The Nobel Peace Prize
August 30th, 2006Who will be the 2006 laureate – or laureates?
An interesting market which politicalbetting contributors were discussing yesterday for the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize, to be announced on 13 October. Like many of the bookies’ novelty markets, there’s room for oddsmakers to have some fun. One doubts much money is being taken on Hugo Chávez or Oprah Winfrey.
The favourite, at 5/1 with Paddy Power, is Martti Ahtisaari (pictured), the former Social Democrat President of Finland who has taken various international roles since leaving office. He served on the commission overseeing the decommissioning of IRA weapons in Northern Ireland, and most recently led the negotiations that delivered a treaty this month between the Indonesian government and the rebel movement on Aceh.
A strong CV for the prize? Probably, but the prize is not always easy to predict, and even if Ahtisaari wins he may not be alone. If the award committee is particularly concerned to recognise the Aceh treaty, a joint award for Ahtisaari and the Indonesian president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono may result. Susilo is himself 6/1 second favourite. Punters should take note that the bookies would settle a joint award using dead heat rules – in other words, your odds would be halved if the prize went jointly to two winners, and cut even more if it were shared more widely.
My thanks to the commenters who began this discussion yesterday, particularly SBS and John O.
Philip Grant
Guest editor
Mike Smithson returns on 10th September.
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Does anyone do a War Prize?
Messrs Bush & Blair would have shared it between them for some years now, but this year might well have been pipped to the post by Mr Olmert.
I think Sam mentioned Vaclav Havel as a runner - any reason why? Great man indeed, but not sure what he’s done *this year* to merit it?
The Nobel Pece Prize is already the War Prize …. Kissinger, Le Duc Tho, Arafat, Peres …. Bliar is a worthy addition to the list.
All that is needed to win the Peace Prize is to start a bloodthirsty war. During a lull in the fighting, you permit yourself to be bought to the negotiating table for a (usually) temporary truce.
1 & 3. Jolly witty. Now, what do you two think about the odds on offer?
The Swedish elections are shaping up to be a close contest - probably the social democrats will hold on even though the conservative alliance is marginally ahead in the polls - see link below for up to date information
http://www.thelocal.se/guides/?to=election&title=the+Swedish+Election+2006
I’m not sure it’s usually a requirement that the achievements be made in the last 12 months, though I think continuing activity is required, and I’m not sure that Vaclav Havel is still doing very much in world affairs. The Committee often uses its prize to promote some cause which is not yet quite assured (the Northern Ireland ‘peace women’ got it on that basis), rather than just for solid achievement of something done and dusted. I wonder if the UN might get it - the Committee might think that it was the right time to strengthen their authority. Not Kofi Annan personally, probabl, because of the difficulties he’s had. Otherwise Ahtisaari could well be a good choice. Or perhaps someone connected with one of the African wars that have made real progress - Angola, Congo 9fragile though it is) and now Uganda?
No glaringly obvious candidates as far as I can see. Under those circumstances they seem to quite often go for an organisation rather than an individual (Medecin Sans Frontiers, Amnesty International, various UN agencies). That might be a possibility.
6. Havel also has the drawback that he fought against communism of course, making him a bourgeois counter-revolutionary.
RE 1, Spartacus, Actually I was thinking of nominating a joint prize for Olmert and Nasrallah for 1. Reducing the amount of armaments held by both sides (admitidly by firing them at each other) and showing the futility of war, when it is has not been clearly thought through.
So do we have a list of pottential candidates?
Has the award ever been awarded to an organisation like say Medican San Frontiers? If so, who could be pn that list?
Is a list of nominees published before the anouncement?
[10] Several institutions have won the Nobel peace prize:
1904 Institut de droit international
1917 International Red Cross, Geneva.
1944 International Committee of the Red Cross
1947 The Friends Service Council (UK) and The American Friends Service Committee (USA) - The Quakers
1954 The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
1969 International Labour Organization (I.L.O.), Geneva.
1981 The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
1985 International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, Boston
1988 United Nations Peace-Keeping Forces.
1995 Joseph Rotblat (Poland/UK) and the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs
1997 International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) and Jody Williams (USA)
1999 Médecins Sans Frontières, Brussels.
2005 The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and Mohamed ElBaradei Egypt)
6 & 7 — Kofi Annan & the UN won it in 2001; Medecins Sans Frontieres in 1999. Since the award is often used to give a shot in the arm to an ongoing process, Nick Palmer is probably right that Africa and Indonesia are the places to look. But as Philip Grant notes in the lead piece, joint awards are likely in the case of peace treaties.
A third category of recipients to consider, besides organisations and negotiators/signatories of peace treaties, is campaigning individuals, such as Jimmy Carter (2002), Shirin Ebadi (2003) and Wangari Maathai (2004) (it says on wikipedia).
At the moment, it looks too open so I won’t be betting. Good luck.
Btw, it is Martti Ahtisaari, not Marti Ahtisaari.
[13] Anyway his original name was Adolfson and he already has the Lenin Peace Prize…
Many thanks to cicero and John L. Most informative.
I do like the idea of Médecins Sans Frontières winning. Having delivered aid on a semi hot front line I know there work is difficult. I understand they were impressed with the Lebonease Red Cross who similarly showed much courage under fire.
On the peace treaty front I think Uganda is far too soon. I personaly do not know how the Acheh situation is panning out, but I think the Tsunami helped in a bizarre way to edge that process on.
Has any one considered Nepal?
One more factor to beware of: the names of nominees are not published, so the prize may be awarded to someone neither you nor your bookmaker has considered. It is not like a horserace or byelection, where only those listed can win.
RE 16, Thank you John L, that does answer a question I had at 10.
14. Other distinguished recepients of that award include Janos Kadar (killed lots of his fellow Hungarians), Julius Nyerere (Tanzanian dictator), Samora Machel (Mozambique dictator), Fidel Castro and Leonid Brezhnev.
We have 191 nominations of which 23 were organisations apparently…oh and look Stalin was once nominated.
Looking at the people who are allowed to nominate, does that somehow encourage a particular ‘type’ of nomination? My guess here is that the same people are often involved most actively year in year out, establishing a pattern. I can see the attraction in giving it to organisations. It’s a grandstanding type of feel to it.
19, Yokel, Where are the nomination rules?
I take your point on grandstanding, but any award of this sort is going to have to have that sort of feel to it surely? Unless you can name one which does not.
Many thanks for the article. I have emailed Betfair who will consider whether or not to open a market. Perhaps somebody else could do so now, saying there is an article here on the prize.
Last year it went to an institution; this year, I feel it is more likely to go to an individual or individuals.
The reason I take an interest in Ahtisaari, is that I lived in Finland during his Presidency. He was something of a joke as President, but everybody assured me he was a truly great diplomat. He did not seek re-nomination as his party’s candidate for president (as he may not have got it). In any case, since about 1990, the President’s role has become far less powerful in Finland, and is now more ceremonial.
I can’t see Havel getting the prize. Perhaps he should have got it in about 1978, or 1990 - but why now?
Controversial choices are available for bets - Mordechai Vanunu, Hugo Chavez, George Bush… please don’t let it be Bono or Bob Geldof!
20.”Where are the nomination rules?”
http://nobelprize.org/nomination/peace/
5- David- thanks very much for the link. What is it about international elections at the minute- all going down to the wire?
This looks like a market to avoid - or a small wager on all the long shots
Their wesbite…some interesting stuff in there.
I’m guessing there might just be a pattern on this type of event now. What money for the Head of Lebanon’s Government?
Chavez no chance, Vanunu nope…..did some of those those good and righteous people listen to U2 20-25 years ago and are now in their 40s?….Ummm….
Thing is Benedict can we use that grandstanding to betting advantage? I think its early in this market yet, surely a few front runners will begin to emerge..maybe pick the one with the most grandstanding potential?
If I read this correctly of their website,do the Norwegians also have a disproportionate influence in nomination?
RE 25 and 26, Yokel I agree with your no hopers.
On the Lebonease front I think Fouad Siniora (PM) has done an amazing job of using his weakness as his streangth (The other alternative being the collapse of the government) I don’t think that makes him prize material. Emille Lahood (President) on the other hand is a prat.
On the Norwegian issue, yes they do have more influence than most, but then Nobel was a Norwegian.
On the grandstanding front, we would need to formulate a list of possible candidates to work out who has the most pottential. I think our list so far is probably incomplete.
O/T for stonecold from yesterdays thread (I have internet access only a.m.)
We in Poole , Bournemouth and Christchurch do not see ourselves as part of the South Coast expansion zone stretching as you say to Eastbourne - we are politically if not geographically in the South West (ugh!!) and have the New Forest between us and the next urban zone
We think we suffer particularly from being in the SW - firstly we miss any SE extra cash despite having property prices higher than most places out of London and secondly as we are remote from the decision making places of the SW (Bristol , Exeter and Taunton)we tend to get overlooked there too for infrastructure monies (Poole New Bridge thankfully excluded)
Sandbanks is both a blessing and a curse upon us in Poole - its amazing beauty and desirability ensures some great tourist numbers and pounds but the effect upon average property prices (which everyone seems to use as a measure of wealth!!) makes Poole appear very rich indeed when in fact there are as many social problems and poverty as in any medium sized town in the South
27 - I thought Nobel was Swedish.
RE 29, John O I have checked, and you are right. I’ll get me coat..
30. That made me laugh out loud, Benedict!
28. Gerry - I tend to think the ‘real’ border of the SW has shifted somewhat to the west in my lifetime, to somewhere between Wareham and Dorchester. The SE corner of Dorset has become much more like the SE of England generally in the last twenty years, and is now very different indeed from the area I live which is in the far west of the county.
32 - “has become much more like the SE of England” - what does that mean?
There are quite a few bits of Kent that do not have much in common with the rest of the SE in character. Romney Marsh, Isle of Sheppey, large parts of east Kent.
Thanks to Philip for this interview, but can I put in a plea for some UK topics next? I find it hard to get excited over the UN in any respect - I think it’s biased and needs reform - and I must confess to also not being enthralled by the French elections.
I am very sorry to see that some activist who attacked a previously selected candidate on the basis of his homosexuality has been admitted to the candidates’ list. We don’t need spoilers who even refuse to vote for our candidates on the list themselves. Somebody dropped the ball in letting this guy have admittance.
Seems to be trouble in the Labour party again re: Blair if the Guardian is to be believed.
SBS- there is an immigrant population at Sheppey dating back from the early 20th century that apparently jumped ship thinking it was New York. As unlucky as life gets!! Doesn’t Bob Marshall Andrews hail from somewhere around there.
You also have Margate, Ramsgate, in Norlfok, Yarmouth, Hastings in Sussex. As bleak and depressing as Morecambe and Birkenhead.
29/30 John O/Benedict. Although Nobel was born in Stockholm in the 1830’s (1835?), it was during the period of the union between Norway and Sweden called Swedeway, Noswede, Noreden or some such thing …
33. I was thinking culturally and economically. For example the local accent is rapidly disappearing in SE Dorset whereas it remains quite evident elsewhere in the county. Also the villages in the area where I grew up are increasingly ‘dormitory’ villages for commuters to the Bournemouth/Poole conurbation, starting to resemble those you see in the Home counties. You are no doubt correct that the SE has its quirky bits too - I was generalising.
35.”Doesn’t Bob Marshall Andrews hail from somewhere around there.”
BMA represents Medway.
34. Commentator, even if they wanted to re-admit him in the party, I think there was no need to put him on the candidates list.
35 - absolutely. But Sheppey takes the biscuit. 35,000 people (of which (2,000 are prisoners - literally - there are 3 prisons). Hardly a tree, and until a new bridge recently, the island was sometimes cut off in stormy weather. Remember this being an issue when they were trying to axe Kent Air Ambulance, and there were no casualty treatment facilities on the island.
It is very bleak! Still, it’s only about 2 hours from London by train. I think with its cutesy expensive villages, most of Dorset is far more south east.
38 Andrea, I heartily agree with you. And this is one of the reasons I post anonymously, I would not as a policy criticize a Conservative candidate under my own name. In this case we are admitting a man who attacked a fellow candidate to the list and there is a danger he may apply to his local seat and be selected for it. In which case we would have a lightning rod for controversy and a man who agitated against a fellow candidate as a PPC and likely, MP, given the state of the polls.
I would urge any Association looking at him to look at his record of attacking a PPC in a key marginal and think twice. I find no excuse for such behaviour.
34, 38, IIRC he was only suspended by the party. His suspension has been lifted. He denies his comments were about the sexuality of the candidate, more aligned to the way the candidate selection was interfered with by CCO. I have seen other selections cocked up in this way by CCO. However I have also seen this used as a cover for some shocking prejudices which have no place in a modern political party. So I don’t think he should be on the candidates list. However he isn’t A list, and as a local would be welcome to seek nomination for his local seat under the rules, wouldn’t he?
RE 36, JackW, can I take me coat off then?
Re 34/38, Who are we talking about here?
41. Ben, from The Times piece it seems he’s suggesting that the deselection vote was somehow influenced and not the original one (”Mr Laws said that Mr Crossley survived because of “the manipulation of Conservative Central Office” who had agents “present in large numbers to stage-manage proceedings”). At the time the tories said Crossley survived over-whelming the deselection vote, but there were rumours it was close.
42. Benedict. Ashley Crosseley, Ian Laws, the Falmouth and Camborne deselection vote…ah, don’t forget Candy Atherton, her assistant….welcome to the F&C 2005 GE saga. No wonders the Libdems won from third place!
I think the whole thing disgraceful behaviour and if I were still a Con Org I would be very wary if either CV passed my desk for selection. Any association chairman who doesn’t ask ‘the question’ as to this incident should not be in post. There are too many black clouds here for anyone to come out of it smelling of roses.
Should not be on the list. Simple as.
SBS 39- I remember driving into Sheppey and noticing the landscape you describe. Bleak and barren.
Cleverly linking Sheppey to the Nobel theme of the day I had a converstaion once with the Chief Executive at the local District Council- he said he was thankful for the cheap supplies of Dutch ecstasy coming through- pills apparently selling on the island for 50p a pop. Transformed the local youth population from beery and leery to loved up pacifists. A favourite pastime for the kids was to take ecstasy and harmlessly wile around the time sitting on the buses- and this during school times. Sounds quite good fun!! If I can get hold of the names of the local Sheppey drug suppliers could add them to the Nobel nominations list. Services for the community and all.
