Should Gord be smiling after the latest polls?
November 25th, 2007
Why I’m scaling back on my “Tory buy” position
As far as I can see there is only one voting intention poll this morning and that is from the non-British Polling Council registered BPIX in the Mail on Sunday
Frustratingly the only figures available online are a CON-LAB split of 40%-35% with no information about the Lib Dems. The pollster found there was a 37%-37% split when it asked how respondents would vote if Tony Blair was still Labour leader.
There are other polls in the Telegraph and News of the World where no voting intention questions appear to have been asked. Such responses are not normally turnout related and it is unlikely that overall the samples would have been weighted in line with past vote recall. As a result I don’t attach that much importance to the findings, which as you would expect, are not that good for Brown or Darling.
BPIX seems pretty good for Labour especially as the fieldwork will have taken place after the latest in the Northern Rock saga, the missing data discs and the concerted attacks on Brown from the former army chiefs. The Tories are down one point and Labour down two compared with the last survey from the pollster six weeks ago.
The message that will hearten Downing Street is that the Tories don’t seem to be benefiting from the current troubles and it is the share that Cameron’s party is getting that is crucial.
My Friday position of £180 a Tory seat was beyond my comfort zone when it became clear that the party’s polling shares were falling back. The great thing with this form of betting is that you can operate in the short-term.
UPDATE 11.27am: It would appear that the ICM poll in the Sunday Telegraph was the same survey that the Guardian reported yesterday morning. This did have voting intention figures so some of my comments above are probably not as valid. The findings from non-voting intention questions do contain the views of many people who are very unlikely to vote. When you are betting your prime concern is what voters think.
Mike Smithson
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Every Wednesday we are inundated with Conservative activists and astroturfers telling us how Dave has humiliated Gordon at PMQs. Mostly they are wrong. Provided Brown answers calmly and appears, well, Prime Ministerial rather than angry or evasive, he wins.
Labour is doing badly, though. A succession of cheap stunts has eroded support (and lost Scotland, lest we forget) and the economy is looking rough for less well off people — Labour’s natural supporters — as we begin the run-up to Christmas and winter.
I don’t think there’s much chance of Labour getting back onto an even keel before Christmas, at the moment. Even if the CB discs aren’t found, the row will die away; but there’s the resolution of the LD leadership to come, which should firm up the party. While Parliament is still in session, the potential for more nasty surprises is possible.
OT: Costello’s decision to stay on the backbenches has caused a big shift in the markets for next Liberal leader. I’m surprised Malcolm Turnbull is now the clear favourite on Betfair at 0.95/1: my impression is that his base within the party caucus is relatively weak; his pragmatic, centrist approach has also exposed him to the charges of careerism and lack of firm conviction; and his personal leadership qualities, as leader of the republican camp in the referendum and as Environment Minister, have sometime incurred strong criticism. I’d expect his price to drift out at some point - but hopefully Alexander Drake will round off his excellent contributions with a post-mortem and look at the leadership.
Totally agree with you Mike, the last 2 or 3 polls have all shown the Tories coming to something of a dead stop. As posted here, I exited from my Labour “sell” bets a couple of days ago and have since actually entered into a small sale of Tory seats at approx 299. Whilst the rewards can be fast and furious, it’s certainly just as easy to make sizeable losses, if one is just a little awry in recognising and acting on any change of mood. The consistency of the polls makes me feel confident, rightly or wrongly, that they are all calling it about right.
I doubt that Labour’s malaise is over, far from it in fact - I personally have grave doubts as to whether Brown is really up to the job and with inflation taking off big time, not to mention the prospect of the housing and mortgage markets facing a really torrid time next year, but right now it’s probably a good time time to take stock on the next GE seats markets, especially taking account also of a possible LibDem bounce on the back of their leadership contest and its likely duration.
Somewhat O/T, but interesting to have confirmation that Murdoch has a direct personal influence on the political stance of his newspapers in the UK. Plus, I just wanted to share with you this photograph of the great man:
http://tinyurl.com/yvc9np
Labour are losing the election. While all the focus is on them, the Tories are frozen out of the spotlight. That will change. Also, I did believe the ICM poll b/c I think Labour’s disaster has eroded trust in politics and government in general, and the Tories are seen as a government party - so LDs picking up the plague on both your houses vote. However, this is temporary. Labour are giving lots of reasons to vote against them and none to vote for them.
I was canvassing yesterday, Tory area within a swing Lab-Con SW marginal. We got several Labour voters who started ‘well I’ve voted Labour all my life but…’
I’d be very optimistic on an election tomorrow, but of course much can happen between now and 2010.
1. JohnL. “the economy is looking rough for less well off people”
It isn’t helped by the fact that, as a result of Brown’s last budget as Chancellor, the 10% rate of tax on the first £2,230 has doubled to 20% from April 2008. Anyone under 65 with an income of just £10,000 - and that includes a large number of occupational pensioners - will then pay more than £900 in tax, almost £200 more than this year.
The rich get rich and the poor get poorer.
Regardless of the polls i think that buying Conservative seats at present levels presents huge risks as anything other than a pretty short term position. Forget “electoral bias”, the sheer discipline that will be required to gain 100+ seats is enormous. One only has to think back to 2005 to see candidates in supposedly “gimme” seats doing stupid things and blowing it. There will be polItical inexperience a plenty and inevitably a number of duds will have slipped through the net.
I’m still amazed by the Mail story about the false Labour donor. Why would Labour declare him a donor if it is that easy to prove that he cannot possibly be one?
mirthios @ 6 “The rich get rich and the poor get poorer.”
It’s the same the whole world over!
When the downturn comes, Labour, as good Keynesians, will want to inject some counter-cyclical spending, so I’m still predicting that ID cards will be kicked into the long grass so that £6 billion can be spent on public works here rather than feather-bedding EDS in Texas.
Or just possibly on lifting more people out of income tax by raising personal allowances since straight restoration of the 10p band may be too politically embarrassing.
Somebody paid me on spreadfair at 296 - I thought it might have been Mike but evidently not.
When the downturn comes, Labour, as good Keynesians, will want to inject some counter-cyclical spending
I don’t think they are good “Keynesians” in the old demand-management sense of the term. Besides, the great difficulty Labour has is that it can’t afford to spend more on the economy than it already has over this decade. Significant spending cuts or tax increases, with their deflationary potential, is going to be unavoidable over the length of this Parliament. Had Brown been as fiscally rigorous as he was before 2000, he’d have plenty of slack now to keep the backbenches happy and to keep the economy ticking over.
From the last thread about Rik making the Times
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article2937053.ece
Sad how the press can hound you for comments made on here. See Labour have wheeler out the sanctimonious hideous Hain to have a go.
Although the Conservative share is ultimately important, i do just wonder if what really matters at the moment is the Labour share. It may be that underlying uncertainty about a Conservative govt (inevitable for any party that has been out of power for so long) will preclude any widespread movement to them until the voters are convinced that Labour has demonstrably failed. Voters will then be forced to begin to cast aside their uncertainties almost by default.
In that sense a share of 35% is still “good” for Labour, last weeks 31% was VERY bad. The big question at the moment is whether the dramatically worsening ‘underlying’ figures are just a foretaste of what is about to happen to the headline figures.
Well it is Sunday after all
In a shock announcement this evening, the Ministry of Defence has admitted that an order of twenty Eurofighters (’Typhoons’) destined for the Royal Saudi Air Force have been lost in the post.
A high-ranking source in the Ministry said, ‘Delivery of aircraft is normally undertaken by regular RAF pilots, but in this case, it appears that some junior official put the aircraft in large brown envelopes for collection by the Post Office. Unfortunately the items were not sent Recorded or Registered, so their whereabouts at the moment is anyone’s guess. I must emphasise that delivery by this method is not in our Best Practice Manual’
A Post Office official said. ‘The aircraft may be worth £15billion, but if there is no proof of posting then compensation will be limited to £25 per envelope.’
The Ministry of Defence has asked the public to be on the look out for 20 very large, bulky envelopes, weighing about 14 tons each.
The story above is a satire or parody. It is entirely fictitious.
First of all I’m sad to see Rik has been sanctioned for his comments on here. One of the joys of this site, is the fact it gives people the liberty to say what they ‘really’ think
On South Africa and Rhodesia Rik’s views were a true reflection of the views held by every Conservative I ever knew during that period. There is now an attempt by Conservatives to re-write history.
On the polls, it shows what I suspect, Labour in deep poo, the public, (as yet) not totally convinced by the Conservatives. Its going to a long winter of discontent for Labour. I’ve always been amazed by the cohesion of New-Labour, certainly compared with Old-Labour it’ll be interesting to see how it stands up to the present battering.
My campaign to return Blair, (re-named B.B.B., Bring Back Blair) seems to have got off to a fine start, see this mornings poll.
God’s chosen, will soon return to lead us to the promised land.
Tangent @ 11 “Labour … can’t afford to spend more” — well, quite. That is why I think projects like ID cards will be quietly postponed (not scrapped, but put on hold awaiting the conclusions of some enquiry or other) in favour of more productive spending.
Interesting Polls. Out this w/e with my personal weathervane friends, who are ** surprisingly ** not hammering labour over the Child Benefit thing. They dont see how it was Darling or Browns fault. Comparisons with 1992 are overblown. The northern rock problem is more dangerous for the govt. Also No love at all for Cameron - who is seen as a “bit of a d1ck”. All to play for. Mike is right, surprisingly don’t buy too many Tory seats. Buy LD seats!
Well I’ve just finished reading quickly the business news:
My expectations are:
co-ordinated interest rate cuts in EC, USA and UK in December - Januray. Further cuts March -June 2008
NRK is sold by Christmas without significant (i.e. less than £1 Billion) taxpayers’ loss.
Buy to let UK market revives mid 2008.
UK housing market stagnates but prices drift rather than fall heavily.
UK and US Stock markets start a big rally after Christmas - lasting 6 months as a minimum. (What level they start from is questionable .. FTSE could fall to 5700)
On that basis I would expect the Government’s reputation for economic confidence would improve … but I suspect it will fall further first so it may only get back to current levels.
The fake donor story very prominent on Marr’s show. This is going to run and run. Dont know why Labour get so excited about ashcroft when potless builders are donating 200k a time.
19- The Times website has also picked up the story of Labour’s council house Ashcroft.
18- What about the dollar and oil prices in your scenario?
Jonathan So you are challenging Roger as the PB Pundit. He uses his waiter in France, of course, and you use your friends. We only need someone who has spoken to a cabby while sitting in a traffic jam at Charing Cross recently and we shall know the future perfectly.
Yes, I’ve been saying for a few days that the “Brown is finished, hoho” triumphalism overestimates people’s reaction to this week’s events. See also
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/11/25/ncustoms325.xml
for a similar assessment.
Mike doesn’t mention today’s ICM in the Telegraph, which doesn’t have topline results (oddly) but relatively good underlying data, with Labour ahead on the economy, people evenly divided on whether GB is doing a good job, and a continuing large majority on ID cards. That conflicts with another poll taken about the same time, showing opinion fairly evenly divided on who’s best for the economy and on ID cards, but overall there’s not the universal “throw the rascals out!” mood that Tories here suppose.
The reason, so far as I can judge, is that people are not personally very worried by Northern Rock, and while they *are* personally concerned about the HMRC data loss, they’re on the whole not inclined to blame GB for it.
That said, there are a lot of people who feel the Government’s shaky and the Tories not yet really credible, and like test I meet people who say they’ve alwatys voted Labour but now they’re not sure (I don’t mean many who add “and now I’m definitely voting Tory”). Conversely I also meet Tories who say they’re blowed if they know how or whether to vote next time. There’s a lot of uncertainty out there, and voters don’t feel any urgency in deciding. It is literally still up for grabs, and likely to stay that way for some time.
And no, ID cards aren’t being scrapped. I’ve had predominantly very positive reactions to my PM programme interview about it and I’m convinced the argument is winnable, so long as we listen properly to the concerns. (For the curious it’s on http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/noscript.shtml?/radio/aod/radio4_aod.shtml?radio4/pm_wed, minutes 31-36.)
23 And the Titaic sails on serenly with the crew laughing about the silly people who worry about icebergs.
24 mind you it would help if I culd typ, wouln’t ti?
23- Hi Nick
What’s your take on the donor story?
The news of the world poll does have a voting intention, the tories are 8 points ahead of labour on 46%
Crisis! What crisis?
20
The Ashcroft, ‘problem’ could be solved quite easily, the government should pass legislation that states, ‘Only British Citizens, domiciled in the UK can: vote, support financially or otherwise, Bitish Political Parties’ If Lord Ashcroft comes to live here, what he does with his money is his own business!
26: dunno - it’s confusing, especially as the chap apparently now says he did donate after all, but still says he hates politics. It sounds to me as though he’s possibly got a personal issue that we couldn’t be expected to know about. But I know no more than you do.
27
Hmmm Labour on 38% then! Yesterday ICM was being attacked by the ‘Blue Harpies’ as being rogue, the Tories on 46% isn’t of course.
30 Yes, it’s all very mysterious isn’t it Nick
Let’s hope there’s a crack team of investigative reporters digging away right now to get to the bottom of it.
Despite appearances this isn’t a private Tory club where ‘traditional’ views can be aired without fear of them being read by outsiders.
If the views expressed by Rik the other night are really his then he shouldn’t be ashamed if the Times consider them worthy of publication. If they’re not he should have said so.
To blame the opposition for finding them odious is silly. Rik wouldn’t care less what the opposition thought if his own party thought them defensible.
Remember a cabinet Minister lost his job because a member of his staff wrote an email about it being a ‘good day to bury bad news’. It wasn’t the misfortune of having the email read that was the problem but having that mindset in the first place.
21
Oil around $100, Dollar keeps sliding .. but slowly as everyone else is reducing interest rates. US exporters (planes. electronics ) do very well.
Note: Assumes NO Iran war and NO big oil supply interruption. - That may be optmistic.
23
re ID cards.(This is not a partisan comment)
IF the so called “security review ” of Government databases does its job, ID cards are dead.
Why? Well the technology is unproven and biometrics have 20% failure rates (the US gave up at that point) and rather more importantly:
It is based on the National Insurance Database as a money saving measure. The NI database is a disaster and it’s like building a house on Norther Rock and finding it’s Shifting Sand..
The Gov’t has ignored ALL expert advice - see prior post by others - on security and design of its IT systems..up to now.
I seriously urge you to get some understanding of the issues involved. Not because I am opposed to ID cards per se but because the Government is going to waste £ Billions of taxpayers money on a system which is fundamentally flawed.
And if it goes ahead, it will make the current crisis on HMCR records look a storm in a tea cup.
I refer to the technology involved.. and if you do not understand it, get someone who does to review it - without any preconceived bias.
28
Trained by Calllaghan?
23: Nick, pushing ID cards now is a really silly idea, so go ahead.
31 So that leaves LibDems and others on 16% between them?
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm……..
18 I’d be amazed if the ECB cuts rates. They do not have a growth mandate and the last inflation data was a shocker.
The Fed have been telling us they won’t cut in Dec either - though it is always possible their hand will be forced. USD will crash and burn if they do.
27 - That’s Cameron vs Brown, not Conservatives vs Labour vs LibDem vs Other
33 - I don’t think Stephen Byers lost his job over that, did he?
27- “The news of the world poll does have a voting intention, the tories are 8 points ahead of labour on 46% ”
My guess is that this is not a normal poll but more of a “given a choice, would you prefer a Lab or a Con govt?” type question.
Nice piece Mike.
