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  • EADD Moderators: Pissed_and_messed | Shinji Ikari

General Election 2015

Which party would you cast your vote for?

  • Conservative

    Votes: 2 4.2%

  • Labour

    Votes: 8 16.7%

  • Lib Dems

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Greens

    Votes: 14 29.2%

  • UKIP

    Votes: 3 6.3%

  • BNP

    Votes: 2 4.2%

  • SNP

    Votes: 6 12.5%

  • Plaid Cymru

    Votes: 2 4.2%

  • None of the above (feel free to post in thread)

    Votes: 11 22.9%
  • Total voters
    48
  • Poll closed .
the new snp mp's tried to nick his seat in the house of commons, 'prime heckling position'. It sounds like they are really planning to stick it to cameron and I hope they do.
 
Yes I'm sure they'd act completely differently if they had an 83 year old MP who has been sticking it to the Tories for 45 years.

Fair play my arse.

The SNP looked stupid and ungracious. Not to mention right wing. Try picking on the right people. Idiots.
 
Leave dennis alone. But on the upside, mhairi black's diary in the herald is quite heartening:

Excerpt:

Wednesday

On Wednesday we had a series of inductions on different matters such as security and parliamentary standards, which I will not go into details about. However, lunch time was quite insightful into the attitudes of some of the existing MPs and the catering staff who work there. After getting a row off of Rita at the checkout for getting chips on a piece for my lunch (as it wasn't nutritious enough and I, "need to look after" myself!), I went to sit down at a table to eat. Beside me was a table of kitchen staff who were sitting on a break, from where a woman signalled to me that I wasn't to sit beside them but to go up to the back of the room. Confused, I decided to follow her instructions as I am new and she knows what she's talking about. As I began to walk up to the back it became clear what she was talking about as I saw that there was a false partition with a sign saying "MPs only beyond this point". The minute I clicked to the division I did a U-turn and walked straight back beside the table of caterers. As I sat down I said to the woman, "If they want us to be snobby you'd think they would go all out snobby and get a different room instead of a half effort partition?!" to which the whole table responded with rapturous laughter. As we began to speak more they told us of how many MPs take their position so seriously that they refuse to sit anywhere unless it is exclusively for MPs or Lords. I expressed how ridiculous I found such a position as it actually reminded me of an episode of Friends where Joey can't sit with Ross when he begins working as a tour guide in the museum because, "blue coats don't sit with white coats". After good banter the woman said to me, "You're quite down to earth aren't you?" to which I responded, "'Normal' is the word I like to use" to which she smiled, winked and wished me a good day.

Thursday:

Once I arrived back on Thursday morning, and despite the fact all I wanted was my bed, I had to get an early train into Glasgow to carry out my voluntary work as I knew they were due to be understaffed. The full day was quite embarrassing as all the service users I have been working with for months were all ripping in about me for wearing a suit, "I saw you on the telly! Since when do you wear smart shirts?!" Although they were joking, they too could only remind me of the huge task we have in front if us as MPs. They are the real, first hand examples of just how much austerity damages people's lives - and now that people have entrusted us to make their voices heard, we must do just that.

After I had finished my shift I made my way home as I had to begin filling up the mountain of paperwork required to declare any financial interests I have. Although considering my last job was in a chip shop, I think I should be fine.

Friday:

I did paperwork and studied!
Click to expand...

http://www.heraldscotland.com/polit...which-our-heroine-goes-through-the-.126259431
 
Yeah, I'd back Skinner always. I still think there are elements of the SNP who wear the social democratic clothing fairly lightly and they need watching. It's not a good start when they're trying to bully a proper socialist.
 
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felix said:
It's not "his" seat. What a bunch of immature and archaic bullshit.

Fair play to the SNP for illustrating how weird things are down there.
Click to expand...

Immature? The SNP were/are acting like a bunch of public schoolboys drunk on Babycham visiting London for the first time. This is how they tried to usurp the Labour Left - the one group they should be making overtures to.

The SNP has launched an attack on Labour’s left wing squad in Westminster by seizing the front row seats usually occupied by the party’s awkward squad.

The rebels’ bench, down the gangway from the opposition dispatch box, is the prime spot for heckling the Prime Minister across the floor of the Commons.

It has been the preserve of Bolsover MP Dennis Skinner for over 40 years in opposition.

But ahead of the new parliament meeting for the first time today, the SNP have put their towels, or rather their MPs, on the green leather.

Three new SNP MPs were seated in the rebel benches hours ahead of the parliament meeting at 2.30pm.

The MPs were taking it in hour-long shifts to stop Skinner and left-wing Labour colleagues taking the spaces.

Partick Grady, Margaret Ferrier and Stewart Mcdonald (Glasgow South) were camped out on the seats at 11.30am to reserve space for SNP Commons leader Angus Robertson and the SNP’s front bench team.
Click to expand...

That's what I call immature.

And for the record I thought Robertson's speech was alright. Certainly in relative terms to this shite behaviour.

Sort out who your friends are.
 
Spudgun :Sure there are elements of the snp like that, but the massive surge in membership i'd guess will be mostly not like that (not to mention the voters) - and they'll be pushing them towards the left and keeping the fuckers honest. SNP have been pushed to the left by the voters - sturgeon was already on the left as i understood it which is partly why she's now leader (this is the same with leanne in plaid cymru) - correct if i'm wrong scottish people.

