I'll say the same thing I say every time - don't go back on your most famous policy which you've signed a contract pledging to maintain if you're going to run a campaign based around the slogan 'no more broken promises'. It discredits you far more than simply breaking a promise does.

A rise of £1.50 in five years is the biggest rise in the minimum wage ever. Full stop. Acting like it isn't going to make people better off just because it isn't as much of a rise as it could be is utter crap, considering how much nine months ago you were waiting baited to start gushing if George Osborne put it up by a pound. I somehow doubt your line in the wake of that would've been 'OH but it's a pitiful rise and could be so much better' - it would've been 'WHY HASN'T LABOUR ALREADY ANNOUNCED THIS.'

 

 

You invariably have people who describe themselves as a bit left wing but who run a local shop and can't afford to pay all their workers the living wage

 

I'm actually not even saying there should be a drastically higher minimum wage, precisely because it's just not practical for the government to set it at £20 an hour or whatever since there would always be some small businesses who couldn't cope with that. But there should be MUCH stronger trade unions who can force higher wages in most sectors/industries bar those exceptions that can't cope with it. This is why I was saying the other day that the minimum wage itself is near irrelevant, it's a total blunt instrument -- there is very little correlation between the countries with the highest average wages (not least Germany) and the highest legal minimum wages, it usually comes down to how powerful the trade union movement is.

 

(Speaking of which, shouldn't trade unions be one of the very best examples of "people and society taking charge rather than big government" that all those faux-left thinktanks are always waffling on about?)

Edited September 28, 201410 yr by Danny

I'll say the same thing I say every time - don't go back on your most famous policy which you've signed a contract pledging to maintain if you're going to run a campaign based around the slogan 'no more broken promises'. It discredits you far more than simply breaking a promise does.

 

or avoiding the issues entirely that are relevant and focusing on one that isn't that important in the scale of things for convenient political reasons. How about ":No more boom and bust" for broken promises. I realise when you're 20 that may seem like a lifetime ago, but when you're over 30 it's vivid in the collective memory. Everybody commenting seems to be under the illusion that I'm in some way biased towards the LibDems, when all I do is call it like I see it - I'm very good at assimilating tedious convoluted complex information and presenting it in a non-biased factual format for the benefit of the general public. I probably should have mentioned I give out info to politicians, public, organisations, legal claims and uncle tom cobbley and all, quickly efficiently and accurately and I deal with people from all walks of life on a daily basis. I can't supply data that is 99% accurate, it needs to be 100%, and I'm very good at what I do. As I've said before, I'm pretty quick at spotting bull and waffle and converting it into core data that gets to the point. Been doing it for years.

 

 

Quoting stats is not going to win Labour an election. Addressing the problems at hand in a direct manner is. The voters have been statted and patronised by politicians for so long now they are incapable of being real people with real connections. Bland homogenised leaders more concerned with target audiences and crap soundbites. Honesty is required, not promises, we all know politicians won't keep them, any of them, any party.

or avoiding the issues entirely that are relevant and focusing on one that isn't that important in the scale of things for convenient political reasons. How about ":No more boom and bust" for broken promises. I realise when you're 20 that may seem like a lifetime ago, but when you're over 30 it's vivid in the collective memory. Everybody commenting seems to be under the illusion that I'm in some way biased towards the LibDems, when all I do is call it like I see it - I'm very good at assimilating tedious convoluted complex information and presenting it in a non-biased factual format for the benefit of the general public. I probably should have mentioned I give out info to politicians, public, organisations, legal claims and uncle tom cobbley and all, quickly efficiently and accurately and I deal with people from all walks of life on a daily basis. I can't supply data that is 99% accurate, it needs to be 100%, and I'm very good at what I do. As I've said before, I'm pretty quick at spotting bull and waffle and converting it into core data that gets to the point. Been doing it for years.

Quoting stats is not going to win Labour an election. Addressing the problems at hand in a direct manner is. The voters have been statted and patronised by politicians for so long now they are incapable of being real people with real connections. Bland homogenised leaders more concerned with target audiences and crap soundbites. Honesty is required, not promises, we all know politicians won't keep them, any of them, any party.

I think the reason that you're perceived as being biased towards the Lib Dems is that you consistently leap to their defence while not minding (indeed, usually joining in) when any other party is criticised for equally legitimate reasons.

I think the reason that you're perceived as being biased towards the Lib Dems is that you consistently leap to their defence while not minding (indeed, usually joining in) when any other party is criticised for equally legitimate reasons.

 

No I quote facts, not emotionally biased individual assessments of two of the three parties, and let's be honest there is a massive Labour bias on here that consistently refuses to acknowledge it's flaws and past lies and past disasters. Unlike most people making comments, I've never voted for any governing party of the UK, and I'm happy to criticise any and all. Suedehead2 has a very reasoned approach to the parties, which is pretty much free of unfair bias, IMHO, and he has made just as many pertinent comments on the LibDem situation which no-one has taken on board preferring to rattle on about dishonesty and lying, subjective opinions on behaviour which all parties are guilty of.