Yes, I’ve had the impression for a little while that the big movements are at an end but wasn’t sure when and where the next one starts, except I’m fairly confident LDs will pick up.
My guess - and it was a guess - was to close out some of my Tory buy positions at a profit. I’m leaving the Labour sell positions for the moment, but am not selling any more. I may even close some out soon.
PfP (4) also seems to be in agreement. Another good sign!
38
The ECB will be forced to cut by politicians. The French will make them. Period.
Either that or Airbus will be eaten alive by Boeing. And Peugeot/Renault will be crucified in export markets.. (Renault deserve it for reliability issues)
The only major EU economy that can survive the high Euro is Germany.
That “Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm……” was of course a deeply skeptical “Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm……” and not to be confused with a “Wow! Tasty!” kind of “Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm…”
Because obviously if you took away the ususal 9% for “Others” that would leave the LibDems on an “Omigod” 7%…..
“Hahahahahaha - poll shows LibDems in historic meltdown - 0 seats” as some around hese parts might say
Why would a newspaper spend a lot of money on a poll and then not ask another question about voting intention ? It cannot be that much more expensive, surely, considering the extra attention it attracts.
Polls taken in the wake of, ‘events’ produce strange results, it’ll take some time for the turbulence to settle, then we’ll get a more accurate picture.
On the dollar, if it continues to decline, its future as the world’s benchmark currency is in doubt. If governments start to sell their holdings and switch to the Pound or the Euro, then the ‘fun’ really starts. The political and economic world, would turn upside down!
Mike
May I propose a toast to Alexander Drake who kept us all well briefed for the Australian elections. Anybody who followed his advice cannot fail to have profited on the numerous betting markets. His call on Bennelong was particularly astute.
Alexander is a Howard supporter and worked hard to try and get his man re-elected. He must be feeling a bit glum. A vote of thanks from PB would be timely.
Perhaps Mike, you could just append a little note on your next article to show our appreciation?
41 That would make Labour on 38%, I dont believe that. 46 % seems very high too.
Checked the NoW website for poll details and found reason for England’s poor showing at the football. The NoW has certainly moved on from the C of E vicars misbehaving at Wimbledon which was the staple fare the last time I read it, many years ago.
46
It seems clear that a downward correction for the dollar is ongoing but it’s sterling that is really going to be hammered down over the next year or so IMO.
Euro and the yen are the one’s to be in if you’re brave/reckless enough to be into currency speculation but if you don’t know what you’re doing leave FOREX alone and stick to the gee gees. It’s much safer.
It seems that the Tories hit a ceiling of about 40% when Labour is in deep trouble. How very reassuring that there is no deep pro Tory sentiment in this country that could give them extended double digit poll leads.
i have a friend whom I trust on all things political. When I spoke to her about my deep unease that people as lightweight and unappealing as Osbourne may even start to become popular with the press and public, she just said that it wouldn’t last. I think she is right.
Finally, watching Marr this morning- how much more confidence would the public have if we had david davis and jack straw as our political leaders, 2 thoroughly decent people albeit on different sides of the political fence?
Anyone see Jack Straw on the Andrew Marr show? Notice the large plaster he was sporting, wonder who was applying the thumbscrew?
I don’t think there’s much for Brown to be cheerful about. One of the recent polls showed that trust in Labour to run the economy had dropped more than trust in the Conservatives had risen. It takes time for people to decide to vote for someone else - it’s quicker for them to decide not to vote for the incumbant administration. Labour didn’t become the public’s clear favourite for managing the economy overnight after Black Wednesday.
Jack Straw decent? I think there’s a few women, who may disagree with that.
The figures for the 24-36 year old should be worrying. That is the age where people ought to be at their most radical. Somehow Gordon is looking so conservative he’s in danger of losing his most potent USP. My advice; Make an enemy of the Sun and the Mail and talk about overseas aid child poverty and start looking like a government that is to the left of the Tories. Otherwise a great opening for the Lb Dems.
33 What is different in this case is one individual apparently taking selective quotes out of context and trying to place them in the national media with the sole aim of damaging Rik. That is not the same as a long and heated debate on here.
56. James. I read the exchange the other night and I would say that the Times have accurately expressed Rik’s views. If his own party doesn’t like it’s activists to hold those opinions then that’s a matter for them.
Can some one start a new permanent Topic, labelled NuLabour Mishaps, list here.
And it continues……………………….
SPPA loses data on Scottish NHS workers
It has been revealed today that the SPPA (Scottish Public Pensions Authority) has lost the details of 200 NHS workers which were sent by the Government’s official carrier, FedEx.
The packaged contained the names and national insurance numbers of those working at Stobhill hospital in Glasgow. The loss was outed last night and has prompted a “frantic” search for the data. All those pen pushers will be scrambling around their hands and knees.
It really looks as though this is a systemic failure throughout government at all levels but what’s more worrying is that those in charged said that there’s no reason to think fraud or theft has taken place and will only make it known to the those staff involved if the package remains unaccounted for.
What a joke! Surely the staff should be informed whether or not? As soon as sensitive information is no longer accounted for there is no way you can be sure that fraud hasn’t happened, it’s common sense. As for only telling them if they package still isn’t found - people have a right to know where their information is, or isn’t. Withholding information violates people’s privacy. Just another example of how the government thinks it knows best for us. It’s a patronising and dangerous attitude.
55- Roger good post.
23. The doctor who writes The Guardian’s “bad science” column had an article about ID cards the other day which suggests that so-called “biometric” measures are not secure.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2007/nov/24/idcards.homeaffairs
Nick Palmer, did you see it?
45 - they probably have done a voting intention question and are just holding it over.
Contemplating a wager with Nick P about ID cards being scrapped by the end of next year… Hmmm!
Maybe Labour MP’s should ring their local builders and see if they can get an 80,000 donation to help counter the ashcroft money. this story is shocking. funnily enough the builder is a director of 4 companies alongside a prominent Labour donor in the north east, whats the betting he banks at Northern Rock as well.
re the Telegraph ICM poll -it is exactly the same sample size as Friday’s ICM voting intention poll, so it wouldn’t be completely out of the question that it is from the same poll, different clients paying for different questions, and hence no voting intention in the Telegraph - that was the Guardian’s question.
Be careful too of the graphics in the Telegraph story - I notice they are sourced to ICM, MORI and Populus - so they are probably comparing apples with oranges, or at least slightly different questions from different pollsters to get their time lines..
60 - yes. I’m reluctant to get into detailed debate here as it’s not the purpose of the site and I just don’t have time, but the bottom line is that it’s difficult but not impossible to fake if you are just being tested by a machine (e.g. an ATM reader), but more or less impossible if there is a human present (e.g. a bank official), since you’d need to slip a simulation over yourt real finger and he’d notice. As I said in my interview, it’s a mistake to claim that anything is perfect, but like chip ‘n’ pin it makes fraud harder.
The story in the MoS about the impecunious chap who is supposed to have donated £200,000 is a weird one. Perhaps he can claim his donor’s peerage anyway? As it is coming up to panto season, can I suggest he takes his seat in the Lords as Baron Hard-up…..
16 - However, JohnL, one prblem is that the downturn is likely to hit areas, like financial services, which aren’t as amenable to the traditional “public works” areas.
62: SBS, I can’t take that as I have definite information and it wouldn’t be fair. They won’t.
66 will he get a grace and favour transit van?
62 except ID cards will never be scrapped, just put into endless “re-evaluation committees”. My advice would be to tie any bet to the passage of legislation!
And, like chip ‘n pin, it means that, when fraud does occur it is that much easier for the relevant “powers that be” to deny that fraud is possible and ignore any complaint.
65 - I’ve never understood the argument that chip & pin makes fraud harder. If someone gets your card and works out the correct combination of 4 numbers then bingo. A signature is actually harder to get absolutely accurate. All chip and pin did was shift the onus from the seller to the purchaser.
coldstone@29: “The Ashcroft, ‘problem’ could be solved quite easily, the government should pass legislation that states, ‘Only British Citizens, domiciled in the UK can: vote, support financially or otherwise, British Political Parties”
Oi oi, what’s your justification for disfranchising anyone who lives outside the country they are a national of? Are we all traitors, or has our judgement been irrevocably compromised by prolonged fraternizing with foreigners?
“Only British citizens can vote” would be fine. So would “Only people domiciled in the UK can vote”. Pick one.
23 Nick P “today’s ICM in the Telegraph, which doesn’t have topline results (oddly) but relatively good underlying data, with Labour ahead on the economy…”
Wrong, pure BS spin from Nick P, things must be getting bad. What the Telegraph actually states is.
“the poll shows the Conservatives dramatically closing the gap on Labour over which party is rated more competent to run the economy”
“The Labour leadership duo of Mr Brown and Mr Darling is backed by 39 per cent of voters, while 32 per cent prefer their Tory shadows, David Cameron and George Osborne. But the seven per cent gap is narrow compared with only two months ago when the Labour team was ahead by more than 30 points.”
As Mike says, take the advice of Bob Worcester and look at the direction the polls are moving in. On the economic management issue the polls have dramatically moved against Labour and in favour of the Conservatives.
72: A cynic might suggest that it allows the bank to say ‘you gave out your PIN so we’re not covering the loss’ whilst a signature puts the onus on the shop staff to check properly.
65 no you wouldn’t make it safer by having a human present. There has been a lot of research on the uselessness of photo IDs. A personal anecdote from my step-father who was in the Military Police - they slipped a number of people into SHAPE with pictures of monkeys on their ID cards. If people can’t spot a fake photo I think a well constucted fake finger tip is going to pass them by.
The purpose of ID cards was to ensure human error doesn’t enter the process but now you’re saying without human intervention ID cards are useless.
I own me - I don’t need the State’s permission to be me, I allow the State a certain amount of intervention in my life but even there I now find the State can’t be bothered treating my information with respect.If you really think you can pass your Mickey Mouse legislation and enforce it then I suggest you also ensure a large scale prison building program is carried out at the same time.
Forgive my ignorence, but does anyone remember in Diamonds are Forever, that James Bind used faked fingerprint that were stuck on. What’s to stop people doing that to cope biometric data?
65 I had not appreciated until now what a complete nit wit you are.
If you regard the prevention of fraud as important, then why send 25million people’s personal data through the post in an unencryted form.
ID cards will just be another opportunity for big companies to take the poor beleagured taxpayer for yet another expensive ride. It has nothing at all to do with protecting the public or protecting the state.
If this is the best that nu-labour can do, then just go away and let someone else, anyone else, do a a half way competent job
74: Rubbish - what I said was that the poll showed Labour ahead on the economy, and so it does, as your quote shows. You are perfectly entitled to say that something else (e.g. the trend) is in your opinion more important. To call my perfectly accurate comment “BS spin” is pointlessly abusive.
Its still very early days since the discgate story broke. It was only Tuesday wasn’t it? Thats less than a week. The first few days of any “event” is always a poor time to judge. For instance, when Gordon Brown cancelled the election, the polls conducted stright the way did show Labour taking something of a hit, but generally they were’nt too bad and they got steadily worse over the next month. So, I really think we need to wait until mid December/Christmas to get a proper handle on just how much this has damaged Labour.
68
Of course the Gov’t won’t back down on ID cards.
they can’t politically..
So we - the taxpayer - are going to spend £5 Billion + on a system that is technically unproven and highly dubious and which a fair % of the population oppose..
Time to make politicians personally accountable I believe for deliberate misspending.
Just seen this
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23422907-details/Political+storm+as+Government+sells+secret+Navy+court+martial+records+for+%C2%A320+at+auction/article.do
Every time somthing goes wrong with information, the media are going to shout about it.
43 I’m happy to bet you are wrong - the ECB will not cut by the end of January. Let me know how much you are prepared to do! They may well intervene if the euro breaks well through 1.50.
46 This switch is already happening on an awesome scale… which is why the USD is collapsing.
Look for Europe to join the US in threatening a trade war with (especially) China if they do not bring their distorting policy to an end. Then the euro etc will be trashed.
74. Don’t deny Nick his few crumbs of comfort. It can’t be much fun being a Labour MP in a marginal seat just now.
80 - you are right, plus between now and then there is time for all the gory details to emerge and a few more bad news stories. Personally I think the government needs to keep its head down as far as possible, say nothing much get on with firefighting the current batch of stories and hope that after christmas there is enough space for a proper relaunch. If they keep trying to regain the initiative in the midst of the last maelstrom they will never escape and will eventually be staring defeat in the face.
79 Nick P, you spun a negative story as a positive one. That is why I called it BS spin. Only by going to a second link from your linked story could the context of the figures be seen. A 30 point lead reduced to 7 in the course of weeks is a dramatic and continuing change. Labour’s fall has not yet bottomed out.
So how about saying. “The trend continues to get worse for Labour but its still retains a lead”?
That would be factually correct and makes no attempt to misdirect the reader.
66. Well it appears he has been making donations on behalf of someone else. The interesting questions are who - and why?
Is this someone not a ‘fit and proper’ person, or are they trying to obscure their link with Labour so it won’t look fishy if they later receive some gong/emolument? Intriguing…
81: I think the government could get out of the substance of the ID cards plan if they wanted to - but it’s not clear to me that they do.
The ID Cards proposal is a combination of two things. The big bit is a national register, with a biometric, listing everyone they think is allowed to be in the country from birth to death, which has to be used whenever you interact with the government, and against which the government will authenticate you when you do. The little bit is the piece of plastic that shows some information that the goverment thinks it has about you.
As I understand it the big bit - the register - will be effectively compulsory - at the very least, you’ll be put on it when you renew your passport, driving license, etc. This is the area which requires the government to spend huge wads of money creating an enormous privacy-destroying IT system which they will almost definitely screw up.
The little bit - the piece of plastic - is the one that is attracting all the attention. IIRC this will be voluntary, at least initially, although you’ll have to pay for it anyway when you renew your passport.
If the government decided to backpedal, they could just forget about the register and start issuing cards to people who wanted them showing information that they already have on record - effectively, plastic passports or driving licenses. In practice this would be a massive u-turn, but it would be very hard for anyone to persuade the voters that it was a u-turn - especially if they made the cards with a microchip, a hologram and some little flashing lights.
But as I say, I don’t think they will.
If they keep trying to regain the initiative in the midst of the last maelstrom they will never escape and will eventually be staring defeat in the face.
I’d disagree, myself. Governments which simply try and keep a low profile and hope for the best tend to find that they never regain control of the narrative, and the stories have become indelibly embedded. An aggressive approach - going on major media offensives when bad stories break to get the government’s line across, being seen facing angry ordinary voters, and so on - is a bigger risk, undoubtedly; but it stops the Opposition gaining as much ground as it should. If nothing else, it gets core voters geared up by raising the partisan temperature.
OK Nick P its not bullshit… its just spin…
73
British Citizens domiciled in the UK, if your main abode is in the UK and you are working abroad you would be entitled to vote. If you have chosen to live abroad, then you would not be entitled to vote.
I do not consider anyone who has chosen to live abroad, to be a traitor, they have done what they have done, that is their choice.
Expats who have chosen to live in Spain/France etc. good luck to ‘em, but vote in UK elections: no!
Labour’s fall has not yet bottomed out.
We don’t know for certain - while there are certainly threats to Labour’s long-term position, a quick solution to NR and no bad news stories for the moment could restore Labour’s equinamity here, although the CB database issues could permanently damage general competence ratings.
91 but they may have paid tax to the UK Exchequer all their working lives. No taxation without representation was the age old cry.
There’s plenty of spin coming from most people here. It’s not a hanging offence. Sometimes spin is grounded in public perception and whatever is generally perceived to be the true facts of a situation, sometimes it isn’t.
