3 Polls tonight show Conservatives 17 points ahead

Generali

LauraW10 wrote: »

That's really bad news. We really are doomed_pale_.

I pity anyone working in or using (most of us ) the public sector.

I'm sure Generali & Wookster will be around soon licking their chops, telling us all what naughty little Brits we are and how we must take our medicine *pah*

In the good times, the UK Government was borrowing money so now the bad times are here, borrowing has accelerated to crazy amounts of money.

As anyone on the DFW board will tell you, you can't just go on borrowing money indefinitely as at some point nobody will lend you any more. The UK is in a budgetary position where she has to borrow money every year no matter whether her economy is doing well or badly.

It's not so much a case of having to take your medecine as a simply reality of economics.

What would you do? Spend the UK into bankruptcy/IMF intervention (either would force the UK to balance the budget pretty much so would have the same impact short term although the former would be more expensive long-term) or look to balance the budget? Those are the choices.

sjaypink

lemonjelly wrote: »

Doing all the above would write great headlines, but would acheive little or be counter productive. For example:

How?
Drastically oversimplified response.
Like which ones?
IMO the DWP will eventually become part of HMRC (child benefit already is, & there are of course tax credits). However, culturally this is a big shock, both to HMRC (who are only experienced in collecting money, not paying out & therefore have made an almighty mess of what they've dealt with so far) and also to service users. A gradual approach is more likely to ensure a smooth transition & allow the service & its users to get used to the idea. agreed
You clearly have no understanding or comprehension about ESA or other benefits do you? i have a feeling he meant EMA? could be wrong...
The whole purpose of ESA is to replace Incapacity benefit (ICB). People claimed ICB when they were unfit for work on health grounds. Swarms of people have been shunted over to it especially in the 80's in order to argue that unemployment figures were low. The average ICB claim lasted 7 years (after which the claimant usually died, or went onto retirement pension). Number of times the ICB claimant had contact with the DWP in that time? None (after making the claim). They were just left (many to miraculously recover, & possibly work cash in hand). With ESA, even though you argue you're incapable of work, you have to work with the jobcentre regularly, to overcome your health issues with the ultimate aim to get you back into work. & believe me, with the training I've had on ESA, it is A LOT harder to get than ICB. IMO, ESA is a good thing, & I believe genuine ESA claimants agree. The ones who think it's a bad thing tend to have a very spurious claim for ICB IMO.
This is absurd! A single person is made redundant, signs on, gets £64.30p/w JSA. How is a person in that position expected to keep on top of food, gas, electric, water, TV licence & other essential spending AND have enough to pay the £11+ council tax each week? agreed
Do you read the daily mail? This hasn't just come in.
Rules were changed recently....
The rules for Income Support state that lone parents are obliged (as part of the conditions of entitlement to the benefit) to share details of the absent parent. The DWP then uses these details to trace the absent parent & collect maintenance from the absent parent & put it back into the DWP coffers to cover the Income Support the lone parent got.

Jeez. Like I say, great soundbites, but please, if you're going to comment on anything, please do so with at least a basic understanding of the subject matter...

The new Lone Parent/ maintenance rules are that the LP gets to keep any money that the NRP gives, regardless of how much, minus a disregard IYSWIM

It used to be that no matter how much maintenance was paid by NRP, the LP would get Income Support + £10 extra from the maintenance (DWP would keep the rest)

Also, maintenance used to be taken into account when assessing income for claims for housing and council tax benefit, this is no longer the case. So you can get a LP on just Income Support eligible for full Housing Benefit, and an LP on IS + £400 maintenance, also eligible for full housing benefit (wouldn't have been before).

Graham_Devon

lemonjelly wrote: »

Doing all the above would write great headlines, but would acheive little or be counter productive. For example:

How?
Drastically oversimplified response.
Like which ones?
IMO the DWP will eventually become part of HMRC (child benefit already is, & there are of course tax credits). However, culturally this is a big shock, both to HMRC (who are only experienced in collecting money, not paying out & therefore have made an almighty mess of what they've dealt with so far) and also to service users. A gradual approach is more likely to ensure a smooth transition & allow the service & its users to get used to the idea.
You clearly have no understanding or comprehension about ESA or other benefits do you? The whole purpose of ESA is to replace Incapacity benefit (ICB). People claimed ICB when they were unfit for work on health grounds. Swarms of people have been shunted over to it especially in the 80's in order to argue that unemployment figures were low. The average ICB claim lasted 7 years (after which the claimant usually died, or went onto retirement pension). Number of times the ICB claimant had contact with the DWP in that time? None (after making the claim). They were just left (many to miraculously recover, & possibly work cash in hand). With ESA, even though you argue you're incapable of work, you have to work with the jobcentre regularly, to overcome your health issues with the ultimate aim to get you back into work. & believe me, with the training I've had on ESA, it is A LOT harder to get than ICB. IMO, ESA is a good thing, & I believe genuine ESA claimants agree. The ones who think it's a bad thing tend to have a very spurious claim for ICB IMO.
This is absurd! A single person is made redundant, signs on, gets £64.30p/w JSA. How is a person in that position expected to keep on top of food, gas, electric, water, TV licence & other essential spending AND have enough to pay the £11+ council tax each week?
Do you read the daily mail? This hasn't just come in. The rules for Income Support state that lone parents are obliged (as part of the conditions of entitlement to the benefit) to share details of the absent parent. The DWP then uses these details to trace the absent parent & collect maintenance from the absent parent & put it back into the DWP coffers to cover the Income Support the lone parent got.

