the snap general election thread

kabayiri

CKhalvashi wrote: »

...
That cost is about 1% of our GDP for access to more than 7x our own population, of largely wealthy consumers, with additional trade deals reaching further than any individual country in the world could hope for. A tiny price to pay for what we get in return.

That's not true though. Just 5 EU countries contribute over half the payments to the EU.

The reason for this is that there is clearly a divide between wealthy and poorer countries in the EU.

Arklight

Theresa May has just taken an axe to one of the boomer sacred cows. The winter fuel allowance will be means tested, she says - to save £2.1bn a year. Or about 1/40th of what Brexit will cost us. It will now not be available to "wealthy" pensioners, although the Tories definition of wealthy does vacillate quite wildly when it comes to handing out benefits or deciding tax liabilities, so this may cause more hardship to those in need.


Whether this is enough to dent the -vote-conservative-whatever- pensioner army support remains to be seen. It does fit in with the Tories' manifesto promise to increase poverty absolutely everywhere apart from the Square Mile though, so one has to give her points for transparency.

Thrugelmir

CKhalvashi wrote: »

They are funded as part of a network by the EU, with membership fees from member governments.

How much is spent in administration on that specific scheme I don't know, however I consider from personal experience that most offer good value for money in terms of tax returns for money spent.

Governments raise money through tax. There's no magic money tree that pays Government fees.

Your personal experience is that you benefit I suspect . Whether the total amount spent to fund the scheme provides value for money is another matter. In the UK. Where the National Audit Office reports independently to Westminster on such matters. The full reports are publicly available. There's not the same transparency level of transparency and accountability within Brussels.

Enterprise_1701C

Why should the winter fuel payment not be means tested, I have never quite understood why millionaires are as entitled to that as the poorer pensioners. And I am a Tory.

Arklight

New poll says that Labour has taken another 5 points off the Tories, who now have a 13 point lead according to Yougov.


http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/election-2017-labour-tory-lead-cut-latest-polls-party-campaign-high-jeremy-corbyn-theresa-may-a7742001.html


This is still quite a lead, but it isn't the 22 point lead May had when calling the election, and the trend is not in her direction.


My experience of canvassing for Labour on the streets is that there is no chance at all of Labour turning round Tory / UKIP voters - or Labour supporters who have left, whether or not they consider themselves to be borderline. But there is a real upswell of support from people who either haven't voted before, or rarely vote - or are Green or Lib Dem and can't face wasting their vote again (the locals were quite helpful here as they demonstrated in many wards the anti Tory vote would have buried the Conservatives in many areas.) . They seem to sense a real opportunity that things can change. There is a feeling of excitement that is surprising a lot of people.


Interesting times!

gfplux

Enterprise_1701C wrote: »

Why should the winter fuel payment not be means tested, I have never quite understood why millionaires are as entitled to that as the poorer pensioners. And I am a Tory.

I totally agree. However it will be interesting to see how the Torys define wealthy.
The Labour Party suggest that earning £80,000 pa is wealthy.

gfplux

Arklight wrote: »

New poll says that Labour has taken another 5 points off the Tories, who now have a 13 point lead according to Yougov.


http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/election-2017-labour-tory-lead-cut-latest-polls-party-campaign-high-jeremy-corbyn-theresa-may-a7742001.html


This is still quite a lead, but it isn't the 22 point lead May had when calling the election, and the trend is not in her direction.


My experience of canvassing for Labour on the streets is that there is no chance at all of Labour turning round Tory / UKIP voters - or Labour supporters who have left, whether or not they consider themselves to be borderline. But there is a real upswell of support from people who either haven't voted before, or rarely vote - or are Green or Lib Dem and can't face wasting their vote again (the locals were quite helpful here as they demonstrated in many wards the anti Tory vote would have buried the Conservatives in many areas.) . They seem to sense a real opportunity that things can change. There is a feeling of excitement that is surprising a lot of people.


Interesting times!

Thank you for that. News from the coal face. Perhaps you could update your experience a couple of times as we count down to the Election.

Arklight

Enterprise_1701C wrote: »

Why should the winter fuel payment not be means tested, I have never quite understood why millionaires are as entitled to that as the poorer pensioners. And I am a Tory.

Sometimes it's more expensive to means test benefits than just to give them to everyone. It depends what May's definition of wealthy is and how many recipients will be excluded.

ThinkingOutLoud_2

gfplux wrote: »

I totally agree. However it will be interesting to see how the Torys define wealthy.
The Labour Party suggest that earning £80,000 pa is wealthy.

This is rather odd from you.

The WFL is a benefit paid currently to many who have perfectly decent incomes in retirement.The impact on them is at max a few hundred pounds not the many thousand of the Labour rich tax. I believe the aim I read was to give the WFA to any who receive pension credit.

Should not benefits be focussed on those in greater need?
Your ability to help the poor is diluted if you give free money to the better off.
The money saved is to all go to social care.

There are plenty of posts here and elsewhere suggesting many better off pensioner feel the WFA is unnecessary for them. I am sure some will hate to lose it, but can afford to.

The Lib Dems proposed this way back too.

Arklight

gfplux wrote: »

Thank you for that. News from the coal face. Perhaps you could update your experience a couple of times as we count down to the Election.

Happy to. I'm going out again tonight. Was out over the weekend where my Home Counties Conservative heartland elected a Lid Dem for the locals, for the first time. A lot of Labour and Green people voted tactically. Further afield we were very close in a lot of wards. In one we had a handful of votes 4 years ago and were 28 from winning outright this time.


The locals weren't great for Labour in terms of seats but there was a whole story of demographic shift and trendlines away from previously safe Tory councils that wasn't told in the media.


The sudden announcement of the GE has actually been quite helpful as we can keep that momentum going. There are also a lot of previously non voters, Green and Lib Dem people turning up to meetings who say they can't stand it any more and they just want the Tories out, and a feeling developing that we can do it.


The local Labour candidate for this area scheduled an hour for a town centre stall and she was late for the rest of the day because people were literally lining up down the street to meet her. And this is in a town where you'd have said there is no point Labour even turning up, a year ago.


It's a self fulfilling prophecy though, people think Labour can't win so they don't bother voting. The increase in party membership has added a lot of manpower, the more people see us out and about the more likely they are to turn out themselves.


However the people we need to reach and who should be voting Labour for self preservation are still hard to reach, The working poor, people on benefits, the unemployed, and young people not in HE. They are hard to reach physically (not in town centres of an afternoon, often live in flats where they don't answer the buzzer, don't want to be disturbed when they are putting their kids to bed).