Now Populus reports a double digit Labour deficit
April 19th, 2008
Are we now heading for a Conservative majority?
As well as the Ken-Boris survey there’s also a Populus poll on national voting intentions in the Sunday Mirror. This records the following shares with comparisons on the last survey by the pollster nearly three weeks ago CON 40% (+1): LAB 30% (-3): LD 19% (+2)
Looking at previous surveys from the firm on UKPollingreport these are the worst figures for Labour that we have ever seen. In February there was a 9% margin but Populus have never reported a double digit deficit before.
The firm’s past vote weighting and certainty to vote formulas are slightly more favourable to Labour than the main phone pollster, ICM which has also been finding big Labour deficits.
What is clear is that the internal bickering within Labour about the abolition of the 10% tax band does not suggest a united party - and all the evidence is that lack of unity gets punished in the polls.
Unlike the non-BPC listed MRUK whose London poll featured in the previous thread, Populus operates past vote weighting to ensure a politically balanced sample and also weights on the likelihood that respondents will actually vote.
This latest polling will underpin the recent trend on the betting markets towards support for the Tories winning the next election with an overall majority. My guess is that the spread markets on commons seats will see a further move against Labour.
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[from previous thread]
69. No, I didn’t. I have been twice tempted to vote for Ken, but never have actually done so.
In 2000 I voted Tory, out of some residual loyalty to Maggie (!); I believe I voted UKIP in 2004; though I can’t definitely remember - I do recall being unimpressed by the Tory candidate (was it Norris then?)
I will enthusiastically vote BoJo this time.
ON-topic: that’s a splendid poll for Cameron. Perhaps the most cheering of the year.
Its an excellent poll and seems to feed into the very negative narrative for Labour at the moment.
Mike, that picture is quite artistic, almost a black and white Andy Warhol effect.
1 - When taking into account that this is a Populus Poll, it puts amateur MRUK into the shade. This poll suggests that Labour are on 30%, which is their core vote (could be less), so that makes the London poll look daft. Even accepting that people of all parties voted for Livingstone in 2000 and 2004, that is not the case in 2008.
But note that the Lib Dems have gained by more than the Tories. Cable and Clegg should be able to make hay with the 10p tax band fiasco come election time.
re 2. Thanks for your comment about the picture. I do spend a lot of time getting the visuals right and its nice when they are appreciated.
5. I echo the comments about the visuals but aren’t you being a bit unfair to Brown - he’s not that grey yet is he??
4 - both are within the 3% margin of error, so both could be wrong
Are we going to have sulky Gordons as opposed to grinning Daves from now on, Mike?
(I prefer the sulky Gordons to be honest…)
4. all the changes are within the margin of error. the Lib dems are well down on the iraq fiasco, in fact 19% was there rating on the last but one populus. However this is great for the tories. i take populus seriously because of its stability. A ten percent lead for the tories can be taken to the bank. I just hope that if we are faced with another 2 years of “long good bye” that they use it to think creatively about what they’ll do with power rather than just pounding labour into the ground.
8. Its the sulky Gordons that make it. That really is a classic. i wouldn’t want to be up against Smithson in an election.
5 Using despondent Gordon in the circumstances of current fortnight of Labour anxiety is effective.
O/T Did see somewhere that Gordon’s PPS is also called Angela Smith - wonder if initially he got confused information and thought it was his own PPS threatening to resign so that’s why he made a personal call while on a foreign visit.
re 7, 10, and 11. The narrative at the moment is about Labour and Gordon - not the Tories. That’s why I use the term Labour deficit to describe the poll rather than the Tory lead and why we have the sulky Gordons.
Apparently Gordon is shaking with anger again.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/leading_article/article3779861.ece
perhaps if we could fit him up with some kind of kinetic dynamo he might be of some use to this country.
1 - did you put a second preference when you might have voted UKIP?
13. We wouldn’t need all those new nuclear power stations then!
Good poll for the Tories again. I still think it is quite possible that the LDs will poll more than 23% next GE, and polls like this encourage me.
As for the London poll, I think Paddick will do better than 9%. This 9% alone makes me doubt the details; I was tempted to dive back into the market, but decided not to. Ken’s price has trickled down so there was a little money in it, but not a great deal.
16 - are you including the 2nd preferences in your belief that Paddick will score more than 9%. Just read an article in Sunday Times that Livingstone was encouraging the Gay voters at a private reception at Haven to vote for Brian Paddick, so long as they gave him their second preference. Not stupid is our Ken !
15. Bush did say they were on the verge of an energy breakthrough that would “startle most Americans”. They must have spotted the potential of harnessing Brownian motion.
12. very astute. Thats why ultimately i think there is a glimmer of hope for Labour. they have 2 years and a working majority if only they knew what they wanted to do with it. It still feels like a Labour deficit rather than a Tory lead.
The canvassing is interesting at the moment. The 10% tax band is huge particularly with the people who are completely uneffected indeed are going to gain through the 22p to 20p switch. However they think that there taxes are going up.
Adopting a psycosocial analysis of the door step conversations what people are actually talking about is higher food/fuel/utility/council tax bills and falling equity.
However this appalling badly sold tax change has given them someone to blame.
Its like brown has gone to the top of a tall mountain in the middle of a thunder storm and shoved a big copper pylon into the storm crowds and shouted “strike me!”. And people just have.
17 - with second preferences, for what it is worth Paddick will get about 35%. Of course, it won’t be worth anything, as he’ll be out of the equation by the time second preferences are looked at. But all details of second preferences, whether counting or not, are published.
4. Jack it is election time. Voters have got their postal ballots and are posting them off. Election is a week next Thursday.
13 What Labour should worry about is that Gordon and those close to him can’t comprehend why this is happening and think they can escape by claiming its all got up by the media and one or two MPs (presumably Frank Field and A.N.Other).
15 even better, I might just vote for Gordon after all…On second thoughts perhaps in defeat he will spend the rest of his life shaking with anger which could be really excellent for our energy needs. I am sure Kieran will be on in a minute to tell us that Gordon’s shaking is recorded as far less than John Major’s shaking for the comparable period by the ONS, and as an “independent” body has proved the tories shake far more.
BREAKING WIND NEWS **** BREAKING WIND NEWS **** BREAKING WIND NEWS
The breaking news is that WIND is reporting to JNN the contents of a new ARSE poll of polls that comprises ICM, Populus, YouGov, CR and MORI that gives :
Con 41% .. Lab 31.2% .. LibDem 17.8% .. Others 10%.
The PISSED Wells/Baxter Index with added SOAMES weighting shows :
Con 321 seats .. Lab 251 .. LibDem 46 .. Others 32.
Con 5 seats short of a majority.
……………………..
Sources :
WIND ….. Whimsical Independent News Division.
JNN …… Jacobite News Network.
