FlyTheNest

Lonewolfie wrote:Morning all

Have been trying (unsuccessfully) this morning to find the vote record for the Bedroom Tax yesterday...have found lists of MPs for and against, but no breakdown of numbers by party...I'm interested to see whether it is true (as has been stated) that without the Lost Deposits, there would now be no Bedroom Tax - and I know there'll be someone here who can point me in the right direction

Re Cuba...great stuff, really - some grown-up thinking that is increasing Neo-Liberal frothiness...a Cuban exile interviewed on R4 (I know - I'm a Maso-sadist) informed us all that the undemocratic Cuba was 'disgusting' and they should have proper 'democracy' to represent the people - no request from the interviewer to name/indicate a 'well-run' capitalist economy (from anywhere ever) that has represented the majority of citizens...nope...just acceptance that the 'Cuban people have been opressed'. A little later they (possibly R5Live) were discussing the US Govt response to the Sony hack attack (yep - that's right - a meeja company gets threatened with extortion, the White House and assorted blustery 'news' outlets immediately connect the actions with N Korea (as said film, that has been withdrawn, is a p**s-take of Kim Jong Il) and 'government' gets involved in the response on behalf of the commercial entity) - at which point, the grown-up being interviewed responded to the N Korean link with 'well they might say that, but they also said there were WMD in Iraq' - categorically stating that the attack was extortion and creating confusion for the journo - no matter how many times she tried to get him back to North Korean controlled secret internet servers in (Evo Morales' Marxist-Socialist) Bolivia, he just kept to 'facts'...I'm sure they won't invite him back again

PaulfromYorkshire wrote:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/po ... 31865.html

tory-chairman-grant-shapps-accused-of-trying-to-silence-leftwing-blog-with-spurious-legal-threats

refitman wrote:

Lonewolfie wrote:Morning all

Have been trying (unsuccessfully) this morning to find the vote record for the Bedroom Tax yesterday...have found lists of MPs for and against, but no breakdown of numbers by party...I'm interested to see whether it is true (as has been stated) that without the Lost Deposits, there would now be no Bedroom Tax - and I know there'll be someone here who can point me in the right direction

Re Cuba...great stuff, really - some grown-up thinking that is increasing Neo-Liberal frothiness...a Cuban exile interviewed on R4 (I know - I'm a Maso-sadist) informed us all that the undemocratic Cuba was 'disgusting' and they should have proper 'democracy' to represent the people - no request from the interviewer to name/indicate a 'well-run' capitalist economy (from anywhere ever) that has represented the majority of citizens...nope...just acceptance that the 'Cuban people have been opressed'. A little later they (possibly R5Live) were discussing the US Govt response to the Sony hack attack (yep - that's right - a meeja company gets threatened with extortion, the White House and assorted blustery 'news' outlets immediately connect the actions with N Korea (as said film, that has been withdrawn, is a p**s-take of Kim Jong Il) and 'government' gets involved in the response on behalf of the commercial entity) - at which point, the grown-up being interviewed responded to the N Korean link with 'well they might say that, but they also said there were WMD in Iraq' - categorically stating that the attack was extortion and creating confusion for the journo - no matter how many times she tried to get him back to North Korean controlled secret internet servers in (Evo Morales' Marxist-Socialist) Bolivia, he just kept to 'facts'...I'm sure they won't invite him back again

The Public Whip site will have a breakdown by party, when they list yesterdays votes (they only go up to Tuesday at the mo') http://www.publicwhip.org.uk/divisions.php" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

HindleA wrote:@Lonewolfie.


Fyi the vote yesterday was not binding,so it didn't make any difference legally the Government would just have ignored it if they had lost.

ohsocynical wrote:Whew!!!!
I bet you all thought I'd died...

Had a fatal error on the computer. Hadn't used it for a couple of days, and then when I did, it gave up the ghost. No idea what caused it.

I had to wait until I could get a memory gadget. [That cost!]
Plugged it in early yesterday evening, and then was up until 1:30 am getting some of it up and running. Won't be around much today because I have Christmas chores lined up.

Anyway, it's lovely to be back.

ohsocynical wrote:Whew!!!!
I bet you all thought I'd died...

Had a fatal error on the computer. Hadn't used it for a couple of days, and then when I did, it gave up the ghost. No idea what caused it.

I had to wait until I could get a memory gadget. [That cost!]
Plugged it in early yesterday evening, and then was up until 1:30 am getting some of it up and running. Won't be around much today because I have Christmas chores lined up.

Anyway, it's lovely to be back.

adam wrote:Andrew Sparrow has posted a link in the comments to a labour whip tweet showing how the lib dems voted here

PaulfromYorkshire wrote:http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-enter ... 31965.html

the-great-british-library-betrayal-closures-have-brought-national-network-to-brink-of-absolute-disaster-reveals-official-inquiry

Lonewolfie wrote:

PaulfromYorkshire wrote:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/po ... 31865.html

tory-chairman-grant-shapps-accused-of-trying-to-silence-leftwing-blog-with-spurious-legal-threats

yahyah wrote:

ohsocynical wrote:Whew!!!!
I bet you all thought I'd died...

