General election July 4th

[Chillidoggy]

36 minutes ago, Kimbers said:

Fact Checking of the Greens and, as normal, their ability to figure out matching their policies with Reality are lacking  and  would hit lower earners.

"Institute for Fiscal Studies deputy director Helen Miller said the Greens were unlikely to raise as much revenue as expected.

"Overall borrowing would end up around £80 billion a year higher," she said, adding a recurrent wealth tax would be tough to implement and “would hit a lot of workers on not terribly high salaries - many nurses and teachers for example."

And how, on earth, do they plan this? Surely 200 people flying in one plane is better than 200 people using their cars cause the train ain't gonna work!!

"Banning domestic flights for journeys that take less than three hours by train."

That’s when the trains aren’t on strike.

[LotusLeftLotusRight]

4 hours ago, pete said:

April was hardly representative of what is actually happening,weather was awful, better to look at 3 monthly Feb. To April. It rose 0.7%

Blimey, UK economy grinds to a halt because it rained.

[C8RKH]

30 minutes ago, LotusLeftLotusRight said:

Blimey, UK economy grinds to a halt because it rained.

And to add context. Thank fcuk for Brexit eh?  🤔  It does make you wonder why everyone is so doom and gloom all the time. Maybe a bit mote positivity would be better for everyone.

In Q1 2024, UK GDP increased by 0.6% compared with the previous quarter (Q4 2023), following two successive quarters of contraction. Eurozone GDP rose by 0.3%, while US GDP grew by 0.4% in Q1 2024.

 

And for more context:

[LotusLeftLotusRight]

Haha. Quoting Brexit. Lies, damn lies and statistics. From the same source. Eurozone 3.4% growth since pre-pandemic level, UK 1.7%. We are dragging behind.

[Barrykearley]

That’s the best thing about statistics guys - you can make them portray anything.

its all irrelevant lies and only each individual can say if its been good for them or not. Most people live in complete isolation to the entire “brexit” issue anyway so for large swathes of society it matters not. Still have bog roll on the shelves and there’s been no shortage of food.

this election however is going to be interesting. Starmer and the Labour Party assume that the conservatives will loose loads of votes to reform. What he’s not considering is the amount of Labour voters whom may well do so. Let’s face it - starmer and rishi are cut from the same establishment cloth.

 

and why oh why are we obsessed with continued growth. Why can no one be happy with sustainability?

[exeterjeep]

This may be minor but another own goal for the cheats etc in the Tory party. 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c722eyxxknro

Sunak aide admits placing bet on general election

"may constitute an offence of cheating under Section 42 of the Gambling Act, which is a criminal offence".

[Timbotucker]

22 hours ago, C8RKH said:

And in your considered opinion, who should "we" vote for and why?

Far be it from me to tell anyone who to vote for but my amazement is how short are people’s memory.

Remember “new Labour” zero road tax on clean small diesels 😂 just one that comes to mind but to vote red for a guy who knelt to the Marxist regime. who wouldn’t comment on whether a woman can have a penis and helped Salville avoid prosecution is not fit to lead a conga never mind a country. These are just small, trivial incidents but they have no meaningful intentions to us “normal” folk and are far from the party of working class people.

Then we have the blue team, do I really need to explain their failings 🙄, these people are the same individuals who let old people die alone, then stopping the family gathering at the funeral. Instigated the biggest medical injustice in human history and organised the biggest transfer of wealth in modern times. All I see is so many people repeating and believing the MSM on all accounts, yet their lies are so blatant now, will we ever learn?

That Meme of the wolf and sheep is unfortunately too close to society, I come from and live in a farming community and we have just had enough of these bobble head, little dictators thinking they know best 🤨, you see the protests in Europe from the farmers there but not on the MSM.

All I’m saying is I wish people would look away from the MSM and see other candidates, to give either red or blue any power will be all our downfall.

 

[MPx]

4 hours ago, Barrykearley said:

and why oh why are we obsessed with continued growth. Why can no one be happy with sustainability?

This in spades Barry.

Clearly everlasting continual growth effectively reduces debt and allows us all to live beyond our means.  But that comes at the cost of ever increasing population, consumption and resource depletion.  Currently there's still a fair bit of the world who are catching up, but they're all coming on fast so growth in the long term is simply not possible (ignoring the potential for other life forms and/or other planets for us to exploit). 