ARSE ….. Anonymous Random Selection of Electors.
PISSED … Political Intelligence Seat Selector Election Determinator
SOAMES …System Of Amending Measured Election Scores
Still bizarre betting on the Tories to get most seats in the London assembly - last match was 5. (4-1).
http://tinyurl.com/62v3xm
I keep on thinking that we’re going to have two more years of this Labour bumbling. Given that Brown prizes loyalty over talent, I can’t see anyone with ability being able to produce any spark that could reverse this decline.
The only hope for Labour is a new leader, but the lack of a mechanism for removing him means that it would take a very obvious assassination. Anyone in the party with any political nous would be wise enough to stay well clear of such an event - especially as the prize would be leading a tired party in a hung parliament.
Labour are doomed.
Reap what you sow
The strategic madness of trying to outflank cameron on the right
if you want selective schools and tax breaks for the rich you vote tory, brown trying to do this for them was madness, get what you deserve
Excellent article on Obama’s ‘bitter’ comments.
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/obama-america-guns-2021119-gun-world
22 Doubts about the independence of the ONS will hopefully be removed by as the UK Statistics Authority has been appointed and will shortly be in operation reporting to Parliament not Government.
27. We already mocked Mark Steyn and that column for being delusional on the last thread.
24 - your link was to the london wide bets - there are current zero conservatives elected London wide (even though the party polled more votes than any other party). If the Conservative gain enfield and Harringey, it would require a huge Conservative percentage poll for the Conservatives to gain just one additional seat from the London wide top up list
16
Having seen Paddick perform on TV and read some of his Newspaper articles I would rate him much higher than either Hughes or Kramer,what share of the poll did they end up with?
14. No, I don’t think I did. Maybe Tory, if I did.
In my entire life I have only ever voted Tory or UKIP - or I have abstained (I’ve done that quite often). I came very close to voting Green once. Not sure why.
11 - Yes, Angela E Smith is now the PM’s PPS, whereas Angela C Smith is Yvette Cooper’s.
Brown seems to have got through several PPSs - Don Touhig (froced to resign over leaking committee documents I think), then Ann Keen, then Ian Austin (promoted/deposed by the PR genius Stephen Carter recently), now Angela E Smith
Benedict Brogan has a good article on A tale of two trips
I agree with his analysis that the American/UN aspects were very successful for Gordon, much better than I thought it would be. But it has been over shadowed by the growing rebellion over the 10p tax band.
“What was more troublesome was the surprising tetchiness Mr Brown displayed about the 10p business. He is dug in and refusing to budge on the question of losers, effectively dismissing the IFS, many of his MPs and the media as little short of idiots and liars. Aides remind me that Mr Brown adopted a similar approach as Chancellor each time the Treasury Select Committee tried to make him admit that the tax burden had gone up. Mr Brown has no intention of giving us the “Brown concedes he has made the poor worse off” headline. Which is why the past 24hrs of talk of concessions strikes me as way off the mark.”
Benedict misses one vital piece of the jigsaw on the talk of concessions, the hints have been coming from people like Darling and Angela Eagle. The tough talk and denials of any concessions have come from Brown and tonight Yvette Cooper, and that is the problem. Who is running the treasury, and more importantly, how can Darling become his own or gain any respect or confidence if his boss continues to undermine the man next door and the two cannot agree on the message?
31. it was 14 point something. i think he’ll add a small ammount to that. The counter valing factors being his dramtically improved camapign and the slight slide in the party’s national poll share.
Given today’s performance by Yvette Cooper (akin to her husbands “So What” during the budget debate) I would say that Labour’s problems are about to get worse.
Part of the problem seems to be that these people appear to believe they are better than the rest of us - it happens as Governments get tired. Yvette reminds me of some of the Major cabinet who couldn’t believe that they wouldn’t rule forever.
Time for a change will begin to get some traction now. All Cammy has to do is come up with an alternative vision…
34.sorry for mistakes.
28. How we wish for truthful stats. Will we ever get them under Labour?
The new UK Stats Authority is just the ONS renamed. As it’s senior staff are still appointed by Brown, its just as bad as the ONS. Answering to Parliament means getting told off for silly stats, but the policy still comes from Brown.
ONS/UKSA produce Britain’s inflation figures, that are widely lamented as ludicrous. No one believes them.
The rest of the world is reporting inflation between 6-7% while ONS publishes 2.5%. Laughable.
Its all being done through the ‘hedonic pricing’ con trick, and removing all high inflation goods from the measured ‘basket of goods’. CPI is a joke. Without the ‘hedonic pricing’, and manipulated ‘basket of goods’, true UK inflation is 6-7% right now.
http://money.cnn.com/2008/03/31/magazines/fortune/spiers_cpi.fortune/index.htm?postversion=2008040305
Budgets are a confidence issue in the Commons, aren’t they? Meaning, that if Gordon loses his income tax doubling wheeze in a revolt, it would mean his government losing a budget measure, and would be expected to resign, I would think.
It wouldn’t be a dignified way to go. Much as it pains me, Polly Toynbee is right about this. Brown lives in fear of being honest about taxation, and that’s how he got in this silly 10p tax mess in the first place.
The correct solution is/always was to scrap the tax credit system, and drastically raise income tax allowances, maybe £12-£15k?
Of course, that would make it explicit that you were taxing the wealthier a bit more to help the poor. But it would never do for Labour to be seen doing that, now would it? Oh no no no.
38
For pensioners (who don’t buy many T shirts or electronic goods from China),must have actual inflation rates well in the 10% + range.
38 very interesting, thanks for that link.
22 - Very funny! I see that you didn’t answer my question from earlier about any evidence of systematic rigging in the stats. Wonder why that was. Although it seems you have been outdone by ‘Newsreader’. The conspiracy has gone global! But where are these 6/7% inflation figures being reported? As that article says they are at 4% in the US. Where is your evidence that ‘no one believes the statistics’ and what would it prove anyway? Just because people have lost trust in statistics doesn’t mean they are not true.
This government has moved towards more accountability for the ONS not yes. If there was systematic distortions why has there been no whistle blower out of the hundreds working for the ONS and why would civil servants put their jobs on the line to help the government? Another couple of questions that haven’t been answered. How are the ‘basket of goods’ wrong. Somehow I think professional statisticians have more idea about what they’re doing than anyone on here (except maybe Andy or Rod). However there is little point in engaging conspiracy theorists in rational debate.
10p revolt? What 10p revolt? Scowling Brown’s outburst at 35,000ft
34.Just seen this other article in the Mail which also makes highlights the different signals coming from Darling and Brown.
Darling’s darlings defy Downing Street over decision to axe 10p tax rate
“Gordon Brown faced an explosive rift with Chancellor Alistair Darling last night after the Treasury signalled it was ready to give in to a Labour revolt over the Prime Minister’s decision to scrap the 10p tax rate.