For those in love with ID cards and biometric data… http://www.badscience.net/2007/11/make-your-own-id/
89: What the Government has to be seen to be doing is acting to sort the problem out. The first hint of of the record story should have been leaks to tame hacks that offices were being searched by the police, with TNT’s London depot closed and being searched too, then going to the House.
The aggressive approach only works if it is done well.
91: In that case let people who have left Spain/France etc. and pay UK taxes vote in UK elections.
Nothing wrong with arguing that voting should depend on where you choose to live, work and pay taxes, rather than where you were born, etc; But the logic of what you’re saying would be that they couldn’t vote _anywhere_. How on earth can you defend that?
89 - All I suggest is a period of heads down until after Christmas, then in January come out all guns blazing. If they keep trying to steady the ship now there is more likelihood that other stories will emerge in my opinion. The danger Labour face is that everything feeds into the emerging narrative and good news gets dismissed and bad news exaggerated.
93 - But then, if they’ve permanently left their UK home, then they’re not being taxed at the moment, which would undercut this particular claim. Having said that, I don’t think the current rules, with the 15-year cutoff, should be changed.
55 Roger’s point on the gap in support for Labour in the younger voters is important because of what it pertains for the future. The longer Labour delays an election the older these people get and the greater their propensity to vote.
We currently have the young and older voters backing Conservatives and the middle aged roughly split evenly between Labour and Conservatives.
My recollection was that in the youngest voters the LDs were doing as well as Labour which could be dangerous to Labour in the longer term.
Nulab’s next self inflicted shot in foot is the roll out of HIPS to all property in December
Already this has reduced the selling market of 3 beds or more by 30%. It’ll have the same impact if not worse across all the market now
2 impacts
Anything that messes up the housing market, where most people gain a feeling of wealth is bad for the government
A massive hole in taxes - How much revenue will Brown loose with a 30% reduction in sales from stamp duty and all the VAT generated in selling and moving costs
Buy more tory seats!
99 if they are drawing a UK pension they will still be taxed on it, unless I am mistaken.
99: Sorry if I’m boring everyone on this, but how do you defend the 15-year cutoff? I’d understand it if there was a 15-year cut-in for non-UK-citizens who lived in the UK long-term, but why should people who live outside the country they’re a national of not be allowed to vote anywhere?
91
If you are working abroad on a contract, (two years etc) and could not afford to maintain a domicile in the UK, but intended to return to the UK, on the completion of the contract, an application for a vote would be allowable.
The loss of voting rights would be aimed at those, who have chosen to live abroad.
It would also apply to those non-UK citizens who are domiciled in the UK.
Those who say, ‘No taxation without representation’ some people of course are getting, ‘Representation without taxation’ If you are a tourist and you purchase something on which VAT is levied, do you have the right to vote? after all you’ve been taxed!
UPDATE 11.27am: It would appear that the ICM poll in the Sunday Telegraph was the same survey that the Guardian reported yesterday morning. This did have voting intention figures so some of my comments above are probably not as valid. The findings from non-voting intention questions do contain the views of many people who are very unlikely to vote. When you are betting your prime concern is what voters think.
78. ‘J Smith’. If you want to join your fellow young Tories in their mindless abuse of Nick P why don’t you at least show as much courage as they do and use your regular username?
96, 98 - Good points. The difficulty is that no relaunch is likely to succeed unless they’ve killed off the previous narrative. John Major spent at least four years trying various realunches and good news ideas of policy, and was always knocked off course as the ghosts of Maastricht, “Back to Basics” and financial sleaze periodically returned. The CB issue has the potential to really embed itself in the same way, and taking the issue head on is possibly the only method that could kill it.
In some ways, Blair has contaminated this approach: his public handling of Iraq in the immediate run-up to the war was, in many ways, the perfect demonstration of how a PM should deal with a major policy which is highly contentious - looking at the way he faced voters and Parliament. But the demonstration of the flaws in his case was truly damaging. It’s going to be many years before a minister can face the public with the same expectation of trust again.
Should Gordon be smiling? Well he might, but the bad news has not fully sunk in yet.
That said the Conservatives are not yet getting the benefit which does help Labour stay in the game.
I expect Labour to slide further. I do hope Cameron gets the Conservatives some positive coverage to capitalise on our current position.
**
I would say when ID cards are inroducedwe will have most of the conditions needed to effectively create a police controlled state.
To run a police state you need:
1. an ineffectual opposition
2. a tangible internal threat you can blame for repressive measures - ” it’s for your own safety”
3. detention without trial for a substantial period
4. a substantial proportion of the population dependent upon the Government for food etc .. so they support it come what may
5. An IT infrastructure enabling you to control your opposition
6. day to day knowledge of where people are (CCTV, incar tracking, congestion charging, road charging)
7. no military force to oppose you (destroy the Army or control it politically)
8. A politicised and centrally controlled police force (Sir Ian BLair)
9. Central control of everything to do with money - which is power so you control local decision making.
I am not saying this is Government policy: I am sure it is not.
But it looks as if it is going down the path to make it happen.
(and under such a policy the rich get richer and the poor survive but don’t get richer)
Next we’ll have centrally controlled electronic voting and postal ballot fraud.
ICM - one survey, 2 buyers - good business.
103 - After a period of time, ex-pats would have no tangible links with the area they come from if they are not domiciled there, and wouldn’t, in the main, be affected by the decisions of Parliament any more than any other non-resident of the UK.
55. Speaking as a 24 year old that is exactly what I would want to see, a few of my peers with no real interest in politics would probably vote Conservative without really thinking about it too much. If they bothered to vote at all.
100 It is pointless trying to deduce some conclusions re the voting intentions of 18-24 year olds from the N of W poll . The overall sample was around 550 giving a base sample of circa 50 only for this age group . The M of E is enormous . Incidently the overall sample size is below the BPC minimum of 1,000 .
111: At the risk of sounding like a broken record: Sure, I see the justification for disqualifying people who live out of the country long-term. (Personally my feeling is that residence - I would suggest tax domicile - is a better way to decide the right to vote than citizenship.)
But if that’s the criterion, foreigners should get the right to vote by living in Britain for 15 years - no need to worry about citizenship.
I still haven’t heard a justification for disfranchising _both_ British citizens living abroad _and_ non-British citizens living in Britain. In other words, I’m still waiting for an explanation of why people who move from the country they’re a citizen of to another country shouldn’t be allowed to vote in either.
ID Cards. I havent taken much interest in them so far but as I understand it they are going to be within passports. As someone who regularly used to travel on 80 odd flights a year if it makes this process simpler then I’m all for it.
I saw the end of a TV program the other night where the only identification at passport control was putting your finger in a hole. This would be perfect. No more panics about forgetting or losing my passport!
113 I was referring to an earlier poll showing that picture, if the NoW shows something similar it increases the chances that this is a true picture.
It’s obvious that no action will be taken against Rik. His comments on Ian Smith v Robert Mugabe were so transparently true that only a red fascist like Peter Hain or a bien pensant posturer like Roger could disagree.
115: Roger, a passport (of whatever form) is voluntary, an ID card isn’t.
117: Although Rik voiced an unpopular opinion I’ve yet to see anyone explain why it was wrong.
55 Roger “The figures for the 24-36 year old should be worrying. That is the age where people ought to be at their most radical.”
As indeed they/we are. The two main radical parties in British politics are, very obviously to most people, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats.
It’s not very surprising that those who want radical change aren’t really interested in Labour - the party of plodding dinosaurs, deary stick-in-the-muds, speak-your-weight machine politicians and freedom crushing authoritarians.
But if that’s the criterion, foreigners should get the right to vote by living in Britain for 15 years - no need to worry about citizenship.
Most of the time, to be fair, anyone who has lived legally in the UK for over 5 years is unlikely to be refused citizenship if they want it, unless there is some big question mark against their character.
My own feeling is that people should vote where they are domiciled.
The country’s biggest selling tabloid by a mile writes Brown’s obituary:
“LABOUR was plunged deep in the Brown stuff after voters turned against Gordon Brown—saying they want David Cameron to run the country.
An exclusive News of the World MSL Poll revealed that the Northern Rock fiasco and the current credit crunch have DESTROYED Brown’s 10-year reputation as a financial mastermind…..”
http://www.newsoftheworld.co.uk/2511_brown.shtml
117, 118: I’m still radically in disagreement with Rik’s comments. We were able to discuss this in a civilised manner.
Re 31, Coldstone “Yesterday ICM was being attacked by the ‘Blue Harpies’ as being rogue, the Tories on 46% isn’t of course.”
Well of course that one is spot on
BTW, any one got a link to the NOTW poll?
123-Benedict-post 121
Will anyone lay me 3/1 or better that Alistair Darling will be removed/resign as Chancellor before this year is out??
The Life and Times of TweedleDumb and TweedleDumber
The Independent: Government in Crisis (II): Captains of calamity: PM and Darling hit by triple whammy
Gordon Brown has barely had time to unpack his boxes since being chosen by the Labour party to be the Prime Minister but already many within the party must surely be wondering whether they stand any chance whatsoever of winning the next General Election under his leadership. It can be argued that every PM will encounter problems but Gordon Brown seems to lurch like a drunk from one disaster to the next whilst doing little to persuade the public that he control of either his party or the Country. Is this a blip or the chickens of Brown’s years as chancellor finally coming home to roost? Brown must rapidly turn around the growing public dissatisfaction in his ability to Govern the country. Will Darling become the first casuality of Brown’s attempt to show authority?
YES YES YES YES
Cameron is going to visit Bush.
At last reality of the real world, might be setting in.
Will be intresting to see how he plays it.
Heir to Blair?
122: I noticed
116 Sorry HF , these subsample polls vary wildly from poll to poll and there is no meaningful trend discernible . For example ICM/SExpress had Con 40 Lab 37 LibDem 15 based on a sample of just 33 people , Populus had Con 23 Lab 39 LibDem 20 on a larger sample in their last poll . Including the N of W findings does not add anything meaningful to the picture .
126 Very interesting… I look forward to the pictures!
117. Stevo. “Posturer” That’s a new one!
I hope no action is taken against Rik. like most on here I like him. The difficulty he has though is trying to keep facing the same way as his rapidly spinning party.
He eulogized General Pinochet on here which would seem reasonable considering he was one of Thatcher’s best buddies but unfortunately the tory leadership had changed by then and things had moved on. These days trying to keep abreast of Tory thinking is rather like the problems faced by Joseph K in Kafka’s ‘The Trial’ and people like Rik are struggling to keep up.
106. Roger - zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Roger (130) - Far more interesting than the views of Rik about Ian Smith, are the views of Cameron himself. I have been trying to find out what these are, but not even with google can I find anything.
So it is no wonder that Rik is getting into trouble by publicising his real thoughts, when his Leader has not yet told him what to think…
132 - Tressage - “So it is no wonder that Rik is getting into trouble by publicising his real thoughts, when his Leader has not yet told him what to think…”
Crass
Why wait 15 years? You don’t even need to exist to get a vote in the UK. If I register two or three extra names - perhaps of non existent people, perhaps of members of my family who live elsewhere, then they will be put on the register. I will be able to get proxies or postal votes for them so I will get extra votes without having to personate them at the polling station. Anyone for a banana?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/11/24/wsmith124.xml
#65 Nick - As I said in my interview, it’s a mistake to claim that anything is perfect, but like chip ‘n’ pin it makes fraud harder.
No, it just changes the game - the 3/10/2007 APAC press release shows plastic card fraud up 26% in the first six months of 2007. UK fraud is down 4%, however there’s an 126% increase in fraud on UK-issued cards being used overseas.
I think Rik might appreciate it if people who agree with him stop digging in his name. The point that many disagree with was IIRC not that Mugabe is a dreadful leader but that Smith was a good one. In fact, you can make a case for saying that Smith’s intransigence led directly to Mugabe, whereas the more flexible de Klerk led to Mandela.
In reply to Edmund, the problem is that there’s no international agreement, so one can end up having votes in both countries or neither. The EU rule that we xcan vote in each others’ local elections seems fair - if you pay tax in Ealing or Yokohama, you should have a say in how it’s spent. Because national parliaments decide attitudes to foreign countries, there are problems in giving foreign citizens the vote at that level, but also in letting British policy be decided by people who’ve lived elsewhere for 20 years. The 15-year rule is a compromise, and like all compromises has snags, but it may be the best available.
That’s it for a while - off to the doorsteps…
132: The control freaks aren’t Tory but Labour. If the Labour Party had let it’s members and MPs voice their real opinions rather than act like sheep things would be a lot better for them now.
The Labour donor thing from the MoS gets weirder - did he or didn’t he give? Does he or does he not hate Labour?? Is it his money or is he acting as a front???
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7111838.stm
Seems like the press are getting into the nitty-gritty of Labour’s post paid-for peerages payments
136: But that’s because chip ‘n’ pin isn’t yet in general use overseas, see
http://www.retail-systems.com/pages/supplement/supplement-feature3.htm
Re 122, Tangent “We were able to discuss this in a civilised manner.”
Which is why it us a shame that someone is using it against him in this way.
Re 124, me, “123-Benedict-post 121″ yes many thanks just got to that!
#115 Roger I saw the end of a TV program the other night where the only identification at passport control was putting your finger in a hole. This would be perfect. No more panics about forgetting or losing my passport!
That would only work when coming back into this country - you’d still need your passport to get you into the country you were travelling to.
Re 137, Nick Palmer “In fact, you can make a case for saying that Smith’s intransigence led directly to Mugabe, whereas the more flexible de Klerk led to Mandela.”
yes, and it would be hard to argue against. Smith was nothing like as bad as Mugabe and by all measures better. That said that does not make him some shining light. There were other possibilities. We shall never know.
142- =)
#140 My point was that simply the game changes. If chip and pin were widely in use abroad, making that particular fraud more difficult, fraudsters would move onto other vunerabilities.
You can view it like some kind of Darwinian evolution if you want.
The NOTW findings isn’t a voting intention poll - the 46% 38% is simply a question as to who is the best leader between Brown and Cameron, and so isn’t cmparable to anything else. The sample size is half what would be expected in a proper opionion poll anyway.
benedict. “yes, and it would be hard to argue against. Smith was nothing like as bad as Mugabe and by all measures better”.
I think if you were to hold a referendum in Africa as a whole or any individual country on that continent-including Zimbabwe-on who is the worst leader Mugabe or Smith you’d find Smith would win hands down. Don’t assume everyone sees things as the British do.
23 - You go ahead with ID cards and you are deliberately criminalising your opponents. If that happens it won’t be a skirmish it will be a battle to the end.
115 - ID cards with passports will also curtail people’s free movement, this is unacceptable.
Add that to the corruption, as shown by the as yet unresolved cash for honours and so on, and it’s difficult to get more angry at this government.
On the polls, given my usual ‘two weeks to feed through’ rule, any polls taken the week after next will show the fallout of the data loss and Northern Rock affairs, as of now they are not settled. Of course, with so many things going wrong for the government, there will probably be other cock ups ready to feed through so we may never get a settled picture!
Lib Dems biggest donor now on Politics show BBC1.
He has been released from prison and is complaining about the over crowding.
148: It might be you who is making assumptions:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/11/24/wsmith124.xml
148. Yes, and Mugabe, a despot who has turned the breadbasket of Africa into a chaotic, starving country in the midst of complete and utter economic collapse, shouldn’t be criticised in relation to Smith because we’re only going on the “British view,” Roger?
Grow up.