35-Andrea- thanks for the BMA reminder. Close enough. Have you got any more cross dressing photos stored away in your locker??
I think Blair actually pips Bush for the Nobel War Prize, because Bush, at least, had the excuses of 9/11 and the attempt by Saddam on George Bush’s life. Blair just joined in for the hell of it.
Moreover, all the specious drivel about Weapons of Mass Destruction landing on Hyde Park within three seconds was dreamt up by Blair and his New Labour chums, coz Blair couldn’t sell the war to the Brits any other way. Bush went along with this mendacious approach to please Blair.
So, Blair gets the War Prize. In fairness, I hope he shares the bloodmoney with all his Cabinet allies and all the other MPs who voted for the invasion.
40 dead in Iraq today already. The new security policy seems to be failing. I read somewhere that this new policy was “Iraq’s last chance”. Sweet.
RE 43 and 44, Many thanks for the info, and yes Ben, I agree that I would steer clear of people who are good at infighting.
43. A UKIP vote was also involved in the suspections:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/08/07/ntory107.xml
A local councillor called Crossley a “sanctimonious shit”…at a local meeting, a local farmer was defending Crossley and anotehr man present asked him who he was. At that point always the same councillor shouted “‘One of Ashley’s boyfriends” (many people present apparently laughed). Crossley stood up asking an apology because he thought the comment was out of order. The acting chair from Conservative central office shouted at Mr Crossley to ’sit down and shut up’” .
Another party official called Crossley’s mother and told her “people like her son should be put in a dustbin and pissed on”.
I don’t think I’ll visit Falmouth in the future….
45 Sorry-Andrea- cross dressing photos- I was referring to Bob Marshall Andrews. Wouldn’t like to spread salacious gossip about PbCOMS foremost analyst!!!
44 Ben, I agree, and I am afraid I am thinking two words and they are “Howard Flight”.
Just from his being on the general list, non A list, the Times has covered the story. Imagine if he were selected, the press would be about his attacks on a PPC in a marginal seat, one he implied he didn’t even vote for although he was the Tory PPC.
All the party would get is questions about are Cameron’s reforms for real. It would be a human interest story that would run and run and undermine all our progress in the polls.
I do hope no Association Chairman is foolish enough to consider this man. Even if they like him in his home seat they should think what it would do the Conservative cause nationally to focus on this man and his attacks on the Conservative candidate in a key marginal - especially if he replaces him.
No thanks.
32/37 Fred
You are absolutely correct about the “real” border of the SW being nearer Bere Regis I reckon - Wareham is really a dormitory town of Poole as are Corfe Mullen and the Ltychetts - Ferndown & Verwood are very much dormitories of Bournemouth
However the political boundary of the SW is at the Hampshire border at Ringwood and that is what I am complaining about - we are too remote from Taunton where GOSW is based or Exeter where the Regional Assembly sits and tend therefore to get left out on a limb as most of the investment tends to go to Bristol/Bath or “deprived” Cornwall
51 - I think there is a case for setting up a new region called “the extreme south east”, to cover much of the Kent coast, and east Kent. (Whitstable can be an island within this.) Might get EU funding.
Andrea, I know this sort of thing upsets you, but I just noted the date on the Telegraph article - August 2004! I wouldn’t want to hang the current Officer Team in F&C unless they are the same people having been reinstated.
However the people then deserved to be suspended on the evidence provided here so far. If not ejected from the party.
Again, like racism, homophobia is not a party political problem, but an educational problem. So both the main parties suffer from it in their membership. Curiously I don’t think the Lib Dems do, but that might be because they have no natural supporters in the working classes.
Sorry, just realised the stupidity of my last post re homophobia in the Lib Dems. It would, of course, be evident in those members who think homosexuality is a sin against their religion. Not something I have encountered in Woodbridge, but I am sure it exists. Sorry. All three parties have an equal problem with it because it exists in the general population. Education is the source of a solution.
“The move has astonished modernisers within the Conservative Party because Ian Laws was suspended after demanding publicly the removal of Ashley Crossley as candidate in Falmouth & Camborne before the last general election.
Mr Laws is now one of the favourites to succeed Mr Crossley as the Tory candidate in the highly marginal seat, which the Liberal Democrats captured from Labour last year.
Mr Crossley, 32, a City barrister, survived a confidence vote within the Tory association in a row over his suitability, which was clouded by allegations of homophobia.”
Ben, I cannot agree with you about religion. My own religion, Christianity, argues that only married people should have sexual intercourse and I believe that to be true. However, there is nothing to say that a homosexual person or a cohabiting person should not be an effective MP. Whatever the religious beliefs I have about sexual morality - which are pretty mainstream in major world religions of many stripes - it does not follow that I support discrimination in the workplace, in housing, in education or for that matter in public office. I have no problem at all with a homosexual MP and think MPs’, and PPCs’, private lives are none of my business.
My concern would be only with Mr. Crossland’s politics. I am aghast to think he was discriminated against on the basis of his sexuality and dismayed to find Mr. Laws might be distracting from our revival in the polls by being selected to replace him.
“Curiously I don’t think the Lib Dems do, but that might be because they have no natural supporters in the working classes.”
The LDs have always got a fair working class vote in Cornwall and parts of Devon. For example, in North Devon, the Labour vote has always been low, and there are some poor working class areas that have probably always been Liberal. It is difficult to say if homophobia was a large factor in Jeremy Thorpe’s defeat in 1979, but I’m sure it played its part. Of course, there were other factors at play too.
54. I think a lot of drivel is talked about homophobia. If you define homophobia as simply ‘disapproving of homosexuality or active homosexuals’, as some do - then you clearly imply that 80% of humanity is homophobic, given the attitude to homosexuality of the world’s great religions.
We cannot seriously believe 80% of the world is made up of evil, hate-filled bigots, can we? Are we going to deny the right of 80% of the world to stand in elections??
Surely the more important definition of homophobia is this: when you turn this disapproval into overt discrimination. That’s where we should draw the line, I think.
53. sorry Ben, I’m not following you. I never mentioned the current Officer Team. I just linked that article and some of the things happened in the run up of 2005 GE for Benedict White who didn’t know who we were talking about.
And would you agree with me Sean T that that line was crossed in Falmouth by Mr. Laws in his attempts to deselect Mr. Crossland?
59. To be honest I don’t know what precisely happened in Falmouth! Shocking for a Cornish pb commenter, I know. There was evidently a kerfuffle.. but what exactly?
59. sorry to be pedant, but it’s Crossley, not Crossland. Btw, he was part of DD’s team during the leadership campaign.
51. Gerry - yes I take your point. All the more reason, I think, to abolish the nonsensical, wasteful ‘regional’ assemblies and have proper local government.
SBS- you forget Broadstairs in your Kent description, known affectionaly by locals as the “jewel in the turd”.
I had quite a few dealings with Sir Sandy Bruce Lockard- council leader for Kent. Tory, but as New Labour as they come policywise, and a good friend of Prezza. He was great at pulling in European funds into East Kent.
Dealing though with East Kent is a bit like Africa- a question of best of intentions, but where do you start? You end up simply wasting money on unsustainable initiative after unsustainable initiative.
Sir Sandy Bruce Lockard though is a visionary- his work on the Thames gateway, the channel links, and Ashford is unbelievable. He is pretty unique amongst local political leaders- someone who has overseen massive change in his community, has driven it forward, and been politically successful. Undoubtedly the most successful and influential Tory anywhere in the last 10 years.
56. Rather than homophobia, perhaps his suspicion of involvement in a serious crime was the real issue.
Sean T:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,17129-2334108,00.html
The first, but I fear, not the last, piece of negative coverage for this man. I trust he will not be allowed to become the distraction that wrecks our campaign
65. I think the Tory association down there needs to avoid other controversy like that (or any other type of controversies). They don’t exactly help to keep the campaign focused on the real targets. But it seems that they like troubles!
I think they need a fresh start: no more people involved in that saga. For ex A lister Fiona Kemp can be a good candidate for Truro and Falmouth.
64 Not to mention Auberon Waugh’s candidacy!
66 Andrea you should come and work for CCHQ.
67. Ha ha yes..the Dog Lover’s Party, wasn’t it?
64 - of course, there was the trial too. I remember canvassing there in 1990, and people were saying “I always voted for Mr Thorpe, until that unfortunate incident with the dog.” I am sure there would have been some homophobia too - but this was 27 years ago, and a lot of voters have died since then (probably nearly half the electorate).
Sir Sandy Bruce Lockart - about as good as they come in local government. You don’t find many people like that in any of the parties.
69 - Well, someone had to stand up for Rinka RIP. All very well bunnies going to France.
69 - Waugh’s election leaflet began “Rinka Lives! Woof, woof! Vote Waugh if you believe that dogs deserve the right to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
Lord Denning granted Thorpe an injunction, banning its distribution on grounds of contempt of court.
70 - I think he’s a peer (non-contributory :wink:) now, isn’t he?
73. Rinka is a peer now?!
74 - In a canine heaven. I’m sure Sir Sandy is also a dog lover.
72. Perhaps then it was the candidacy of Bill Boaks ‘Democratic Monarchist Public Safety White Resident’ that did for Thorpe…
69 / 70 - Rinka, the most famous dog in the world!
Actually, Thorpe didn’t do all that badly in 1979. North Devon had never been all that safe a seat for him. Despite everything he still managed to get almost 37%, which was only about 7% down on what he’d got as party leader in 1970.
76 - Fred, I though ROAD safety was a key component of Boaks’s, er, ‘platform’
75. John, she’s still with us and she provides a great deal of inspiration….
SBS- Sir Sandy (Lockart not Lockard- sorry) is one of the few politcians who doesn’t let politics get in the way. Just does what he thinks is best and gets on with it.
His work in Kent is slightly reminiscent of Heseltine’s inner city development work from the 80’s- except with Kent there is no democratic deficit. Sir Sandy uses an electorally accountable local authority as the vehicle of change. Hezza simply bypassed local politics and set up a series of quangos (pretty effective all the same, especially for those who think politicians cannot achieve anything)
I am sure in the future the reputation of John Prescott will be revisited. People like Lockart will vouch for Prescott’s work in less turbulent times. Even Tory local politicians must be able to appreciate the size of the task that Prescott has faced, and how he has attempted to make a positive difference to how local authorities work and operate. It is a massive shame that this is rarely highlighted as folk (mostly completely ignorant of Prescott’s work) like just to put the proverbial boot in.
77 - I’m not altogether convinced that an adverse 12.4% swing can be reasonably described as not doing that badly.
63. 80. A new career as a hagiographer beckons…
OT: I see New Labour’s puritanical and authoritarian crusade continues apace, with the de-facto criminalisation of the bondage culture and community:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/berkshire/5297600.stm
Prepare for news stories of ordinary cul-de-sac couples being banged-up for the outrageous criminal behaviour of showing a friend a pic of anything leathery and painful looking.
81 - Under normal circumstances no. But when half the country still thought he’d tried to murder his gay lover
(and was involved in killing a dog - in a nation of pet lovers), he might have done a lot worse!
I seem to remember one of the Liberal candiates seaking the Exeter seat made great play in the selection being disgusted at the Labour MP being opely gay and living with a male MP. Homophopia unfortunately is not confined to just the fringe of the Tory party. Just visit any Labour club, the old club in Little Lever in Bolton, now closed down was a typical example.
O/T Layers market ?
Next General Election - Most Seats
Lab 2.24/2.3
Con 1.75 (!)/ 1.81
Total Matched £115,915.
RE 48, Thanks Andrea, but whilst the infighting was wrong, there did not seem to be anything homo phobic from that report.
However memories are stirring about the incedent as a whole.
87. uhm, maybe you haven’t read it well. Allegations of homophobia were made by Crossley’s supporters (and one of them in the middle of that piece). Naturally they were denied by the other faction.
85 - I thought it was the Tory MP, a GP, who was outraged at Ben Bradshaw’s sexuality. But there could have been a Liberal after cheap votes too.
89 - sorry “I thought it was the Tory candidate…”
83. You seem personally rather affronted by this..any reason?
O/T my local newspaper is running an on-line poll to see if people should be fined for missing a GP or hospital appointment. It comes after the local hospital revealed part of it’s deficit is down to missed appointments. Surprisingly people voted NO to the question, by 84% no, 15% yes. Any thoughts?
O/T: the other day Rik Willis was having an argument with a fellow Conservative on here about whether paid Tory agents were necessary or a waste of space.
Given his employment with Rob Wilson MP perhaps this story about the (unpaid) Tory agent for the Reading East MP might make him change his mind:
http://www.getreading.co.uk/news/2003/2003351/drinkdriving_tory_banned_from_road ?
92 - I’d vote OK for fine for missing or running late on appointment providing the Hospital equally pays patients something if they have to wait more than 15 minutes for their appointment and the equivalent to the fine if patients have to wait more than 30 minutes
83- That Lady has done a great job. I think you will find her campaign had cross party support.
Only sickos and freaks like that kind of filth.
Mark, will you be defending child porn websites next or maybe animal sex ones?
Tyson, Re Prezza an local government, I think you are looking at him with rose tinted spectacles.
As an example, in local planning there is the issue of “pre determination”, which is where say I might have a view on whether or not a project should go ahead. If I have such a view I can’t vote.
I could for example have been elected in Lewis or Brighton on a pro or indeed anti stadium platform, but not be allowed to vote because of this new ruling from two shags.
The pathways initiative is going right over the heads of local people as well, bull dozing houses even where conservation groups believe they can be used, in favour of large scale developers being able to do what they want to do.
Not good im my view I am afraid Tyson. Nice taht you like two Conservatives though.
RE 83 Mark, I seem to remember from the trial that the accused adiction to violent porn consisted of two visits. If taht is the case he clearly was not addicted. I can make two visits here is 2 minutes let alone what happens over a day!