The growing division between the two men burst into the open when junior Finance Minister Angela Eagle revealed that the Treasury was considering giving back some of the money low-earners would lose because of the change.
Her comments caused panic in Government ranks and Treasury Minister Yvette Cooper was ordered to give a series of television interviews stating that no concessions were planned.”
It sounds like we might be seeing a Darlings/Brownites split in the Treasury which could make things even worse.
40 - Yes and they can go on the ONS website and see that confirmed for themselves. But of course there is a great conspiracy to rig the figures!
Had a quick look at the article, hardly rigorous was it? CPI ‘might’ understate inflation, no definitive evidence. But it could be right, the basket of goods may be wrongly calculated and maybe it should be investigated. The thing that is batty is suggesting that this is some deliberate attempt to rig.
39. Yes they are a confidence matter but no government has been denied a supply measure since I think 1918. They aren’t going to lose at Second reading because voting against that is in effect voting for a General Election.
Losing an amendment is a differnt matter. If I recall correctly the precidents are kenneth Clarke making VAT on fuel a confidence issue? and obviously maastrict ratification one.
If the whips genuinely thougt they loose a vote on a Finance measure then they’ll either 9a) make it a confidence measure (b) retreat. they just won’t let 10p go down on a vote in its own terms.
43. Disastrous - just disastrous. Already at war with his Chancellor. Openly mocked by journalists. Despised by his colleagues. Disliked by voters. Mistrusted by MPs. Hated by underlings. Laughed at by the Lib Dems.
Deary me Gordon. All that scheming and plotting… and for this. Tsch.
42 - No one has to read official figures. Everyone sees them when they shop. A year ago, I could buy eggs for 49p, now 89p. A loaf of cut bread is now over a pound, a year ago it was 75p. Tell my mother that inflation is even 4% and she would ask when was the last time you shopped.
43. This is the best bit:
Mr Brown was forced to break off from his White House talks to beg Ms Smith not to resign. “You said a Minister was going to resign, but she didn’t,” Mr Brown told Mr Bradby.
Asked “What did Angela Smith say to you?” Mr Brown replied: “She just phoned me to say she wasn’t resigning.”
BBC Newsnight political editor Michael Crick asked sarcastically: “She phoned you up at the White House to tell you she wasn’t resigning? Do all your Ministers do that?”
The real mystery is that the CPI here is 2.5% apparently while in Germany it is 3.6% on what is supposed to be a comparable measure - and that is with the help of the over strong Euro making energy imports and raw materials cheaper than in the UK with the wilting pound.
How can that be?
47 - I will try to take this slowly.
Food prices only make up a small proportion of the spending of an average person. (With me so far). This means that it only has a small impact on the overall level of inflation. Quite simple really. To reinforce; whate percentage of your income is spent on food?
49 - Maybeit means inflation here is lower than Germany. Just a guess.
42 yeah sorry I had to go out. Proof, just my own anecdotal evidence: I know my energy bills have gone up about 50% in the past year. My food bills have risen by about 20%, my mortgage is is likely to increase by at least 10%. I have stopped buying electrical goods and don’t buy many clothes as my disposable income has been reduced. My wage has been static (so even on your inflation figures my standard of living has decreased).
Outside of the Labour Bubble you seem to inhabit in the real world there are many people like me who know your figures don’t add up. If it is down to hedonic pricing then its sounds suspiciously like Bill Clinton bet the ranch on “it being the economy stupid” and then devised ways of making sure the economy APPEARED to be fine. I would argue that Brown has probably taken the same approach. The figures may not be wrong but the system appears to be fiddled from the start.
47 - Just to add. I don’t doubt that people’s perception of inflation is that it is higher than 4%, but that doesn’t mean that perception is accurate.
38, 40, 41 & 42 The ONS provides on its site a personal inflation calculator as it recognises the CPI/RPI are averages at a national level. Its not the independence or otherwise of the ONS but the statistic itself and the use of that statistic which causes doubt. Just as polls have margins of error, weightings etc so statistics are particular with their own specifics.
http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?ID=22
44 Explain to me why you are more credible?
Breaking off talks with Bush to talk to a PPS, is, as I suggested on the previous thread, a sign of poor judgement, panic, or uncontrolled bad temper.
And to say the trip was a success is hardly supported by the evidence. A good point in the UN did loosen Mbeki a bit, but COSATU was much more influential than Brown. The White House? What success? Getting a JFK statue from the old fraud Ted Kennedy, a dinosaur by anyone’s reckoning, was a stunning policy initiative which was ignored by one and all. Berating bankers who immediately poo pooed Brown to the press?
Many more successes like that and he will be gone and and so will the government in a storm of mocking laughter as the Orange Blossom Special whizzes off to another destination with its leader displaying the sign of the cult on his forehead.
I don’t think the government would consider this a confidence issue - whether a major vote which isn’t an explicit confidence issue or not is actually a resigning matter depends entirely on the circs. If this were a hung Parliament and Cameron had a real opportunity of forming a government, it certainly would be. As it is, the government, if it lost the Field amendment, would probably amend the Finance Bill accordingly with a mini-Budget and stay in, although Cameron might move a motion of no confidence for a follow up.
Alternatively, the government could announce that it would treat the Field amendement as a confidence issue, which would probably save them. This would be as much of a humiliation as losing, though. and there’d be the question of what to do with Frank Field and his supporters. Either leaving them alone or trying to punish them for conceivably threatening to bring the government down would be highly unattractive options which would make things worse.
Well jumping jimminees..just returned from 18 days cruising around the Carribean to find McSporran has simply imploded and some buffoons still think the rancid newt is going to win the mayoral election…despite the fact that even the polls grossly over stating his support have him statistically neck and neck with Bojo.
Reading through today’s threads (having been deliberately out of touch for 20 days) is astonishing…before I left I was sort of hoping the Consevatives had a small chance of largest party in next election and now seeing even Populuis giving them double digits I am struggling to keep an even keel..
Also sad to hear about Ms Dunwoody..like many others have noted, she was just about the only Labour MP I could listen to without wanting to vomit (I add Nick P to this very short list as well. She was a truly independent and principled voice in parliament and I wish her well into the next life.
However, reading the link to the squinty eyed Balls-up interview in the Times reminds me what it is I loathe about the extraordinarily slimy, hypocritical, arrogant, sanctimonious, catastrophically wastefull and unpleasant nature of most Nulabour clones.
Mcbroon really is a fool and a totally inappropriate man to have as this great country’s PM’s. Nulabour MP’s hould hang their heads in disgrace that they allowed such an imbecile and embarrassment to rise to the highest political rank in the country without a single vote being cast.
47 You are clearly not shopping around . Iceland today still had 2 cut loaves for £ 1 and 18 eggs for £ 1 .
51 - Right, good, so you have absolutely no evidence of rigging. We’re making progress.