148 - I think it’s difficult to make a clear comparison, because the pressures are also different. Mugabe’s dictatorship is not strictly race-based, although tribal elements are important. Whereas Smith reprsented the collective will of most white Rhodesians. This leads to different attitudes on the part of the government; Mugabe fears the populace more in some ways, and is thus more ready to be brutal.
On the economic point Rik made, it’s important to make the point that, whereas Mugabe’s political attitudes became rancid fairly quickly - and certainly by the mid-1980s - economic progress was only seriously affected from the late 1990s onwards. If you do take the view that economics matters most (which I certainly don’t), then the earlier phases of Mugabe’s rule might be said to be on a par with Smith’s.
property developer comes clean - he is the mystery donor who gave 400 k to labour
154 - The question now is why he didn’t give the money straight to them but through two other people?
153 - It looks pretty clear to me, both Smith and Mugabe were/are as bad as each other in a moral sense. Smith was better at running a sanctioned economy though.
155 - Would have looked bad when he was offered a peerage of course…..
155: Isn’t donating through undisclosed third parties a crime?
155 mmmm now let me think…… whatever the reason it will involve dishonesty, corruption and sleaze. standard NuLab practice… arise Lord Breeze Block of Blaydon
157 - That is a tad cynical.
152 Matt. I was answering Benedicts value judgement that “Smith was nothing like as bad as Mugabe and by all measures better”.
I was simply pointing out that it depends where you are looking at this from.
151. Ralph. I’m not impressed that Ian Smith’s gardener thought he was a ‘very generous man’ it was a typically silly article in the Telegraph. It said in effect that there was widespread rejoicing at Smith’s passing in Zimbabwe but his domestic staff liked him!
160 -
“Labour ran a virtual “supermarket in honours” and “organised” the award of peerages to millionaire party donors, the Liberal Democrat leadership contender Chris Huhne has claimed.
Mr Huhne said that the chance of so many Labour donors being given peerages by accident was “about the same as being hit by an asteroid”.
He challenged the Government to take him to court and disprove his accusation that honours were deliberately offered to generous Labour backers.
In an intervention that threatens to reignite controversy over the cash-for- honours affair, despite prosecutors’ decision not to press charges, the Lib Dem environment spokesman said that the affair has meant that “the whiff of corruption has become a nauseating stench”.
In an interview with The Independent on Sunday, Mr Huhne alleged that “there was an organised arrangement whereby a very large amount of money was donated to the Labour Party and at the same time the major donors received peerages and knighthoods”.
“It’s quite clear what was going on,” he said. “This was basically a supermarket in honours. It is completely mad to suggest other than this was an organised matter. I am very happy to say that on the record. If they [the Government] think otherwise they can very happily take me to a libel court.”"
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article3127417.ece
How could I fail to support someone who had the guts to say what so many people are thinking but frightened of saying? Anyone reading, take me to court if you want but, as far as I’m concerned, there are a lot of guilty people walking around freely.
162 - But, then again, Huhne regards Lloyd George as his political hero….
161 Roger: then I apologise if I was slightly heavy handed.
As Ukpaul says, morally both leaders were/are in the wrong. Mugabe was obviously influenced by a reaction to Smith’s white minority rule, but has swung the other way too sharply.
What I will say for Smith, and this should not be misread as personal admiration for the man, is that economically he built up a fairly confident and competant African state, that was the envy of others at least in economic terms. His government was mired by blatent discrimination and for that reason alone he can be considered a bad leader, but it is a shame that his successors could not use his bigotry to demonstrate how a country should not be run, and govern Zimbabwe wisely, fairly and continue to strengthen the economy that had been bequethed to them. Instead Zimbabwe has been brought to ruin. The wrong lessons of Smith’s regime have been learnt.
I think it ought to be a criminal offence to use, clearly without their permission, the identities of two working class people to donate money to Labour. They knew nothing about it and are now being pressurised into saying they did so as not to get sacked. That’s harassment.
137. Canvassing on a Sunday Nick. That’s brave, voters might think you’re obsessed.
Interesting with ICM, I read on UK polling that someone who was surveyed said the questions were going on forever (as all this other data would indicate). That might explain the rogue element as people may have got bored and put the phone down. Esp Tories as they have busier lives
:)
165 - Where did the property developer get the money from?
165
If there are money transfers backing up the payments then it’s an open and shut case. And I would expect the Labour party to repay money under false pretences .. like the LibDems do…
Property developer says he has done this because he didnt want publicity as a donor. Oh well that singularly failed to work didn’t it.
164 - However, Smith’s economic success was at least partially based on the perverse consequences of sanctions; these weren’t severe enough to prevent Rhodesia earning export income from non-British markers, but were tangible enough to allow for growth in domestic industries to make up for the drying up of British imports (and were also backed up by series of regulations on capital and labour movements). After the oil crisis, the economic position of Rhodesia worsened significantly, which is one reason why Smith’s government became more amenable to concessions at that time.
Re Contact Point and the Child Database
Acccessible by over 300,000 child workers etc..
Ministers are so sure of its security that exclusions include the children of some politicians and cleberities - who may not be on the database.
Says it all.
148
‘I think if you were to hold a referendum in Africa as a whole or any individual country on that continent-including Zimbabwe-on who is the worst leader Mugabe or Smith you’d find Smith would win hands down. Don’t assume everyone sees things as the British do.’
The sad thing is that if you held the referendum you propose, between Smith and the current and past African leaders over the last 20 years,Smith would also do well.
A few comments on the so-called biometric passports (although they are not truly biometric at the moment, they just contain a digitised image of you):
The new passports contain an RFID chip - if you have one go to the last page and view the large copper wire loop antenna connected to a small plastic chip.
These chips are basically a microprocessor and some non volatile memory and communicate with a reader in a wireless fashion - radio frequency energy from the reader provides enough power for the microprocessor, which then responds to requests for information, all over a wireless link.
There are already claims that it is possible to read the information from these chips (and later clone) when they are in your pocket or handbag, or even as they are delivered through the mail (you don’t even need to open the envelope!). The gear to do this costs less than £200. As far as I am aware the chip does not maintain an audit log of when/what has been accessed, and even if it does, you personally cannot easily get access to this information. Contrast that with the ‘paper-only’ passport where you carry a mental log of just who you may have shown it to.
Your details are encrypted on the passport, but the encryption standard is not particularly strong and anyway since it’s possible to guess at the information on there - dates, names, addresses etc it is relatively easy to attack the encryption.
Also it has been reported that a small electromagnetic pulse will total the chip - I don’t want to go into this too much, other than to say it’s easy to do, and has the potential to screw-up your life if it happens to you. I also believe you are legally responsible for the chip, although it could have been destroyed without your knowledge.
161: Roger, don’t the opinions of those who actually knew the man have some validity, as opposed to ‘widespread rejoicing’ probably organised by a dictatorship?
Both latest polls are mildly disappointing for the Conservatives, IMHO, though I suspect the level of support in the ICM represents the floor of Conservative support.
WRT Australia, the Coalition performed creditably in terms of vote share - but very badly in terms of seats. I wonder why that should be.
WRT Rik W, Hain’s and Burstow’s comments are pathetic, and it would be a shame if a panicked Conservative Party sanctioned him over them (unfortunately, we have form in that respect). Once again, I must thank Shireen Ritchie, Trish Morris, and Simon Burns for rejecting me when I applied to get on the candidates’ list and thus spared me the miserable lot which is that of a Tory Parliamentary candidate.
IMHO, comparing Smith with Mugabe is a bit like comparing Nicholas II with Lenin. The rule of the former had many flaws, but was vastly preferable to what came after.
Quite a few cocky left of centre posters on today trying to find solace in any subjective way they cantTo put things into context:
1.These polls are bad for Labour because they are NOT midterm opinion polls but effectively 4 months in to a “new” government and
2. As the marginals poll showed in October uniform national swing and national polls are increasingly irrelevant to the actual result.
Most Conservatives are happy with 37 to 40% at this stage.
176 - I don’t think marginal polls indicate much: partly because there’s a possibility that existing Conservative marginals (particularly those, like your seat, which are 2005 gains) and current Labour-held marginals might behave differently in terms of swing - and partly because the sampling technique, I think, is flawed for such seats. But local election results (and local swings over the years) do support your point.
#175 Sean Both latest polls are mildly disappointing for the Conservatives, IMHO, though I suspect the level of support in the ICM represents the floor of Conservative support.
Do you mean ceiling?
178 No.
179 ok - so used to seeing other posters saying x% represents the limit of Conservative support.
175
Where were the Hain & Burstow comments?
181 Both quoted in the Sunday Times, I think.
ID cards are morally indefensible and practically unworkable.
Even though it’ll allow my party a rare and valuable chance to side with “the people” against a shadowy and vaguely sinister “them”, and presents significant electoral advantages, this is nothing compared to the enormous and ghastly implications of this idea.
Please, Mr Palmer, you’re clearly a good man who just happens to be on the other side, I implore you and your party to reconsider.
175 Agree. If, as the current polls suggest, the Tories currently have a floor of 40% support, that gives them a couple of years to go to work on the rest of the population. The Tories may still provoke strong antipathy with some, but if they can keep those currently giving their support in line, they would only need to turn 1 in ten of the remaining 60% to have a very comfortable ride into the next election with 46%. (Although hammering away at the competence issue of Brown/Darling may also do the job, by making former Labour voters stay home.)
“It’s worth noting that the ICM poll in the Sunday Telegraph appears to have been carried out in the same set of fieldwork as the one for the Guardian in the week. This changes the picture slightly - we don’t have horrible YouGov and Populus polls for Labour, contradicted by two ICM polls showing less bad news for Labour and some poor results for the Tories. Instead we have horrible YouGov and Populus polls for Labour, and a single ICM poll showing a different picture. It could be that the ICM poll just happened, through the normal vagueries of random sample error, to get a sample that was more sympathetic to Brown and Darling - we shall see in the next lot of polls.” Anthony Wells, UK Polling Report
185 Anthony seems to have got something wrong there . The last Populus poll was in fact good for Labour with them in front of the Conservatives and of course immediately dismissed as a rogue by many Conservative posters on here .
186 - was the Times poll last week not a Populus poll?
Mark Senior, as has been pointed out before, you seem incapable of posting without some nasty ‘sting in the tail’ directed at the Tories. Ho hum!
How’s the unpacking going? Have you hung that custom made Maggie Thatcher Dart board in the loo again or are you decorating ‘post modern style’ and less padded cell psychotic.
Nick P is so sure that ID cards are here to stay that he won’t bet against them being shelved as it would be unfair!
More on the growing Labour donations scandal:
“Lord Chancellor Jack Straw has admitted concern about the transparency of donations to the Labour party after a property developer admitted channelling the money through friends to keep his identity secret…..”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/11/25/nlabour125.xml
175 “IMHO, comparing Smith with Mugabe is a bit like comparing Nicholas II with Lenin. The rule of the former had many flaws, but was vastly preferable to what came after.”
That’s a very apt analogy, SeanF. Mike should enter it in the Book of Fine posts that I’m sure he keeps.
187 There has not been a proper poll in the Times since the beginning of the month . The poll you mention from last week was a snap poll conducted online and had no voting intention question .
A perceptive comment on the Labour donation on ConHome from “Patriot”
“I trust David Cameron will be asking for confirmation that Mr Ruddick paid income tax on the gross earnings which were necessary to enable him to donate this amount of money to the Labour party.”
Yeah - me too! After all, Labour were extremely concerned about Lord Ashcroft’s *legal* tax status.
193 I’m sure a self employed jobbing builder will have a squeaky clean tax record dont you?
193 - not looking to investigate the builder, rather, the property developer who used the builder who “hates Labour” without his permission
MODERATED
I’m sure the property developer has declared all the gifts he made to the builder as “lifetime gifts” as allowed under IHT regulations..
Well well, the Scotland on Sunday has a tale of a curious affair. This political love in should be of no surprise to anyone who follows Scottish politics, it has quietly been gathering into a fine romance since before the elections. But like all strong women Annabel Goldie made Salmond woo her and her party!
The whole problem of Africa is summarized here.
http://tinyurl.com/yo85xv
Lagging IQ levels due to different evolutionary pressures in differing environments mean there just aren’t enough smart people in sub-Saharan African countries: not enough to run an efficient economy, anyroad.
The answer is to install a capable colonial elite, or bring in some very smart immigrants - Jews, for instance.
Fraser Nelson explains Des Browne’s Defence Spending Fiddle over at the Coffee House Blog.
198 - Chris I think this is the link you were trying to post. A Conservative/SNP coalition has always made intuitive sense to me - after all the SNP rise has arguably been on the back of ex-Conservative leaning voters (aren’t they sometimes called the “Tartan Tories”?)
202 Whilst I would defend the right to freedom of speech the link is a load of nonsense - the data is complete and utter toss (technical term).
201.Oops, thanks alex, my computer is playing up and being a bit slow today.
I saw that article but is was the opinion piece by Eddie Barnes on this subject in the Scotland on Sunday that I tried to link too.
The curious affair of the SNP-Tory love-in
109 even
199 even - it’s got me so excited I don’t know what I am doing.
194.
“a self employed jobbing builder will have a squeaky clean tax record”
He forgot he had given the money. He had told the Labour treasurer “The lads will be round at the end of the month to sort out the paperwork” but they never came.
Mark [184] I think 40% for the Tories is a ceiling not a floor. The Conservatives are disliked by most of the population and Cameron is disliked by a lot of Conservatives. They are stuck.
Of course, this is the Tories only hope. It’s in their interests to encourage Scottish Nationalism to full independence, so Scotland can be lopped-off the UK body politic. The Tories can’t win a UK majority, but they can quite easily win an English majority. The Tories and SNP now have a convergence of interest - the destruction of the Union. In a hung parliament I can quite envisage Salmond’s Westminster contingent supporting the Tories’ idea of an English Grand Committee, leaving Labour up sh1t-creek..
207 - how can it be a ceiling when they’ve had a higher score in 8 of the last 13 polls?
201.They were indeed called the Tartan Tories in the distant past, but over the last 20 years the party has increasingly become more left wing in membership and overall agenda. The Tartan Tories do still exist although as a much smaller group, I often feel that they are driving force behind the SNP’s more interesting fiscal policy these days though.
During the election campaign Goldie was adamant about no coalition deals making it clear the Tories would deal with policies issue by issue with a new government, IIRC she was quite strong on accepting the idea of minority government and working with them in this way. The SNP had it enshrined in their constitution that they would not go into coalition with the Tories, but even during the campaign it was obvious that Salmond and Goldie enjoyed a friendly relationship and agreement on certain issues.
209 - MOE
207. Yet still they are on 40%. A fairly good figure, no?
207
I admire your conviction you KNOW what most of the pouplation thinks. You should sell yourself to a Polling company and save them the cost of polling.
211 - What’s so special about 40%?
BTW i’m not a statistician but i would be surprised if “MOE” can be used to justify your statement in this case. 3 or 4 of the last 13 maybe, but not 8.
199 Maven
I cannot open that link. This is a pity, because a solution to ‘the whole problem of Africa’ would be extremely useful.
Do you not think you should be publicising the message to a broader and more influential audience though - the UN, for instance? I hear it has been working on the problem for some time, with only mixed results.
8 I’m still amazed by the Mail story about the false Labour donor. Why would Labour declare him a donor if it is that easy to prove that he cannot possibly be one?
If the Taliban is funding the Labour Party and Gordon Brown asked them to pay via stooges, I shall be very disappointed. I am sure this is not the case. I can see how the Taliban benefits from a Labour Government but I dont think this is what happened.