 

Nothing wrong with being a supporter of Labour, politics certainly needs new blood, new enthusiasts, and Labour needs a kick up the proverbial to get back to it's original purpose, the UK doesn't need a slightly-left-wing version of the Tory party, they tried that and it didn't work (plus one might argue that's where the LibDems were have supposed to have been until the roles became a little reversed). For me personally, I don't join groups (bar being in a Union, which I very much believe in), I'm for the underdog individual, it's they who often get stamped on by the groups with agendas.

 

As for not criticising the LibDems, they haven't done much of anything, being as they've not been in power, they've been in coalition and the policies they have pursued and forced the Tories to pursue (as opposed to being forced to pursue policies by the Tories) aren't that disastrous. The bad ones are Tory-policies. Just the blame for some reason is going to the LibDems instead, lucky Cameron...

Edited September 29, 201410 yr by popchartfreak

No I quote facts, not emotionally biased individual assessments of two of the three parties, and let's be honest there is a massive Labour bias on here that consistently refuses to acknowledge it's flaws and past lies and past disasters. Unlike most people making comments, I've never voted for any governing party of the UK, and I'm happy to criticise any and all. Suedehead2 has a very reasoned approach to the parties, which is pretty much free of unfair bias, IMHO, and he has made just as many pertinent comments on the LibDem situation which no-one has taken on board preferring to rattle on about dishonesty and lying, subjective opinions on behaviour which all parties are guilty of.

Suedehead does indeed make some very good (and succinct, something you may want to try out) points. They're certainly taken on board and they're debated like everyone else's. The other difference is that he doesn't accuse every perfectly valid counter-argument of 'rattling on'. There's not so much a Labour bias (two members out of half a dozen regular posters) as there is a social democratic one which you're part of. A Tory on here would think we were all splitting hairs.

 

Nothing wrong with being a supporter of Labour, politics certainly needs new blood, new enthusiasts, and Labour needs a kick up the proverbial to get back to it's original purpose, the UK doesn't need a slightly-left-wing version of the Tory party, they tried that and it didn't work (plus one might argue that's where the LibDems were have supposed to have been until the roles became a little reversed). For me personally, I don't join groups (bar being in a Union, which I very much believe in), I'm for the underdog individual, it's they who often get stamped on by the groups with agendas.

It suits you to be the underdog individual since you're under the illusion that anyone who's a member of a particular group is automatically biased in favour of it. There's a lot of things in my party which I disagree with, but being a member doesn't invalidate my argument.

 

As for not criticising the LibDems, they haven't done much of anything, being as they've not been in power, they've been in coalition and the policies they have pursued and forced the Tories to pursue (as opposed to being forced to pursue policies by the Tories) aren't that disastrous. The bad ones are Tory-policies. Just the blame for some reason is going to the LibDems instead, lucky Cameron...

What? If being out of power meant being immune from criticism then Danny for one wouldn't post anywhere near as much!

 

succint: true enough!

Despite the media's infatuation with it, the public rank the deficit/national debt as only their 5th biggest issue in their opinion:

 

01 Economic growth

02 Immigration

03 Cost of living

04 NHS

05 Cutting the deficit/debt

 

 

http://lordashcroftpolls.com/wp-content/up...int-Phase-5.pdf (p.29)

Yet when it comes to previous Labour voters saying why they won't vote Labour next time, 'you spent all the money' comes up about as much as immigration and benefits. 'You're basically just Tories' is the sole preserve of the very few Green and TUSC converts out there, most of which haven't voted Labour since the early 00s in any case.

Yet when it comes to previous Labour voters saying why they won't vote Labour next time, 'you spent all the money' comes up about as much as immigration and benefits. 'You're basically just Tories' is the sole preserve of the very few Green and TUSC converts out there, most of which haven't voted Labour since the early 00s in any case.

 

I have never even denied this is the case, but again, that's got NOTHING to do with the deficit specifically (as shown by people constantly saying they don't care about it or actively don't think yet more cuts are needed), and so Labour posturing about it doesn't do anything to solve their problem. Their problem is just caused by them projecting such incompetence in general -- and saying that cuts were a bad idea consistently for a few years, then changing your mind and saying they're a good thing, does not do ANYTHING to show competence to say the least. As shown by the fact their economic credibility numbers have tumbled further over the past year as compared to when they were doing the shockingly Marxist thing of...saying the government should spend some money.

 

The election campaign will probably feature a ton of these carcrash interviews, where the very attempts to be "credible" and "tough" only end up making them look even more incompetent because of how contradictory and incoherent their stance is:

 

Edited September 29, 201410 yr by Danny

I have never even denied this is the case, but again, that's got NOTHING to do with the deficit specifically (as shown by people constantly saying they don't care about it or actively don't think yet more cuts are needed), and so Labour posturing about it doesn't do anything to solve their problem. Their problem is just caused by them projecting such incompetence in general -- and saying that cuts were a bad idea consistently for a few years, then changing your mind and saying they're a good thing, does not do ANYTHING to show competence to say the least. As shown by the fact their economic credibility numbers have tumbled further over the past year as compared to when they were doing the shockingly Marxist thing of...saying the government should spend some money.