If you’re energy bills are up 50% on a year ago you should really think about changing suppliers.
If you read my posts you would see that I don’t contest the fact that inflation is up over the last few years and that RPI better represents what people experience than CPI. However that means inflation is in the 4-5% range at most. This means there is a squeeze in people’s disposable income and the economy will slow. It is partly a product of the natural economic cycle and partly due to the huge commodity inflation.
There is no evidence for systematic evidence, you just have a hunch that there is a big conspiracy. Fair enough your entitled to your opinions, but before accusing the government of lying it would perhaps be better to have some evidence first.
50 - I am glad you are average. Two can be sarcastic !
There are millions of people in this country who spend most of their income on food and keeping warm - the very people who Gordon Brown claims he wants to help. Whatever the merits of which system the government uses, there are millions of people who are getting poorer and poorer. I thought Mr Brown wanted to get rid of child poverty. These figures bear no relation to what it can cost those on low or fixed incomes. Consequently, pensions and benefits are not increased in line with real rising costs. If you think that is fair, I am happy to accept your viewpoint. However, I am not - and certainly my mother who is a pensioner is not either.
58 The point is they probably had them for 50p a year ago.
expect Stuart Dickson to post this tomorrow
http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/opinion/Reasons-to-be-cheerful.4000811.jp
goodnight all
52. Keiran when fuel goes up the cost of everything goes up. I am now paying more than 15% more for diesel than I was paying a year ago. I have to pass that cost on to my customers. They pass it on to their customers, many of whom have just had an extra £232 taken out of their budget thanks to the 10% farce. I’ve spoken to pensioners today who are really angry with Brown over this. And believe me, Gordon is the man they blame.
Kieran You seem to know your economics in theory and in statistics, but reality is rather different.
We have a massive balance of payments deficit, and enormous debt mountain, both private and public, a viciously unbalanced budget, off the books debts and a growing tax burden and a sinking curreny which is already importing inflation and will increasingly do so.
Germany had a positive balance of payments, a low debt compared to ours, a budget targeted to be in balance by 2011 and on target to do so and a strong currency that imports and will increasingly import deflation.
The measure called CPI was created to match the EU measures countries like Germany and France use. Yet despite this it shows that inflation is lower here than in Germany and the EU as a whole . Remarkable.
I don’t think retreat on the 10p is an attractive option - removing the 10p rate is crucial to the rest of the Budget, and going back on this will have to mean a comprehensive mini-Budget that will lead to a number of succeeding changes. The entire Budget tax settlement would have to be recast. Given this, there’s no way the government is going to go back on the proposal without a vote.
58 - that is fine if you have an Iceland where you live. However, many pensioners would not want to buy 18 eggs at a time, and sadly 6 eggs are dearer than buying 18. I can also remember not that long ago that Tesco used to sell bread for 11p, under their value range.
50
Yes,but according to you anything that increases significantly Petrol,diesel,oil,food,gas,electricity,water rates,council tax,train fares only has a small inpact on the inflation level and are all offset by cheap T-Shirts and electrical goods from China.
I am not sure if you are a government or Labour party employee,but outside that circle (the real world)the 2.5% inflation rate is not what anyone experiences when they visit a supermarket or pay a bill.
To keep pretending the 2.5% rate has any connection with reality you are only fooling yourself.
54 - Because I attempt at least to construct a coherent and rational argument based on evidence rather than simply assuming that my prejudices must be right. You still haven’t answered my questions about why all the civil servants are quiet about this scam.
You really should take the Ted or Witan approach. Question whether the statistics are accurate by all means if you have evidence that they are not, but that is rather different to jumping to the conclusion that the government must be ‘lying’.
56. Indeed. If it was made a confidence measure then they’d have to with draw the whip from anyone voting with Field. And if the only way of getting field to with draw is to make it a confidence measure then the government loses just in a different way.
I think they just need to avaoid a sweetner and all but the ususal suspects will melt away.
59 Kieran - a pensioner has a different experience of inflation to a working husband & wife - look at the ONS link I posted above and work it out. I agree with you on the national statistics but they are not that close to particular people or groups experience, they are based on a model of spend applied to a model citizen.
Government increases pensions using the RPI figure calculated as an average. Pensioners however experience an inflation rate higher than the national RPI as the proportion of their spend on basic necessities is high and on electrical goods, furnishings etc low, they tend not to have borrowing costs. Pensioner RPI is probably closer to 6 or 7% today and last year was probably even higher.
59 You are possibly the most arrogant condescending poster I have come across. I ask again why on earth do you believe you have any credibility whatsoever? If I am to take your defence of the government seriously can you prove your own belief that you are an expert. If not then I suggest you remember what comes after hubris.
SBS
You are not looking at what you think you are. To quote the info
“Which party will win the most London-wide top-up seats at the 2008 London Assembly election?”
I think the Tories are expected to get no top up seats up. No doubt someone can correct me on that if wrong.
Well:11 years nito the radical project of a non_tory,albeit Tory-lite govt.Till c.9 mths ago,walk in the park-now,and it is GOOD for democracy,HM’s Opposition are putting the foundations in for a possible alternative.
The cold,bald stats of the night of May 1st/2nd (and that mornings Majoral race in London will crystalise matters.
One point: as a p1ssed off Labourite,I would rtaher avoid Johnsons’ threat of ‘total ergualtion’ of London Transport;eschwed by his own party’s 4th retm of govt by (as I recall,Steve Norris,London minister)
So abig part of me feels;go ahead BoJo,get elected to be London Major-and I’ll quote NOW 1/3 (75% cahnce in my favour) you will f*** up DISASTROUSLY in your first 100 days-leading to early/mid Septemebr-and undermine David Cameron’s mission,to re-habiliatate the Tories as a party capable of national govt.
YES,I admit I am being controversial.But I have a fair inkling I may not be so far from the mark
72 - i think it is unlikely as I explained earlier
Kieran The real test of the statistics is who believes them to be true indicator. The FX markets don’t, the voters don’t, nor do they believe the Budget. That is why the pound has sunk like the proverbial stone. That is why the government is becoming an object of ridicule and anger.
Someone sometime said you can’t buck the markets. Markets may be mad or bad but you can’t pretend they are not there and not powerful. Neither can you treat the voters as idiots, they tend to turn against you. Spouting inflation is 2.5% endlessly despite what people experience might be seen as doing that by those struggling to keep their lifestyles together.
Remember if you and the Tin Man and the Scarecrow are determined to follow the yellow brick road of denial and false hope, an empty room behind the curtain and certain catastrophe await you.
56. Treating it as a confidence issue might be the way to go, but as you say, it’s a pretty extreme option. It could be spun either way - “Brown puts his foot down/is in control” versus “Brown has to threaten the fall of his government to get his MPs to vote for him.”