Had a fatal error on the computer. Hadn't used it for a couple of days, and then when I did, it gave up the ghost. No idea what caused it.

I had to wait until I could get a memory gadget. [That cost!]
Plugged it in early yesterday evening, and then was up until 1:30 am getting some of it up and running. Won't be around much today because I have Christmas chores lined up.

Anyway, it's lovely to be back.

Lovely to have you back OhSo.
Don't suppose you've had time to bake us any mince pies [where's the little hungry piggy icon ?]

80,000 UK students are told they can't train as a nurse: Thousands can't get on courses despite four in five new NHS workers being foreign
Nurses in their 40s who left to start families can't find jobs to return to
It has emerged that it costs NHS £70,000 to train a nurse for three years
But for the same amount it can hire three qualified foreigners
Hospitals recruited almost 6,000 overseas nurses last year
Estimated there are 100,000 applicants a year for 20,000 training places
Government has cut number of places, from 20,829 in 2009/10 to 17,219 in 2012/13 – although it rose last year to 19,206
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... reign.html

Hospitals recruited almost 6,000 overseas nurses last year, a four-fold increase on the previous year.
Four out of five new NHS nurses are foreign, with managers flying to Spain and Portugal to hire up to 50 at a time. Dr Peter Carter, of the Royal College of Nursing, yesterday accused the Government of ‘lamentable workforce planning’.

‘We’ve now got a crisis and we’ve got trusts recruiting from all points of the compass,’ he added.
Dr Sarah Wollaston, the chairman of the Health Select Committee, said it was ‘time to deliver’ the workforce the NHS needs and to give thousands of young Britons a chance.

Kate Green retweeted
Andrew Copson ‏@andrewcopson 6m6 minutes ago
“@BHAhumanists: Major update: @UKLabour pledge legalise #humanist marriages if returned to power. https://humanism.org.uk/2014/12/18/labo ... s-couples/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; …” <breaking news!

Mehdi Hasan to host new weekly show on Al Jazeera
http://pr.aljazeera.com/post/1055146165 ... al-jazeera
ournalist Mehdi Hasan is to host a new programme on global broadcaster Al Jazeera English. He joins the channel full-time for the weekly show, which will broadcast from Washington DC. Kicking off in 2015, it means he will move to the US from London.

Hasan will go behind the headlines to examine important stories through in-depth, hard-hitting interviews with big-name guests and lively discussions involving experts from across the world. ...

Mehdi Hasan is an award-winning British journalist, broadcaster, author and social commentator. He moves to Al Jazeera from the Huffington Post UK where he was political director. ...

Lord Ashcroft: Moderate Tory cheer and a fright for Labour in my final marginals poll for 2014
http://www.conservativehome.com/platfor ... -2014.html

In previous rounds I have said I wanted to find the point in the Conservative-Labour battleground at which seats consistently stay blue and the damage stops. Well, it has not stopped yet, though I suspect Labour will be disappointed not to be inflicting more of it.

In the last few weeks I have polled 1,000 voters in each of the eight seats with Tory majorities over Labour of between 7.1 per cent and 8.1 per cent. On the basis of this snapshot, four of the eight would stay in Conservative hands – Carmarthen West & South Pembrokeshire, Elmet & Rothwell, Harrow East, Pendle, and Warwick & Leamington (each with swings to Labour of 2.5 per cent or below) – and a fifth, South Swindon, would be a tie. Labour would gain Stevenage with a 5 per cent swing and Ealing Central & Acton with a 7 per cent swing.

On the Labour-UKIP battleground I looked at four constituencies in which, according to the Fabian Society’s Revolt On The Left report, Labour are at “critical” or “high” risk of a direct challenge from UKIP: Great Grimsby, Dudley North, Plymouth Moor View and Rother Valley.

I found Labour ahead – just – in all four of these seats. But if the Labour Party is worried about them, it has good reason to be. In three of the seats I found UKIP ahead by up to six points on the standard voting intention question, and they were tied with Labour in Dudley. It was only when people were asked how they would vote in their own constituency that Labour’s lead reasserted itself: six points in Rother Valley, five points in Plymouth Moor View, three points in Dudley North and one point in Great Grimsby. In the seats as a whole the swing to UKIP was 13.5 per cent.

In the unique constituency of Brighton Pavilion, I found the Green Party ten points ahead, with a four-point swing from Labour. Curiously, a higher proportion of voters here said they would prefer Miliband as PM (45 per cent), and that they wanted to see a Labour government (43 per cent) than in any of the seats where Labour are actually ahead.

Again, the ground campaign looks closely fought, with 27 per cent saying they had heard locally from the Greens and 26 per cent saying they had heard from Labour.

rearofthestore wrote:Good Morning
A new IPSOS Mori poll this morning shows the Tories leading Labour (CONS 32% LAB 29%) by 3%. So according to this poll Labour will only get the same % they achieved in 2010 although same poll shows LibDems down by 14% (2010 23%, This Poll 9%). I just don't see it as credible but maybe I'm wrong.