87/88. Btw, I’m pretty sure there were other issues involved (the UKIP video for ex) Anyway as I said, I think they need a fresh start and in a Falmouth Tory members’ shoes, I wouldn’t vote for either Crossley and/or his old opponents in the next selection process.
RE 88, Andrea, Firstly in the Telegraph article there was no mention, and whilst there was in the Times article these do seem insubstntial there.
I do note that others here have talked of homophobic baracking at meetings, which is wrong, but was it Mr Laws?
One thing concerns me though. Clearly crap candiates are going to be selected from time to time. Can we only get rid of the straight white male crap ones, else face cries of homophobia, sexism or racism? I don’t wish to imply he was crap, but he may have been.
85/ any Lib Dem ppc who publicly stated homophobic views would be slung out, and rightly so! Its a non issue with us. Not so with many tory members.
95: DC, do you understand the principle of consenting adults?
Re hospital appointments - was told that someone needed to cancel an appointment - the matter having been dealt with by her GP, but was unable to get through to the hospital appointment line to cancel - “your call is important to us….”
98. Benedict again, read paragraph 5!
(and btw, I linked the Torygraphy piece to show there were other reasons too for the local fights)
Re 97, Andrea, I agree with that. Witout a fresh start there will be rancour. Crossley is on the A list so can get selected anywhere.
RE 95, DC, you and I part company on this one. Firstly, government managed to close down radio fast as a tool of free speech when it came out, and I don’t want to see the same happen again.
Secondly, as I stated above, all I heard of this alledged addiction is that he looked at websites of that nature twice. The causal connection is not there.
Thirdly, people (including either a Conservative MP or PPC, can’t remember which) die in bizare sex acts every so often. You can’t ban stupidity.
Fourthly, Exactly how are we defining this type of picture as opposed to porn containing adults over the age of 18?
Not only am I against it as an old net hand, it will be a dogs breakfast at best.
RE 102, Paragraph 5 of which one, torygraph or the murdoch rag?
98/99 Although procedures do exist to remove a PPC once selected it would have to be a pretty significant matter that was not known at the time of selection. I think part of the problem is that in order to combat some percieved homophobia candidates selection panels are not allowed to inquire as to someone’s sexuality. Whilst this should make no difference, it doesn’t allow for the electorate. There is a small bias in the electorate, and candidates need to appeal to as many people as possible. So unfortunately it is more of an issue in rural areas than in metropolitan areas where sexuality is much less of an issue. Much as I might like it to be different, a homosexual candidate would find it difficult to get elected in Suffolk Coastal IMHO. This is because many voters in Suffolk Coastal feel that sexuality is an issue. I don’t, but then equally I don’t think the colour of someone’s skin should be an issue but it would be. Not with party members so much as with the electorate in general. The proportion of the population that is out homosexual or from a Black or Ethnic Minority is so much smaller here in rural Suffolk than in central London, that it would be a problem because the candidate wouldn’t reflect the community he or she were trying to serve.
103. Benedict, is he on A List? He wasn’t in the original one, but he can go in it with the top up.
Ah, Torygraph. But it’s just the homophobic baracking at meetings..so it’s not that it’ll give you great revelations.
(btw, why are we discussing it?)
99. SAC. I recalled to have read a similar thing to the one reported by S Penketh. And I thought to have read it here on pb.com. So after a brief search, here’s the post:
“Sadly, the Lib Dem was not very much better in 97 - I went along to his adoption meeting and he was greatly exercised by the fact that Mr Bradshaw at that time shared a flat with two other people - both men, no less! I still regret not having walked out.
by James January 20th, 2005 at 3:05 pm “
100/103 Sorry guys but I have to agree with DC on this one. If you look at the article linked by Mark, the websites we are talking about show forced acts and strangulation. This is not something that ‘consenting adults’ normally undertake. Or at least not in my experience! For once this is a Government regulation that is sensible. Whether it will be enforceable remains to be seen, mainly because of the difficulty in defining it, but they manage to enforce rules against child pornography.
Let’s not forget that the ‘models’ on these sites are subject to horrendous abuse and are often not ‘consenting adults’ but victims of abuse.
Should be banned.
This legislation on violent pornography is actually quite clever despite the usual moans from the legal profession and libertarians. Rather than being seen as legislation to attack dirty minded but otherwise harmless Bob of Suburbia it may be the equivalent of nailing Al Capone on a tax evasion type of charge. Used intelligently it may well be used to lock away a few people who are a genuine danger..or just saddos who need a slap. Society could do with both being taken out of circulation.
On the Swedish election, how very Nordic to have the ‘Moderate Party’.
For all fans of the Blair succession saga interesting article in the Times. It’s the last paragraph that is most interesting.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,17129-2334107,00.html
105. “I think part of the problem is that in order to combat some percieved homophobia candidates selection panels are not allowed to inquire as to someone’s sexuality.”
Time for a great Dinky’s quote. Selection meeting, Dinky is asked if he’s married or if he has intentions to get married…his reply:
“Put it this way. If I was selected for this seat, you wouldn’t have to worry about the sheep”
100/103. Mark/Benedict. I see no justification for anything that attempts to glorify or glamourises sexual violence.
It was Stephen Milligan you are thinking of Benedict, who was MP for Eastleigh. We lost the by election.
108. Yes if he doesn’t realise that he is already a lame duck, he really has lost the plot.
Absolutely the way to deal with an impertinent question. However the question isn’t asked anymore. Apparently if it was asked then the candidate could have a case against the association under employment law if he/she wasn’t successful.
I know of at least one candidate where this was a big factor in his selection, the agent was very very worried that when his sexuality was revealed many activists would turn away, simply because they were not used to homosexuality. I have to admit that whilst racism is now seen as totally taboo (I’m not denying it still exists but it is not displayed anymore) homophobia isn’t, to our shame.
O/T - Statement today on Ed Balls website saying he still supports the campaign to overturn the Boundary Commission decision.
http://www.edballs.com/
Underneath there is a link to a statement by Jon Trickett MP. In this he says:
“it is my intention, and that of other local MPs to continue to pursue this in parliament and the courts.”
What does everyone think they will now do? The Boundary Commission have said they will issue their final report before the end of October. So if they want to try to stop this they will need to start legal action quickly.
If the report is issued then the only possible step would be to either get the Labour Party to vote against the whole Boundary Commission report in the House of Commons or maybe for the Secretary of State to make an amendment to the report before it is laid before Parliament?
106/ Andrea - if this is true, a wrong un.
To be fair you have to admit that its very uncommon with the Lib Dems. In fact an occassional challenge on the doorstep that I face from the electorate is that we’re too ‘pro’ gay people. Nonsense of course. Its about equality of respect for all irrespective of sexual orientation, colour etc….
RE 106, Andrea, Actually I don’t know why I thought Crossley was on the A list, but he certainly hopes to stand somewhere.
The homophobic barracking whilst wrong may have been peripheral to Mr Laws campaign, is the point I would consider.
That said, what ever the reason for wanting him out, it should have been discussed quietly.
Why are we discussing this? No idea. I thought we were trying to see who the contenders could be for the Nobel peace prize.
114. SAC, to be fair, I don’t have a clue if it’s true or not.
112. Ben, do you really think it would be so difficult for a gay candidate in Suffolk? Other rural places have gay MPs (ex Nick Herbert in Arundel)
115- Benedict, maybe we can put forward Mr Crossley and Mr Law for the nobel prize
Are Labour trying to put a block on the boundary changes altogether, in the hope that the litigation drags on and they can have an election in the meantime with the old boundaries?
If so that is bang out of order.
I have heard many times that the current boundaries are quite seriously unfair to the Tories in England - how did it get like that? I appreciate there have been population shifts, but how has it got so out of whack in the last 9 years since the Tories were in power (I assuming it was fairer then as they were in power and would have made sure of it)?
I’m not saying it is impossible Andrea, indeed I wouldn’t care either way! What I’m saying is that it would be an added handicap. Something that some people wouldn’t like. I would hope that it wouldn’t be an issue. It certainly would have been an issue when JSG was selected. I don’t think it will be by the time he decides to stand down, so barring any accidents (God forbid) it won’t be an issue I have to tackle.
I can say that the deselected UKIP candidate at the last election in Suffolk Coastal told me in 2004 that he wouldn’t vote for me because I had a ‘Paki’ on my leaflet. I told him I didn’t want his vote anyway if that was his opinion. The ‘Paki’ was Bashir Khanbai, who is from Tanzania IIRC. Mind you in light of more recent revelations I’m not sure I should admit having him on my leaflets!
111 There really seems to be an attempt amongst some people in the Blair camp (very possibly including the man himself) to hold on or work a sabotage plan against Gordon, either of which could be absolutely deadly all round.
The other possibility is that Tony is going to step down sooner than suggested and he’ll deliver this announcement in shock fashion but it seems doubtful.
Interesting times and I can definitely see Blair not going as the widely circulated plan of 2007 handover suggests. Something isn’t right at all, I’d be surprisied if there isn’t some blood letting. Brown’s warnings on Blairites ot stirring the pot is perhaps born out of fear, he wants no competition but it looks like he is going to get it.
RE 109, Andrea,
RE 117, Do you think so? I thought we were not suitable people to nominate? Nice idea though
122. Btw, benedict, did I sound harsh at 88?
The new Shedindan party is called Scotland’s Socialist Movement
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/5297040.stm
RE 110, DC. Yes that was him. So are you saying you don’t like it because he lost us a by election? That this sort of behaviour between consenting adults should be banned? (Found legal at some court hearing some time ago), or merely pictures of it are not allowed?
Then there is the issue of definition. What if someone likes being tied up and whipped till they bleed? Some do. In parts of Italy they practice self flagulation in public, until they bleed. Aledgedly Opus Dei do as well. Want to ban that? or just pictures of it?
122. btw, Benedict, did I sound harsh at 88?
Sheridan’s new party will be called Solidarity - Scotland’s Socialist Movement
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/5297040.stm
122. btw, Benedict, did I sound harsh at 88?
Sheridan’s new party will be called Solidarity - Scotland’s Soc*alist Movement
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/5297040.stm
122. btw, Benedict, did I sound harsh at 88?
Sheridan’s new party will be called Solidarity - Scotland’s Socialist Movement
122. btw, Benedict, did I sound harsh at 88?
Sheridan’s new party will be called Soli*arity - Scotland’s Socialist Movement
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/5297040.stm
RE 123, No, but then again I have a thick skin, so don’t usualy notice.
On the Tommy Sheridan bit, well, it would make a good soap opera.
123 et al ….. We get the point !!
On the Blair Brown thing, I genuinly think Tony will stay well past his sell by date, or at least will try. I may be wrong by I detect vanity and “purpose”.
Also it does look like factions are gearing up for some serious in fighting. Someone pass the popcorn. I look forward to a nice relaxing bit of viewing.
122. btw, Benedict, did I sound harsh at 88?
Sheridan’s new party will be launched this weekend
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/5297040.stm
RE 132, Andrea, there is an echo in here somewhere..somewhere…somewhere…
sorry for all those posts! But they didn’t appear immediately. So I was wondering if they contained a banned word! (you can see from the various attempt I made).
Now I look like a psycho (please, Philip, delate some of them!)
132 Andrea. Enough already !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
134 Andrea. “Now I look like a psycho….”
As long as there’s no shower scene !!
124. Banning the activities of the crackpots of Opus Dei seems eminently sensible to me.
x18 The boundaries for constituencies are changed every 8-12 years by the boundary commisison, which is independent. See the attached link for how this works:
http://www.statistics.gov.uk/geography/westminster.asp
Obviously people move about in the interim, particularly from inner cities into the suburbs. Labour voters tend to spread out quite evenly, but Tory voters tend to huddle together in the suburbs, which leads to large concentrations of people in a few seats. When the boundaries are re-drawn (to make sure each contituency has roughly the same amount of people in them) this should get redressed.
The 2005 election was fought on the 1994 boundaries.
Andrea - I asked James about the quote you dug out at 106. He can’t post here right now but he told me the following:
“I can’t remember raising the issue but if I did refer to the candidate then that was an error - it was definitely the guest speaker at the adoption meeting - I think he was a local radio DJ”
We’ve been comparing notes about the candidate himself and, as far as we know, he was a good egg and not at all homophobic. The guy at the selection meeting sounds to have been well out of order - but I don’t know if he would have been a member even.
138. The posts suddenly dry up. Perhaps in anticipation of the good-humoured discussion seen so far today coming to an abrupt end?
Smowflake, Just out of mild speculation what line of business are you or your partner/husband/civilpartner (delete as appropriate) in?
20.”Something isn’t right at all, I’d be surprised if there isn’t some blood letting. Brown’s warnings on Blairites ot stirring the pot is perhaps born out of fear, he wants no competition but it looks like he is going to get it.”
Yokel, I have to agree with you on this. If Tony Blair really wanted to see Gordon Brown succeed him in a smooth dignified way, which benefited both of them he would have done so by now.
I just can’t see TB sitting in the front row looking delighted and ready to shake hands with a triumphant GB following a leadership contest. :D:
You have lost control of the agenda when authority breaks down and you have Blairites and Brownites openly briefing against each other. I think a civil war has already started in the Labour party.
x41. Husband is a java programmer, I’m in finance.
143 - Java is a big place. Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is a Javanese (and not easily programmed), so we’re now right back on topic
144. LOL. To go just briefly OT again, what do you and Ben do?
The law against “possessing violent pictures” is plainly absurd - the Dangerous Dogs Act of our day. But worse. How surprising that this government should immediately reach for Prohibition when it encounters a problem.
The law is, it seems, going to make it an imprisonable offence to possess images - (i.e. look at them on the Net) which merely show violence which “appears to be life threatening”.
“Appears to be”? Appears to whom? What’s life threatening? some people like scarfing each other until they pass out during sex. That’s dangerous. But not illegal. So it will be legal to do it but not legal to look at it on the Net. In fact it will be illegal to look at someone simply pretending to do it.
Let’s get this straight. You will be liable for three years in prison for looking at someone only pretending to do something entirely legal.
What about al Qaeda beheading videos? Maybe we should all be prosecuted for watching those on the BBC? What about King Lear? What about documentaries about the Nazis? They show violence? What about that clip of the executed VietCong? will that be illegal? What about people who nail themselves to crosses in the Phillipines, will images of that be banned? What about live bullfighting on satellite TV?