Jeez. Like I say, great soundbites, but please, if you're going to comment on anything, please do so with at least a basic understanding of the subject matter...

Ok, going to respond, hope the points make sense as the quoting has made it difficult to keep in sync!

1. NHS waste....Centralised database. New software system which has been new for years and never got anywhere. Steering groups. Stop renaming organisations constantly then naming them back. PFI. Managers upon managers upon managers.

2. I can't really argue with the oversimplified response thing, I guess thats 2 differing opinions.

3. Cold payments. EMA. Christmas bonus. Child benefits for more than 2 children.

4. The ESA thing. Simple letter mistake. I meant EMA, the thing which pays kids to go to school.

5. Council Tax. I did say banded. Even if it's token payments. I don't think it's really all that fair that if you don't pay, you often get extra services, such as large items for refuse picked up for free, though if you do pay, you pay to have those items picked up. I also think it's absurd to have people like I know, literally going without lunch at work to pay their council tax bill while others don't have to pay it and can afford to eat lunch. Could be very much like income tax, and I'm all for a local income tax paying an amount based on your ability to pay.

6. CSA - I think you will find you just haven't realised this is coming in yet. So thanks for the stuff about basic understandings of the subject matter

kabayiri

Can I confirm one of Graham's "oversimplified" savings.

Pull out of Afghanistan. If we don't, it's going to become the new Vietnam.

We won't win. The Russians failed. We will fail.

I'm personally sick and tired of seeing bright, motivated young men coming home minus both their legs or arms or eyesight.

There. That's my 4 billion per annum saving suggestion.

Generali

kabayiri wrote: »

Pull out of Afghanistan. We will fail.

Again:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Game#British-Russian_rivalry_in_Afghanistan

Rochdale_Pioneers

kabayiri wrote: »

Can I confirm one of Graham's "oversimplified" savings.

Pull out of Afghanistan. If we don't, it's going to become the new Vietnam.

We won't win. The Russians failed. We will fail.

If the objective was Afghanistan then yes, we'll fail as the others did. the objective surely is stabilising Pakistan. Keeping the taliban and their friends down in Afghanistan reduces their effectiveness in Pakistan. Have the loonies sieze control of a nuclear armed state and we're in deep deep trouble.

kabayiri

If this is a global terrorism problem, can you tell me why China isnt committing any resources?

China does have massive military manpower, and isn't short of a few quid either.

If we want a global policeman we have the UN. Otherwise it will be seen as old fashioned Western imperialism.

The objective was not Pakistan 8 years back. What will the objective be next year one wonders.

Generali

If the objective was Afghanistan then yes, we'll fail as the others did. the objective surely is stabilising Pakistan. Keeping the taliban and their friends down in Afghanistan reduces their effectiveness in Pakistan. Have the loonies sieze control of a nuclear armed state and we're in deep deep trouble

That was never the aim. The aim was to get the guys that blew up the WTC.

Due to the massive cluster fk that Afganistan has become (for the 4th time now for the British - c'mon guys!) now Pakistan has been weakened and so all those nukes could go goodness knows where.

There's a very interesting book out:

http://www.amazon.com/Accidental-Guerrilla-Fighting-Small-Midst/dp/0195368347

he talks about a village in Afganistan that has been bombed perhaps three times by the British and Americans in this war. Then he looked back at some of Churchill's writings to discover his lot had also bombed it twice!

kabayiri

Generali wrote: »

Again:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Game#British-Russian_rivalry_in_Afghanistan

That was interesting Generali, thanks.

whathavewedone

Rochdale I really think you're clutching at straws.

After months on end of polls showing the tories comfortably ahead we had three polls taken during and immediately after the conference season showing labour 10, 11 and 12 points behind (still an utterly dismal place to be). Now we have three polls showing the tories 17 points ahead.

It's absurd to say that you don't get a good picture of voting intentions by only including those certain to vote.

If the don't knows still don't know on polling day then they won't bother to vote.

If they have changed their mind by then polls closer to election day like ICM will give us a clearer picture.

It's absolutely ridiculous to say that it's more accurate to allocate the don't knows to the party they voted for last time. Given the fact that labour are looking for a fourth term, people are sick of them and you have a leader that can't even smile properly it is far more likely that the current don't knows voted for Labour last time than voted Conservative. I just think you're deluding yourself.

Incidentally if the don't knows stay at home then it's no problem for the Conservatives. Labour on the other hand need these don't knows desperately.

In 1992 polling methods overstated labour's position which is why Kinnock thought he was onto a winner when in fact he wasn't. Also the Sun's "last person in Britain turn the lights out" article didn't help.

I think you're misguided if you think that scaremongering is going to save Labour at this stage. Do you remember the Demon Eyes campaign that the tories ran in 1997? No one listened, they just looked desperate. Still, even then people thought that Labour couldn't possibly win, that at the last minute people would vote Conservative. They didn't.