But we're very short termist and greedy and greed drives incredibly hard.  Early in the last millennia when I was taught economics and accountancy there was a pricing model that essentially said look at costs/overheads and add (say) 13% profit to fix your price.  But current method pricing is just whatever the market will stand so multi 100 % mark ups are now expected and common place and rarely has much to do with costs, just greed.  It was all laid out starkly to me when John Harvey Jones went to Morgan in 2000 and tried to disrupt their business.  Yes there was obvious nonsense with the factory layout and other issues - but the fundamental thing he couldn't get his head round was that they weren't interested in growth.  They had a business which produced a niche product at a rate that demand outstripped supply enough to keep prices profitable with a long enough waiting list to confirm ongoing business.  The owners made a (very) good living, were proud of their company, workforce, and product, but they weren't oligarchs.  JHJ clearly thought they should be trying to become richer - he had absolutely no concept of how much is "enough", or the contentment that can come from factors other than wealth.  My guess is we won't learn to appreciate that stuff until we have to - which, given the exponential nature of these things,  I'm expecting will be before the end of this century.  In some ways it can't come soon enough but it will be a very unpleasant ride while the adjustments are made (think world war 3) so I'm hoping its after my alloted time.

[Chillidoggy]

I’ve had no flyers though the letterbox, seen nothing on billboards, and nothing locally to suggest who the candidates are in my ward.

I ended up doing a Google search to find out. And when I did, I recognised none of them. The only thing I did find out was that it appears the local Labour candidate doesn’t actually live in the area.

Honestly, I have no idea where to cast my vote.

[exeterjeep]

36 minutes ago, Chillidoggy said:

Honestly, I have no idea where to cast my vote

think you are not the only one.

[Barrykearley]

Seriously my car tax on the Esprit has skyrocketed this year. All I know for sure is it started with a 2 last year and this year it’s starting with a 3.

i also never had sky tv growing up - the struggles are real.

[exeterjeep]

https://cardealermagazine.co.uk/publish/what-have-the-political-parties-said-they-will-do-for-drivers/303138

Labour has announced today it will reinstate the 2030 ban on new petrol and diesel vehicles should it win the election on July 4.

adding that Labour was the only party ‘truly on the side of drivers’.

[red vtec]

On 09/06/2024 at 17:22, DDubya said:

The Greens are fielding candidates in every constituency across the uk. Hundreds of them popping up on my Twitter feed, but fu*k me, collectively it looks like an episode of Fraggle Rock! We’re doomed I’ll tell thee! Doomed!

The Greens are known as watermelons. green on the outside, red on the inside as they are formed from the old communist party. 

[eclat22]

I did the same, I'm in Dunstable and our Labour candidate lives 70 miles away in Ely and has only just been selected. I have had our existing Tory MP visit canvassing, I'm not holding my breath waiting for the Labour represntive.

 

Edited June 13 by Bibs

[Chillidoggy]

I think our Labour candidate lives 110 miles away from here.

[pete]

2 hours ago, Chillidoggy said:

I think our Labour candidate lives 110 miles away from here.

Sensible.

[Kimbers]

Looked everywhere and can't see this on BBC but Reform just went ahead of the Conservatives in the polls!

https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/reform-uk-overtakes-pm-sunaks-conservatives-opinion-poll-2024-06-13/#:~:text=The poll by YouGov for,topped the poll with 37%.

[pete]

What a waste of time the televised debates are. None of the questions answered directly and constant squabbling and accusations . To me the only one that came over reasonable was the Welshman.

[Kimbers]

Why is it that supporters of the Greens and left are so rude and just plain nasty to the likes of Farage and Sunak, especially in shouting over them to not let them speak and personal attacks, when you don't see it the other way?

Just listened to Farage on Radio 5 Live interview and he was making sense somewhat. However when one bloke comes on and tells him to "You are only in it for the money, why don't you go away" his reply of "Actually if I was in it for the money I'd have stayed doing my TV program" was excellent.

[Chillidoggy]

Like him, or hate him, Farage is always impressive in debates, and he doesn’t care who he upsets, especially during his time as an MEP.

[LotusLeftLotusRight]

Only anecdotal to where I live (East Northants), but households here have so far received separate letters from both Kier Starmer and shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves, as well as a flyer from the local Labour candidate. Nothing at all from any other Party or candidate. This is the former safe Conservative constituency that they recently lost to Labour in a by-election after nasty MP Peter Bone was ousted and put up his girlfriend in vain to replace him. She has already been replaced as the Tory candidate this time round. If the Conservatives aren’t even putting any effort into winning a previously safe seat, they must have conceded defeat already.

[pete]

3 hours ago, Kimbers said:

Looked everywhere and can't see this on BBC but Reform just went ahead of the Conservatives in the polls!

https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/reform-uk-overtakes-pm-sunaks-conservatives-opinion-poll-2024-06-13/#:~:text=The poll by YouGov for,topped the poll with 37%.

It's all over the radio today.lots of talk of farage leading the opposition,but his opinion poll rating won't translate into MPs and unless he has a substantial number of MPs he can't be considered.

[Chillidoggy]

Slightly disappointed that Kimbers hasn’t put an election poll up.

[pete]

Got 3 weeks 

[Chillidoggy]

I reckon he could just about make it in time.