The 10p thing is a lot more serious than the Blairite rebellions (save Iraq). With the Blairite rebellions it was the usual suspects making noise for the most part, and when defeat did occur (terror laws) it wasn’t the worst thing to lose on (ie not in the Labour manifesto, partisan but hardly dangerous territory). You got the impression that most MPs in the Blairite era would fall into line after getting their arms twisted by the whips.
The 10p rate thing reminds me of the Top-up fees rebellion in a way; it’s clearly something that a lot of Labour MPs didn’t think they entered Parliament ‘to do.’ Blair only won that vote through his stonking majority - at the end of the day weren’t there 5 votes in it? Labour nowadays only have a majority of 70 or so, and the 10p rate is even more toxic than top-up-fees - at least then Labour MPs could be persuaded that it was taking the tax burden off the general taxpayer and onto the student who was using the service.
Brown is suffering from his Stalinist tendency - he can’t treat Labour MPs this way (see earlier post when the Times suggested he didn’t think they were explaining the policy well enough on the doorstep) - they’re clearly angry at this and unless he’s careful he’s going to have a big rebellion on his hands.
The worrying thing for Brown, though, is that I’m not sure how he’ll find a way out. Even Blair would have found it difficult. His trump card, if we’re to believe journalists, was to get whips to berate a rebellious MP with “are you really going to undermine our most successful leader electorally?” Brown doesn’t have that weapon at his disposal because Labour MPs are beginning to realise he looks to be shaping up to be a terrible leader electorally!
Just noticed this: our PM has been attacked by Brendan Barber, head of the Trades Union Congress, over the removal of the 10p tax rate:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2008/apr/20/tax.tradeunions
That must have some effect on wavering Labour MPs. There will definitely be some level of rebellion when it comes to a vote on the Budget… but is it possible that it could actually be defeated?
If so, Brown would face a vote of confidence and most likely have to call an early election, which (on Populus’ poll figures) he would promptly lose. Brown has been in office less than a year; that would make him one of the least successful PMs in British political history.
That scenario still isn’t likely, but it is (just about) possible. All I can say is… Yikes!
67 - Have you read my posts? I have not claimed that inflation is 2.5%. Jeez.
60 and 63 - You are absolutely right in saying that this inflation hits the poorest hardest and those on fixed incomes. Rises in fuel and food prices are a global phenomenon and there is not much the government could do about it. Interesting how people claimed all our economic success was down to the international scene, but now the failure is all domestic. The good thing is that there is little evidence of a wage-price spiral that happened after the commodity boom in the 1970s. However the government should be doing much more to help the poorest in society and I would heartily welcome some redistribution. This would also help the economy as poorer people have a higher marginal propensity to consume.
64 - Witan I praise you and then you overblow your case. Some of your criticisms are valid. Public finances are not in a good position and our balance of payments have been bad for years. But a ‘mountain of debt’? What is the debt to asset ratio in the private sector? Public debt as a % of GDP is at 37%, that rises to 45% if you want to include PFI. Still hardly disastrous and not much higher than 1997. If there is a recession the public finances will look horrendous or should I say Lamontesque. And our currency isn’t doing too badly against the dollar, it is weakeneing but it is hardly a run.
And you leave out the positives. Employment at record levels up in real and percentage terms over the year. Another astonishing statistic at this time of economic crisis redundancies are at their lowest level since 1995. Disastrous!
Yes there are economic problems and we aren’t experiencing a miracle economy, but things aren’t hopeless.
42. Thank you for your contribution. You are asking for more detail. As an economist, it’s an important area. And for the public it’s pretty serious. There’s not the time to go into the detail. So I’ll summarise. You’d benefit from a degree in economics to understand this better. I’ll do my best to simplify.
Most countries in the world report inflation between 6-7% right no,. E.g. most EU countries, e.g. Italy, etc. and across the world, China, India, Russia, Latin America, etc.
There are really only two exceptions reporting lower inflation right now. These are the UK and USA.
The 1996 ‘Boskin Commission’ in the USA wanted to manipulate inflation figures to get a lower figure. The US changes were introduced under Bill Clinton. Thus all of America’s problems are due to Bill Clinton’s actions in the 1990’s along with the subsequent actions of the Federal Reserve in keeping interest rates too low, year after year.
Under Gordon Brown the same ‘Boskin’ manipulation was introduced into UK CPI - and Brown even adopted the same name - i.e. ‘new CPI’. Remember that Brown does not have an education in economics and really didn’t understand what he was doing. He’d just found an excuse to alter inflation figures to get a lower figure. He went ahead and made the change. The last and biggest was in 2005.
So he introduced a set of ‘biases’ into how inflation is calculated so that he could get a lower figure.
First ‘hedonic pricing’. He treats any form of substitution as a psychological price-cut. Telling you that you through switching to pay a higher price, on the same item, different only in features, you are benefiting from a ‘price cut’ for psychological reasons, which is very subjective and highly controversial. There is a serious flaw. When you ‘eat out’ instead of ‘eating in’ the economy is not growing by the full amount as unrecorded household work is replaced by restaurant work. This means there is ‘double counting’ and inflation should actually be higher. So hedonic pricing is being interpreted in a very biased way. True hedonic pricing may result in higher inflation rather than lower. Of course this was never the intention of the Boskin Commission and the interpretation that reports higher inflation is not being followed in the UK or USA, just the interpretation that lowers the figure.
The second major change was to try to ’strip-out’ high inflation items because they are ‘volatile’. As any economist will tell you, this is a euphemism for ‘going the wrong way’. You can’t strip out high inflation items such as energy and food and still call it the rate of inflation. It’s no longer inflation. It’s a totally misleading figure, as just a small part of what people buy is now being measured. The CNN article obviously tries to go into a bit more detail.
Economic theory predicts that wherever inflation figures underreport the true level of inflation we will eventually see a run on the currency. Right now we are seeing a run on the pound - the biggest run on the pound in the last 100 years.
This further compounds true inflation causing it to go higher still – as imports are much more expensive (import inflation). Inflation is rising and the UK pound is collapsing. The cause. Brown.
68 I have given you numerous examples of where the government has lied (to recap: dodgy dossier, immigration figures, crime figures, foreign prisoner figures, Iran sailors fiasco). To try and pretend that the government doesn’t have form is just ridiculous.
30. My current prediction is that the Conservative Party will win a top-up seat (and will gain Enfield & Haringey) with 34.5% of the votes (compared with 27.8% in 2004).
77. Brown wouldn’t lose a vote of no confidence. It just wouldn’t happen. The convention, I believe, for any government MP to vote for a motion of no confidence would be to promptly withdraw the whip.
It’s also turkeys voting for Christmas - how many MPs are actually going to vote to give themselves a huge chunk of job uncertainty, especially in this current climate?