FFS.
139. Oxonian, I just cut and pasted the quote. I mentioned the day of the posting, so he can go back and check.
146 I find it hard to see how one could come up with a definition that was legally watertight.
Interestingly enough, consent is not a legal defence to a charge of assault, so consensual S & M remains a criminal offence.
143. You wouldn’t by any chance be working for a company called UKplc? I believe the finance department is next door to company HQ.
RE 146, Sean, we agree.
RE 148, Sean, I thought that had been dealt with? or ws it that it was raised on appeal and still found to be ileagal?
Re 145, Snowflake, I set up networks, Linux systems, and spam kiling boxes.
Do you have a mortgage?
148. Sean, under what circumstances did you find that bit of information out?
148. Interesting point. Moreiver, if this new law is anything like the law pertaining to internet child porn (and it sounds like it will be) then there’s another problem.
It is an offence to possess pornographic images (i.e. look at them on the Net) of young women who appear to be underage. That sounds sensible when you first hear it, but what it actually means is this: it doesn’t matter if the woman is actually in real life overage, and you know this - she just has to “appear” underage to a 3rd person - that is to say, the police - for you to be convicted. And people have been convicted on this basis.
Clearly absurd, no? And this wording in the new law “appears to be life-threatening” - makes it sound like they are going for the same catch-all effect, relying on the wisdom of police, prosecutors and judges not to arrest and convict everyone on earth.
I hope I’ve got this wrong, but I fear I’m right. What a shower of incompetents this government is. They get more laughable by the day.
x50. Yes, do you? (Are we playing twenty questions here?!)
145 - I’m a retired oil mogul (4th class).
150 Yes. The “Spanner” Case ultimately upheld the conviction of those concerned.
If consent were a defence to an assault, one would have to tolerate things like duelling, or wife-beating (if the wife comes from a cultural background where women believe it is right for their husbands to hit them).
IMO, the degree of violence inflicted in the “Spanner” case was so extreme that I think it was right to prosecute. The police originally thought they’d come across a snuff movie.
152 IMO the reason why it is right to ban child pornography on the internet is because (like receiving stolen goods) one is encouraging the commission of serious criminal acts. I can’t see the reason for making it illegal to view images of people who are adults, but look as though they are young enough to be children.
148. Yes - the case of the Scotish judges hammering nails into each other some years ago comes to mind.
124- Benedict. Opus Dei? Is that what Ruth Kelly is a member of?
I agree at the margins there could be confusion but I think we all know some things are just plain unacceptable. Ben’s post about not knowing if consenting adults was good. Viewing violent sexual abuse should be outlawed in the same way child sexual abuse is. Getting off on this kind of thing is sick.
Also Milligan’s antics were not just dangerous (sadly proven) but downright perverted although Oaten managed even more depraved activity.
146- Sean T. I don’t think I want to know what ’scarfing’ is but it doesn’t sound pleasent. Your blog is a bit of an eye opener. How’s the toffeewombling going? Your posts are normally excellent but I disagree with you on this.
157. Scarfing is strangulation until the point of near-asphyxiation, usually done just before sexual climax. Said to increase the thrill of orgasm momentously. I think it drastically opens up the blood vessels in the brain or something - flooding the mind with extra endorphins maybe - same principle as amyl nitrate (also sniffed before climax).
I only have this info cause I’m curious! Scarfing is not my cup of carnal cocoa at all. Readers of my memoirs will know all too much about my fairly mild kinks.
Re your more serious point - yes we can all agree that there is some seriously sickening stuff on the Net. But the way to deal with it is surely to more vigorously prosecute the purveyors, or to close down sites where it is found. Not criminalise millions.
I sould think every adolescent boy in the country has looked at some disgusting images - sites like Ogrish.com specialise in them, and they are wildly popular (likewise magazines like Bizarre). But this is just normal human curiosity, however much we might lament the fact.
Are we going to put all our sons in prison?
RE 155, I see Sean. The Spanner case. I agree with your analysis. Further more it could also be used for witness intimidation so there are reasons of public policy.
I think it is also odd that you can be convicted of looking at pictures of someone they may personaly know, and know to be over 18, but convicted of child porn offences because for example, some prat does not know what a Brazilian is.
Re 157, DC, Ruth Kelly is a member of Opus Dei.
“Also Milligan’s antics were not just dangerous (sadly proven) but downright perverted although Oaten managed even more depraved activity.”
Well, are you proposing banning this activity? If so why not others people consider perverted?
159 - And think of the impact on the sale of oranges (cue for Sean Fear and Auberon Waugh)
RE 153, Snowflake, not yet.
Could I ask, if there were large numbers of entrants to your employment markets halving your take home pay, would that affect your life style at all?
Sean Fear - yes I agree that the law does have to intervene in extreme cases of S&M, where it segues into potential lethality or abusive mistreatment. The Spanner case was pretty extreme (cheese graters anyone?) and maybe fell across the line. The German cannibal case of course crossed the line, by several miles.
But the line should be set as liberally as possible. The law has no right to say what consenting adults do in private, as long as both are free agents, however disgusting we might find their actions.
Lots of people find homosexuality disgusting; they have no right to ban it.
161. We already went through that during the dot-com crisis, in my husband’s profession - we survived on my income, savings, he did additional exams, upgraded his skills, got another job. I can see where you are leading with this, but as long as you make savings to tide you through the changes, are flexible and compete hard, and you’ll be all right!
149. Well the cr*p pay you get at the Treasury would probably oblige you to live somewhere dreadful like Southampton.
*Reeling in shock at agreeing wholeheartedly with seanT*
All these things are separate categories:
What I believe to be dangerous
What I believe to be immoral
What I wouldn’t like to do myself
What a majority (however defined) think is dangerous
What a majority (however defined) think is immoral
What a majority (however defined) doesn’t like doing
What actually is dangerous
What should be against the law
What justifies an intervention by the state’s police and prosecuting authorities.
There are overlaps but no necessary connections between these categories. Unfortunately, arguments tend to slide between one and another. A question worth asking is how involving the criminal law would help matters for the people involved and/or society in general. If the answer’s not clear, I presume against invoking the criminal law.
159-Benedict. Well it should certainly not be encouraged.
162- Sean T. I just popped out to buy a paper and on the top shelf in my local newsagents is a magazine called 18. This edition is a “Back to School Special”. Without looking through it, it appears to be full of young girls who may well be 18 but may look younger. I assume it must be the right side of the law but part of me cannot help but find this concept disturbing.
107: Ben, what about “acting”? That is the point of a lot of these things. The police wont bother asking you if they were or werent acting like it was forced, while they’re taking you off to the cells.
110: I really dont care what consenting adults get up to in their beds, be-it violent or not. But then, I’m not a Conservative.
It’s all very well saying that legislation isnt designed to catch X, Y and Z the fact is that it will be used to the maximum theoretical limit. History tells us that. I’m telling you (and if there was a market on it I’d put money there) that it’s just a few years till these acts are criminalised too. Anything that is illegal to watch, look, at or own will surely go that way too.
167 - in fact, the acts are already illegal. I’d think it very unlikely the police would be interested in mild S & M though.
RE 155, Sean Fear, what do think the difference is between the spanner case, and say boxing?
RE 165, Lewis, I agree.
Re 163, Snowflake, how is a person on a low wage, with high marginal tax rates, high housing costs (compared to earnings) suppposed to live on a partners earnings when there is no partner, or indeed live on savings they don’t have when retraining for what exactly?
I know I can survive, because I can turn my hand to many things. Apparently so can your husband. However not everyone is universaly gifted.
Given that people can have perfectly legitimate reasons for possessing pictures of people suffering acts of extreme violence, I’d have thought this law is bound to be either oppressive, or unworkable, or both.
I understand that there are people who get turned on by pictures of dead and dying people in Nazi concentration camps, but there are entirely legitimate reasons for possessing such pictures.
How do you distinguish between the two?
169, the Law permits injuries to be inflicted in the course of “manly sports”. These include rugby, boxing, etc. but not flagellation.
167. Well then its funny that its a Labour government, not a Conservative one, which is seeking to ban all this. Ban ban ban ban ban ban ban. That’s all they frigging do.
166. You are easily disturbed. Its perfectly legal for schoolgirls to have sex as long as they are sixteen, so presumably it is legal to look at them naked in private. Of course it is. However it is illegal to look at images online of women over 18 who might appear underage to a policeman.
That is the absurdity of it all. “Oh, so you had sex with a schoolgirl of sixteen, that’s fine Sir, on your way.” “Oh, so you looked at a jpeg of a naked woman of 19 years old with a straw boater on - that’ll be ten years in prison.”
In fact your use of the word “disturbing” is key. You find images of young women dressed as schoolgirls disturbing, fair enough. But lots of men find them titillating, that’s fair enough too, as far as I can tell, as long as the girls are over the age of consent. Or at least over 18.
Just because some people find something disturbing is no reason to imprison others who disagree.
163. Depends on what their profession is, isn’t it? In my husband’s case, he’d been delaying taking additional java development exams, ’cause simply too much hassle to study on Sunday afternoons. When he lost his job, it concentrated his mind, he did some temping while he studied, passed, and got another development job within a week of passing - in his profession skills get stale very quickly and employers expect up-to-date exams, so he now does exams every year, to keep up. It wasn’t dificult getting temp jobs to tide him through. And everyone should have at least three months savings just in case.
There’s nothing stopping single people from moving in temporarily with their parents while they look for something, if they haven’t got a partner. Or letting out their house, if they’ve got a mortgage. In any case plenty of work out there, otherwise employers wouldn’t be scrambling looking for workers abroad.
There will always be what is called frictional unemployment, where even though the overall economy is doing fine, a particular sector may be struggling temporarily. The job centres and colleges are there to provide advice about which areas have work. People are also expected to use their nous and speak to friends and ask around for openings, and keep a sharp eye on the local job market. There is no such thing as a job for life anymore - if it ever existed (perhaps for about a decade in late the 1950’s-early 60’s, out of the last couple of centuries).
172 “There’s nothing stopping single people from moving in temporarily with their parents while they look for something, if they haven’t got a partner. Or letting out their house, if they’ve got a mortgage. In any case plenty of work out there, otherwise employers wouldn’t be scrambling looking for workers abroad.”
C.f.,
“I grew up with an unemployed father. He did not riot. He got on his bike and looked for work, and he went on looking until he found it.”
Both are cut from the same cloth of pure Tebbit-ry.
seanT - I never thought I’d be saying this, but you’re talking an awful lot of sense on this subject. I’m glad you’re challenging prejudices on this. Good (socially) liberal stuff.
What Darren or indeed I find disturbing is neither here nor there; the test must be a harm principle - and the state should need a good reason to legislate against something, rather than that being the default option.
RE 166, DC, I was not thinking of proposing tax credits for it certainly
171 - Its the legal principle of “non volenti fit injuria” - to a willing person no injury is done. Means that a boxer cannot sue for injuries if he willingly put himself in a dangerous situation. Although there needs to be a clear understanding of the risks at the start. I suppose the fact there are rules and officals make it clearer from a legal standpoint what risks are or are not being borne, as opposed to say a gangfight, or some of the more risque activities discussed above.
174. Sigh. Gwynfa - I’m just describing what people actually do when they are unemployed. They temp, they ask around for jobs, they enroll in colleges, they move in with parents temporarily or rent out their houses. The period of unemployment lasts at most for about three months. If you are prepared to take any work, while looking for the good jobs, it doesn’t even last a week. That’s because the economy is very strong, and there is plenty of work out there.
If there was a recession, I might understand your attitude - but there isn’t, you are simply carping at the normal functioning of the economy!
You and Ben seem to have a very patronising attitude to “the poor” - you seem to think they are cretinous, helpless people, whose hands the govt must hold and guarantee them a job for good, so they never have to go through the bother of looking or competing for one. Actually people are pretty shrewd and capable, and understand that this is how the economy works. This is not Cuba, nor will it ever be. Pretending everything non-Cuba is “Tebbit”, just shows how far gone you are.
What is most disappointing is that if you google: naked, schoolgirl, spanner, sex, underage, S & M - you are not directed to this page.
I would love to think there were some weirdos out there surf the net for their titillation, who inadvertantly stumble across our musings.
RE 175 Oxonian, I agree totaly. One of teh reasons why I disagree with the ban on fox hunting and think that the ban on smoking in pubs should be he choice of teh landlord, though government may feel it has a place in setting air quality standards.
RE 174, Except that tebbit was not proposing a completly open labour market, providing all sorts of people with new and unused to competition for work in a very sudden fashion.
RE 174, Snowflake, you would not be out of place as a middle class rich girl with no life experiance in the young Conservatives.
The fact is that whilst it may be desiable for people to have savings, they don’t always.
Whilst it may be possible for some people to move in with parents orphans find it a bit cramped.
Whilst those with family may of course have strained relations with them for either having a barstard child (still happens) or because the relationship may have been abusive.
There are lots of things people who are well organised, who have strong family backrounds on which they can rely can do. Not everyone has those advantages.
You are an old fashioned unreconstructed 19 Century middle class liberal.
This government has a peculiar attitude to prohibition. They want to prohibit people from looking at images of kinky violence - even if these images are just pretend ones - because they fear the images might just provoke somebody to do something awful, though we’re not sure this has ever happened.
Yet they refrain from prohibiting forced marriage - something which obviously causes enormous and direct suffering to hundreds of young women every year.
How strange.
172- What I find disturbing is the idea of grown men perving at pictures of what looks like naked schoolgirls doing all sorts of things in a magazine on sale in a newsagents yards from a primary school.
They also sell the morning star so another good reason to shop elsewhere…
Benedict, glad to hear you weren’t proposing tax credits for it…
180. LOL. No life experience - as compared to you I suppose! I suppose working my way through university, doing two jobs to earn the deposit on our house and supporting my husband through his travails doesn’t count as life experience.
The fact that you need to claim that the unemployed are “orphans” or “abused”, just to make your point, shows that you’ve lost the plot. Have you actually met any working class people? Why do you assume that they “don’t have strong family backgrounds”, or that they don’t have friends whom they can stay with. Why do you assume they they won’t cotton onto how lucrative it could be to rent their houses out, or that they are too thick to be able to find a new job if their old one packs in?
