the tax payers that don't use it pay for it.

[cityfanlee23]

1 minute ago, Innovindil said:

It is indeed sensible to expect that. It's still not sensible to have the tax payers that don't use it pay for it.

But it would provide a net profit for the treasury which lowers the taxes you pay. 

[Jon the Hat]

17 minutes ago, Barky said:

Your own half decent car is a much better form of transport than being sat in an overcrowded tin box bouncing along 80-year-old tracks, occasionally getting to the next station within ten minutes of the scheduled arrival time. I think it's entirely sensible to expect public transport to work out cheaper than your own half decent car.

I'm not sure I agree there, the benefits of the train, which is that someone else is managing everything from the track to the carriages to the staff to fuel to the station buildings, safety etc mean you get a whole lot of service for your money.  Not really comparable at all in my view.

 

It should only be cheaper if it actually is cheaper, not because taxpayer subsidise your journey!

[Innovindil]

4 minutes ago, cityfanlee23 said:

But it would provide a net profit for the treasury which lowers the taxes you pay. 

How so? Why wouldn't it just go to further lowering the prices for train users? 

[cityfanlee23]

3 minutes ago, Innovindil said:

How so? Why wouldn't it just go to further lowering the prices for train users? 

Depends how it's allocated, government could do either, put it toward services or put it toward lowering taxes. 

Either way we send billions in tax payer subsidies to train companies each year, so it's a net saving regardless, ticket inflation has been 100% average since privatization, lower ticket prices means more consumer spending, it all adds up. 

If train commuters can save £500-1000 a year on ticket prices, thats a massive tax return to the treasury as they spend it into the economy in many different companies, rather than companies we know are owned by other countries who take the money out of the UK in most cases.

[Webbo]

4 minutes ago, cityfanlee23 said:

Depends how it's allocated, government could do either, put it toward services or put it toward lowering taxes. 

Either way we send billions in tax payer subsidies to train companies each year, so it's a net saving regardless, ticket inflation has been 100% average since privatization, lower ticket prices means more consumer spending, it all adds up. 

If train commuters can save £500-1000 a year on ticket prices, thats a massive tax return to the treasury as they spend it into the economy in many different companies, rather than companies we know are owned by other countries who take the money out of the UK in most cases.

There wouldn't be any saving because as a nationalised monopoly it would be run by the unions, overmanned with a like it or lump attitude to service.

[Jon the Hat]

Just now, Webbo said:

There wouldn't be any saving because as a nationalised monopoly it would be run by the unions, overmanned with a like it or lump attitude to service.

Are we on to London Underground now?

[cityfanlee23]

Just now, Webbo said:

There wouldn't be any saving because as a nationalised monopoly it would be run by the unions, overmanned with a like it or lump attitude to service.

Nice rhetoric, we have a monopoly now in many senses, I cant jump on a different train provider to get to the same location on a single track. 

[leicsmac]

Just now, Webbo said:

There wouldn't be any saving because as a nationalised monopoly it would be run by the unions, overmanned with a like it or lump attitude to service.

Which is different to what we have now how?

 

Korea, for a country the same size and population as the UK puts us to shame when it comes to public transportation. Of course there are are a few reasons for that, though.

[Webbo]

Just now, cityfanlee23 said:

Nice rhetoric, we have a monopoly now in many senses, I cant jump on a different train provider to get to the same location on a single track. 

But it's regulated by the govt and the govt always demands higher standards of other than they do of themselves.Any business that can go out of business has to look after their customers. Anyone who can remember BR will tell you they didn't give a shit.

[Webbo]

1 minute ago, leicsmac said:

Which is different to what we have now how?

 

Korea, for a country the same size and population as the UK puts us to shame when it comes to public transportation. Of course there are are a few reasons for that, though.

Then you've answered your own question.

[cityfanlee23]

3 minutes ago, Webbo said:

But it's regulated by the govt and the govt always demands higher standards of other than they do of themselves.Any business that can go out of business has to look after their customers. Anyone who can remember BR will tell you they didn't give a shit.

I agree, but lets be clear here, that was a long time ago, the public are not as strongly sided with unions today compared to then, it would almost be impossible to return to that sort of power, almost everyone now accepts the market and government are no longer in a position to allow strikes to happen every week, even if a government supports unions. 

[leicsmac]

3 minutes ago, Webbo said:

Then you've answered your own question.

 Infrastructure is a part of it, yes - as was discussed a few pages back. But speaking of which, how is it that in a few decades they put together this bleeding edge track and train tech into a system that can get you the equivalent of London to Newcastle in two and a half hours for the equivalent of 35 quid (50 for first class), almost always on time...and yet we're stuck with what we have?

 

That they've had to built it up from nothing and maintain the standard it is still puts us to shame, even though it wasn't replacing anything. What is the difference?

[Jon the Hat]

3 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

 Infrastructure is a part of it, yes - as was discussed a few pages back. But speaking of which, how is it that in a few decades they put together this bleeding edge track and train tech into a system that can get you the equivalent of London to Newcastle in two and a half hours for the equivalent of 35 quid (50 for first class), almost always on time...and yet we're stuck with what we have?

 

That they've had to built it up from nothing and maintain the standard it is still puts us to shame, even though it wasn't replacing anything. What is the difference?