78 Kieran- putting up a strong defence but your penultimate paragraph is not good evidence. Employment is a lagging indicator as jobs cuts tend to be put off by businesses until they have to make them as investment in training etc is valuable and there are one off redundancy costs. Equally employment usually only starts to rise some months after growth picks up.
78 Keiran you know as well as I do that the Government has several ways in which it can seriously effect the fuel price on the forecourt. For a start it could reduce the duty, or change the VAT rules so that VAT is charged on the fuel rather than the fuel and the duty. The first would be cheaper and would help businesses more than the public.
The reason for high employment and wage restraint are partially down to immigration, but not wanting to set off seanT I will leave that particular thought alone. Wage restraint is also affected by the pessimism that has seeped into the economy - something I think Brown encourages without meaning to - just looking at him makes me depressed. You can see that people are more pessimistic than a year ago by the way stories are spun by the media - Tesco reports record profits simply acts as a magnifier to other problems in the retail sector.
The point is that Brown isn’t the answer he is part of the problem. The trouble is Cameron isn’t the answer either - the person who appears most trusted is Vince Cable, which in reality shows how ridiculous the whole thing is. Who would trust the Lib Dems with the treasury!
77.I think it could be defeated, the double whammy of the consistently bad polling figures and Labour MP’s feeling a real backlash from their constituents could be a real tipping point on this issue. There have been plenty of rebellions in the last 11 years, most notable on the Iraq vote which was a matter of real principle over government policy to many MP’s.
It does not sound as if Brown (rather than Darling) is prepared to make any concessions to appease some of their MP’s concerns. I think that is what some were hoping for this week, and I think it was the reason behind those PPS’s speaking out in what to me was a very orchestrated manner.
Its dangerous for the government to see normally very loyal MP’s speaking out rather than just the usual suspects.
70 - That is fair enough but there is only so much the government can do. The budget did offer some help for pensioners.
71 - Sorry for being condescending but it frustrates me that you make wild accusations that you then are unable to support apart from to say ‘I think it, so it must be true’. I make no claim to be a statistical expert but I am not arguing that the government is lying. If you had evidence that they were I would listen to it but you don’t. My argument for trusting the stats is that the people who compile them are professional statisticians. If there was a scam then there would have been a whistle blower by now. It is almost impossible to prove a negative. Those who see conspiracies are never satisfied with rational explanations.
75 - Yes the pound is worth just under $2, I see it has ‘dropped through the floor’.
People should stop attacking me as if I am parroting the government line on everything. I haven’t on inflation but for example, or on the budget deficit. But I’m trying to balance the hysteria on here that the economy is falling apart. We are going through difficult times but lets not get carried away.
78 “Employment at record levels up in real and percentage terms over the year.”
Indeed we have had unlimited immigration which has both kept the native population’s wages lower (thanks for that) than they otherwise would have been and artificially inflated the number of employed withut having the bother of doing something about the NEETS or the millions on incapacity benefit or indeed on job seekers allowance
Inflation, over the medium term, tends to be OVER estimated. The current hedonic pricing approach is not fast enough.
How much did a 42 inch telly cost 5 years ago vs how much now? What about a blank DVD, or a tin of baked beans? Whenever the monthly inflation figures are produced they are met with bewildered bafflement by the people who actually sell us stuff. Who do you think has a good overview of consistent selling prices - your grandma or the retailers?
In 2000 and 2004 I voted for Steve Norris in the second round. This time, I am definitely not going to vote for Boris Johnson, and there is a small chance that I might vote for Ken Livingstone. Am I as unrepresentative as the various polls which keep putting the top two on 85% and “Others” on 1% or 2%? Am I the only regular poster on pb.com who has stood in an election against Winston McKenzie? Am I the world’s only gay autistic Loony Marxist Monarchist? Have I voted for more political parties (eight so far, soon to be nine) than anybody else? Why am I asking all these questions anyway?
86. Keiran, I’m afraid you don’t seem to be listening. As I mentioned :
‘Economic theory predicts that wherever inflation figures underreport the true level of inflation we will eventually see a run on the currency.’
‘The 1996 ‘Boskin Commission’ in the USA wanted to manipulate inflation figures to get a lower figure. The US changes were introduced under Bill Clinton. Thus all of America’s problems are due to Bill Clinton’s actions in the 1990’s along with the subsequent actions of the Federal Reserve in keeping interest rates too low, year after year.’
The US dollar is experincing is biggest collapse in the last 100 years. The pound is experiencing the biggest collapse in the last 100 years. That’s why the dollar to pound ratio is the same.
The pound to every other currency in the world is currently showing a collapse of 20% in just 8 months, and still falling further every month. Have you changed pounds for euros recently? Brown has been an unmitigated disaster. The UK economy has been wrecked.
88 How many 42 inch tellies do you by every week? Against how many times you fill your car up with fuel, or how much food you buy (teabags up about 70%) or how much you spend on all sorts of things we buy EVERY week. The cost of living is rising, therefore as wage restraint kicks in the quality of life has to fall. That will hit those on low incomes hardest and fastest. Not what this Government is supposed to be about. But then came the 10%…
Kieran The private debt in this country is mountainous. As someone with lots of statistics to hand you have the exact figure, I am sure, but last time I looked it was over 1.3 trillion. Debt to asset ratio is immaterial if you haven’t got the cash to pay the interest and capital back.
And if, as in the UK, you borrow from one set of foreigners to buy goods from other foreigners this debt has a direct effect on the currency - once the carousel (aka carry trade) stops the currency suffers. The carry trade continues but we are now being priced out of the market with the pound so weak.
The result is a balance of payments deficit that has grown three times in the last ten years to nearly 80 billion currently. And what, it is legitimate to ask, have we got for it. High tech business, new machinery? No, flat screen TVs, flash foreign holidays, german cars, Chinese gizmos, French food, Italian fashion, Spanish villas, While the world and her sister are buying up UK businesses and we are creating an economy over dependent upon the retail sector which itself is a driver of the deficit in trade.
Last month the balance of payments position improved slightly but significantly, and that was attributed to the reduction in profits of foreign owned financial institution: they had little to repatriate. And so it is unlikely that there will be a new rush of inward investors where profits are difficult, taxes are increasing and the currency so weak that any repatriation of profits is far less attractive.
We are in a mess. The fall in the value of the pound is claimed to help exports. Well, the first export it helped was meat and the resultant shortage has raised prices in the UK. Why? Because the meat producers can charge more in pounds and still sell for less in Euros and immediately boost profits. That is hardly sustainable export growth.
But it does fit our history of devaluations. Lots of hope and little delivery in medium to long term export growth.
79 - Fair enough. The method of calculating RPI hasn’t changed though has it? That’s at 3.8% at the moment. CPI may not be useful in reflecting people’s experiences but it is internationally comparable. And as Witan pointed out shows us doing favourably compared to other countries.
