Politics Thread!

[pogo]

I think Cameron knows what he is doing. Saying the SNP are evil might turn out a few supporters in England and lose a few votes in Scotland. But the SNP are going to sweep Scotland, so those votes are lost anyway.

Probably too little too late to swing the election; the benefit is more for the next parliament with the assumed SNP-Labour government. It is likely to be a disaster for one or both of the parties. SNP if they get nothing for Scotland. Labour if they give away too much. Both if there is gridlock. Even if there is not gridlock after the Tories and Lib-Dems were able to work together so well despite their differences many will expect the SNP and Labour to cooperate even more, given their much more similar ideologies.

As for another referendum the SNP are sensibly being vague about when it might be as they are unlikely to win one any time soon. North Sea oil revenues are much worse than a year ago, uncertainties are much greater. And if thing go badly after the election their support and so support for Scottish independence may fall further. Like the Lib-Dems they may find being the minority party in a coalition very bad for their support.

[ewan]

You'll have to excuse my late entry into the discussion, but been reading along with it and I must say that it is quite heartening to know that there are some people who do not actually believe the media spin and think for themselves when it comes to the SNP issue.

After the referendum last year we were quite skunnered to be honest and the fact that the Tories are now saying that we should have no say in Westminster after that was the last ditched plea to Scotland - to stay part of the Union, comes as no surprise. Oh wait, that is right,we are a valued member of the UK (or at the the oil, power generation and other resources are) but we don't have a say as we are a small proportion of the whole...

Of course debates on education and health at Westminster affect us since the amount we receive is dependent upon the amount of extra spending in England and so I'd imagine Scottish MPs would vote on these issues as would Welsh or NI MPs.

As for another referendum the SNP are sensibly being vague about when it might be as they are unlikely to win one any time soon.

If this is the case, assuming that the people who can be bothered to vote in the general election make up the majority of people who would vote in a future referendum, can you explain where the nationalist vote would have gone?

[The ghost of raids past]

Its more the point that a small number of the electorate can so heavily influence the election. If Labour are wiped out in Scotland, but critically get enough seats to form a minority government, the UK will be held to ransom by a left wing nationalist party. People may well vote for Labour but would they vote for the left wing policies the SNP will demand to be part of a coaltion.

Thats the problem with Coalitions, you vote for one party but you get the baggage of the minor parties who wield a disproportionate power to the number of votes they recieve.

Its a shame that after the referendum there wasnt a law passed that banned Scottish MP's voting on any laws that do not influence Scotland or on issues not already controlled by the Scottish Parliment. Devolution cuts both ways, if you have power over your own affairs you should not be able to influence the affairs of another country. I agree that the Scottish people should be heard on laws that have an impact on them and would defend their right to do so.

[venusian]

Thats the problem with Coalitions, you vote for one party but you get the baggage of the minor parties who wield a disproportionate power to the number of votes they recieve.

In 2010 the Tories got 10,703,654 votes, Labour 8,606,517 and the LibDems 6,836,248 (says Wikipedia). So the LibDems contributed 40% of the votes received by the eventual coalition government. You think they wielded a disproportionate amount of power?

[gravy]

Thats the problem with Coalitions, you vote for one party but you get the baggage of the minor parties who wield a disproportionate power to the number of votes they recieve.

In 2010 the Tories got 10,703,654 votes, Labour 8,606,517 and the LibDems 6,836,248 (says Wikipedia). So the LibDems contributed 40% of the votes received by the eventual coalition government. You think they wielded a disproportionate amount of power?

Proportion isn't the issue more that a vote for centrist party enabled a right wing -governmen-

[pogo]

The Tories got 36.1% of the vote in 2010, 7% more than Labour’s 29%. Yet they could not form a government. While Labour got 35.2% in 2005, under 3% ahead of the Tories’ 32.4%, and had a good majority.

If our electoral system were fair the Tories would not have needed Lib-Dem support. But the bias towards Labour meant they still won many seats despite being very unpopular (it was their lowest share of the votes since 1983 & Michael Foot, their second lowest since the 1920s).

