Entirely agree on your point of spinning messages. I have said before, and will say again, don't trust the media to give you the truth. Andy Murrays "anyone but England" was the first time I came across how good the media actually are at taking part of a conversation and making it look awful. As for government subsidies, I don't know if the exist already, but I have noticed that quite a few branches of McDonalds employ people with Downs. For the job they do, they are not disabled. They are perfectly abled. There are many jobs people with disabilities can do where their disability makes no difference. So if McDonalds are doing this out of supporting the society that supports them, the good on them, well done, I am very impressed.
I don't understand how Labour are screwed in Scotland if they embrace EVEL? I don't know anyone in Scotland who is against the idea? The only people against it are labour MPs who will do anything to grab power. Your average Scot recognises that EVEL is the right thing and the current situation is totally unacceptable. Salmond recognises EVEL as being he right thing. Labour are fecked in Scotland for the simple reason they aligned themselves with the Tories and they will not/Cannot deliver DevoMax, which is what was promised. Right now I am pishing myself laughing at Better Together Lamont resigning due to Westminster Labour interference and being treated as a branch office and not the separate entity "Scottish Labour" was set up to be. Can't believe she is complaining about Westminster control. Its what she voted for.
yep,, good riddance to Lamont ... stooped bitch I guess she now sees the error of her ways,, pity she was not bright enough to see it before the referendum we might be rid of the Englander albatross by now
This raises an interesting point about referendums. In any ordinary election, manifesto promises made during the campaign always have the implicit proviso "if we win". Only the winners are in office and thus in a position to implement anything; the losers are by definition out of power and can't do any implementing. Uniquely in a referendum, a party can make commitments during a campaign, win the vote decisively, yet still be in opposition and unable to implement anything. It is a fundamental problem of referendums which is hard to solve. It is less likely to arise if a referendum is held at the same time as a general election.
It is the linking of constitutional reform north and south of the border by the Conservatives that lays the trap for Labour. Labour can support it or vote against it. If they support it then they are effectively delaying reform north of the border, due to the long consultation period that will entail, and watering down Scotland's influence at Westminster; this will be seen as a betrayal north of the border. If they vote against it then the English will see Labour denying them the devolved powers that Scotland will get; that will be seen as betrayal south of the border. Lose / Lose for Labour.
Very true. So why did Gordon make promises he was unable to keep and why did anyone believe him ? It was a fight for survival by Labour; they won but were severely wounded in the process. Unfortunately the fundamental issues were not resolved and the fallout will be felt for years.
" why did anyone believe him " ,, good question mate.... for that matter , why do millions vote for the same old same old shit politicians every 4 years
Yip, and further complicated by the fact that the SNP are in power in Scotland, sovereignty lies with tenSttish people, not Westminster and yet, it is Tories in Lib Dems who will decide. As Denis Canavan said, power devolved is power retained.
