The election 2015

Cheerio then Clive, but you've been called out to find evidence of when the Tories were warning that the UK was heading for the rocks in what became known as the credit crunch, and you can't find it (because it ain't there) - put simply, they didn't foresee it and would have done the same. You still refuse to acknowledge the debt structure and graphs I've sourced for you, because it doesn't support your blind narrative. I'm sure everyone can see that.

I've provided you a list of the capital programmes they cancelled and suspended, and that (I'm afraid) is the best they could come up with. It's hardly substantial is it?. Gareth Bale costs more than most of these projects which we're being led to believe were bankrupting the UK. Some of these cancelled projects were more related to dogma anyway such as the Future Jobs Fund. The Tories cancelled it yes, but replaced it with another one which focused on the private sector, the net saving was negligible. You might recall that particular scheme collapsed as, (predominantly retailers) withdrew from it when the SWP (of all groups) successfully shone a bright light into the murky employment practises that it was concealing. With their reputations at stake, the employers accepted that they'd been caught out trying to obtain cheap labour in unskilled work, with next to no training progression, and withdrew.

The deficit rose because of a massive deterioration in the economic climate caused by the collapse of the banking system and need to refloat it. This created a perfect storm as obviously it involved the direct loss of tax revenues, and increased the consequential spend on direct and indirect benefits associated with unemployment. This is where I'd take issue with Benny, as I doubt a rainy day fund could have been built up capable of absorbing all these 'hits'. The Tories would have faced the same. It wasn't caused by extravagant spend on capital programmes. The coalition suspended many of those they suspected of being the cause, but ultimately reintroduced them. Will you at least confirm that HS2 costs more than the combined total. Whilst you're at it, will you also confirm that their frankly idiotic decision to sponsor a civil war in Libya also cost more than the entire capital budget cut? the ramifications of which are washing up on Italy's coast of course
 
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BennyB said:
The Tories wouldn't have prevented the crisis, or regulated the banks more heavily. They would have spent less money pre crisis and been in a better position, with less debt and a lower deficit, when the crisis hit..
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Quite frankly, I think they had their head buried (rightly or wrongly) in one or two issues, e.g Hague's save the pound campaign, they weren't even on the pitch in terms of ideologically or economically challenging Labour until David Cameron got to work on them.

As has been said before, Blair did much of their own work for them, and under his rule there just wasn't an effective opposition party. If there had been maybe Iraq wars wouldn't have been so easy to undertake.

And it wasn't just the Tory party in a state of paralysis either, half our media were under the same spell with good old Alistair Campbell applying his spin-doctorate on them at every given opportunity.

At least now we're in an age where if a politician picks his nose the wrong way he'll be challenged.

Ps, I personally think the deficit should be reduced at a slower rate than proposed so I'm more likely to vote Labour this week.
 
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marble said:
At least now we're in an age where if a politician picks his nose the wrong way he'll be challenged.
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We'll see what happens to the review regarding Greville Janner

And having initially refused to rise to Clive's baiting and what i suspect has to be wilful misinterpretation, eventually I found myself compelled to.

This is what he wrote:

"I will leave others to reflect but the highlighted quote, which is total crap and Insinuates a point that I have NOT made and never would. It sums up the way you go about things".

Just to summarise, we're looking at the bit he (Clive) highlighted, and the suggestion that I have insinuated he said something that he "never would". So the bit of my post he chose to highlight is;

"At least Benny accepts that the Tories would also have crashed into exactly the same problem, and almost certainly have done exactly the same as Labour as there is precious little to no evidence, that they were flashing red warning lights ahead of it."

The use of the phrase "at least", to begin the sentance with, should give a clue. Most people who possess an understanding of the English language and its use, would recognise the phrase excludes Clive by clear implication and attaches the description instead to Benny by way of inclusion. That is to say, I'm saying "at least Benny accepts" which clearly acknowledges that he (Clive) doesn't.

Clive, you are very hard work! but it's not a bad way of avoiding the substance of the thread otherwise
 
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Whatever the tribal arguments, be they pro-Labour or pro-Conservative, the National Debt is currently running at £1.5 TRILLION and by 2018/2019 that is forecast to cost £75 billion per annum in interest payments alone.

That figure of £75 billion is more than the combined annual Defence and Transport budgets. It puts into context trivial "deficit reduction" measures like introducing Mansion Tax. As ever all politicians dance round the edges to get their grubby fingers on the keys to power for 5 years. The big picture is frightening, and they have no answers.

"We're doomed, doomed, I tell ye" as Private Fraser would say to Captain Mainwaring.
 