80 - I answered that. The cases you cite are areas where there was no long-term data series in place (except for crime and I don’t see where the lying is here. Care to elucitdate?) However you were using these examples to argue that inflation, employment and growth figures are all lies. Don’t you see the difference? In the latter cases the ONS has maintained methodological consistency.
83 - You are right that employment is a lagging indicator. However its strength indicates a certain resilience in the economy and it is certainly better going into an international downturn with it rising than falling. Who knows what the future holds though?
84 - Employment is up in percentage as well as real terms. The government has frozen fuel prices several times over the last few years. However reductions in fuel duty would be a pretty blunt instrument and the money could be better spent elsewhere.
Interesting para in the Observer report of 10 p tax stuff - not sure Gordon will be pleased about Miliband entering the fray - a bit of veiled criticism a la Darling?
“The comments come as one of the most senior members of the Cabinet, David Miliband, warned that the Prime Minister had to change his tactics if they were to win back voters. Writing in the News of the World today, the Foreign Secretary describes the party as now the ‘political underdog’ and says the PM has to ’see the world through the eyes of voters’.
‘People will only listen to our claims about what we have done right if we are candid about what we have not,’ he writes. ‘Employment has never been higher, but people are worried about housing. Crime is down, but people think crime has gone up. Universal nursery education has been delivered, but more and more people are concerned about care for elderly parents.’
78.”Interesting how people claimed all our economic success was down to the international scene, but now the failure is all domestic.”
Kieran, a bit of balance please. Gordon Brown has been taking all the credit for economic success in the UK without a nod to the previous government or the health of the world economy. He promised “an end to boom and bust” - something that will come back to haunt him in much the same that “whiter than white” did for Blair.
He talked of stability being the key, but that is just what he has not provided in his 10 years as Chancellor, if he had the UK would not have the Treasury or personal debt levels we have. He encouraged easy credit at the expense of hard saving because it fuelled the economy and the feel good factor. Instead of having hard cash in the bank to help us weather the rough ride ahead, he is gambling(a first!) that the worst case scenario does not happen.
There is a lot of voters on various income scales in the same boat.
81 - that’s my view too - I think Labour will hold just three constituencies (and may be in trouble in City and East). Tories will easily poll over 35% on the list (but obviously won’t win a seat if they win more than one extra seat).
There is of course the chance that the appalling Tony Arbour might lose in SW, so two off the list may be possible.
My best guess is Labour will get most off the list (4/5), Lib Dems (3/4), with the Tories getting one and the Greens and BNP fighting over the remaining two seats.
78- Kieran, I don’t think you get it. It’s not about how bad the world economy is, what inflation is, how many city jobs have been lost, it’s about the fact that petrol is up from 85p per litre last year to 108.9p per litre today. It’s about bread being £1 today, compared to 60p last year. Rice was £2.50 per kilo for Basmati in February, more than £4 today. Add it up!
My partner (earns £15k pa) cannot get tax credits or the like. The 10p tax change, doubling the rate to 20p, is hurting real people. Brown will suffer, and pull down the current government. That’s what the MPs are hearing on the doorsteps.
86 “Sorry for being condescending but it frustrates me that you make wild accusations that you then are unable to support apart from to say ‘I think it, so it must be true’”
Which wild accusations are these, I repeat (to recap: dodgy dossier, immigration figures, crime figures, foreign prisoner figures, Iran sailors fiasco). The government lied nothing wild about these accusations. If you don’t accept that these are facts then I am afraid you are slightly delusional. They lied get over it, if you don’t tell the truth you lie are we clear
“I make no claim to be a statistical expert but I am not arguing that the government is lying.”
In which case all you are doing is toeing the party line. there is no analysis here just you reading from a government supplied factsheet.
“My argument for trusting the stats is that the people who compile them are professional statisticians. If there was a scam then there would have been a whistle blower by now.”
The argument that the CPI is not representative of peoples real inflation is not some conspiracy theory dreamt up by me it is an accepted fact. You yourself have even said the RPI is a better measure. The CPI is an accounting wheeze to fool the public. The figures may be true but the point is they have little relevence to everyday life.
91 - I simply used tellys as a poster child of why hedonic pricing is not working too well in todays world. Products and services are getting better at an ever increasing rate, this may not fit people’s agendas but there we go.
Think back to 1900 and ask how much a banana was, or a cup of coffee or an orange. Do the same with a tailored suit. A transatlantic flight in 1950 cost about a YEARS WAGES. Stuff gets cheaper because we innovate. But because we get richer we buy better stuff.
88. How many flatscreen tv’s do you buy every year? 20, 30, 100, 1000!
Or like real human beings you buy a flatsreen tv once every 5 years! From the point of view of inflation flatscreen tv’s, etc. are neglible - representing just 4.4% of annual spending.
So don’t get confused by one or two items in your house falling in price. You will spend far more on the electricity powering your tv’s, etc, then on the TV, etc. itself - and electricity and energy is soaring in price. You could call it energy hyper-inflation.
Also remember that flatscreen tv’s are not falling in price any more. Because of the falling pound they are getting more expensive now (for the first time in 10 years).
Inflation is year on year, not the last 5 years. And for the first time in 10 years the prices of household consumer durables is rising, along with everything else.
90 - You’re right that the Federal Reserve kept interest rates too low but I think that has little to do with inflation manipulation. Again you have not provided any hard statistical evidence or quotes from a creditible source to back up your claims. You lack any crdedibility when you call Brown an ‘unmitigating disaster’ and claim the economy is ‘wrecked’. That is simply not the case. We have grown consistently for 16 years, employment is at record levels.
92 - Some of your arguments hold and you are right that we should be worried about the balance of payments deficit. The next decade will be far bumpier than this one. However I still think that you are being overly pessimistic. You recognise that every country has strengths and weaknesses in their economic performance. We have structural weaknesses that we need to address but we’ve not got the worst economy in the developed world either. I’m arguing for a bit of balance rather than seeing everything as hopeless.
And of course debt to asset ratios matter. If someone is in debt but has assets worth far more than that debt to pay it off with then they can sell that asset if they need to.
Independent on Sunday reports that Peter Hain to be interviewed as a suspect within days. Another pre-locals unwanted gift to Labour
http://tinyurl.com/534893
101 - “And of course debt to asset ratios matter. If someone is in debt but has assets worth far more than that debt to pay it off with then they can sell that asset if they need to.”
What if that debt/asset ratio is their home? This isn’t Monopoly, we’re talking about real people and real lives!
93 - “I answered that. The cases you cite are areas where there was no long-term data series in place (except for crime and I don’t see where the lying is here. Care to elucitdate?) However you were using these examples to argue that inflation, employment and growth figures are all lies. Don’t you see the difference? In the latter cases the ONS has maintained methodological consistency”
Creating straw men is not a tactic to be proud of.