I think you yourself are a very inexperienced man, who doesn’t really understand how the economy works, is full of negative stereotypes about “the working class” and quite unrealistic of what govt can and cannot do. The only thing a govt can do is provide a very steady, stable, macroeconomic climate, and let people get on with things. What they don’t need is people like you patronising them.
RE 183, The point I was making Snowflake, is not that all “working class” people are abused orphans too thick to look for another job, but that your assumptions about how people should survive hard times are not available to all.
“The only thing a govt can do is provide a very steady, stable, macroeconomic climate, and let people get on with things.”
So how does generating massive wage deflation in the unskilled sector provide a stable macro economic enviroment in which people can get on with things?
Whilst it is true that if you lose one job you can get another, some one who is on low wages for the cost of living may not be able to get another job. Some people have families who can’t be moved into other peoples houses, some people rent their houses from an RSL, which took years of sitting on a waiting list, and they can’t rent out lock stock and barrel, even if they had the space, which they usualy don’t because you only generaly get one room for two kids.
81-What is a hagiographer when it is at home? (and please do not say you)!!
Benedict White- am not too tribal anti Tory to spot an occasional goodun- especially when working in my day job.
And- I bet if you had to work around Govt officers, and occasional ministers you wouldn’t quite be so tribal. Going back to Prescott alot of the work at the ODPM under Prezza’s guidance has really been quite good, and believe it or not many people there are committed, inovative and effective. That is how Tories such as Lockart have benefited- both for themselves and for their communities.
Problem with politics is that people get judged for the one or two bad things that they do (Mandelson, Prescott or Blunkett could tell you that). Same thing with work and life for that matter. C’est la vie
184. Those weren’t “assumptions” of what people do when they are unemployed, but anecdotes.
You tend to make a lot of assertions - yesterday you were claiming falsely that brits were losing jobs to immigrants. Now you are claiming that there is “massive wage deflation”, again without proof. Wages are rising at 3.8% per annum, if you exclude bonuses. If there was “massive wage deflation”, the stats would show wages falling. All that is happening is that wages are rising moderately, instead of very fast. This is a good thing. If you read accounts of the 1970’s, very fast wage inflation is what caused price inflation. Price inflation hits the poor most, as they spend a larger % of their earnings on consumption.
You also seem to be quite confused about the status of people involved. eg you seem to think that construction workers and plumbers are minimum wage earners and all live in council houses! Actually most of these people make pretty good money (though no longer £80k a year for plumbing as it used to be a few years ago) - pretty much in line with average earnings now. No one on average earnings is “poor”. And most will have savings from the good years (unless you also subscribe to the belief that they are working with their hands so they are too cretinous to think of saving). You need to get out of your ivory tower more.
RE 185, Tyson I am not entirely tribal. I admit for example that Madelson did one very very good thing. Resign
On a slightly more serious note you are right to say I do not know the good things Pezza has done, though I will admit some people in the ODPM need commiting.
What concerns me is pathfinders inflexibility and removal of planning democracy.
187.” admit for example that Madelson did one very very good thing. Resign ”
So 2 good jobs!
RE 186, Snowflake, I don’t live in an ivory tower, I live on a council estate.
Proof of wage defaltion? I thought we discussed that yesterday with the wages of cleaners, builders and plumbers dropping through the floor. Builders when they had work were making between £100 and £150 per day, or £500 to £750 a week. Some builders don’t get paid when it rains. Some have enough inside work to cope. Now they get £60ish a day, or £300 per week FOR WHEN THEY CAN WORK.
Cleaners on £15 per hour, FOR THE HOURS THEY CAN WORK, (£27K assuming working 37.5 hours per week, for 48 weeks of the year) are now on £7 per hour (£12600 same assumptions).
If that is not wage deflation what is?
What world do you live in where the average wage for cleaners is £15 per hour?
89. Sorry, cleaners were never on £15 per hour anywhere - that was just a figure plucked out of the air. (Remember the min wage is £5.05). And we also discussed how the earnings of self-employed people fluctuated - it’s the nature of being self-employed). The good plumbers and construction workers, who have a clientel based on word of mouth will have plenty of work. The scammers will have to find other work to do.
There is actually an awful lot of construction work going on - the London Olympics, Heathrow Terminal 5, various PFI hospitals and schools, the numbers of projects are a decade high.
I think we should give credit to Commentator for standing up to be counted on the dubious candidate issue - I’m ready to listen more attentively next time he criticises someone on our side.
Can I disagree with the suggestion that we need more articles about British politics and fewer on foreign ones? There is a limit to how often we can chew over the relative merits of Blair, Brown, Cameron and Campbell when there’s no new data to chew over. I like to learn something, and the piece on French politcs was especially interesting. How about one on the Swedish election?
On the snuff porn thing - I’ll wait to see the detailed proposal, but as I understand it the question of definition is already resolved, since it is illegal to purvey material of the kind described, and has been for some decades. The problem is that the purveyors nowadays mostly live abroad and supply pictures via the internet, and the proposal is to prevent British people from encouraging what in Britain would be an illegal activity.
192.”the piece on French politcs was especially interesting. How about one on the Swedish election?”
There’ll be soon elections in Austria too.
I have found recent debates on porn and immigration very confusing and can no longer remember who is meant to be left wing and who is meant to be right wing. I can no longer tell pig from man.
I see the topic of the day ran out of steam pretty early on. I suppose it always would. It is something of international significance, but one that nobody here has firm prejudices on.
191. If I can clear this point up - seeing as it was me that made it!
Snowflake is partly right. I never said cleaners were on £15 an hour, that was the amount I was thinking I might have to pay today, given that cleaners in Islington were on £10 an hour ten years ago (as I know, coz I employed one).
However, the point remains. £10 an hour ten years ago must be worth, maybe, £12 or £13 an hour today. That’s how much cleaners in central London should be on if they were just treading water, salarywise.
However, as we know, Polish girls will charge £7 an hour, a drop of 40% from £12. That is pretty impressive wage deflation. I’m glad I’m not a poor, unskilled working indigene in Blair’s Britain. Aren’t you, Snowflake?
192. A fairish point. Much of this stuff is already illegal to make. Yet the leap to criminalisation of mere possession is still enormous, especially as possession, when it comes to the internet, is classified as merely having a photo on your screen once - you don’t even have to download it to your hard drive.
Jailing people for five years simply for looking at images, images which might not be actually of violence, just giving the “appearance” of violence, comes quite close to Orwell’s concept of thoughtcrime, as far as I can see.
194. SBS - that’s because traditional concepts of left and right are redundant.
All you have to remember is that the left, New Labour, Blair’s Cronies, are basically AUTHORITARIAN and ANTI-BRITISH.
Likewise, all you have to remember is that the right, the new Tories, Cameron’s Conservatives, are basically LIBERTARIAN and PATRIOTIC.
Hold those ideas in your mind and the attitudes of most commenters here become perfectly explicable.
seanT @ 196 I couldn’t have put it better myself!
192 - “Can I disagree with the suggestion that we need more articles about British politics and fewer on foreign ones? There is a limit to how often we can chew over the relative merits of Blair, Brown, Cameron and Campbell when there’s no new data to chew over. I like to learn something, and the piece on French politcs was especially interesting. How about one on the Swedish election?”
Agreed. It’s stuff I just wouldn’t have the time and/or ability to discover for myself, so I really appreciate those who make the effort to provide a good and impartial guide. I also enjoyed this morning’s piece about the Nobel Peace prize.
I’ve been on my holls and just been trawling through the topics of the past couple of weeks and have read Sean’s (as in Fear) very interesting bit on the London local election results/the votes recieved for the parties under the new constituency boundaries.
So…
Sean, could you please e-mail me a copy of your constituency analysis, it would be much appreciated. My address is ajd87@hotmail.co.uk . Sorry for the delay in the request… and thank you in advance.
198 - yes, I know that. But, it is amazing how legislative NuLab are getting. If in doubt, legislate - and ban something.
I was hoping somebody would comeback with a link to one of those tests you can do to see if you are left or right, authoritarian or libertarian. Forgotten the web addresses for them and feel I need to do one again.
PS: Tories not so liberal / libertarian on immigration though. Still, there’s hope they may come round to the LD way of thinking on this too.
295 - “However, as we know, Polish girls will charge £7 an hour!”
I think Lewis Baston summed up the porn issue very well.
I find it very, very disturbing that the government will so easily confuse what they disapprove of with what should be illegal. There was an idiot on the local news just now, arguing that any measure which kept children safer online is a step in the right direction. Well this clearly isn’t the case. We could rip out everyone’s phone lines. It would keep children safer online, but it clearly wouldn’t be a step in the right direction.
This action is not only wrong, it’s disproportionate.
This is a draconian measure that is easily taken because those on the sharp end of it attract little sympathy. But every step in this direction makes it easier for them to ban something that I do. Like drinking heavily. Or rugby. Or bellringing. All attract their disapproving tuts.
Anyway - though I disagree with much of what Snowflake says, I’m much happier arguing with lefties who are to the (economic) right of me (they’re pretty much all to the authoritarian right). It’s confusing, but it’s intellectually refreshing.
196. But Sean, I thought the tories were backing Mrs Longhurst call to take actions against those sites (or at least some of them).
http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=25923&SESSION=682
http://edmi.parliament.uk/EDMi/EDMDetails.aspx?EDMID=25928&SESSION=682
On the subject of the non-British stuff - I welcome it, but can’t contribute much. The discussions often come back to Britain anyway where we’re all more well-informed - but I think it makes a nice change to at least start out on a fresh topic. When you get to discussing the respective party leaders’ man-boobs, you know you’ve probably done the subject to death.
On the subject of Immigration - has anyone noticed that the Independent is getting almost as monomaniacal on the subject as the Express is about Diana? Every other day gives us a new ‘Cram them in!’ headline.
RE 190, Ian, I understand that was the going rate some time ago in places like Guildford where living is expensive.
Re 191, Snowflake, yes “self employed” people have to go with the rough and the smooth. Dockers used to be paid on a day rate. No ships to unload, no pay. Tiny Tim goes hungry. That is why they unionised so heavily. Unfortunately it bread a lot of militancy which went on to threaten the jobs and conditions which they rightly secured.
However, you seem not to appreaciate that some of these “self employed” are not in high paying work, and they are hit hard when wages fall. This happens in the normal course of events in a reccession, but the cost of living tends not to rise so fast either. What we have here is an increased competition for other things as well like for example housing.
In that sense there is a double whammy. A large influx of new arrivals will tend to drive up accomodation costs whilst driving down pay. The level of immigration is in the control of government.
Whilst it is true that we can do with more competition and workers in some trades, the sudden increase causes real hardship whilst at the same time leaving the most vunerable with litle time to prepare or adapt. You also seem not to appreaciate that some people who are cleaners or other unskilled workers may not have the time in between child care to be able to re train.
Re 200, SBS, Our concern with regards to immigration has more to do with a concern for those already here, regardless of when they got here than anything else.
Nikky P- can I suggest you follow the French morning thread from yesterday. A poster- Chris from Paris was especially illuminating, and much better than anything I have read in the broadies.
As I have said before there is no better sight on pbCOM than snowflake5 in full flow vanquishing all before her (reading yesterdays thread which is a damnsite more interesting than listening to seanT’s bleating on pornography and immigration).
Now knowing that snowflake5 in finance would like to think in the teasury rather than a mortagage adviser attached to an estate agent.
SeanT- your point from Saturday that all things attractive are driven to the Tories. Why is it that the intellegentsia, the artists, the entertainers, the writers, the intellectuals are so repulsed by the Tories (aside of course from Andrew Lloyd Weber, Jim Davidson, Pati Boulay and of course Mr Rickets).
Why is that many of the Tory posters on this site are either pompous nitwit baffoons, or just nasty, bitter twisted haters of anything progressive. Not true for the LD’s, or Lab. I can vouch for that.
The fact is that anyone with a brain and half an ounce of humanity is mutually incompatible with anything right wing. It is why they dislike NuLab too.
Progressive thought is not on the right. Discuss
Sorry Tyson, but I know far too many Labour activists and elected members who are Labour ‘because we hate the Tories’
For instance when fighting a Labour council’s attempt to build executive houses on a school playing field I was left speechless by the accusation from a Labour councillor that I didn’t know what I was talking about, it’s all right for you Tories, you’ve all got a roof over your heads. Since we were talking about quarter of a million pound houses I thought that was a very revealing attack.
Yes some Tories can be aggressive and heartless. But at least we know what we stand for. The LibDems stand for anything that a Focus leaflet will get them elected. Labour often stand for ‘not being the Tories’ which simply isn’t good enough IMHO.
So am I a pompous nitwit buffoon, or a nasty bitter hater of anything progressive?
08- sorry for the rant- I guess seanT’s posting on Saturday hit a nerve being myself of course an ugly, boring, inarticulate, thick, creature that pervades the left.
I do not really think that all the Tory posters on this site are baffoons, or bitter and twisted- just anti progress and anti modernity that is all.
210 I’m so progressive and modern I want a totally new Government! Lol!
RE 208 Tyson, “Why is that many of the Tory posters on this site are either pompous nitwit baffoons, or just nasty, bitter twisted haters of anything progressive. Not true for the LD’s, or Lab. I can vouch for that.”
Am I supposed to take that as a compliment?
207 - any desire to restrict something can be dressed up as a concern to protect.
I do find the Indy’s obsession with supporting immigration a refreshing change from the usual suspects. But it is going over the top now. And it bases most of it on the “good for industry” = “cheap slave labour” argument - citing a lot that industry bigwigs have said.
195. Well according to this 295-page report into low pay
http://www.lowpay.gov.uk/lowpay/report/pdf/DTi-Min_Wage.pdf#search=%22min%20wage%201997%20uk%22
cleaners were getting between £4.1 and £6.9 per hour in 2002 - 18% were earning £4.1 per hour, 8% at £5.1 per hour and a lucky 0.5% were getting £6.9 per hour. See pages 103-106 of the report - the table with the cleaning wages is on page 105.