148. ‘I think if you were to hold a referendum in Africa as a whole or any individual country on that continent-including Zimbabwe-on who is the worst leader Mugabe or Smith you’d find Smith would win hands down’
This is an interesting post, isn’t it? Either Roger thinks Mugabe is better than Smith, which makes him close to certifiable, or he has an extremely low opinion of Africans.
40% of 60% who vote - pretty crap if you ask me.
207. Stuck at 40%. Gutted at that!!!!
201- Chris that can only be overturned by Annual Conference and if it comes up at National Council on Saturday in Perth as a discussion, I would expect a thumbs down to it. I think the party would like us to keep going as a minority Government.
The missing records that were reported on the radio this morning and in the newspapers were found where they were sent to - at Stobshill Hospital.
218 - Yes, Icarus, it pains us no end that we cannot match the soaring heights of the Liberal Democrats in public esteem.
207
‘I think 40% for the Tories is a ceiling not a floor. The Conservatives are disliked by most of the population and Cameron is disliked by a lot of Conservatives. They are stuck.’
So if the Tories are disliked by most of the population with 40% I wonder, using your logic how you would describe the Lib Dems with ratings this year of 11 to 21% loathed? hated? irrelevant?
Agree we should be better. We are out spent and have the electoral system against us - My point is that no one should be proud of their poll ratings at the moment.
220,Thanks Marcia, can you keep us up to date with the developments at the National Council on Saturday?
Reading both articles in the Scotland on Sunday, I do wonder if the one highlighted by Alex about allowing more cooperation at council level might give some traction to this idea?
220 - But it’s not about coalition at Holyrood, is it? That would just be a potential by-product. Reading the article the change is needed to allow the SNP to take control of numerous councils under STV.
If patsies have been used to channel money secretly to the Labour party, then that money has to be paid to the patsie.
I would be interested if the patsies have declared that income before making their donations.
At the very least, tax is due. The 40% tax rate would be liable.
I would be interested to know if that tax had been paid.
223. Of course, how silly of me, the Tories should be on 60% and rising….
Icarus, you’re beginning to sound as silly as the posters on CONtinuityIDS in the first few months of Cameron’s leadership, who after every poll started showing a Tory lead shrieked “But it’s not good enough! With Davis we’d be further ahead!”
207 Icarus. Some rather stupid comments about a ceiling as already pointed out. Also “if” some Conservatives don’t like Cameron analysis of many recent polls shows a high proportion of those who voted for the Tories in 2005 GE election still prepared to vote for the party. Your 218 is also rather irrelevant given that in the last few GE’s Labour achieved a lot less than 40% of those willing to vote. To avoid any misunderstanding I should make clear I (and you) don’t know whether 40% of 60% (who vote) would be good enougth for the Tories to win an overall majority next time.
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/politics/st…2216635,00.html
I’ll change, vows PM after week of crises
Brown breaks with his exclusive inner circle as Labour slumps in polls
Nicholas Watt, political editor and Patrick Wintour in Kampala
Sunday November 25, 2007
The Observer
A chastened Gordon Brown has told key allies that he going to ‘radically alter’ the composition of his inner circle which has been criticised for being too small and excluding senior members of the Cabinet from major decision-making.
As ministers lick their wounds after Labour’s most difficult week since Brown took over, the Prime Minister has issued orders to end the apparently favourable treatment enjoyed by his closest allies in the Cabinet.
We are witnessing the last days of GB. The bunker mentality is breaking down and now its pleading to keep his job. Its sad, pathetic and so predictable. I thought he would be gone by early Spring but this is shaping up to a Christmas exit IMO.
207. Pretty childish post. For a start if 40% “like” the Tories then your talking nonsense in teh first place.
However, assuming your silly statement was true then where does that leave McSporran and his Politburo.
It looks like everyone other than Browns client state have decided they want a change. Cameron still needs to convince many of them that the change is him. At this stage there seem to be only two options at the next election, Hung parliament or Tory win.
Cameron would have taken that 8 weeks ago I am sure he is delighted with the current state of play. Cant see Brown has any reason to be smiling.
The Tories probably are disliked by most of the population, but (at the moment) they’re disliked less intensely, and by fewer people, than Labour. If that is the case at the next election, then they’ll win.
223
Aah diddums.
The Tories can also easily argue that the electoral system is against them,if you had some policies that excited the electorate,business,Unions or any other organisation then the funding would follow.
229
Brown stated:
“Brown also made clear in Kampala yesterday the depth of the challenge he has faced in recent weeks when he said that the collapse of Northern Rock in September was caused by ‘a uniquely deficient business model’.”
So why is he giving 25B of tax payer money so it can be propped up? Didn’t they say NR was a going concern a few weeks back?
Vince Cable needs to pursue this ruthlessly
229. But this is the same Brown who promised a new consensus, a government of “all the talents,” to restore cabinet decision making and authority.
All of this was guesture. Brown cannot change. There is no evidence that suggests that this recent volte-face is any different to the spin he lumped on the public come the Blair succession, which very quickly unravelled. Even if more advisors are added to his inner circle, everyone knows he’ll still rely on the usual suspects behind the scenes. This is how Brown operates.
It amuses me that he came into office promising to restore trust, and yet today we have him saying, I quote, “I do not look at opinion polls.” A brazen lie as we all know from the election fiasco. Does he honestly think people have such short memories.
He does not understand public relations. Blair and Cameron do. This is what will be Brown’s undoing.
Gordon is the wrong personality type to be a leader of any kind of organisation. TB, Bill Clinton, Maggie, The Shadow Chancellor, Richard Branson what do they all have in common? A healthy combination of Type A traits, charisma and powerful people skills. I am afraid David Cameron is light on the necessary ingredients to make a great leader.
Gordon is a back room boy. A sort of Simon Cowell but without the funny sort of anti-Charisma.
His mistake was in not knowing his limitations. He got lucky as Chancellor for a few years and should have recognised his mistakes a couple of years ago, apologised and resigned to the House of Lords where he could snooze in a nice comfy leather seat while others witter on.
224 - I shall be there and let you know what happens.
225 -Alex, now read it and it would be, if true ,to let local councillors have a more leeway with the present rigid stance. I spoke to a few members today about it and none supportive locally. The Tories here in Dundee prop up Labour.
233 Norman good point. Also if NR Had a “uniquely deficient business model” why did the FSA (who Brown passed responsility for monitoring bank’s to) not pick this up a long time ago?
229
gordon in Uganda says he’ll change..
Whom did he take with him? Wee Dougie Alexander.
Change ? More open. Transparency.
There is a one word response but I’m afraid Ed uses it as a surname.
237
Suggesting that the FSA might be competent is akin to suggesting the moon is made of blue cheese.
239 Not so, Fishy.
There’s a one in a billion chance the moon is made of blue cheese.
240 lol
236.Thanks Marcia.
Had a chat with an SNP friend in a different association today, they were totally relaxed about the SNP dropping the policy of no coalition deals with the Tories, they feel it has become outdated in the present political climate for the party both locally and in Holyrood.
232 “some policies that excited the electorate,business,Unions or any other organisation then the funding would follow.”
When the next Government gets in, they can remove the annual 12million pounds payments to the unions. Then we can see if the unions can continue to fun 8million a year to Labour.
O/T InTrade.com: Hillary to be Dem nominee down 3.4 to 67.7 in just half an hour (1052-1122 EST) a couple of hours ago due to a flurry of activity. No other Dem candidates really benefitting - seems the market is correcting itself, because the news from her campaign out of Iowa is not really positive. Most polls have Obama in the lead, with Hillary second and Edwards third.
Personally, I have a hunch Edwards will exceed expectations in Iowa. To survive, I think Obama and Edwards have to better than 3rd place in both Iowa and New Hampshire (a 2nd and a 3rd would mean a decision would have to be made after South Carolina though). For Hillary not to see her campaign come off the rails, she needs to win New Hampshire, and place at least second in Iowa -the latter is the more difficult challenge.
Morus
235. Have you ever met Cameron, I can tell you that i observed him at Tory HQ before he was an MP. He has excellent people skills, polite, courtous to all people whether it is the lady at the front desk or the security guard. Cameron is one of the best people persons, i have ever seen other than myself!
But i decided against politics because i did not want the media intrusion (Plus i would only want to be a backbench MP anyway).
Cameron has charisma in bucket loads, you write partisan drivel their on his attributes.
The Labour sleaze thing looks likely to really be set off again, they are not working in the spirit of their own rules. Think these people used as fronts for donations is ridiculous!
Evening all,
Going back to the polls and whether Labour should be smiling.
I believe that the regional differences in voting will have a significant affect in the next GE. From the national polls we cannot get anything particularly useful about the individual regional figures because the samples are too small. In addition the regional areas differ to some extent differ between pollsters.
However, with Yougov, Comres and Populus you can look at the figures for England and Wales in isolation. Scotland’s political landscape is very different and as England & Wales make up the vast majority of seats if there was any ‘regional’ difference it might be important in an election. Furthermore, as it only means reducing the sample by around 10% the level of added inaccuracy would seem small.
So I took the comparative August and October polls for each of the three pollsters and calculated the figures for England & Wales alone based on the pollsters weighted numbers. In each case there seemed to be some consistency in the outcome.
Analysing the polls indicated that to estimate the England/Wales figures you can use the following adjustments.
Con: plus 2 to 3%
Lab: plus or minus 1%
LD: nc to +1%
Others: minus 2% to 6% (on such low samples it is likely to be more volatile)
So for the latest Yougov Poll (C 41% L 32% LD 14% Other 13%)
the England and Wales only poll would be C 43% L 32% LD 15% Other 10%
So for the latest Comres Poll (C 43% L 32% LD 14% Other 12%)
the England and Wales only poll would be C 46% L 33% LD 15% Other 6%
And for the latest Populus Poll (C 36% L 37% LD 16% Other 12%)
the England & Wales only poll would be C 39% L 36% LD 17% Others 8%
Given that the current situation in Wales also favours Labour it seems reasonable that whilst this current poltical situation persists in both Scotland and Wales that the national figures could be adjusted by the following to get the English figures:
Con: plus 2% to plus 4%
Lab: plus or minus 1%
LD: No Change to plus 1%
Others: minus 2% to 7%
Obviously, this is not good news for Labour but that said the Scottish situation seems little better. Looking at the limited Scottish figures they all show a similar trend in the latest polls with a drop of between 5% and 10% in Labour support in Scotland.
Of course if the Labour levels of support in Scotland fell significantly that would reduce the disparity between the National/ England & Wales figures but similarly if they improve then the disparity increases.
ICM include their Scottish figures in with the North of England figures so it’s impossible to assess whether their results would be similar and I haven’t found any Ipsos Mori detailed figures to check.
245
Yes I have met David Cameron and many other MP’s and am most at ease in the company of Vince Cable at the present time.
He is shortly to contribute in no small way to the demise of Alistair Darling
Darling’s role ‘nearly untenable’
Mr Darling blamed the missing discs on a junior official
Alistair Darling’s role as chancellor may soon be “untenable” following a series of “disasters”, Liberal Democrat acting leader Vince Cable has said.
The only reason Mr Cable said he was not calling for Mr Darling’s head was that the problems facing him “relate to decisions made by Gordon Brown”.
On the subject of Rik W:
I read the debate about Ian Smith last week with great interest, though knowing shamefully little about his rule beyond the bare facts. My ignorance requires that I keep my counsel (others take note…) on the subject of whether Smith was indeed a benign if misguided leader or a rascist tyrant and I therefore have no view on what Rik and others had to say.
However, I think it is profoundly sad that Rik’s personal views, expressed on a discussion board, have been used by rivals to attempt to embarass his party and, ultimately, to try to have him sacked. Recent political history is littered with the corpses of good politicians whose resignations have been forced because their opponants have publicised some view of theirs which contradicts either the party line or political consensus, in the hope of scoring some cheap political point. This tactic seems to be used particularly against the Conservatives, who (to their discredit) have too often sacked (or forced the resignations of) individuals whose private views have made the headlines along with the usual chorus of “Cameron must sack X or it proves the Tories haven’t changed”. However, it happens across the spectrum and I don’t intend this to be a party political post.
My concern is that we are gradually allowing all character, unorthodoxy or even plain old eccentricity to slip away from party politics. There were sound reasons for the pre-97 Labour machine to focus on the “message”, and party discipline, both within the parliamentary parties and beyond, is of course important. But if we want to avoid our politicians morphing into timid creatures whose only concern is not to allow themselves to be used to embarass their party leadership, or score party political points, we must allow them (and the would-be politicans of the future) the space to express their views without rushing to teacher with evidence of any unorthodoxy and urging it to be punished.
I saw a poster today which read “well behaved women rarely change history”. To me, that is a truism of broader application.
I know of plenty of people who would make excellent politicians; people of genuine ability, intelligence and insight, people who are interesting and, more importantly, interested. Not one of these would venture into politics, and for most a significant discincentive is the prospect of having to toe a party line (almost) without exception for the rest of their lives. Politics would be much the richer if we were all more tolerant of unorthodoxy, and if we allowed ourselves and our opponants the freedom to express opinions without the fear or hope that they could be used as weapons.
249 Flockers, well said.
249. Yes i read the Sunday Times piece in disbelief, think people are entitled to their own views on all people/systems/leaders etc. If you look at what some MP’s and party folk have said about foriegn governments over the last 100 years - i would say that some went much wider across the line than this small example.
Think it is very poor and the people who planted the story should get £50 or whatever the going rate is from elsewhere!
249. I particularly agree with your last paragraph.
But Martin, I don’t know you…
253. Don’t get what you mean?
Bob the Geordie builder announces on sky TV that he is “off down the bingo to try and win some money to donate to the labour party”. I kid you not.
what an absolute shambles.
251 The story is a nonstory - way off the page. I imagine it is of no interest to anyone except pbc lefties and LDs.
If anyone could find the article and could be bothered to read it would probably say - sounds perfectly reasonable.
Storm in a teacup. Nothing will come of it except the usual mob would have driven another poster from the board - and we all know who they are.
256. you are right.
247. I think you exaggerate the differences. It is most unlikely that England will differ from GB or UK in swing/change by more than 0.5%. Scotland Or Wales have the potential to diverge a lot more, and regional diffeences within England could be significant, but England itself, composing 82% of the UK, cannot differ as much from a poll or a prediction as you make out.
249
‘I know of plenty of people who would make excellent politicians; people of genuine ability, intelligence and insight, people who are interesting and, more importantly, interested. Not one of these would venture into politics, and for most a significant discincentive is the prospect of having to toe a party line (almost) without exception for the rest of their lives.’
Some excellent points and reasons why we end up with the current nondescript bunch of MP’s, many never having held a job in the real world.
Apart from having to toe the party line,political correctness has been a highly successful form of additional censorship resulting in almost any words,sentences being able to be twisted to have perceived adverse meanings when desired.
Right that’s it then.
Odds on Richard Branson to go into politics please ?
Treasury have approved Virgin as preferred bidder. Announcement expected early tomorrow. 11.5B will be repaid to the BofE, a similar amount will remain on loan. No word on the proposed offer to shareholders yet.
Edit: Source - BBC News 24 just now
251
‘Think it is very poor and the people who planted the story should get £50 or whatever the going rate is from elsewhere!
The Lib Dems are obviously desperate for the £ 50.
259. I think my main problem is i could not vote for something i did not believe in, this will alwise arise somewhere.
To my mind we need more Boris Johnson’s and Dennis Skinners etc, you may not agree with them but they tell it how it is. More importantly they give representation to people who share their views.
I remember when i saw Boris Johnson in the Commmons how excentric he looked. I could just imagine him sitting their with a world war 2 german helmet on!