What do you do with all the passengers while you are building your new super railway on the route they take to work?

[Webbo]

1 minute ago, leicsmac said:

 Infrastructure is a part of it, yes - as was discussed a few pages back. But speaking of which, how is it that in a few decades they put together this bleeding edge track and train tech into a system that can get you the equivalent of London to Newcastle in two and a half hours for the equivalent of 35 quid (50 for first class), almost always on time...and yet we're stuck with what we have?

 

That they've had to built it up from nothing and maintain the standard it is still puts us to shame, even though it wasn't replacing anything. What is the difference?

You'd know more about Korea than me. At a guess, was it built while they were still under the dictatorship? No planning restrictions, barely any heath and safety, land's probably a lot cheaper.Perhaps the work force are more flexible? If you're starting from scratch then you'd use the latest technology whereas a lot of ours was built in Victorian times.

[leicsmac]

17 minutes ago, Jon the Hat said:

What do you do with all the passengers while you are building your new super railway on the route they take to work?

What did they do?

 

I agree that that's a problem - likely a key one - but evidently they were able to get over it.

 

16 minutes ago, Webbo said:

You'd know more about Korea than me. At a guess, was it built while they were still under the dictatorship? No planning restrictions, barely any heath and safety, land's probably a lot cheaper.Perhaps the work force are more flexible? If you're starting from scratch then you'd use the latest technology whereas a lot of ours was built in Victorian times.

It was certainly started when the generals were running the show, but the quality hasn't stopped improving since they became a democracy.

 

Like I said above (and earlier on this thread), I agree that infrastructure is an issue, but how it got there in the first place speaks of a difference in general national attitude towards such things also. I think we're missing that.

[Strokes]

42 minutes ago, Jon the Hat said:

What do you do with all the passengers while you are building your new super railway on the route they take to work?

I was just going to write this. It's far more complicated than well let's just build it.

[Guest MattP]

39 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

What did they do?

 

It was certainly started when the generals were running the show, but the quality hasn't stopped improving since they became a democracy.

 

Like I said above (and earlier on this thread), I agree that infrastructure is an issue, but how it got there in the first place speaks of a difference in general national attitude towards such things also. I think we're missing that.

We might be missing that, but you missing out the fact that South Korea was the recipient of the some of the most generous aid packages the World has ever seen from American and Japan, $60billion dollars between 1946 and 1978, a little short of what the whole of Africa received in that time.

 

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/nov/28/south-korea-development-model

 

I'm sure would could have the best railway in the World if a couple of countries decided to give us 360 billion over the next twenty years (that's the equivalent now from 1970 in money conversion so that's a very conservative estimate as well) to spend on development, HS2 is only expected to cost about a seventh of that.

 

1 hour ago, cityfanlee23 said:

Corbyn has made it perfectly clear that it is his personal preference for a salary cap to stop the grotesque earnings some people have in this country (which is at the detriment of everyone) 

but it is not party policy, and will not be party policy until the electorate want it. The policy Corbyn has put forward is a cap on PAY RATIO to stop bosses earning 100x more than their staff. 

This was proposed by David Cameron originally, Corbyn has just been asked live on TV by Robert Peston if his plan is to impose a top wage cap and he has dismissed the idea, saying we should look to tackle ratio of pay, this is a completely sensible idea.

If a CEO wants to give himself a massive pay rise, he must first give the staff that made him the profit a pay rise to keep a ratio. 

 

Compltely sensible, the irony is the people who reject it are the ones that have nothing compared to the megarich. 

The idea you will be able to force these people to do this is fantasy, for a start you would just take dividends rather than award yourself a bonus or a pay rise, that's if they even bother to stay in the country. We live in a globalised World now, the ones at the top are the ones that can up sticks and move if they want too, basing a company elsewhere in the internet age isn't a problem, it's 2017.

 

We heard this thinking from Hollande in the last French election, wealth taxes, higher rates to create more money for the treasury and low and behold it went tits up and they ended up having less to spend, it went so badly the bloke isn't even bothering to stand for re-election, let alone in with a chance of winning.

 

I don't know how many times this sort of politics has to fail before people actually try and find a different way to do it, how can they remain stuck in a mindset for so long of a tried and tested failure.

[leicsmac]

1 minute ago, MattP said:

We might be missing that, but you missing out the fact that South Korea was the recipient of the some of the most generous aid packages the World has ever seen from American and Japan, $60billion dollars between 1946 and 1978, a little short of what the whole of Africa received in that time.

 

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/nov/28/south-korea-development-model

 

I'm sure would could have the best railway in the World if a couple of countries decided to give us 360 billion over the next twenty years (that's the equivalent now from 1970 in money conversion so that's a very conservative estimate as well) to spend on development, HS2 is only expected to cost about a seventh of that.

Yep, the US paid a lot of money to make them a bulwark against the North. It's pretty clear that they spent the money well, though (when the ruling junta of the time weren't embezzling it, anyway), and I'm also sure not all of that was spent on rail infrastructure.

 

Like I said a few pages back, we won the war and are losing the peace. Perhaps we should let a country or two reduce our own country to rubble so that we have to get such things sorted rather than standing around bickering about how much it'll cost while the rest of the OECD gets away from us?