May as well get some money put of the Bullingdon bum boys I've also done a double 4/1 coalition with the rancid Liberals and Cameron to be pm at 5/4 don't quitye understand why prices are so big,looks like clegg would sell his soul so looks the only possible outcome..
 
gigilo said:
May as well get some money put of the Bullingdon bum boys I've also done a double 4/1 coalition with the rancid Liberals and Cameron to be pm at 5/4 don't quitye understand why prices are so big,looks like clegg would sell his soul so looks the only possible outcome..
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Surprised they let you do that double - massive related contingency. May well get palped.
 
My own suspicion is that the undecideds will break for the Tories in the last 24 hrs and they'll just sneak a small majority (I won't call it a working majority as it'll be a de facto coalition with UKIP in everything but name). In case anyone doesn't understand what I'm saying, the Tories have about 20 MP's who are closer to UKIP than they are Tories! Having said that, the Tories campaign has been extremely negative throughout, which would lead me to conclude that their own private polling is poitning them towards a coalition

I have little doubt that the younger Liberals who were weaned on Blair/ Brown would prefer to continue as they are, which is why I feel Clegg and Alexander have to win their own seats. It's possible that both could be ousted by Friday. However, the liberals first call at this stage will be to continue as they are in coalition with Cameron. I persoanlly suspect Cameron wouldn't be totally averse to this if the alternative was being beholden to his own looney fringe instead. Either way, he's going to have a restraining liberal or rabid UKIP influence on him.

We could have a situation though where the anti Tory family has a majority of the seats even if the Lib/ Con has the most solid bloc. Could Labour go into coalition with the SNP? Miliband has ruled it out, and although the consensus view is to not believe him, I wouldn't be so sure. He could easily find (for reasons of party strategy rather than the national interest) that he can't invite the SNP into a coalition. If he does, then at a stroke he costs Labour about 40 seats in Scotland for ever and for now, and even opens up the prospect of client labour parties developing elsewhere within the movement on a geographic basis. He could take the view that the Scots need to learn the hard way that a vote for the SNP is a vote for the Tories, and consequently allow a fragile conservative/ liberal coalition to continue. Will the Scots continue voting SNP if it keeps delivering them conservative governments? Miliband could easily find that he has to take one on the chin for the future national appeal of the party.

However ..... what if the Liberals then sided with Labour.

Might Labour play poker and say we'll vote you down with the anti parties aligned, and we have the maths to do it? But if the Liberals threw in with Labour to eclipse the Tories, the DUP and Nigel Falange they could potentially render the SNP spectators? Might the Liberals say this is in the national interest? It's not as if the either the SNP or Plaid could vote with the Tories and expect to retain any credibility amongst their core vote, so they become passive in effect, and the SCots don't gain any influence for returning SNP MP's

Interetsing scenarios

All of which assumes of course that they don't call another election within 6 weeks. I'm not so sure that the opposition parties if they had the maths to do so, would benefit from defeating a Queens Speech. The likelihood is that the Tories would win a majority on the next election that would follow it
 
No point in discussing the politics or even what I might think might happen but the betting is worth considering. Based on the spreads for number of seats won, you get the following for the 'major' parties:
287 Con
267 Lab
51 SNP
25 LibDem
3 UKIP
but, if you look at the odds for the individual constituencies and say that the favourite will win, you get:
277 Con
265 Lab
55 SNP
26 LibDem
9 DUP
5 Sinn Fein
3 Plaid
3 SDLP
3 UKIP
1 Green
1 Independent
1 Respect
1 Speaker

The latter figures would make it very difficult for the Tories to construct any kind of workable coalition even with the threshold at 323 allowing for the Speaker and Sinn Fein being absent. Like Warbler, I expect the Tory vote to harden by Thursday but there has to be some kind of betting angle with the above figures. One seat to watch out for is my former domecile in Wirral West. In the Thatcher/Major years it was Tory under David Hunt but went New Labour in 97 (Stephen Hesford) and stayed that way until the last election when Esther McVey won it back. A high-flyer under Cameron, she's currently in great danger of losing and this seat might just be a bell-weather for the whole country.
 
gigilo said:
May as well get some money put of the Bullingdon bum boys I've also done a double 4/1 coalition with the rancid Liberals and Cameron to be pm at 5/4 don't quitye understand why prices are so big,looks like clegg would sell his soul so looks the only possible outcome..
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Which bookie laid you this then?
 
Some mug indies in centre of town got on in 3 shops let me have the treble with 285 seats as well,can see the con/lib 6/4 come thursday and Cameron odds on at 4/6,they also let me do placepots in there as well that don't go in pool,very noce of them..:cool:
 
I'm fairly sure that it was a fairly hefty Clement Freud touch that made the bookies change their rules on election betting.
 