:lol: 
261. Yes they can probably send out 1000 Bar graph sheets with that!
:lol: 
It was the LibDem poster Dan who brought this on to PB gloating, and so I expect it was he who chose to publicise it. Wretched behaviour and should earn him our contempt. I speak as someone who totally opposed Rik’s view at the time. I don’t blame Rik for getting a pseudoynm, it was the right thing to do. Once again, some LDs show why the two main parties think of them as nasty. Kudos to Nick Palmer for having the courage to defend an acquaintance of long-standing when his worthless ex-boss Peter Vain couldn’t wait to put the knife in the Sunday Times.
263
Have you considered a career as a stand-up comedian?
265. Actually i know your joking their but many have said this!
Not sure why but i can even get people with no sense of humour to laugh!
:lol: 
260 - Norman Normal
When Ken Livingstone was first seeking re-election to the London Mayor, a Yougov poll was taken to see who Londoners would ideally elect as their Mayor.
If memory serves, Greg Dyke scored 6%, Sir John Stevens 5%, Ken and Rudy Guiliani scored 22%, but the leader was Richard Branson with 24%. I would expect that if Branson did want to enter politics, this would be the most appropriate way in. See page four of the link;
http://www.yougov.com/archives/pdf/ITL040101001_1.pdf
264
‘It was the LibDem poster Dan who brought this on to PB gloating, and so I expect it was he who chose to publicise it.’
It was published on the ‘Liberal Democrat Voice’with the first comment from Dan,but unlike any of their other articles on that site there is no author, so either Dan or another spineless cretin was responsible.
267. Think Branson has far more inflience by not being a politician. Multi-billoinaire with 10’s if not 100’s of thousands employees.
He can change policy more effectively now than he could as London mayor on some of the key metropolitan issues such as the green agenda, public transport etc.
Myrtle Proper: >We are witnessing the last days of GB. The bunker mentality is breaking down and now its pleading to keep his job. Its sad, pathetic and so predictable. I thought he would be gone by early Spring but this is shaping up to a Christmas exit IMO.
255. He is lucky that his bingo hall is still open many have had to shut down following the smoking ban and betting taxes disadvantage bingo other forms of betting as well.
Still may be this new form of donating money to Labour is part of the fallout from the cash for peerages affair. If you want the ermine you can’t be seen to give money directly to Labour so you do it through third parties instead.
…sorry, angled bracket suppressed the erest. The Broxtowe cats are offering you a charity bet at, say, 10-1 odds, up to £100 against GB resigning by say April 1 2008. You can win £1000 for your favourite charity, and risk only £100 on what is so predictable. Go for it!
258. Rod - I have not ‘exaggerated’ the figures in any way! I calculated the figures using the same numbers that the pollsters used. All I did was remove the Scottish figures and thats how it came out. You may not like it but thats what the England & Wales figures indicate (assuming the pollsters weighting method is right).
From that I derived the rule of thumb % figures above and as I said they will change should the % for Lab (and in fact Con) change significantly. Whilst Labour are far ahead of the Conservatives in Scotland these differentials won’t change.
I will be following this up as polls come out to see if the results stay the same or not but I don;t think I will discover I have made some radical error.
If you don’t believe me do the figures yourself.
65. **Very belated response** - I’ve been out all day.
You said “it’s a mistake to claim that anything is perfect, but like chip ‘n’ pin it makes fraud harder.”
Is this what we are selling to the electorate - just something something like chip ‘n pin?!!
Surely not. I thought the new ID cards are supposed to be fraudproof, bulletproof, rocksolid, or whatever.
Obviously the devil is in the detail on this one. Whatever has been agreed up to now, I am quite sure that the government now understands public concerns on this matter. I shall ask around a bit…
270. That is so obviously a spoof! I cannot believe someone has tried doing that, not funny!
It was the Lib Dem Voice site that gave prominence to the Rik W story. Their poster was unusually named as “The Voice” and not an individual.
http://www.libdemvoice.org/tory-ppc-praises-apartheid-1670.html
Mark Pack (a Lib Dem employee) then posted a gloating update two days ago (Nov 23rd) and later today added links to today’s Sunday Times.
http://www.libdemvoice.org/richard-willis-1679.html
So it does look like the work of at least one Lib Dem employee.
268. Dan came back here boasting about it and when I pointed out it was the lowest of the low to try to get a fellow PBer in trouble (for it was quite clear from Rik’s various comments that he abhors racism - my disagreement with him was over what constituted racism, had he himself believed it of Smith he would have loathed the man) - at that point Dan tried to defend the shopping.
IMO the community should treat Dan as a man of dishonour. I am sure there are many LDs here who wouldn’t stoop so low, but Dan gives his party the bad name that major party politicians ascribe to it
271 the whole thing stinks and whats more they dont care, this bloke basically makes a joke of the fact he has been used to funnel funds to the labour party and does it on national TV. shameless.
269 - You’re probably right. I was just suggesting that if he ever did enter politics, an independent executive role would probably suit him better than anything like the House of Lords or a ministerial post.
I wonder if, more broadly, what the poll suggested is that there is an appetite for successful executive officers from the world of business to become senior politicians - they are under-represented in politics, compared to lawyers or journalists (for example).
It is far more common for the possibility to be raised in the US (Ross Perot, Michael Bloomberg etc) - which senior businessmen, if not Branson, do you think might be welcomed into public life in this way?
270. & 272. Maybe Nick has a quirky sense of humour
270. MIKE. Banning the IP please. Nick, don’t worry, nobody will assume it’s you; you know how to string a sentence together.
272 why not see if bob the builder wants the bet? hes off down the bingo anyway so we know he likes a flutter.
276. What a revolting piece of work Mark Pack is. I shall so look forward to watching those seats tumble in the South West.
273. I did not intend to imply any dishonesty or error on your part, merely that your extrapolation are unlikely to materialise in a real election. They have not done so in any election so far that I can recall. It’s Scotland and Wales that may diverge from the overall figures, not England….
249 Flockers.
Nice post. Please post more often.
What on earth was Charles Kennedy up to with his report on channel 4 news tonight ? Certainly not doing his party any favours when their poll ratings have gone up in the last week ( not down as quoted by the reporter) , and going over last week’s row again ?
277. Indeed, one simply cannot tolerate such behaviour in the world of public life. A gentleman’s honour and reputation should be uppermost among his concerns at all times. Any man who disregards his honour by betraying the trust of one of his fellows is no gentleman, and should straightwise be cut by all respectable people. If we allow such base behaviour to flourish, civilised standards will be gravelly imperilled.
Would Cameron even have the power to “sack” Rik? Surely that’s up to the voters?
Should people who attack pbc site users in the way that the poster “Dan” and Mark Pack have done, be banned from this site?
Afterall they have used posts made on this site for their own political purposes without the permission of the site owner (I presume) or the originator.
They may have acted within the law but have they not breached the spirit of the site which wants to encourage dialogue and the exchange of information amongst the political and non political.
I see Dr Julian Lewis MP has resigned from the Oxford Union in protest at the Free Speech Forum where Griffin and Irving are speaking tomorrow.
What party does Julian Lewis belong to? I do not know him.
290 - Conservative. Longstanding vociferous critic of CND.
Tory New Forest (East?).
He’s a bit of a character.
Wikipedia says “He has been described by Quentin Letts of the Daily Telegraph as “one of the most vigorous rightwingers in the Commons” and by David Hencke of The Guardian as the Conservative Party’s “front bench terrier”. I know Wiki is not always right… but…
284. Rod fair enough but a few observations on that.
Isn’t that true of the National Polls and UNS anyway?
Given, the national poll is exactly that and in Scotland and Wales the Conservatives are likely polling ,at best, one half of their figures in England it seems to me reasonable that they will poll a few per cent above the national figure in England (again the regional disparities within England make the results likely).
Secondly, in May we saw significantly different results in the 2007 local elections in England from the National polls. Off the top of my head it was something like Con (+4) Lab (-5) Libdem (+5). Given it is not the best comparison but if my extrapolation is close then perhaps that may be part (and only part) of the reason why.
Anyway, when I have a chance I’ll do some more research on this and see if I can extrapolate the 2005 GE election results for England. I think there is information I can use available from the Electoral Commission on this.
Maybe we should have the equivalent of the “White’s s*** of the Year” competition with a “PBC S*** Of The Year” and these 2 specimens, Dan and Pack, could be included in the list for misusing the site? Their actions discourage the expression of honest opinion and will harm future debate on here.
They are also illiberal actions but sadly the Lib Dem party does not seem to worry if its own people have illiberal views.
288 alex, let the voters decide. I actually disagree with Rik and think Ian Smith’s actions helped create the situation the Mugabe thrives on. But then I believe more in Liberty than most other “ities” and “isms”.
Rather strange of Dr Lewis, almost an extreme left-wing approach, some might say….
I much prefer this:
Liberal Democrat MP Evan Harris, who is billed to speak at the forum, said it was the “views of these extremists which are a disgrace” and “not their right to hold their views”.
“I have spent my whole political life opposing racism and bigotry, but it is vital to demonstrate that they will be defeated within our existing laws.
“The measure of our country’s respect for free expression is our willingness to allow it for the most objectionable and offensive lawful speech, not just for those with whom we agree.”
290. He is also Jewish, so it might be expected…
296 - I prefer this
Well, I agree with your last paragraph, HF (295). But as for the rest, I think some of you Tories are taking supposition for certainty, as you so often do.
296. Fair play then to Evan Harris, who is also Jewish!
294 The England vote shares are on the BBC Election 2005 website and were Con 35.7% Lab 35.4% LibDem 22.9%
295 - look guys. I actually feel sorry for Rik W. And I’m a LD. But the Rik W I know, I’m sure is quite capable of fighting his own battles.
So move on. I fear that in a week’s time we’ll still see message after message going on about LDs being so nasty over Rik W. By all means rubbish the LDs; it’s a popular enough hobby on this increasingly Tory dominated site. But you’ve made your point about Rik W’s situation.
So slag us off for a new reason instead. I’m sure you’ll find one.
295 HF , you were quite happy at the Southall byelection for Grant Shapps and others to impersonate LibDem posters on various blog boards , you seem to have 1 standard of behaviour that you expect members of other parties to follow and a lower standard for members of your own .
288-Actually the only people able to sack Rik W from his post of Cllr are the standards board of GB.
The Conservative party could take away the whip or his membership but i think that is somewhat unlikely considering the amount of work he has contributed to 2 local associations.
294.
I have it already! These are the swing differentials for previous elections. I don’t have the aggregate England totals, but I can assure you the swing differential from GB is about 0.5% in all cases.
2005
LN +1.8
EA +1.1
SE + 0.4
WA 0
WM 0
EM -0.1
NW -0.5
NE -0.7
SC -0.8
YH -1.1
SW -1.4
2001
LN -1.1
EA +0.2
SE -1.4
WA +2.0
WM 0
EM +0.8
NW +0.5
NE +1.2
SC -1.6
YH +1.0
SW -0.8
1997
LN -3.0
EA -2.4
SE -1.5
WA +3.1
WM +0.6
EM -0.8
NW 0
NE -0.6
SC +2.8
YH +1.4
SW +1.2
1992
LN -1.3
EA -1.6
SE -0.4
WA -0.5
WM -1.0
EM -2.6
NW +0.2
NE -0.6
SC +4.6
YH +0.5
SW -1.0
300 - Evan Harris is a very independent mind. I have known that for a very long time.
He has become a hate icon of the Daily Mail. Respect!
304 - Quite. And the Conservative whip in Reading is nothing to do with Cameron. And it would I would guess be unprecedented for an individual’s party membership to be taken away. Never happened to MPs or PPCs in the past. Did they even take Jeffrey Archer’s membership away?
I am sorry, but I think there is a point of principle about Rik. I do not know him well, we have met only a few times. I do know many of his colleagues in both Reading and Sutton. Rik is not, never has been a racist. He has a deserved reputation as a hard worker and outstanding candidate and councillor.
His mistake appears to have posted in an identifiable fashion. There are numerous postings here, from people in politics that could cause damage to their party, including some from Dan whose actual name and identity is well known, and that is before ColinW’s more terse musings receive a wider public.
Frankly most people here live and let live. It would be a tragedy if this site fell apart because of mindless point scoring.
276
‘Mark Pack (a Lib Dem employee) then posted a gloating update two days ago (Nov 23rd) and later today added links to today’s Sunday Times.’
Mark Pack is really an employee of the Lib Dems? I had assumed from the picture of him and the style of his articles that he was a school boy contributor.
305. You can model these regional differentials (and a reversed 1997 notional pattern) with my swingometer.
http://www.titanictown.plus.com/Swingometer.rar
309 - Apparently
303 Mark Senior says “you were quite happy at the Southall byelection for Grant Shapps and others to impersonate LibDem posters on various blog boards”
1. I was not.
2. Your statement has no relevance to the misuse and damage done to this site by “Dan” and Pack?
Let us please keep the discussion focused on web behaviour on here and other’s use of quotes from this site.
307 Michael Howard managed to get Howard Flight deselected just prior to the last election despite the wishes of the majority of his local party .
Willis brought this on himself by posting a variety of odious ultra right wing views in a public forum. To hear the Tories - who just about monopolise this site now, to its great detriment - whining about this is truly pathetic.
If Willis is so politically naive as to think that he can come out with views that reflect true Tory feeling over Ian Smith & his white supremacist dictatorship, rather than the sanitised version Cameron prefers, without comeback, then he really is dumb as well as odious.
If I was Mike Smithson, I’d be getting worried that this pb.com is beginning to look like a Tory party cheerleading site every day.
I’ll repeat again , well done to whoever made sure this did for Willis.
My previous posts on Willis seem to have mysteriously been removed.
308
‘including some from Dan whose actual name and identity is well known’
As I’m maybe one of the few people that doesn’t know Dan’s identity can you please enlighten me.
313 - And?
“It was published on the ‘Liberal Democrat Voice’with the first comment from Dan,but unlike any of their other articles on that site there is no author”
Yes, I dipped my toes into that site just to see if articles were attributed, only to find they were except that one. I was not surprised the author did not put their name to it, they would have to admit they troll this site looking for ammunition from regular posters who are in politics to use against their party.
I kind hoped that activists would not stoop to that level because it attacks and undermines the PB.com community of posters and discourages politicians even further from posting.
308-I totally endorse your comments.
I know from personal experience that Mark Pack is a nasty piece of work.
I tried to start a debate on Lib Dem voice over the values and identifiable traits that distinguish LDs from the other main parties.
All i ended up with was abuse and vitriol hurle d my way because Mark Pack did not have the ability to engage in an intellectual argument or discussion.
I hope he is exposed for what he is in due course.
312 HF
1 Pleased to hear that , a pity thst you did not speak out at the time .
2 I don’t actually believe that any misuse or damage has been done to this site . I post on here realising it is a public site open to view by anyone who wants to click on google or whatever to find and read the site . As such I woould be siurprised but not upset if anyone thought it worth quoting any of my posts in the national press .
306 - Interesting that Evan Harris has now pulled out. There will be no public figures challenging Irving and Griffin.
319 - Has he? Where did you read this?
Sorry JohnF. But in light of what I said I believe it is wrong to identify Dan.
Mark Pack was the author of the legendary piece of spin, “if the local authorities where the Lib Dems did badly in 2007 are ignored, then they did well!
Well, well, well, after the worst week for GB (again), if a GE was held now, the Tories would struggle to be the largest party, let alone form a government.
Disastrous polls for the Tories!
On a relevant note and having spent my afternoon and evening in Stamford Hill, I am delighted that Evan Harris has pulled out of the Union debate and in the stand that Julian Lewis has taken.