That was in 2002, two years before the eastern europeans joined the EU, and 6 years after you supposedly paid £10 per hour to a cleaner. Either you are making the figure up, or your old cleaner scammed you.
Going from £4.1 per hour in 2002 to £7 per hour in 2006 is pretty reasonable and notice the wages went up. So much for wage deflation.
RE 213, SBS, We curb the ability of people to engage in sexual intercourse below a certain age in order to protect children. Do you have a problem with that?
I see you now equate the indies want of immigration with slave labour. Is that a bad thing in your view?
Tories are fun, interesting, attractive, humorous people, but can be off-putting en masse; Lefties are stupid, humourless, juvenile, creepy, boring inadequates, who try to put on a good show when they are together (seanT from Saturday).
In all seriousness and to get away from playground talk I think there is room for centre right progressive thinking- it just doesn’t go with the Tories.
The Tories are the problem- they have denied the centre right of a viable, progressive voice that could capture the imagination. Why- because the public hate them.
The Tories raison d’etre was to win elections. All it is going to take for Labour is to boot out Blair, re-energise over the successor, present a couple more policies and the next election is bagged. Simple as..
So again the Tories fail, and again progressive centre right politics is denied a voice. How many elections in modern Britain do they have to lose before they pack their bags. The British public do not want the Tories back. What they want is a progressive centre right party that champions modern, mulicultural Britain as it now is. When will the penny drop. How many elections will the Tories have to lose??
Hilarious reading on this thread, Seant on the joys of bondage and women in straw hats right next to a discourse on java programming.
On the bondage and other non-vanilla sexual practices issue, I rather think that this is a ploy by labour to criminalise as much of the opposition benches as possible. Could be their only way of wangling a majority next time if they can bang up (no not that way) tory and lib dem MPs like that.
As new labour seems to be a party that does it with the lights off (with only office rogering permitted as a peccadillo) they would appear to be confident in their own safety in this area.
Seriously, they are barmy if they think this is a law that is enforceable in any way.
RE 214, What a large office cleaning company, or rather more likely a contractor working for the state (some times employing ileagal immigrants to clean the immigration and nationality directorate) pays by way of a non living wage bears no resemblance to what they charge charge for them, or how much in certain areas a private cleaner can get working one hour here for SeanT and another hour somewhere else for Mrs Muggins. I doubt the low pay unit looks at it that way.
x16 - Tyson you could add that Tories are also world-class hypocrites! They opposed the minimum wage, which gave a whole bunch of cleaners, nursery nurses etc a pay-rise from the wretched wages they were earning under the Tories. Then they pretend that the wages at the time were more than double what they actually were, so they can claim that immigrants are causing “massive wage deflation”, and so they can bash immigrants supposedly in the name of the “poor”!
With a straight face they claim that an unskilled cleaner would normally make £27,000 in London if immigrants weren’t there, even while they are also claiming that the Labour government has poured too much into public sector wages, examples of this are starting salaries for teachers in Inner London of £24168, and outside London £20,133!
Oh and they claim to live on council estates, while demonstrating the above complete lack of knowledge of the labour market and wages.
You couldn’t make it up!!
I guess it’s another of the myths they have to tell themselves in order to continue, just like the one about how we are in a recession right now.
“RE 213, SBS, We curb the ability of people to engage in sexual intercourse below a certain age in order to protect children. Do you have a problem with that?” - no problem. I am a liberal, not a libertarian. I was just stirring…
“I see you now equate the indies want of immigration with slave labour. Is that a bad thing in your view?” - it leaves a slightly nasty taste in the mouth when it becomes a crude financial decision. My view is that it was right to let the Poles, Lithuanians etc come and work here.
If we allow Romania and Bulgaria to join the EU, we should let those nationalities come and work here, as the EU should have a free market (at least internally). Personally, I feel that these countries may not be ready to join (but am undecided), and the Mail, if they feel so strongly, should be using their influence to get Blair to veto accession, rather than impose a protectionist measure in a supposedly free market.
218. Sorry, the low pay unit looked at what people were actually earning. And given that cleaning is unskilled manual work, it isn’t much. If you are a cleaner expecting to be paid more than a teacher, you’ve got rocks in your head.
The minimum wage delivered a wage-rise for these people. And their wages have continued to rise because the govt continued to raise the min wage in the teeth of Tory opposition.
You are either naive, or so desperate to find some evidence of “massive wage deflation” that you’ll believe anything about what cleaners used to be paid. The reality is that for about fifteen years, this work has been done by new immigrants, Brits go for the better paid work, and the min wage has helped them enormously. If Sean T’s cleaner is getting £7 per hour, when the min wage is £5.05, then she’s doing well.
ukPaul- glad that you made a call. You are a case in point. Liberal centre right. It is people like you that are going to be badly let down by clinging to a hopeless Tory party.
And as a libertarian myself- authoritarian NuLab is no different from the authoritarian populist instincts of the Tories. Remember the video nasties- and more recently Cameron decrying flimsy children’s wear. Cameron is no natural libertarian.
My feeling is that post Blair Lab’s liberal will take over. Most of the parliamentary party are genuine liberals. In contrast few in the Tories are genuine liberals- do not get taken in by Cameron’s expedient liberal spin.
219 - snowflake, you are taking the comments of one person/a few people, and extrapolating these into “they say this, they say that, gosh aren’t they beastly” form of sweeping generalisation, as if everyone in the Conservative party has precisely identical views on everything.
222: ‘My feeling is that post Blair Lab’s liberal will take over’
Who’s he then?
“ukPaul- glad that you made a call. You are a case in point. Liberal centre right. It is people like you that are going to be badly let down by clinging to a hopeless Tory party. ”
Seeing as I’ve never voted tory (and unless they rid themselves of their loopy extremists will not do so now) they’ve nothing to let me down for!
Now labour (who I once represented, to my subsequent shame) is a different matter, they’ve let me down badly.
222 - “My feeling is that post Blair Lab’s liberal will take over. Most of the parliamentary party are genuine liberals. In contrast few in the Tories are genuine liberals- do not get taken in by Cameron’s expedient liberal spin.”
Love the irony! Most Labour MPs are genuine liberals! Why the hell do the back all this authoritarian and warmongering stuff then? All those laws banning this, that and the other… all those centrally imposed targets… Pull the other one!
13 - belatedly corrected, apologies.
Ladies, ladies! Oooh, I must have hit a nerve or two. Unclench your pinafores.
Snowflake - I’ve no idea what the Low Pay Unit thinks cleaners were getting in 2002 or even 54BC, all i know is that 10 years ago our cleaner, in central London, was charging £10 an hour for heavy duty house cleaning (four guys in one house!) - which works out at £14,400 a year for a thirty hour week, 48 weeks a year (remember she was a single mum).
Perhaps you consider £14,400 a year an absurdly high wage for mere cleaning done by an unskilled white cockney woman with a “common” accent. And it was, of course, her fault for not having herself sterilised so she didn’t fall pregnant. These chavs, tut.
Tyson. If you look back at that thread which has got you so hysterical, you will notice it was YOU that started the name-calling, by claiming all Tories were stupid etc, and what a relief it was not to be surrounded by stupid Tories with their “filthy rags”.
I merely gave it back to you, in spades. Be a man and stop whingeing.
x28. SeanT - all I know is that your cleaner wasn’t typical (if that’s what you actually paid her), because the min wage lifted the wages of cleaners, nursery nursesm security people etc.
When the min wage was introduced in 1999, it was £3.60 per hour. And your side bleated that this was too much - which makes me think that all your comments about cockneys, chavs etc, is just you projecting your beliefs outwards.
snowflake5- your point earlier today about the right (Tories) attacking immigration, by instead upholding the rights of the poor, dispossessed and working classes- brilliant.
Do they understand that they are Tories. Do they understand the history of their party. Do they know what they are about. The working classes despise the Tories. There are no votes for Tories with the working classes.
As you said the Tories are hypocrites, masking their hatred of immigation and immigrants in a different language.
223: snowflake, you are taking the comments of one person/a few people, and extrapolating these into “they say this, they say that, gosh aren’t they beastly” form of sweeping generalisation, as if everyone in the Conservative party has precisely identical views on everything.
I suppose when one belongs to the New-Labour cult, whose brainwashed members defend to the hilt whatever headline-grabbing fatuity Tony Blair happens to be spouting that week only to see Lord God King leader ditch the notion the week after, it must be difficult to grasp the concept of diversity of thought being permitted in political parties.
229. Oh deary me. do you know what you sound like, Snowy? You sound like the most heartless Tory circa 1983. Screw the working classes, to hell with the unemployed scroungers. Etc etc.
You know, I used to wonder what it was about the Thatcherite Tories that so got up the noses of everybody else - but listening to your uber-capitalist screeching I start to realise. Its this heartless sneering from the better off, backed up by screeds of cold and dubious data, its just appalling.
If any undecideds read this site, I think you probably lose New Labour ten votes every time you post. You also make me think there is a real point in David Cameron - there really is room for a compassionate conservatism, unashamedly patriotic but liberal too, decent, honest, fair, a party on the side of ordinary British people and their ancient freedoms.
Thanks for confirming my beliefs.
230 - okay, there’s no football on, so I’ll humour you for a bit.
So…I’m “working class”, if you’re going to attach labels to people. And a Tory. How does that work?
232 SeanT, if there are undecided’s reading this board, they’d have noted how you opposed the min wage, opposed the latest increase, and invented figures for what cleaners should now be earning in order to pretend that immigration is causing problems.
What a duplicitous man, they’ll conclude.
Given your professed concern for the poor, why did Dave and co oppose the increase in the min wage to £5.05? Was it the 5p tacked on at the end that was too much for you?
230. “Do they understand that they are Tories. Do they understand the history of their party. Do they know what they are about.”
Do you understand use of question marks?
230. “The working classes despise the Tories. There are no votes for Tories with the working classes.”
At least try to be slightly intelligent, please. I was originally attracted to this site because it seemed to be a place for intelligent discussion on politics and betting. The standard of posts is sadly slipping and due to Mike’s (correctly) liberal attitude it’s up to us, the users, to uphold the standards.
213. The Independent’s histrionic cheerleading on immigration is truly bizarre. The headlines this week border on the pathological - actually using the phrase ‘let them all in’. And the people they used to back up this demand? - capitalist fat cats, on the hunt for low wages. You couldn’t make it up - a leftish newspaper eagerly quoting pinstriped directors about the need to keep working class salaries low.
But what is it about Britain as she is that the left so despises? That they should want to transform her forever with massive and untrammelled immigration?
Are there still too many pretty green bits left? Are there not enough concrete estates and multi-storey car parks? Perhaps the fact that there are still working class local people earning a decent wage irks the left beyond belief? I mean, these people are unskilled and they drive cars!
It really is very strange.
RE 219, Snowflake, Beware implying taht I am lying about where I live, when in writing it is libel. (As opposed to slander).
I am fully aware of the forms one has to fill in to get a court order to make ISP’s etc cough up sufficient information to get an address for service. With a bit of luck that will convince you that I live where I say I live. I will admit though, estate makes it sound larger than it is, and the council owned houses were the subject of a large scale voluntary transfer to a housing association.
£15 per hour, does not equate to £27000 a year if you are not in a position to work to work 37.5 hours a week, because you have to travel between jobs, pick up kids and what ever else. Besides which, they may not have a full order book.
Also, the price is not for all areas of London, or Surrey. It applies in some areas where this type of home help is scarce.
56 - SBS, the Lib Dems strongest support in North Devon comes from Barnstaple - and their support comes from the worst areas of the town. Ditto Bideford which is in Torridge and West Devon.
I suspect when Thorpe was the MP he used to carry these wards/areas overwhelmingly, helping him overcome the Tory advantage in the rural parts of the constituency.
193 - I don’t know much about Sweden, but if anyone would like to write a guest piece on the elections there, I’d be happy to run it.
We should have something on Austria next week.
RE 220, SBS, I accept the stirring. However, a free market has to have some rules imposed on it for various different reasons.
We do need to deal with Romania and Bulgaria’s lack of economic growth.
Very interesting today-I’m off to my local hostelry for refreshment-will pop by later
237 Ben I was just surprised that a person could live on a council estate and be so unaware of the facts of life. I’ll be charitable and conclude that you are naive. People claim all sorts of untrue things on web-sites - eg that we’re in a recession, that cleaners earn more than teachers, that there is “massive wage deflation”, all without providing links to any reputable site to back their argument up.
I can’t believe you are still going on about cleaners earning £15 per hour. Think. If a teacher starting out in Inner London gets only £24168, why would you believe an unskilled manual worker with no qualifications would have a greater hourly rate? Why would anyone do teaching if cleaning was so lucrative?
Cleaners have always been the poorest paid in society. They usually tend to be immigrants (in fact since the 1960’s Heathrow has been cleaned by immigrants from the sub-continent for instance). Most struggle to negotiate pay-rises and depend on the govt to raise the stat min wage to get a rise. Self-employed cleaners do a bit better.
I know you are desperate to prove that immigrants are a catastrophe, but you do your argument no favours when you make such ludicrous claims as cleaners earning £15 per hour.
And no one has come back on the point of why the Tories opposed the latest rise in the min wage, if you all care about the poor so much.
242. Snowflake. What was that you just said? - oh yes: ‘i can’t believe you are still going on about cleaners earning £15 an hour’ and this: ‘you do yourself no favours when you make such ludicrous claims as cleaners earning £15 an hour’.
Interesting, you really are quite adamant that a cleaner couldn’t earn £15 an hour, aren’t you? Really really quite adamant. Really really sure. Sure as sure can be. No one could earn anywhere NEAR that much, not for cleaning. No WAY.
Whoops - a swift bit of Googling gives us this:
“London, May 22 /PRNewswire/ — Whispered dinner party talk of how much one should be paying the ‘lady who does’ can now come out into the open. A new survey reveals that domestic cleaners around the UK are earning between £4.50 and £15 per hour. The average weekly wage packet is £30 for 4.5 hours work - equivalent to £6.70 per hour.”
What’s that figure there, oh yes, £15 an hour! Goodness me. the biggest ever survey done of domestic help, and some of them are earning…. £15 an hour!