Spreads with 365 look nailed on as well cons 276-300 evens and labour 251-275 evens can't see anyway those figures will be out..
 
If they do, (and I think they will) it's likely to be through a combination of the undecided's but also a collapse in UKIP, which might give you an angle elsewhere. I wouldn't be shocked if UKIP failed to win a seat, albeit Falanage might get through.

The BNP got 5% at the last GE, so one assumes that this is UKIP's floor limit now. I reckon they could easily end up with <10% as Tories come home (same thing will happen in a Euro referendum as well).

Will the Scots do something similar though and realise at the eleventh hour that they're on the verge of putting the Tories in (ironic isn't it!). I suspect they won't. They're either going to look like the most savvy voters in Europe if they succeed in enfranchising a strong regional lobby with all the over representation and influence this involves, which falls outside the labour whip. Or they're going to look like the biggest chumps who ever put a cross on a ballot sheet if Miliband is good to his word, freezes them out, and accepts opposition. The problem Miliband faces here is that if he invites them into coalition, then the Scots will repeat that voting preference in the future, and long term, it might even start to set off resentment within the Labour party by English region. I'm sure both sides could cobble together a temporary agreement on policy, but long term can Labour really afford to risk permanently shedding 40 seats by legitimising the SNP vote? Probably not. I'm guessing that the Scots could be miscalculating a bit here that Labour will work with the SNP in a formal coalition. I'm not sure that's a given. It's a high stakes game of poker
 
It's a terrible condemnation of Milliband and the "Labour" Party that there is a chance of this Tory shower being re-elected.

Who was it who said "there is no alternative"?
 
Conservative Overall Majority is currently ~16/1 on Betfair which looks reasonable value

I feel there may be a replay of the 'shy tory' vote of 1992 when many disaffected dyed-in-the-wool conservative voters blustered to the pollsters they'd be voting labour/liberal but didn't come the privacy of the polling station and pencil. The bluster this time is UKIP! UKIP!

Likewise, I feel (and fervently hope) that SNP won't do as well as predicted and Labour will hold on to rather more seats in Scotland than anticipated...which might rather bollox-up my cunning Conservative Overall Majority punt, but 'tis only a fun bet to keep me awake into the small hours

My heart would like the Greens to do well at the expense of the Liberals. Come on the good burghers of Sheffield Hallam, go as leafy green as your constituency!
 
I've long felt resentful at certain things about Scotland; free prescriptions, cheaper further education etc and I think the England/Scotland divide is going to be a minefield if the SNP hold the balance of power after tomorrow.I spend a lot of time in The Borders and felt incredibly uncomfortable there last autumn before the vote; in fact nationalism [if that's the right word] makes me uncomfortable in general.As a lifelong Labour voter I'm still undecided as to who to vote for tomorrow. Can't even vote for the Greens given that they want to ban the Grand National. Might make my decision after watching Ballott Monkeys tonight.
 
Drone said:
My heart would like the Greens to do well at the expense of the Liberals. Come on the good burghers of Sheffield Hallam, go as leafy green as your constituency!
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I assume you're aware of the Green Party stance on horse racing ?
 
Diamond Geezer said:
I assume you're aware of the Green Party stance on horse racing ?
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I am indeed and I don't agree with their stance but I've yet to encounter any political party/movement/dogma that I'm in full agreement with. If one is to vote, as everyone should, then choosing the party whose policies you least disagree with would seem the only alternative to cowardly abstaining or blowing one's brains out

Much as I enjoy seeing horses run around fields there is a bigger world view to consider

And regarding the Grand National: if that wholly atypical bad advert for racing were banned I for one wouldn't lose any sleep. The Earth Summit/Suny Bay match was a wonderful display of steeplechasing and horsemanship but other than that the race has never done much for me

I am an oddball, admittedly
 
Their policy for anybody interested. Not too mental...

AR426 The Green Party will end the exploitation of animals in horse racing, greyhound racing and all situations where animals are commercially raced. There would be an immediate ban on the use of the whip in horse racing and in jumps racing, and on the use of a non-linear track in greyhound racing. A single regulatory authority would be put in place for each sport, tasked with establishing and enforcing strict welfare standards. There would be a requirement for full traceability of all animals involved in racing throughout their lives (using microchip technology where applicable) and full publication of injury and death statistics. These statistics would be used as evidence to close dangerous tracks and ban trainers with poor records. Breeding and import of animals for racing will be tightly regulated and monitored to improve welfare and prevent over-breeding. There would be regulation on the conditions and times of transportation of animals used in sport as well as the housing of all animals. A high level of compulsory levy would be imposed on all betting, to be used solely for welfare improvements.
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I genuinely think the Greens will outperform tomorrow. Any thoughts on how I can back up that view with cash?
 
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