[Wudzi]

So the IFS have analysed the spending plans of the main parties and found a £30bn hole in the Tories, because of that uncosted pledge on the NHS

http://www.theguardian.com/business/201 ... s-says-ifs

[pogo]

As I’ve written the Tories plans mostly consist of “more of the same” which may not be everyone’s cup of tea but is at least consistent and needs much less elaboration. Labour for obvious reasons can’t promise a re-run of their last time in office, given how it ended. So what about what they have said?:

But the IFS cautioned that Labour had been “considerably more vague about how much they would want to borrow”. In total, Labour could borrow up to £90bn more than the Conservatives over the next five years, the IFS calculates.

Yes, that’s from the same article. The Guardian do at least report the facts in the body of the article, below a misleading headline which implies Tory plans are more vague. The BBC puts the Tory plans in a bit more context.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015 ... ote][b]How big would Tory spending cuts be?[/b]

These would need to be cut at a "slightly slower rate of cuts than over the previous parliament" taking departmental spending "to its lowest level in real terms since 2003-04" says the IFS.[/quote]
So not back to the 1930s, not even back to spending levels acceptable during Tony Blair’s first term, and more slowly than the cuts this time which despite predictions did not cause mass unemployment or a further recession.

[The ghost of raids past]

The same report states

Labour had been "considerably more vague" about how much it wants to borrow.

according to the bbc article.

[gravy]

The only praise was reserved for the libs dems.

Neither of the parties with a chance of forming a governemnt come out of this looking good.

A bit harder for the cons who's stall is set out on the basis of sound financial management

[tufty]

The Tories got 36.1% of the vote in 2010, 7% more than Labour’s 29%. Yet they could not form a government. While Labour got 35.2% in 2005, under 3% ahead of the Tories’ 32.4%, and had a good majority.

If our electoral system were fair the Tories would not have needed Lib-Dem support. But the bias towards Labour meant they still won many seats despite being very unpopular (it was their lowest share of the votes since 1983 & Michael Foot, their second lowest since the 1920s).

Sorry what?

In what way would any fair system have given overall, non-coalition power to the Tories (or any other party) based on (significantly) less than 50% of the votes cast?

[Wudzi]

The same report states

Labour had been "considerably more vague" about how much it wants to borrow.

according to the bbc article.

Yes I agree that they need to be more honest as well, but the Tories have built their whole election campaign around knocking labour over the economy. If the public actually read this stuff, rather than sucking up all the Murdoch press they've realise that the Tories throwing criticism at Labour about uncosted policy is complete hypocrisy.

[VNVObit]

This graphic from the Guardian article suggest clear water in terms of spending between right/left as they need to find £30bn their sums are missing!


as for the vagueness around borrowing, well I'd be surprised and skeptical of someone committing to a fixed figure given all the various dependencies that would underpin it.

[pogo]

But Labour is all about uncosted policy, about spending more than revenue.

The 2003/04 date given by the IFS is telling. The question is not what the Tories want to do from 2010 to 2020 to return us to that level of spending, it's how Labour managed to raise it so much in just six years and why?

It made no economic sense to pile on so much debt, as was obvious to anyone paying attention at the time:

http://www.yakyak.org/viewtopic.php?p=704907#p704907

And what did it get us? More and richer civil servants mostly. That’s why the Tories have been able to cut so much, without damaging the economy or services – much of the money was being wasted.

Why then did Labour do it? As they are bankrolled by the unions, and had to give them something in return for their support, and they knew rolling back trade union laws introduced by the Tories would be very unpopular. But hire a million more civil servants and give them ever more generous pay increases? No problem.

[pogo]

This graphic ...

That is scary. Labour want to increase total spending by over 40% in real terms? Why ?? Sure the NHS needs above inflation spending rises (though hot 40%) but everything else ? And how will it be paid for? The things they have said they will use (taxes on the mobile rich mostly) will raise little or no revenue. Such spending would require large rises in broad based taxes such as income tax, VAT. Or massive increases in borrowing.