Irving and Griffin deserve to be left under whatever stone usually covers them up.
Just three hours to go until the ‘nice to LDs’ week finishes*.
But for the time being….
SBS and Paul Lloyd are the future….
* Exemption - Dan is excluded from this. I have dealt with him at various locations including vote-2005 and can confirm he is a complete @.
322 yawn (you are labour arent you so i dont have to be nice to you)
317
Yes, Dan and Mark Pack pretend to be Liberals.
319 - This is irritating. The important thing about the BNP’s attending the Oxford Union is that it stops them developing their little conspiracy theories about Establishment plots against “ordinary voters” by suppressing free speech, and gives leading figures the opportunity to show them up as the vile scrotes they are. It’s rather like the occasion in the early 1960s when the Cambridge Union when Kenneth Clarke invited Mosley to speak, which caused Michael Howard to resign from CUCA, and then stand and beat Clarke for the Presidency.
303: Mark S ‘Grant Shapps and others to impersonate LibDem posters on various blog boards’
When did Grant Shaps do that and have you any evidence he did?
300. Rod, fortunately the electoral commission have a very helpful excel spreadsheet here:
http://tinyurl.com/2pj49m
So I have created a poll of polls for the last 9 polls prior to the 2005 GE (those from the 1st of May 2005) this combined with the actual results gave figures of:
Poll Of Polls - Con 32 Lab 37 Libdem 23 Other 8
GB Result - Con 33 Lab 36 Libdem 23 Other 8
England - Con 36 Lab 36 Libdem 23 Other 5
Wales - Con 21 Lab 43 Libdem 18 Other 18
Scotland - Con 16 Lab 39 Libdem 23 Other 23
Now if you compare the actual result with the extrapolated per centage differential figures I set out at post 247 they all fall within the ranges I specified.
328 - Common knowledge i think.
314. JohnF
Is this an identification? - see post 192.
http://politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2007/11/23/sean-fears-friday-slot-36/#comments
289 - So HF, you think Dan and Mark Pack should be banned from this site? I thought it was only lefties who believed in banning anyone who didn’t agree with them?
If Rik W believes in what he posted here then what is the problem with his views receiving a wider airing?
It is interesting that the common perception is that the Tories have been and still are the”Nasty Party”.
I believe that the true nasty party are the LDs and you can see this by the way they campaign.
This has come about because they have to scrap for almost every vote they can get.
Labour and Conservative have generational and class votes. The LDs do not.This in turn has caused their inner core to become embittered and in turn leaves them turning to tactics which the other parties are only know picking up on.
The decapitation policy in the last GE campaign being one of these.
The other parties have now woken up to these tactics and the troops on the grounf from the 2 main groups are now able to neutralise a lot of the personalised and quite appaling campaigning coming from the party of Clegg and Huhne.
Just look at last week when Huhne turned on Clegg.They are good at being nasty even internally.
This is why i think that Huhne will win the LD leadership contest.He has got an attack trait that the LDs need and can recognise.
332 - I think the problem is that he was quoted in the press out of context (and indeed probably without right of reply before publishing) the context being, to some extent, “relative to Mugabe”.
re 291 he’s one of the Tories arch homophobes as well.
328 There is contemporary proof that his computer was used and not even members of his own party believed his 1234 password story .
334 (con) - also was reported effectively as praising apartheid, even though his post specifically deplored apartheid (whether you think the two positions are consistent is another matter).
Test. I am a great fan of your always chivalrous posts butl this ‘Shoot the messenger stuff’ is complete nonsense’.
I agree that Rik can hold whatever views he wants but surely they should be robust enough to withstand scrutiny beyond this forum? If this was a misinterpretation of his views then I would agree that he’d been treated shabbily but it isn’t. The Sunday Times accurately reported a series of his posts which I understand he stands by. What is more this isn’t the first time he has posted views that most polite company would flinch at but the fourth (that I’ve read).
If his party has problems with his maverick views then the fault lies with him or his party but not with the person who wrote it up in Liberal Voice.
289. People should only be banned from the site for serious offences, such as inappropriate use of apostrophes.
339 or the excessive use of smiley faces .
Those are policie’s I would support.
:lol: 
325. Tories walking backwards for Christmas!
340 NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
342 Are you a turkey - oh no thats gobble
329 Woodpecker, I raise the issue of banning Dan and Pack not because I disagree with their views, (I also disagreed with Rik’s view on Ian Smith), but because they misused this site.
ChrisD sums it up better than I can
“I kind (of) hoped that activists would not stoop to that level because it attacks and undermines the PB.com community of posters and discourages politicians even further from posting.”
That is why we have to make a stand against these guttersnipes.
334 - Alex, I take your point about RikW being quoted out of context however if a PPC in my constituency was going around writing things like “Ian Smith was a benign and successful leader” then I’d be glad to have that brought to my attention.
344-Spot on.
345-Is he actually a PPC in Reading?
331
Thanks for the info,google reveals that Dan Falchikov is an official Lib Dem agent in Kingston upon Thames and works for Transport for London.
348-So he gets paid a great deal of money for doing nothing then…..
In amongst the whole Rik W debate, the most important thing is that we want open and honest debate and would like people to be able to post under their own names. This has certainly made me consider using a nom-d-p in future which is a shame. However this is a publim forum and politicans should know that opponents will trawl it looking for embarrassing quotes etc. Jody Dunn will tell you the potential problems of blogging etc.
I think Roger has a point. We all post here, or anywhere, at our own risk. No one asks us to post. The internet is the latest public domain. Don’t post something you would feel unhappy to defend to a wider audience.
It’s the journalist test. Would I feel OK if my views were expressed or quoted on the front page of a national newspaper? The same applies to emails sent to a friend or colleague.
339 ….and Latin plurals.
345: Information is one thing, what activists claim is another.
If people want to read his views on Smith they should read the posts in totality not just a few quotes and some inane drivel from the likes of Hain.
344.Thanks, I wish I had something like spell check which spotted my regularly missed out or misplaced words.
351 You’re right and wrong, StJohn, if that’s not double-Dutch.
You’re right in the sense that people shouldn’t write things they’re not prepared to defend before a wider audience. But you’re also wrong in that it was just plain sneaky, and mischievious.
People come here to banter and enjoy the cut and thrust of argument. It’s a shame if they can’t do so without fear of being quoted out of context and in a harsher environment.
To the extent that this little episode has inhibited some contributors, it has dimished the Site. That’s why I regret it.
351/355 I see HF (344) put my point of view much better than I did.
354: There is a spellcheck function as part of Google Toolbar which might help.
357 Will it also help me to think straight, Ralph?
348 - i had the same idea. He is swansea city too lol!
350 - what about hair dye LOL
358: Google can do anything muwhahaha
I know nothing about Ian Smith, but as with Hastilow, Rik W should surely have known what would happen, I was astonished to see him keep digging himself deeper into a hole the other day.
IRRESPECTIVE of the facts, Liberals and other assorted anti-tories were QUITE OBVIOUSLY going to do what they did, and again, irrespective of what you think of such behaviour, Rik should have seen it coming and kept schtum. Sad that he would have to, but that’s what Cameron needs, discipline and “on-message” candidates, whether they like it or not. Any whisper of support for anyone even tenuously associated with racism will get the PC brigade out in force exaggerating it for all they are worth, that’s the way the world is nowadays, and the public will not see the details of the argument, just the headlines. Amazed the tories seem to have learnt so little from the ruthlessness of Labour, or from opposition.
349
Apparently now left TFL and working for Peergroup Communications based in Tunbridge Wells.
355 I agree Peter. Didn’t sympathise with Rik W’s point at all, but the person who deliberately shopped it around the national press etc is a snide. It also may have an effect on Rik in real life outside of this site.
If a member of the press had come across it on their own and made it an issue, well then that’s Rik’s funeral, but for a contributor to deliberately stir the pot ? Very poor.
339 and 352: Thank God some people still care! Work has recently forced me to develop the ability to smell misplaced apostrophes and hear when a hyphen has been dropped. I heard somebody use ’sunset’ as a verb the other day (meaning ‘to retire’), not to mention that they also contributed the neologism “solutionizing” [you could tell that such a mistake would carry the American spelling - another bugbear of mine].
Anyone else see Nick Clegg is a 15.0 on Betfair to be the next Home Secretary? They don’t usually include LDs on ‘next in Cabinet’ jobs, unless it’s a long shot in the leader for PM.
Peter the Punter - was that your doing?!
Peter. I haven’t followed this particular argument or case closely. I suspect if I had that I would agree with you and deplore the “out of context” quoting and “mischief making” that has occurred here, if indeed that has been the case.
My point is a cautionary one. Be careful what you say. Not everyone is a friend.
But if you have the bravery to say something controversial, which you sincerely believe to be the case, then good luck to you. As long as you don’t cross my own red lines, in which case I might be after you!
362 - hope he drives. not easy by public transport from kingston to tunbridge wells
345 - Rik is not a PPC.
366-No like any good LD he must cycle everyday.
364 Nope.
I cause all sorts of mischief, but innocent this time, Morus.
Ergo he is not involved in the central party ergo he can say what he likes, subject to the rules of his local party and the wishes of his electorate.
368 hehe - good luck on that score!
Remember we like LDs (until midnight)
365 You know StJohn, posting on PB has made me more careful about what I say. You start shooting the breeze on this Site and you’re likely to find yourself very quickly shot down.
Not that I would ever shoot the breeze…ahem.
364 - solutionizing” [you could tell that such a mistake would carry the American spelling - another bugbear of mine].
Rubbish - using a “z” is the original spelling. “realise”, “recognise” etc are vulgar 20th century British bastardizations. The OED did not even list “realise” until the 1960s. I’m not sure what its preferred spelling is now, but I would hazard it is with a “z”.
But I agree that “solutionizing” is a dreadful word, however it is spelt.
364/373 Cor, you’ve done it now, Morus. You’ve woken the Pedants up. They’re worse than the Creatures Of The Night.
I can hear Augustus Carp emerging from his study as I write.
373 - i prefer the ’s’
And I’m orf, before Carp arrives to lecture us all on the proper use of semicolons.
Nite all.
372. Agreed Peter. That is one of the many strengths of the site. If you spout rubbish you will be shot down. There are so many bright and well informed posters.
But it’s also a tremendous resourc. On many occasions I have either had my own strong views, normally on betting, either reinforced or revoked here.
With this in mind I have been meaning to ask Sean Fear’s view on something. I will post separately in a moment, in an attempt to catch his attention.
373 I find “New” Labour difficult to come to terms with, there was never anything new about it… except of course “spin” that was employed to a greater extent than ever before.
I agree about Z’s I was taught realise correctly as realize and so on and so forth, but its common spelling these days. The one that irritates me the most and I’m not sure why is “mispronounciation” instead of mispronunciation. We are all guilty of typos, but some spelling is verging on the unacceptable IMHO
Branson to be preferred NRK bidder, wot a shock. a ‘popular’ politically expedient choice with the headline “11bn repaid upfront”. this will be a finacial disaster for the taxpayer. he will have secured huge concessions from the treasury as it gives them the best case political get out.
when the numbers are run it will result in 3-5bn of losses to the taxpayer.
I prefer “realise” too. I just don’t like being told the other one is American. It is also increasingly archaic British. But Dickens, Austen, Brontes etc used “realize” and they were not American.
Anyway all Rik basically said was that he thought Ian Smith ran a pretty good economy and generally improved the lot of Zimbabweans. The dispute seems to be over whether he was also a racist or a (misguided?) paternalist (along the lines of some of the British near the end of the Raj, who genuinely thought they had to stay to avert bloody civil war).
What’s the difference to take an example, between Rik expressing admiration for Ian Smith, and John Prescott citing Oliver Cromwell as his political hero?
There is so much Labour sleaze at the moment, it is difficult to follow threads.
320 - It hasn’t been reported but apparently happened about a couple of weeks ago. This is according to someone who rang his office. Of course the President din’t rush to publicise it and Harris himself has been rather sheepish.
Surely the joy of the English language is that it’s still peasant driven i.e what us working class oiks write is right!!
I don’t mind alternative spellings of words. What gets my goat are the meaningless phrases that start off in Sales & Marketing then spread to the business world in general.
My pet hate is “going forwards”, instead of the “in the future”.
374 - Apologies! I’ve just been re-reading John Humphreys’ ‘Lost for Words’, and it set me off.
I can accept that there is a hint of revisionism about the ‘-ise’ claims to authority, but it seems no less fair than Noah Webster’s standardization [sic] of the ‘-ize’ form. My reaction is more aesthetic than serious etymological pedantry, I can accept that.
The crime most likely to make my ears bleed at the moment is when people insist on finishing a sentence with a preposition. Can you imagine if Hemingway had written a novel called ‘Who the Bell Tolls For’?
I once heard of a young chap who made it from a trailer park to Harvard on a scholarship. He approached some preppy New England types, and asked “Hey y’all. Where’s the library at?”. They snobbishly explained that at Harvard, one simply never finished a sentence with a preposition, to which he shrugged and said “Ok - so where’s the library at, y’assholes”.
This will be my last post on grammar-fascism, I promise…
382. Shouldn’t that be ’slease’?
384 - it is certainly great that we are not brow-beaten by the British equivalent of the Academie Francaise.
Look at how the word “gay” has changed in meaning in the last couple of years. It has nothing to do with homosexuality any more.
384 1 cn writ what 1 wants 2 and its’ mor or les ok to understnd, but it still irks me..
350 the most important thing is that we want open and honest debate and would like people to be able to post under their own names.
Open and honest debate? You dont understand these people do you.
For them, its all about winning the debate. Logic is very low on the list. Their primary tools are spamming, fake outrage, dismissal, insults, banning and driving people off the site.
I imagine they would have found employment in Salem, generaly fynding wytches.
383 - seems strange that he has been quoted on various sites as going, not disputing what you say.
BTW if anyone feels like arguing beyond the generalities of my post at 381, don’t bother i know absolutely zilch about Zimbabwe pre about 5 yrs ago, other than white rule provided Mugabe with a widespread core of support, and that he possibly massacred a lot of people in Matebeleland in the eighties.
” Logic is very low on the list. Their primary tools …fake outrage”
FAKE OUTRAGE! Quite frankly I am appalled you could say that!
381: I’m one of the few people who’d rather Oliver Cromwell was seen as a traitor and tyrant. Rather appalling to place his statue outside Westminster Hall.
On Smith; it also depends what people see as racist. I’d argue that Smith was a racist, not because he was necessarily filled with hatred and contempt for black people, but thought it better for themselves and for white people like him if they “knew their place” and weren’t stirred up by “agitators” for at least the next century or so.
391 Imagine Zimbabwe if Mugabe had got in 20 years earlier. The irony is, by delaying another tyranny, Ian Smith probably saved 1000s of lives.
394 - or perhaps a peaceful transition of power in the 1960s would have led to a stable government. We will never know.
395- Just as it did in Uganda,Kenya and the old Zaire..
Sean Fear.
You have stated that high 30s to 40 per cent is, in your view, the floor to the Tories likely polling levels from here on. I agree if current trends on events and Brown’s leadership characteristics continue.
So here’s my question. Let’s assume you’re right. How would you call the floor and the ceiling for Tory and Labour GE seats at the next GE?
Is we gonna get the rezults of the Oz predikshun bompetition? I wanna kno wot peeple guest the rezults woz gonna be. Qwite offen i find that my massages are at the end of a thread just b4 a new wun appears, so hopefullly a new Oz thread will appear as if by magic in the next minute or threeee.