I was not using those examples to state that inflation, employment or growh figures are all lies.
My problem with inflation is it does not represent the reality as I have argued above. My problem with employment is that it is due largely to unlimited immigration (which as the lords recently said has no benefit) and that has a knockon effect of not dealing with our own country’s unemployed. and my problem with GDP figures is when you include buy-to-let capital values as part of gdp you are kidding yourself that you have a viable and sucessful long term economy.
95 - You’re right that the govt. has tried to have it both ways but so as the opposition, just pointing that out.
98 - (Warning: the rest of this post may appear condescending. Those of a nervous disposition should look away now).
Voreas you are either quite stupid (not language I use lightly or have used on here before) or being deliberately disingenious. I wasn’t arguing that the government hadn’t ‘lied’ about certain things and conceded that they had been less than completely honest on the dodgy dossier etc. (although the crime one has me bemused but you don’t seem to want to elaborate on that one). The wild accusations were in extending these examples to inflation, unemployment etc. As I pointed out there is a clear distinction here as they are part of a long-standing data-series. Not had an answer to that.
People can go around making allegations about people lying if they want to but most people would find it reasonable for them to show evidence to support their claim. You do not seem to grasp that.
On your comment - what is not truth is lies highlights your problem. You see there are different ways of interpreting the truth. For example ONS publishes 3 inflation figures: CPI, RPI and RPIX. All get reported. The government may use the more favourable figures but the press often report the least favourable. There is no lying going on.
And on that note I think I’m off to bed as we’re just going round in circles. But seriously people should cheer up a bit, things aren’t that bad!
More government bureaucracy:
The ONS(!) is to start a 2,000 (yes TWO THOUSAND!) question survey of 500,000 people per year.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=560771&in_page_id=1770&ct=5
104 - You see you can put forward rational arguments!
I’m sure we will be able to debate these issues another time, they are a difference of interpretatio. However on the thread earlier today you did make the link between the cases you highlighted and the inflation figures.
99. Again blairf, we see that you’re not listneing. Inflation is not the last 50 years, its year-on-year. The ‘distraction con’ will not work.
The fact is that it is inflation is 6-7% per year before Boskin CPI manipulation.
The run on the pound proves that the market believes that the value of the pound is falling because of high inflation. The reason for the correction being so sudden (20% collpase in 8 months) is the market believes it was mislead about the rate of inflation for a number of years previously.
And again the attempt to focus on consumer durables over the last 50 yearsis misleading. They are just 4.4% of household expenditure. We can all pick one or two items that fall in price over 50 years! It would be a ‘distraction con’ to link them to the rate of inflation right now!
The key is to look at what is happening now. What is inflation right now, year on year. It is not 2.5%. The stats are therefore a lie.
The public agrees with this conclusion, given recent surveys, as do the markets given the collapse of the pound (versus the euro, yen, etc.). We win the case where it matters.
105 “On your comment - what is not truth is lies highlights your problem. You see there are different ways of interpreting the truth”
actually it highlights your problem If you deliberatley go out of your way to deceive the public (or interpret the truth in toady labour speak) then you will pay for it at the ballot box.
107 and you remain the most arrogant poster I have encountered and people like you are exactly the reason why Labour will be in meltdown come the next election.
109: >you remain the most arrogant poster I have encountered < (voreas replying to the inoffensive post 107)
You do live a sheltered life, voreas.
110 oh its nasty authoritarian nick If you don’t consider “You see you can put forward rational arguments” as arrogant and condescending then you have truly lost touch. Still maybe you can join Gordon shaking in anger when it is all over.
88 - Anyone who bought a 42″ TV five years ago is not going to be content with merely buying a 42″ TV nowadays. The price of the top-of-the-range electronics stays relatively constant, just the range changes, that’s technical progress not deflation.
Not that a top-of-the-range TV is standard purchases in everybody’s weekly shop. Why just last week I picked up three from ASDA forgoing buying food or petrol as they’re just not required.
Gordon Brown cornered as rebellion over 10p tax reform grows
This rebellion is gathering pace at an alarming speed.
“Five ministerial aides publicly criticised the policy last week while a sixth, Angela Smith, was prevented from resigning only after a personal appeal from Brown. Yesterday five more parliamentary private secretaries (PPSs) joined the attack. Several others are voicing serious concerns in private.
Derek Wyatt, a junior aide to Margaret Hodge, a culture minister, said: “I’ve had virulent e-mails from my constituents saying they feel betrayed and deserted. They say they will never vote for Labour again. I have thought about resigning, yes. The government has time yet, so it’s too early to say. But I’ve taken soundings from my local party and yes, many of us do feel this is a betrayal of our core beliefs.” “
Free Tibet protests stir Chinese nationalism:
http://uk.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUKPEK27822720080420
This is why it’s stupid for the Olympic protests to focus on the Tibet issue: it’s the one issue where the man on the street agrees with his government. Why can’t they focus on Beijing’s relations with Burma and Sudan?
114. Because then no one would care. And it’s not as if the average Chinese person cares about what their government is doing in Burma or Sudan, not as long as economically the country remains stable.
cont’d 115. But they’d still take it as criticism of China, which is the real catalyst, not any nationalist “greater China” idea (at least, at its root, though many would cite the myth of greater China).
Pope telling porkies about the Nazi regime:
“It banished God and thus became impervious to anything true and good.”
Except, of course, the Nazis didn’t banish God. Their whole ideology was based around Providence having a special place for the Divine German race, and they made a deal with the Vatican to install Catholic priests in place of deposed Orthodox ones in the Balkans.
(OT) is it time for a reshuffle of the pictures in the oblong at the top of the page? Perhaps it should also include Clegg and Boris and Ken and Obama and McCain and Clllllllllllllllllllinton as well as Brown and Cameron.
116. No, it’s because they believe Tibet to be inherently part of China, and that the West wishes to emasculate their country. Precisely the same how the Serbs felt about Kosovo. Under Western pressure, the Chinese government could foreseeably change it’s policy towards Darfur/Burma, but clearly won’t with regards Tibet.
119. You’re pushing two very different arguments there. Emasculating China–that I agree with as a rationale for the nationalism. But it has only tangential relevance to the notion that Tibet is a part of China. The bigger Chinese nationalist problem is the notion that China might be wrong, which is just as big an issue with criticizing other Chinese policy (albeit the reactions might be weaker simply because the issues are less prominent–but they’d still be there).
Can I repost my comment yesterday on the 10p tax problem together with Nick Palmers reply:
I really don’t understand why the Gov is being so pig headed about sorting the abolition of the 10% tax rate. If 5m people lose an average of £100 a head then for £0.5bn it could be sorted - That is the sort of loose change the Treasury could find in on