Yes, I understand all that..... I think we at different time frames. We in the Yes camp saw this coming before the referendum. It demonstrated how desperate labour were to hold onto 1/10 of the seats they would need to win a general election. How desperate were they. I mean, a whole one tenth! We are a pretty insignificant part of the Uk but they are so bereft of imagination, intellect, moral purpose and ability to convince the broader English population they had to come up with this "bribe" they could never deliver in order to hold onto these 35 seats. Not that they will. But watering down of Scotland influence in Westminster won't upset us. Not at all. If you want to frack the bejesus out of your water supply, over run nuclear power stations and sell off your NHS that's your prerogative. Doesn't affect us. Why would we care as long as Westminster cant force us to do the same? As for a Scot not being allowed to be PM? We have been there already with Gordon Brown. The uproar when he took over at number 10 was unbelievable. No one said a word when Major took over from Thatcher. Wish I had £1 for every time I heard someone say "I'm not having a foreigner run my country". Not all English people,or even a majority, but enough for me to feel uncomfortable living there. The only time I did in fact. It certainly made me feel like "foreigner" in somewhere I called home. The "vow" won't be delivered until after the 2015 general election. They will be fecked AT the 2015 general election here, because people don't trust them because of aligning themselves with the Tories and because of the reasons you highlight. They will get routed and Salmond will lead a substantial "yes alliance" group to Westminster to push it through. They will also vote FOR EVEL
John Major was elected leader of his party after a hard fought two-round process and he subsequently fought a general election and won that as well. Deposing an elected leader is a shabby process whoever is involved but at least Major secured a mandate to lead from both his party and the country. Gordon Brown had a coronation, and a pre-arranged one at that. Granted his disastrous premiership was a sham and he was an implant. But he was not an implant by dint of being Scottish - he was PM of the UK Government, not an English Government (the fact that the Parliament building happens to be in England is neither here nor there) and Scotland was and remains a constitutional part of the UK. His illegitimacy had nothing to do with his nationality but everything to do with the Labour party and its belief that the moral right to govern which it has assumed for itself takes precedence over the democratic rights of the electorate. And it was, I have no doubt, in that same partisan spirit that Brown crawled out from under his stone and made devolution pledges to Scotland which he had absolutely no authority to make, in order presumably to retain the Union and preserve Labour's Westminster power base, a suspicion seemingly confirmed by his subsequent denunciation of Cameron's call for equivalent devolutionary powers for England. This isn't about Scotland, England, the Union or democracy, its about the Labour party and the arrogant belief in its right to rule.
The Conservative leadership election of November 1990 was in fact a three-round process. John Major did not stand in the first round. He stood in the second round but did not secure an overall majority of Conservative MPs (who were the only people to have a vote). A backroom deal was then cooked up which resulted in the withdrawal of the other remaining candidate, so the third round became a one-horse race and John Major was elected unopposed. The Labour leadership election of 2007 was a one-round process. Since Gordon Brown had overwhelming support from voters in all sections of the party, no other candidate stood so he was elected unopposed. Your choice of words to describe those two respective processes is really quite amusing.
Back to the original topic of the OP. Nigel Farage deal with Polish far-right party ‘raises serious questions’ | Politics | The Guardian Interesting how Farage is quite happy to: a) align himself with far-right parties elsewhere in Europe b) Take EU money for the sake of his Party yet he doesn't want to have anything to do with the EU. I suspect come election time we will see the true colours of his merry band of shysters and hopefully most of the electorate will see it too.
I don't think there is anything wrong with Farage's UKIP accepting money from the parliament of the European Union, of which he is a member. Anyone who goes into democratic politics, whatever their views or policies, has to work within the system as they find it and it is a weak criticism of Farage that he does so. Running a party and standing for election costs money, which has to come from somewhere. Wherever any party's money comes from is inevitably criticised by their opponents, but public money provided openly from a transparent fund is surely less objectionable than any other source. Again, a very weak criticism of Farage. Much more serious is UKIP's alliance with East European fascist parties who have a few seats in some member states. Even the French fascist party of Le Pen (the Front National) refuses alliances with the more extreme ones, but Farage has no such scruples. I think this will come back to bite him later.
you are probably right on this count however the bite back labour are going to get for burying their collective heads in the sand and ignoring Ukip and the votes that they take from both labour and conservative could be an even larger upset at the elections next year.
I hate to put in another "Question Time link" but I think it was very shabby of the Labour party to make use of the supposed gaffe in the way that they did (saved up for Miliband at PMQs).... but it backfired on the ghastly Angela Eagle on BBC QT. The rest of the panel were prepared to give the question the serious consideration that it deserves, and the audience realised exactly how Ms Eagle was trying to misrepresent the situation for purely political reasons, and made her look a fool:
I disagree. He rants and raves about how much money the UK supposedly gives to the EU and wants to stop us giving anything but is quite happy to take their money if its available to suit him.