398 - recount - Coalition hold australia*
* its a joke
Indeed, it’s pretty likely that, had a move to black majority rule taken place earlier, figures like the Rev. Sithole, Herbert Chitepo, or even Nkomo, would have been able to stop Mugabe’s manoeuvring. The transformation of black resistance to Smith’s rule to a guerrilla movement dominated by factions who suspected and plotted against each other had a strong and malign influence on the way post-independence politics operated. The ANC was different in that the armed struggle never dominated its politics in the same way, with civil protest playing a much stronger role.
It is worth reading the late Bill Deedes account of Ian Smith
Having used the link to the libdem Voice site, I had the dubius pleasure of reading the numerous posting of a pbc regular, one Tressage esq
May I just say what a vile, contemptuous piece of work you are, the true face of the nasty party that is the Libdems. You and Mark Senior make a fine pair, anger, bile and poison are you only form of communication and I for one am sick of it.
If Mike S intends to make this site his full time occupation, God help him while you two vile, simpering creatures are permitted to pour forth your nastiness.
Thank you, Vile. You are very kind.
Very interesting - Tories believing in free speech, but only for Conservatives.
For the record I do not work for Transport for London, or in Tunbridge Wells or support Swansea City…
For Conservatives to make the argument about Rik Willis’s comments on Smith to be one of free speech and unorthodoxy and to claim ‘he is not a racist’ misses the point.
I don’t know Mr Willis (and from his postings on here I’m rather glad I don’t). After all he is a man who prefers tyrants like Pinochet and Smith to democrats like Heath.
I have no problem with people expressing contraversial or indeed racist views - I’m sad that the no platform brigade seems to have forced the democrats off the platform and left the Oxford Union to the nazis.
The point about Willis’s views was that they were an attempt to rewrite history - by no objective measures could Smith be called ‘benign’ or the various other eulogies Willis paid him. In fact the laws that Mugabe uses to lock up his political opponents were those that the Smith regime used to lock up their political opponents.
Tory posters on this site need to recognise it is not some cosy closed club - it is a public site and views attributed to posters are in the public domain. Rik Willis holds some pretty bizarre views (sub BNP as I described them in the original thread). He is an elected offical of the Conservative Party, an adviser to one of their MPs and a former target seat parliamentary candidate. From the original thread it was clear that many Tories found his views offensive.
If an elected Lib Dem or Labour poster on this site eulogised Erick Honneker or Fidel Castro then they would expect their views to be questioned in public.
The fact is that Rik Willis doesn’t want that - he has gone to ground. He clearly knows his views are not acceptable in mainstream politics and has decided to hide.
Rik Willis only has himself to blame - he was happy to promote a white supremacist and made no effort to engage with those who thought his views offensive.
402 For your first ever post under that name , you exemplify the sort of poster Mike should not ban to remind everyone how obnoxious some Conservative posters are .
Now I wonder what name you will post under next expressing support for yourself .
My pet hate. About 90% of the population seem to get it wrong.
http://www.d-e-f-i-n-i-t-e-l-y.com/
Re prepositions. A proof-reader corrected one of Churchill’s speeches because a sentence ended with a preposition. Incensed, Churchill wrote in the margin “This is the type of pedantry up with which I will not put!”
Help, the Pedants of the Night indeed, and some Creatures too - 402 is a striking new Creature, vehement and vague at the same time. I really don’t think that supporters of Rik’s views are doing him a favour by pressing the case. He’s said something that many of us disagree with. OK. Let’s move on.
SBS at 392 -
392/407 - SBS: one of the few LD posters here with a sense of humour….
406. Shouldn’t a preposition stuck at the very end of a sentence become a “postposition”?
I only ask because sticking prepositions at the end of a sentence is not something that I am used to.
404. you are an arse and you tried to play the racist line and you know it. well done, a good week’s work, hope that you are proud of yourself.
re 373 absolutely, zeds every time for me
and please can we not put the meaningless diphthongs into fetus, fetal, fetid etc. too.
re 385 there’s a wonderful cartoon in the current Private Eye of a family firm of undertakers and the son is saying “Dad we’ve got to start thinking out of the box”
411: faetus faetal etc - old English - its where its at!
“Labour admits secret cash may be illegal”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article2943702.ece
I see that Jack Straw admits that the secret cash weren’t “plainly transparent”, but I don’t see anyone in the Labour party saying it was “illegal”…
404. Stop digging. We’ve heard enough to make our own minds up….
These prepositions at the end of sentences such as “It is something with which I will not put up”…
“with” is a preposition here; “up” is an adverb. Nothing wrong with “up” at the end of the sentence. Churchill was right.
414 - Can I clarify something?
It appears that either Mr Abrahams (who used the intermediaries to donate money) OR the Labour Party has broken the law:
If Abrahams did not declare to the Labour Party that he was the donor, he has broken the law, but they have not (section 54 places the burden on the agent, meaning Ruddick and Kidd are in trouble two). However, if the origination was made clear, then the individuals are in the clear, but Labour will have broken the law.
Am I correct in asserting that this is an either/or, with respect to illegality? Obviously the political damage is huge, but they will just have to repay the money if they have not broken Election Law, is that right?
412 Chris A
418-Morus-
“If Abrahams did not declare to the Labour Party that he was the donor, he has broken the law, but they have not”
I believe that’s right
“However, if the origination was made clear, then the individuals are in the clear, but Labour will have broken the law”
That, I don’t know
But what I fail to understand is how the Times article says that “Labour admits that the cash may be illegal”, but has no member of the party saying this…
Very interesting episode of “The Blair Years” again tonight.
Blair is obviously still a powerful arguer, and for the most part of the episode he puts in a strong defence of himself and his actions, such that the viewer believes either that he was right, or that he probably took a fair decisions based on he was presented with at the time (e.g. WMD evidence from security sources). His line: “You read the JIC documents, and see what conclusion you come to” is powerful.
However, the two specific moments he really lost the credibility and trust were:
1. When the UK and US clearly span furiously and misled the public over what Chirac had said regarding the second UN vote. Watching our UN rep squirm while he read something he knew to be misleading was unpleasant.
2. When questioned by Aaronovich on post invasion planning, when Blair said “What is happening is that the people there have decided to fight back”. That is a total non answer and utterly disingenuous, because every diplomat and military commander outside the the US was saying all along that there would be massive resistance that would need to be very cleverly overcome, if it could be overcome at all.
Blair knows full well that, while his positions and actions in the run-up to Iraq can be argued quite fairly to all, and won quite easily to those who share his world-view; his failure to ask the obvious questions on the aftermath was a dereliction of duty even to those who did share his world-view and were happy to back him.
It is at this final point that Blair’s vanity gets the better of him. It’s almost like, “I have been right up until now. Therefore I am right now.”
If, as the Times says, the woman worked for Abrahams, is there a HM Revenue and Customs interest in all this?
417. Quite, but Churchill was archly saying ‘”This is something which I will not put up with..” is perfectly good English, and to force yourself not to end with a preposition can produce ridiculous un-English results.’
Even Shakespeare was happy to end a sentence with a preposition.
To die, to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heartache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to…..
[Hamlet, one of many examples of the Bard breaking the "rules"]
421 Should read “took fair decisions based on what he was presented with”
424. No it shouldn’t. It should read “based on with what he was presented…”
“based on that with which he was presented…” no surely not - too clumsy.
-Other bugbears - use of “however” and “therefore” as conjunctions.
-Use of “which” instead of the correct “that” or (better still nothing) in defining relative clauses… “The hotel room which (sic) I usually book”
-less and fewer; little and few…
Going back to my #2: Turnbull’s price as fallen to 0.36/1. Aboott’s drifted out, while Brendan Nelson’s drifted in to second favourite, after a prominent Australian bookmaker tipped him.
Despite Turnbull’s many drawbacks (you can add in his wealth, which does seem to create some resentment, and the fact that he’s only just ocmpleted one Parliament), Turnbull’s USP at the moment is that he is the only candidate who appears to have real charisma and star quality. Brendan Nelson is at risk of being seen as too bland and passive. Tony Abbott is aggressive, but made a couple of damaging gaffes and can be painted as being too far to the right to appeal to swingers. Alexander Downer’s also unexciting, and would patently be a continuity candidate when a break from the past is probably what the party needs at present. There’s also Julie Bishop, who might, as a woman, effectively provide that sense of novelty. Turnbull has the early momentum, but Nelson, Abbott or Downer might well be competitive among Liberal MPs. There still seems to be value in other candidates.
395
‘ or perhaps a peaceful transition of power in the 1960s would have led to a stable government. We will never know.’
396
‘395- Just as it did in Uganda,Kenya and the old Zaire.’
396 You forgot to add to your list Sierra Leone,Liberia,Ghana,Nigeria,Angola,Ivory Coast,the Congo,Chad,Niger,Upper Volta,Guinea and Cameroun.
Rod:
Is this serious?
“A dad got a letter of apology from civil servants over the lost data scandal - and found it contained private information about another woman, the Mirror says.”
BTW, Whilst I catch up, The Mirror is reporting benefits blunder No 2, in that the letter they sent to one father contained someone elses private details.
Priceless.
I wonder if the contractors digging the whole the Government are in are doing it on PFI? After all it seems a very large project, and such a massive hole.
428 - absolutely. But aren’t most of these countries better off than Zimbabwe is now? It seems to take decades years to reach the post dictatorship scenario, and it could be argued that Smith’s intransigence has delayed Zimbabwe getting there.
430. I’m looking forward to my letter from the Inland Revenue that begins “Thank-you for informing us of your death. As a consequence, no further tax is payable, and you are entitled to a rebate….”
433 - another bugbear of mine - “thank-you” or “thankyou”. Sorry, just too pedantic today.
428 - Great differences between those. Kenya has had stable government (if not democratic until this decade). Ghana’s been stable since Rawlings. Ivory Coast was largely stable until the death of Houphouet-Boigny brought various suppressed tensions to the surface. Burkina Faso is also stable, although with one dominant party. There’s a lot of variety involved, and, in much of Africa, there’s been slow but sure political progress during the 1990s.
431-Benedict-post 430. Thanks, you just answered my question…It’s serious!!!!!!
404
‘For the record I do not work for Transport for London, or in Tunbridge Wells or support Swansea City…’
I think the confusion with Tunbridge Wells is that is where the Peergroup Communications UK Ltd offices are based and where you have been active with Three Rivers District Council.
433-LOL!
427 - Good analysis. Whilst Bishop is little-known, Abbott always comes across as a bully (and hypocrite since that farrago over his son). Difficult to see beyond Turnbull at the moment unless the Libs accept they won’t win in 2010 either and so go for a caretaker (like the aptly-named Downer) to hold the fort until a new leader can emerge from the younger MPs.
432
‘428- absolutely. But aren’t most of these countries better off than Zimbabwe is now? It seems to take decades years to reach the post dictatorship scenario, and it could be argued that Smith’s intransigence has delayed Zimbabwe getting there.’
If you mean better off in terms of the dictators/rulers in charge of these other countries not deliberately starving their people to death or bulldozing their homes,then in that context yes.
For most West African countries there is absolutely no excuse for the massive corruption, squalor,poverty and general appauling conditions that there people live in other than the dictators that are supported by the west and the recipients of generous aid packages (most of which gets recycled to Zurich)
Virtually all these countries are rich in minerals,diamonds,timber and oil and with the exception of Nigeria ,have small populations to support.
Having seen the level of corruption at first hand in many of these countries together with the looting of international aid by the ruling elite,the chances of any progress is minimal.
Re 300. Rod “Fair play then to Evan Harris, who is also Jewish!”
Is this some sort of Jewish conspiracy to confuse people? I think we should be told!
Actually on a more serious note I agree with Evan’s position far more. Beat them in open debate. Don’t allow them to claim the are freedom of speech martyrs.
Re 302, SBS “So slag us off for a new reason instead. I’m sure you’ll find one.”
Thanks for the invite
435
‘ There’s a lot of variety involved, and, in much of Africa, there’s been slow but sure political progress during the 1990s.’
Where has there been political progress in the 90’s,which countries? and in which countries has the standard of living improved for the average African?
For most West African countries there is absolutely no excuse for the massive corruption, squalor,poverty and general appauling conditions that there people live in other than the dictators that are supported by the west and the recipients of generous aid packages (most of which gets recycled to Zurich)
There have been changes in international aid in recent years. For a long time, one of the key drivers of aid was geopolitical interest rather than a genuine interest in development - so donor states were prepared to turn a blind eye as long as recipient governments were happy. That’s not so much the case now, although things are changing. And aid isn’t, relatively speaking, huge enough to make a seismic difference - only private capital inflows can do that, and most African countries are poorly placed in terms of trade, unless they possess oil wealth.
Regarding the “correct English” debate, many of the rules of supposedly “correct” English were actually written in the 17th Century in order to make English follow Latin rules due to the Enlightenment’s reverence of classical antiquity. This is why we have “rules” like not ending a sentence with a proposition or not splitting an infinitive, neither of which have any basis in traditional English.
“Northern Rock: Branson takes pole position
“Government support for Virgin offer angers rival suitors for stricken bank”
“Private equity firm JC Flowers, which was considered the frontrunner by many experts after it promised a down payment of £15bn, said it was shocked and upset at the move and would be seeking an explanation from the bank and the government.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2007/nov/26/northernrock.banking
“Virgin’s bid includes an immediate repayment of £11bn of the £25bn the bank owes the Bank of England, with the rest to be repaid within three years. ”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7111813.stm
I’m not an expert, and maybe I didn’t get this right, but if JC is offering 15 bn and Virgin, 11 bn, why Virgin “is poised for Rock takeover”?
Where has there been political progress in the 90’s,which countries?
42 African nations have shifted to multi-party voting systems since 1989. Now, in many of these, there is, admittedly, the phenomenon of a dominant party which uses its power to either twist the electoral machine, or bury opponents by exploiting spending disparities, the state machine, or various methods of low-level intimidation. Some, like Uganda, have become less free within this spectrum. But, overall, this has led to greater freedom and an increase in the power of civil society - with journalists, local pressure groups and other similar foci of opposition able to campaign rather more freely, to gain representation in national legislatures, and to act as watchdogs for the people.
and in which countries has the standard of living improved for the average African?
Botswana, of course, is the leading example, but more modest progress is discernible in Uganda, Kenya, a few of the West African nations which avoided serious civil strife in recent years, like Ghana - and even, to a more moderate extent, in oil-rich nations like Gabon, Angola and Nigeria, although the elite has obviously been successful in grabbing the cream in these free nations.
440. Anybody that has studied African economies knows full well that ethnic strife is the number one hindrance to developing, far more than corruption. Smith undoubtedly exacerbated ethnic strife in his country with his use of the death sentence, torture and suspension of democratic rights in order to maintain minority rule. The us-vs-them mentality that set in among the Shona majority during this time - and was caused by Smith’s nondemocratic policies - is what keeps them rising up against Mugabe’s brutal regime.
439 - Turnbull must be banking on Rudd to mess up pretty quickly. I’d have thought he’d be wiser to do what Hague should have done in 1997: act as kingmaker now, while waiting to see what the future brings. I don’t know how far he can carry the Liberal grassroots with him if he seeks to transform the party’s image (his future stance in any republican referendum might be key - there are plenty of Liberal republicans, but a Liberal leader supporting a Rudd referendum on the issue might be a step too far).
Re 388, SBS ,”Look at how the word “gay” has changed in meaning in the last couple of years. It has nothing to do with homosexuality any more.”
It never used to. It meant kind of happy.
Re 392, SBS “FAKE OUTRAGE! Quite frankly I am appalled you could say that!”