£15 an hour! Yes, FIFTEEN pounds per HOUR.
Weirdly enough, of course, none of us here on Planet Sanity ever claimed cleaners could or should earn £15 an hour, I just extrapolated that figure from the £10 an hour my cleaner earned in
1996.
Nonetheless, it turns out to be true! some cleaners are - or were, this survey was done in 2003 - earning £15 an hour.
Its a small point. But I do know you like to get the data straight.
LOL.
But Sean - the “average” was “£6.70 per hour” - back in May.
So £7 per hour now seems reasonable; so where’s the evidence this wage has been influenced by mass immigration?
Sean T - from your own quote: “A new survey reveals that domestic cleaners around the UK are earning between £4.50 and £15 per hour. The average weekly wage packet is £30 for 4.5 hours work - equivalent to £6.70 per hour.”
How many earn £15 per hour - 0.5%? As many as earned £6.9 in 2002? Yet your whole claim is that £15 per hour is the average, and that there has been “massive wage deflation” if people earn £7ph. In order to be “massive” the average needs to be £15. and it isn’t.
Otherwise anyone could use the extreme outer limits. A worker could claim that wages in Britain range from £9191 to £1000,000, and that really it’s absolutely dreadful that the average person was getting much less that £1,000,000, must be something very, very, wrong… - point the finger at the govt, blame immigrants, or whoever is taking the flack today.
Sorry, you claimed there was deflation in cleaning wages caused by immigrants, when in fact the average wage rose - and you can’t bring yourself to admit that you got it wrong.
Snowflake,
1. Where (roughly) do you live?
2. Have you tried hiring a cleaner to do one or two hours a week?
Tyson, All the factory reforms of the 19th cnetury and some of the 20th were under Conservative administrations. There is at least a 15% residual working class Conservative vote in many places. Durham miners apparently kept Edwina Curry as an MP.
So think what you like Tyson, we will see what happens when the votes are counted next time.
Compare and contrast:
Snowflake: ‘i can’t believe you are still going on about cleaners earning £15 an hour’
& ‘you do yourself no favours when you make such ludicrous claims as cleaners earning £15 an hour’.
with
“London, May 22 /PRNewswire/ — Whispered dinner party talk of how much one should be paying the ‘lady who does’ can now come out into the open. A new survey reveals that domestic cleaners around the UK are earning between £4.50 and £15 per hour’.
Snowy, you call yourself an economic expert, when what you are is a CRETIN. I never claimed £15 was the ‘average wage for cleaners’; indeed I never claimed it was a wage AT ALL. I said - go back to the thread - that if my old cleaner earned £10 an hour ten years ago, then..
Oh, what’s the use! You clearly have Special Needs, Snowy. I suggest you retire from this thread, which is becoming increasingly embarrassing for you, and go and chew a blanket, in a darkened room. Someone will come in later and change the plastic sheeting.
Sean, this is what you said in post 195: “However, the point remains. £10 an hour ten years ago must be worth, maybe, £12 or £13 an hour today. That’s how much cleaners in central London should be on if they were just treading water, salarywise.
However, as we know, Polish girls will charge £7 an hour, a drop of 40% from £12. That is pretty impressive wage deflation. I’m glad I’m not a poor, unskilled working indigene in Blair’s Britain. Aren’t you, Snowflake?”
You were claiming that immigrants caused a “40% drop” in wages, when in fact wages rose 4.4% from £6.7 in may to £7 now when you hired your cleaner.
You’ve been caught fibbing about the impact on cleaners by immigrants.
178 Sigh, snowflake5. I am making no assumptions about the poor.
You support the Reds. Tebbit supports the Blues. The Blues hate the Reds. The Reds hate the Blues.
But, there is no difference between the Reds and the Blues. There is no difference between Tebbit and yourself.
Like the trooping of the colour or the opening of Parliament by Black Rod, the fight between the Blues and the Reds is one of those glorious, meaningless, pieces of British pageantry.
Snowflake what about John Denham (Labour MP) stating that the daily pay rate for builders had halved in Soton.
A 50% is way deflation by my maths.
250. I’ve no idea what he is basing his claim on. There is not a large amount of contruction going on in Southampton at the moment anyway - and wages fluctuate according to the amount of building projects taking place in an area - not sure that has anything to do with immigrants. In Britain overall, there is a lot of building work going on - but the construction workers need to move towards the buildings, they won’t come to them (no doubt Gwynfa will think this very harsh of me). Construction projects are at a decade high, given the Olympics, Terminal 5 and the various hospitals and schools being built.
250 correction
A 50% cut in pay is deflation by my maths. And from a Labour source that you must know Snowflake5?
Benedict
Some of the Factory Acts were passed under Tory Govts, but others were certainly Whig (and later Liberal) ones. The key 1833 Act for instance, was under the Melbourne Govt.
246. Benedict: “Durham miners apparently kept Edwina Curry as an MP.” Eh? Edwina Currie was MP for South Derbyshire. The constituency contains some ex-mining territory around Swadlincote, but also includes rural areas and Derby suburbs. It has always been a marginal.
Tyson - “As you said the Tories are hypocrites, masking their hatred of immigation and immigrants in a different language.”
That is inaccurate and insulting. I haven’t met ANY Tories who hate immigrants. The only hatred that I’ve seen comes from Labour supporters.
The only hypocrits are the champagne Socialists gloating about their cheap East European cleaners.
I’ve met some very decent Labour activists, but they all seem to be dropping out of politics. Is it any wonder when their fellow travellers have drifted so far to the Right?
At a time when the Tories have finally recovered their social conscience, Labour seem to have lost theirs. Don’t you folks care anything for the real underclass? The poor are real people, not mere statistics to be fed into the New Labour spin machine.
You are sounding more and more like the Tories in the dog years of the Major government. They knew they were going to lose the next election, and no longer cared. With rail privitisation, etc, they seemed to be implementing a scorched earth policy, in order to leave the biggest possible mess for their successors.
At the moment, Blair and the Blairites seem determined to out-do Major; to them, it doesn’t matter whether they are followed by Brown or the Tories. Either way, the mess they are creating (Iraq, Afghanistan, mass immigration leading to pauperisation of the underclass, etc.) will fall on an opponent. It’s a win-win situation.
It’s very sad to see the Party of the Working Man reduced to suppressing the wages of the lower paid in the name of fighting inflation. Everybody thought we’d seen the back of that policy when Thatcher fell.
RE 254, Thanks KevinL. I’ll get me coat again.
You are right about the constituancy, I just remember her talking about being in a miners club or with miners when they heard Scargil talking about rolling back the years of Thatcherism, and the miners she was with told her in no uncertain terms taht as they voted for it they did not want it rolled back.
There were still 7 pits working in South Derbyshire in 1970 . The last one closed in 1988 so those miners who voted for Thatcher were a bit like turkeys voting for Xmas .
RE 253, Tim13, Many thanks for the correction.
RE 257, Mark, well yes perhaps. I don’t know what they are doing now.
I wish I could afford a cleaner.
Certainly the Nottinghamshire miners who formed the breakaway UDM ended up feeling used and betrayed by the Conservative party - see for example http://www.minersadvice.co.uk/nottingham.htm
260 - Could you not get your pupils to do it under the guise of practical domestic studies ?
256. Hmmm… Labour have held Swadlincote quite comfortably in two local by-elections recently, so the Derbyshire (ex-)miners’ alleged dalliance with Edwina and Margaret must have been short-lived.
Construction projects are at a decade high, given the Olympics …
spin alert! Read the briefing again. Olympic construction hasn’t started yet.
Well indeed, I’ve had an offer from a pupil to babysit under the guise of coursework for GCSE Child Development! However, not after all the trouble I got in for getitng them to deliver Tory leaflets claiming it was P.E. …
p.s. For the humourless left, that was a joke.
263- The swing in South Derbyshire to Labour in 1997 was 13.5% well above average .
The Swedish election really is interesting - no honestly it is -
many of the issues we debate here are on the agenda but with a swedish consensus veneer . In many policy areas they are years ahead but also they worry about their lack of competiveness and rising unemployment .
But even more impressive than this is it is a finely balanced contest with some interesting opportunities for those of a gambling disposition and willing to do some research
First two cleaners I could find in Norwich cost £8.25 an hour (young, but keen to please) and £11.50 an hour (apparently has 25 years experience and excellent references). Not that I can afford either. Actually, the present Mrs Cllr Little won’t have a cleaner - not for money (which is why Cllr Little won’t have one) but because she doesn’t want another woman riffling through our stuff. Not that have anything worth hiding unfortunately…
RE 260, See Snowflake, she is keen on selling them cheap.
RE 268, Apparently Councilor, Snowflake thinks your making it up or being had.
Tell me, is your area more or less expensive to live in compared to central London?
Do you suppose the wages are higher there or where you are?
267 - the going rate in Notts is 10gbp/hr.
Norwich has very cheap standards of living - much lower than, say, London. Given the regional differences, I wonder what an £11.50 per hour cleaner in Norwich could get if they worked in London?
RE 271, Tabbers, your lying, Snowflake has looked up a quango report so there,
266. Mark, some time ago IIRC you were asking about Glasgow locsl election results. I now have these in a spreadsheet with a rough approximation to the new STV wards. If you are still interested let me know your e-mail address.
268 etc. Interesting real-life data! I did some research too - down in the family seat in Cornwall, the going rate is £8 an hour. So it seems the national average is about £8-£12 an hour, perhaps £8 on the periphery, £12 in central London (which fits with my cleaner getting £10 in central London ten years ago).
All of which means that the new Polish girl, bless her, offering to clean up after my fiancee and our three month old daughter, is a definite bargain at £7 an hour for central London.
And this in turn means local cleaners are facing some serious wage cuts.
Case closed, methinks.
Incidentally, Cllr Little - the same survey I quoted about cleaners’ wages also pointed out that 60% of Brits don’t WANT a cleaner even if they can afford it - for the same reason as your wife…
273 - of course, I could be being ripped off for living on “bread and lard island”
One day, Sean, one glorious day, I shall be able to afford it and then say “nah, I don’t want a cleaner picking up my undies thank you very much - I’ll do it myself and spent the £5.05 / £8.25 / £15 an hour on printing leaflets to help oust Blair / Brown / Benn / Reid / Johnson”
Delete as appropriate.
And clearly I am assuming this will happen within the next 3 years or I would say that I’d spend the cash supporting our wonderful new PM Dave “the man” Cameron.
However, I do detect the faintest whiff of hypocrisy here. I do not recall too much grief from the blue corner over “artificially high wages” and restrictive practices being broken in the glorious 1980s (O Claudia, where art thou?). Is there much difference between subsidies to coal miners and preventing local workers facing competition from immigrants?
RE 276, Ah, yes that must be it Tabman.
277 - Dave “the man” Cameron.
That’s a little too like a definitive statement, Anthony. Remember the CCHQ briefing.
“Dave Cameron has set up a policy forum to find out whether he is indeed male. Or not. He has expressed support for the idea of Y Chromosomes, but accepts that traditional X Chromosomes represent solid core feminine values and those can be presented in the modern world as positive too. Masculinity AND femininity. As one.”
I am having a new front step build tomorrow for £70 by a very nice local builder who lives just around the corner. If anybody knows of an immigrant / British builder who will do it for less within the next 12 hours, please let me know.
Am I being ripped off???? Or is £70 a good price???? Now I’m really worried.
RE 278, Tabman yes I think there is. We are not saying no to immigration, what we are saying is that it has to be controlled and meet our communities needs.
We also have to remember that OUR voters need housing atc. and immigrants take up all sorts of resourcing housing being the obvious one. They may be some building them and that is fine.
Please remember Tabman, this is not the Lebanon where when that building is built we get to send the Syrians home.
Fantastic. A leader who is all things to all people … a man for men and women, and a woman for men and women. All we need are policies to match - for and against Europe, for and against tax rises, for and against privatising post offices and we’d be …
Nah, you all get the end of that joke.
282 I thought in Lebanon when the Syrians finished building it up the Israelis busied themselves knocking it down, whilst the rest of the world wrung their hands collectively and relied on the French (the FRENCH!) to provide the basis of a Peacekeeping force.
Actually, scrap that estimate of London cleaning wages. I just found this advert on Craigs List:
WYoung successful male seeks pretty young cleaner 18-30 to clean small studio flat in west kensington regularly, wearing either underwear or naked. light cleaning duties only..hoovering, dusting etc. Nothing of a sexual nature. £30 -£50 per hour. once a week-fortnight ideal for open minded student or free & easy young lady looking to earn fast cash with little effort please send details about you. pic would be helpful Compensation: £30-50 p/hour”
£50 per hour! Snowflake eat your chilly capitalist heart out! OK she has to clean naked, but its OK, coz its “not of a sexual nature”. Just yer average nude hoovering.
Maybe I should get a cleaner after all.
Or maybe if I did, a divorce.
RE 280, Tabman, just how do you get hold of our top secret breifing papers?
274 Kevin - Many thanks would appreciate them very much Email address markseniorcoins@msn.com
282 - Benedict. Erecting tariffs is an honest policy. Free trade is an honest policy. Accepting free movement of goods and capital without free movement of labout is not.
283 - Anthony, pace seanT, doing both at once is so much more interesting than flip-flopping between alternate positions in petit-bourgeoise fashion …
287 - it’s what comes of being an Orange Booker/Closet Tory (delete to taste)
Enough of cleaners !!!!!!!!! try getting a decent footman these days.
And another one:
“Cleaner wanted. Light cleaning duties and ironing. 2 bed home in Notting Hill. Weekly. 3 hours in an evening. This job is in a naturist house. Cleaning to be carried out naked. No sex or physical contact. Please send contact details and full length photo (clothed or unclothed). Older women preferred. Compensation: £35 per hour”
Now I know what my old cleaner is doing. She’s a mature lady doing naked dusting in a nudists’ house in Notting Hill, for £35 an hour. I wonder what they think about THAT at the Low Pay Unit. Hah!
RE 284, Ben, its all an elaborate scheme to make construction companies lots of money, whilst employing lots of Syrian Labourers.
The Yanks and Iranians fund the demolition, whilst they, together with the EU, Saudi and various other nations fund the second phase.