Jamie Reed ‏@jreedmp 6m6 minutes ago
Anyone up for a 'Twelve Daves of Christmas' tweet-a-long later?
#davemas

rebeccariots2 wrote:

rearofthestore wrote:Good Morning
A new IPSOS Mori poll this morning shows the Tories leading Labour (CONS 32% LAB 29%) by 3%. So according to this poll Labour will only get the same % they achieved in 2010 although same poll shows LibDems down by 14% (2010 23%, This Poll 9%). I just don't see it as credible but maybe I'm wrong.

What's Ukip doing on that poll?

rearofthestore wrote:

rebeccariots2 wrote:

rearofthestore wrote:Good Morning
A new IPSOS Mori poll this morning shows the Tories leading Labour (CONS 32% LAB 29%) by 3%. So according to this poll Labour will only get the same % they achieved in 2010 although same poll shows LibDems down by 14% (2010 23%, This Poll 9%). I just don't see it as credible but maybe I'm wrong.

What's Ukip doing on that poll?

UKIP are only on 13% but Greens are on 9%.

Angela Eagle ‏@angelaeagle 17m17 minutes ago
UKIP nativity play: the 3 wise men have been sent back where they came from & they've told the Virgin Mary to stop breast feeding in public

rebeccariots2 wrote:

rearofthestore wrote:

rebeccariots2 wrote: What's Ukip doing on that poll?

UKIP are only on 13% but Greens are on 9%.

Hmmmm. The polls really are all over the place aren't they. As Smithson said we've got two polls on the same day - one with a 5% lead for Labour and one with Conservatives 3% ahead.

And elsewhere I see Farage's leader approval ratings have plunged since all the expenses, racist, homophobic goings on .... I wonder when that IPSOS Mori poll was done?

rearofthestore wrote:

rebeccariots2 wrote:

rearofthestore wrote: UKIP are only on 13% but Greens are on 9%.

Hmmmm. The polls really are all over the place aren't they. As Smithson said we've got two polls on the same day - one with a 5% lead for Labour and one with Conservatives 3% ahead.

And elsewhere I see Farage's leader approval ratings have plunged since all the expenses, racist, homophobic goings on .... I wonder when that IPSOS Mori poll was done?

P_R_Proudhon 2h ago
I would rather talk to my dogs arse and if she chose to respond by farting at me then I would find this more acceptable than listen to the puerile yet polished responses from this sham of a man, good riddance at the next election, arse.

rearofthestore wrote:

rearofthestore wrote:

rebeccariots2 wrote: Hmmmm. The polls really are all over the place aren't they. As Smithson said we've got two polls on the same day - one with a 5% lead for Labour and one with Conservatives 3% ahead.

And elsewhere I see Farage's leader approval ratings have plunged since all the expenses, racist, homophobic goings on .... I wonder when that IPSOS Mori poll was done?

Fieldwork was 13th to 15th December.
Edited to add Sample is 1012 and unweighted result was LAB 32% CON 30%

Badger culls have failed for a second year - Maria Eagle

Maria Eagle MP, Labour’s Shadow Environment Secretary, responding to today’s Written Ministerial Statement on Bovine TB, said:

“It is appalling that these badger culls went ahead for a second year when they had already been described by David Macdonald the chief scientific advisor to Natural England as an ‘epic failure’.

“The target set in Gloucestershire has been spectacularly missed whilst the Somerset target was only narrowly reached meaning that if anything these culls will make the problem of bovine TB worse.

“The Government must today commit to abandoning any attempt to continue these unscientific, inhumane and ineffective badger culls. They must instead work with scientists, wildlife groups and farmers to develop an alternative strategy to get the problem of Bovine TB under control.”

mikems wrote:A lot of hysteria from the right today about the US/Cuba diplomatic agreement. Owen Jones joining in claiming that embargoed and threatened Cuba is a 'dictatorship'. Funny dictatorship that is run by mass participation and non-party elections.

Never mind. It is a dictatorship because corrupt western governments say it is and 'left-wingers' currying favour will fall into line. Fuck 'em. I support the Cuban people and their government - it's not a dictatorship, it is a country living under permanent threat from the world hyperpower and subjected to regular economic, political and military attack, including from state sponsored terrorism.

What the right want, and won't get, is multi-party elections that they can fund and corrupt. The Cuban people aren't that stupid and have learnt enough these last fifty years not to be bought by their enemies.

rebeccariots2 wrote:

rearofthestore wrote:

rearofthestore wrote:

Fieldwork was 13th to 15th December.
Edited to add Sample is 1012 and unweighted result was LAB 32% CON 30%

I see Smithson has tweeted that the IPSOS fieldwork was done before Osborne's Autumn Statement ...

Government admits badger cull could fail to reduce bovine TB
Controversial cull will continue despite government admitting for the first time that the Gloucestershire cull may prove unsuccessful due to low number of badgers killed
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/ ... -bovine-tb