Edit: And i like dennis, but lets not get all misty eyed about him - how effective has he actually been in that position for 40 years? Pretty incoherent a lot of the time really. Wielding a mace is all very well, but heseltine did that too. There's an emotional attachment to him on the left, but i fear he is pretty polarising and that's maybe why the establishment is happy to keep his place for him (do you think he'd have a special seat if he really made a substantial difference?) - maybe they see him like a tame 'working class' (like off that big train sketch ('ello love' 'ello love' 'i aint eating that without daddy's sauce' 'come on you spurs!').
 
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Normal people become MPs and show up the entire charade as a bunch of fucking nonsense.

I'm really surprised that you of all people disapprove of this, SHM.
 
Aye that Mhairi black seems sound.

I treat them with caution (even although I voted for them) as they must (?) make decisions with an approach for the 'greater good' as they see it i.e. independence.

I personaly think that if another referendum came around we would say No thanks -again. However it was a risk I heavy considered before voting for Snp. Sturgeon convinced me by the fact she was challenging the Tories more than Ed.... So they better choose their battles and enemy wisely.
 
Vurtual: I'm not one of those people who claim he represents the true beating heart of the party, but I do think his presence is important. Far from being polariaing, I find even proper right wingers have a grudging respect for him and I think the Tories do actually fear at least the threat of likable, non Westminster village, working class people getting any leverage in the party, but fat chance of that happening any time soon.

And I don't mind a smidgen of incoherence if it's caused by genuine passion.
 
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I think the tories are only too happy if the only representative of the working class embodies a lot of the stereotypes that the public has already been trained to dismiss. People like mhairi 'last job was a chipshop' black are much more of a threat.

Forgot to say - thanks shambles for the nod to the frankie boyle thing - that was excellent (the bbc kept it quiet though).
 
I wasn't talking about him specifically, like he's been biding his time, but his hour is now nigh :D. I'm talking about the general idea.

I'm unsure what aspects of his personality the public would have been trained to dismiss about him though, if that were even possible or true of those that are aware of him.
 
Vurtual said:
I have to take issue with dissing 'squeezing the pips' though shambles - i'd say that's natural justice (though i would being poor). In simplistic (but largely true) terms, the rich are rich because of the actions of the poor who make their widgets for them - the rich are only as rich as the difference between what they pay the poor and the actual value of the widgets. I know there are various categories of rich and poor who don't fit this, but ultimately, that difference is still where the wealth comes from. The capitalists would have us believe that only by having them and their genetically superior randian-hero minds do we get the innovation, but i think that's bullshit (exhibit A: the entire computer industry which is often given as an example of capitalist innovation was developed by massive government/military investment over decades - capitalists would never have taken that risk))
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I agree with all of that. Problem is how to achieve this pip-squeezing. Simply raising taxes doesn't seem likely to work seeing as the cunts pay no tax anyway (comparative to earnings anyway). Far easier to pay for some "creative accountancy" than to actually pay eye-watering tax rates. I am absolutely in favour of a more just method of redistribution but I'm not convinced simply whacking the top level of tax up to 80% (or whatever) is ever going to be all that successful. There must be better ways but economics is really not my strong point (y'all're shocked to hear I can imagine). Raising minimum wage to a full living wage would be a start, perhaps. I'm rather fond of the basic income idea too (can't recall what it's called - where every household gets a certain basic income and people can work flexible hours to top it up to their own needs or desires).

Much as I dislike the way that rich folk mostly get rich by shitting on others, it seems more feasible to raise the income of those at the bottom than try to claw it back from those who can afford to work the system however they damn please.
 
Well i'm all for pragmatic - and basic/citizen's income are a good place to start as any. Though we did have top rates of tax of 90%+ for decades in uk and america and we did alright - actually buillt the modern world we know and developed the welfare state (it wasn't 90% of their whole income, just 90% of the bit over 'loads'). Plenty of the very rich avoided tax in that period by squirreling money away from their 'income' (we can fix that if we really want to), but plenty was still paid, and even many of the capitalist class were approving of the keynesianism because it provided them with a stable economy improving infrastructure and an educated workforce (and avoided the inevitable social revolution) - the capitalists benefitted as much as anyone from that long boom - they'd just started to calculate that maybe they'd benefit even more if they ditched that system - and so self-serving neoliberalism was born out of voodoo neo-classical economics (a good book or videos to learn about economics is anything by Ha Joon Chang).
 
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Replace the archaic system of tax bands (which was created in the first place to make the calculations possible without a computer, and using £.$.d -- neither of which conditions still hold now we have ubiquitous computers and decimal coinage) by a quadratic regression, of the form tax = a * wages squared + b * wages + c. Now, a would be small and c negative (but you wouldn't receive a rebate if your "tax" figure was negative; you just wouldn't pay anything. In fact if c was set so that no tax is payable at all at minimum wage, then this would encourage job creation: as an employer, you could take on a new employee at minimum wage without incurring any tax liability. Obviously this only creates minimum wage jobs, but there would be other employers offering the same deal, giving decent hardworking employees a bit of leverage -- "Pay me more or I'm outta here".
 
Makes sense - though i can imagine the average joe staring bewlidered at a quadratic equation on his p60. Combine your nice formula with a decent citizens income (you do the math(s)) and you can get rid of (most of) the benefits system too.
 
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