I understand Lebanease contruction, cement and steel work making stocks are up.
You get paid more per hour being a naked cleaner than for being a Councillor. Humphf.
RE 289. Tabman “Benedict. Erecting tariffs is an honest policy. Free trade is an honest policy. Accepting free movement of goods and capital without free movement of labout is not.”
Could you explain the last comment please? Why, if that is the published position, is it dishonest?
294 Cllr Antony. Have you tried canvassing naked !! ….. Mind you, you could get more than you bargained for ….. especially from small dogs and your sausage department !! ….. ouch !!
294 Surely Cllr Little you do it for the same reason I do, the love of serving your community.
Especially when the bins aren’t collected (like today) because the residents insist on parking so badly the trucks can’t get down the road. But that’s my fault too.
Actually on second thoughts, maybe you’re on to something. A new career. Pack in the politics, take up nuddy cleaning. Certainly different! Could call it something novel. Like Oaten Cleaning Inc.
294. LOL! That is Notting Hill though, London weighting and all.
Stark naked dusting in Lytham St Annes fetches only £15 an hour, I understand. And cutlery polishing in split crotch panties earns a measly £11.25 in Boston, Lincolnshire.
And wait till those Polish girls hear about this gig! They’ll have their bras off and the knickers on the floor and the Brasso out for 50p a day!
I’m getting all excited.
291 - “footman” - is this some sort of code for extremely well-endowed?
295 - for the free market to work, you need free flows of capital, goods and labour. Otherwise you’ve erected a tarrif barrier.
My favourite headline from the 2005 election was:
“Little is as pro-sausage as Bacon”
Refering to my support for the Sausage Fans website, sponsored by local Tory MP Richard Bacon.
If I tried canvassing naked, I’d lose. Although I have canvassed quite a few naked people. Oh dear.
296 ….. cont …. also I wouldn’t stand still in certain areas as cyclists need somewhere to park their bike …. ouch mkII !!
298 - by far the funniest post I’ve read on pb.c - made me laugh out loud.
Why has our friend Snowflake5 not responded to this overwhelming evidence of cleaners wages (naked or otherwise)? Shame.
299 Tabman. Not in certain parts of Nottinghamshire so I’m led to believe !!
I do love the people of Bowthorpe and Earlham. But boy do I earn my 5k minus Brown’s tax. And I am proud to say I earn it despite being clothed for 99.9% of the time.
298 - ah, but sean, is it Lytham, or St Annes? I’m typing this in Lytham, and I can assure you that the market is quite different in each location!
x66 - Mark - I remember the Telegraph in May 1997 greeted the fall of notable Conservatives in rhyming couplets. Can’t remember the first half, but Edwina’s finished up:
Edwina on the wane?
Conservative gain!
Bizarrely, the only one I remember in it’s entireity was:
‘Sir Nicholas Bonsor?
By God, he gone, sir!
Not to worry because,
I could never quite remember which one he was’
Sadly this is the ONLY thing I can remember about Sir Nicholas Bonsor.
Because the naked cleaners earn more than I do, I can’t even afford one to make my life easier. Why Sean, did you have to let us know of their existence? I was happy when I thought all cleaners were clothed.
203 - have you been speaking to Mrs Tabman?
302. Too kind.
Snowy is probably trying to find a quango report that covers Domestic Drudgery in the Altogether, to prove that Labour has actually benefited cleaners who ‘Do’ in their birthday suits, by 349% since 1996.
And on that note, possibly the maddest post I have ever done on pb, i must retire.
Ciao!
255. “I haven’t met ANY Tories who hate immigrants.”
If you don’t hate immigrants, why are you making stuff up about them? Why pretend they are taking the jobs of Brits, when they are doing work that is unfilled, why pretend that they supressing wages? (Yes, I’m aware that a plethora of Tories have posted claiming cleaning wages are high, but you guys also claimed the economy was slowing down whem it wasn’t - the only link supplied so far shows an average of £6.7 per hour - and I note that SeanT is ignoring his own link!). How do you think Poles and others feel when they hear you spreading mis-information about them with an eye to hounding them out?
“At a time when the Tories have finally recovered their social conscience, Labour seem to have lost theirs. Don’t you folks care anything for the real underclass?”
Labour cared enough about the underclass to institute the minimum wage, to increase the LEL threshold, to abolish the N.I. entry fee and to introduce tax credits.
Tories care so little that the opposed the latest rise in the min wage, and want to abolish tax credits to pay for a single transferable tax allowance, so that some middle-class wife can sit at home playing 50’s housewife, subsidised by some cleaner’s former tax credits.
I note that still no one has come back to explain why you opposed the increase of the min wage to £5.05. And why would you want to withdraw the lifeline that is tax credits? Spare me the fine words about caring for the poor - you only bring them up because you believe you can use them to bash immigrants.
Sad thning is Sean, such a report probably exists under this government…
… and the present Mrs Cllr Little says we can have a naked cleaner if it a male naked cleaner with an enormous do-dah.
And on that note, good night all.
302. I was busy doing other things! Are you aware that a teacher starting out outside London makes £20133? And you still stand by your claim that a cleaner would earn the same?
snowflake5 I am now off to bed as I am knackered, but I am just warning you to expect a storm of protest over the claim that tax credits provide a lifeline. In my experience they are a dogs breakfast of a system that must cost far more to administer than simple benefits would. The whole system has been a complete cockup, and I know many families who are now in quite severe financial difficulties because of mistakes made in calculating their credits, mistakes that were built in at the design stage and are now being collected on. We’ll discuss this tomorrow, because there is no way in hell I’m letting you get away with that.
Good night all.
(Gosh, ten minutes posting on ConHome has got me all cross!)
208 Tabman. I’m sure your cocktail sausage is of amble proportions in the meat and two veg department !! …… whilst the Scottish sporran rubber must bid you all farewell up the wooden hill.
Good nite all ….. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Snowflake5 - when have I suggested that cleaners earn more than teachers? I have said that naked cleaners earn more than councillors. Which, apparently, is true.
311 - “male naked cleaner with an enormous do-dah.” So that’s a footman!
310 - take a look at Julian’s liberal forum. This stuff on immigration/labour markets would make a good topic.
RE 299, Tabman, “for the free market to work, you need free flows of capital, goods and labour. Otherwise you’ve erected a tarrif barrier.”
Just in case you had missed the point, I am in the CONSERVATIVE party, Hayak was a LIBERAL.
We reserve the right to deviate from Liberalism in the interests of OUR voters.
We accept free markets, with caveats, and alterations where appropriate.
That is our published position, and whilst you may feel it is logicaly inconsistent in terms of your ideals, I can’t see it as being dishonest.
The Conservative party is at heart a pragmatic party. I understand that the Peterloo massacre had a great deal of influence on Robert Peel proposing a proper police force. We have to deal with the electorate as we find them, with their hopes, fears and idiosyncracies. Its called democracy.
x15. £11 per hour? Work it out.
Am off to bed now. Night all.
Totally off-topic,just something I wanted other’s opinions on-I was born in February 1971:last year I was in a loud,brash pub near my house,where a track played on the juke-box,and I thought ‘Christ,I remember that-goodness knows how young I was!’ I ckecked the record books-the track charted when I was 3,in spring 1974,and I somehow recalled it from summer 1975,during a trip to nursery school with my grandmother.I tell you what,it does’nt half make you feel old when you can start recalling 30 years-plus old records! (I have found the DVD on-line,and playing this song brings tears to my eyes at bring able to recall so far back-O.K-the fatal moment,the song is ‘Seasons In The Sun’ by Tery Jacks-I’m off to bed soon,but I would appreciate views from others around my age-group-bye for now!
317 - well, I guess you’ve confirmed my belief about the purpose of the Conservative party, which is to perpetuate itself in power on behalf of its narrow sectional interests.
RE 310, Snowflake, Where do I start,
Unless you beleive that Liberals are conspiring with us Conservatives to show how much a by the hour home cleaner costs, you have to accept the figures quoted which are far higher in terms of what is paid than the report you quote suggests.
You have to remember that in most hourly employed jobs (except franchise garages and lawyers) the hours worked are the hours charged, and there are lots of hours that are not charged for. So a pro rata rate that implies £27K per year based on a 37.5 hour week with 4 weeks holiday is in fact rubbish. someone who charges £15 per hour may make nothing like that.
You talk of the minimum wage. I understand that we no longer oppose it, however, it is a red herring because if you work for £4 per hour for 40 hours a week, you can do a lot if you are single and or living in a low cost area. For example there are parts of Belfast where you can’t give houses away.
The same does not apply in the South East where £5 is ridiculous, unless you are living with parents.
As for your decrying a parent wishing to stay at home whilst singing the praises of tax credits, well, I have found much of what you have said patronising and ignorant in the extreame, but that takes the biscuit.
There are some people who even if they worked full time could not earn more than the hourly rate for putting their children into child care.
There are some who could earn a bit more but feel it more important to have parental care.
There are some who have dealt with the tax credit system and have been dumped in burocracy and having the tax man as a debtor.
Do you know, that when I renewed one year it took them three months to get my pay right. There was a computer glitch that doubled it. We did not get any tax credits during that period. And the poor b**by infantry in the call centers who could not tell the computer it was wrong had to take all the undoubted Sh*t, and emotional pain of a badly thought out poorly implemented system by a half wit chancelor highering a serial set of c*ck up merchants. And I bet working in those call centers is not quite as well paid as dreaming the f*ckup in the first place.
Re 318, Snowflake, CHARGING £15 PER HOUR DOES NOT MEAN THAT YOU GET TO DO THAT FOR THE WHOLE WEEK FOR THE WHOLE YEAR SOLID!
RE 320, Tabman, narrow sectional interest? The voters who elect us?
Are you nuts man?
That is what democracy is about is it not.
323 - well, perhaps its a matter of nuance, but personally I think there’s a difference between ensuring that around 25% of the electorate do OK and f*ck the rest of them, and implementing policies that might not always directly benefit “your” voters but are nevertheless morally and pragamatically right in the sense of for the greater good. I suppose its the difference between leading and following opinion, and is why I’m a Liberal and not a Conservative.
[and for the cynics out there - where is Matlock? - yes, that's probably why we've been out of power for 90 odd years]
Right off to bed.
As this thread draws to a close I will bring the three main topics discussed today together. That being Immigration, sex/porn and cleaners/wage deflation.
Has anyone noticed how there are brothels springing up all over the place of east european girls? I bet they are not counted in the numbers the government gives us of EU migrants. Also I wonder if wage deflation is happening here. Is the traditional British ‘working girl’ being priced out of work? Here we have a less savory aspect of our eastern invasion.
Perhaps Snowflake5 and Sean T care to comment?
324 - That’s Mr Matlock to you.
326,Quitr right;even as a younger Labourite,I feel some deference!
RE 324, Tabman, To the greater good of whom? We have to manage, we have to balance, we have to move forward, as much as possible with out destroying.
Yes the 80’s were hard, but had to be done. But we have to represent a combination of interests not an ideological ideal.
327 - Jolly Good. As my Grandfather used to say: ‘God Bless the Squire and his relations and keep us in our proper stations.’
Darren, you shock me!
“Has anyone noticed how there are brothels springing up all over the place of east european girls? I bet they are not counted in the numbers the government gives us of EU migrants. Also I wonder if wage deflation is happening here. Is the traditional British ‘working girl’ being priced out of work? Here we have a less savory aspect of our eastern invasion.”
What does a nice girl like you know of such things? Ah, I have it! Such places were mentioned in passing when you read Eng Lit at Oxford, but obviously you know nothing about them really. Just a literary concept….
If these girls are illegal immigrants, obviously they would not be counted. But there is the thing for you - they would nevertheless depress income among competing groups. The difference between Economics and Sociology….
Did you really study at Oxford? Tabman tells me that you have all the hallmarks….
What do you think is your proper station, AHMatlock?
Cookie at 306: The full set of 1997 election rhymes in the Telegraph was:
Sir Kenneth Baker
Was a mover, not a shaker
He had a slippery feel
A little bit like an eel
Edwina Currie
Went in a flurry
Edwina on the wane?
Conservative gain
Sir Nicholas Bonsor?
By gad, he’s gone, sir?
(not to worry, because
I never knew which he was)
Iain Sproat
Said “hand me my coat
after a disasterous poll
I’m going out for a stroll”
Lady Olga Maitland
has met her fate, and
it all seems like dream
to the folk of Sutton and Cheam
Tristan Garel-Jones
adored telephones
for chatting and dreaming
but mainly for scheming
Roy Hattersly
Knew all that matters; he
Wrote for those could afford him
(Maybe politics bored him)
Sir Patrick Mayhew
Said, “Pray, who
is arriving now?
Ian Paisley? Ciao!”
130- Jonny. It has been in the media both local and national.
I have only once ever been to Oxford. It’s a bit of a dump but’s that not surprising with no Conservative Councillors there…
x32 - Thanks Steven! Most edifying.
321. Ben, your whole argument is based round the belief that cleaners don’t do 35 hour weeks, or work the whole year. But all the ones I’ve met do 40-50 hour weeks.
And SeanT himself provided a link that showed that cleaners were getting on average £6.7 per hour - but because this clashes with your (and his) beliefs, you discard this survey in favour of unsubstiantiated anecdotes.
You are like a creationist, who presented with evidence of evolution, dismisses it because it doesn’t accord with your beliefs, and concocts some other half-baked theory instead. The data shows that cleaning wages have gone up from about £4.1 per hour in 2002 to about £6.7 in 2006. In other words steadily rising. This whole “immigrants are supressing wages” business is false. Wages are not rising as fast as they used to - but they are not falling.
Snowflake, are Joan Ryan, Frank Field, and John Denham all lying when they speak of the adverse impact on wages of mass immigration in certain sectors?
Is your government being stupid when ministers express concern that the availability of cheap labour in certain sectors makes it harder to get unemployed people back to work?
Yes or no?
RE 335, Snowflake, where YOU live, how much can YOU hire a cleaner for to say do 2 hours per week in your house?
Are the people like Anthony Little or Tabman lying?
Also not Sean Fears comments at 336.
Re 337, that should have been:
Also note Sean Fears comments at 336.
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