 

The election campaign will probably feature a ton of these carcrash interviews, where the very attempts to be "credible" and "tough" only end up making them look even more incompetent because of how contradictory and incoherent their stance is:

Unfortunately, in an election campaign perception is far more significant than the facts. The Tories have succeeded in persuading the public that the downturn was all Labour's fault and the fact that the rest of the world also suffered a downturn is pure coincidence. They have consistently accused Labour of "not fixing the roof" in the good times when, in fact, that's exactly what Labour did do. They fixed the leaking roofs of schools and hospitals. They did a lot wrong - particularly after September 11th - but they did a lot to improve our public services.

But how can the economy/budget NOT be intrinsically linked to the deficit Danny? People may think they don't care about it - but it is linked to all sorts of things that they do care about. Not least of which being the NHS, which the Labour government directed vast amounts of money towards during the 2000s with little or indeed no improvements to show for it.

Not least of which being the NHS, which the Labour government directed vast amounts of money towards during the 2000s with little or indeed no improvements to show for it.

ERM. The NHS was pretty much falling apart by all accounts in 1997. By 2009 it was ranked by the OECD as the second best health service in the world. Endless snark about 'target culture' and 'taps of money with little to show' doesn't change the fact that increased funding and reform helped rebuild and revitalise hospitals that were on their last legs - as well as building many more. And for all people wanked on about it just going to 'bureaucrats', waiting times plummeted because the funding actually allowed frontline stuff to get on with their jobs rather than having to deal with the paperwork.

Ok, a bit harsh maybe - there were notable improvements in Blair's first term. What I mean is that considering how much was spent 1997-2010, the returns for all of that investment (tripling of spending pre-1997) have been disappointingly small, and the public perceive a lot of it to have been wasted. Although it does remain one of Labour's strengths in the eyes of the voter.

 

I'll keep digging shall I?

Public perception on this is pretty much irrelevant though. When you asked the public all throughout the New Labour years about their perceptions about their local hospital, almost universally they would admit that there had been massive improvements locally. When you asked them about how they thought the NHS was doing nationally, they'd perceive that the health service was getting worse because of the endless stream of scare stories paraded by the Mail, the Express et al. They would never connect local improvements to national improvements.

Yes, I guess you're right - the public have been constantly fed the same scare stories which ends up reinforcing a perception that may not be true.

 

A bit like how Salmond and the SNP kept bitching about the NHS being privatised by the Tories and at risk if they voted no in the referendum, and yet the Scottish parliament has had complete control over the budget for which it can choose how much to spend on the NHS in Scotland already.

I have to agree with Tirren on this one. If most people thought their local health service had improved then the likelihood is that it had improved nationwide. People are better able to judge something within their actual experience (i.e. local services) than the national picture.

 

The same principle applies to crime. People finally believe that their local crime rate is falling but still think crime is getting worse in the country as a whole. This counts as progress of a sort but it has been very slow to happen. After all, crime has now been falling for 20 years and is now at roughly half its mid-90s peak.

But how can the economy/budget NOT be intrinsically linked to the deficit Danny? People may think they don't care about it - but it is linked to all sorts of things that they do care about. Not least of which being the NHS, which the Labour government directed vast amounts of money towards during the 2000s with little or indeed no improvements to show for it.

 

You might have a point if this question just asked about "the economy" in general (which people might have included the deficit in), but the question specifically asked about "getting the economy growing and creating jobs" -- I really don't think people would've selected that option if what they really meant was the deficit.

 

And it's not just this question either. The same polling found that, when people were specifically asked whether there should be 5 more years of cuts, 55% said no to 45% yes (which admittedly is a closer split than I would hope for). It's just NEVER been true that everyone's bought the Conservatives' line that the deficit is some big evil which must be gotten rid of at all costs.

My (slightly eccentric) predictions are as follows:

1. In early autumn, David Davis forms the breakaway Mainstream Conservative Party, pledging repatriation of power from the EU, much tougher policies on crime and tougher line on immigration; taking 50 current Tory MPs including Liam Fox, John Redwood and Nadine Dorries. The Coalition consequently loses its majority
2. By the end of the year, the Coalition are regularly losing votes in the Commons due to their lack of a majority, made worse by the majority of Lib Dem backbenchers frequently rebelling. All the talk is of the Mainstream Tories (who have agreed an electoral pact with UKIP) collaborating with Labour and minority parties to pass a motion of no confidence in the Coalition in the new year
3. Opinion polls at the end of the year: Labour 40%; Mainstream Tories 27%; Coalition Tories 15%; Lib Dems 5%; Others 13%

Well, it took three years but we KIND OF got there in the end *.*

Gosh, "eccentric" was rather an understatement...