Wednesday 13th May

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:32 pm

This article below is prior to a flashing red banner on the Guardian notifying us all the letters are published, therefore, Dave is wasting his time.

PM to seek cross-party consensus for veto on publication of documents
Downing Street speaks of need to protect confidential correspondence hours before publication of Charles’s memos

"The Guardian journalist Rob Evans first lodged a request to see memos between Charles and ministers in various departments when the Freedom of Information Act was in its infancy, coming into effect under Tony Blair at the start of 2005. Blair later berated himself as “a naive, foolish, irresponsible nincompoop” for introducing it.

The requests were originally refused by Whitehall mandarins, who were supported by the information commissioner in a December 2009 ruling.

The Guardian fought on, appealing against that decision. After a six-day hearing at the upper tribunal, judges ruled on 18 September 2012 they should be released after all. But on 16 October 2012 the then attorney general, Dominic Grieve, used a ministerial veto to block the release. That was challenged again by the Guardian, which won at the court of appeal on 12 March 2014. Lord Dyson, the master of the rolls, said Grieve did not have reasonable grounds for issuing the veto “merely because he disagrees with the decision” of the tribunal.

In a final bid to maintain secrecy, the attorney general appealed to the supreme court and lost in a judgment handed down by Lord Neuberger, its president, on 26 March this year."

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015 ... hs-letters" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I'll add the allegation Blair thought the introduction of his Freedom of Information Act to my list of incomprehensibles.

JustMom · Post by **JustMom** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:32 pm

Afternoon all, has anyone else noticed a change with their local councils. I have been a tenant for over 50 odd years,but never had a letter like we did recently. It said I was to receive my annual visit and would I have all relevant identification handy when he arrived.
He came today and asked for the names of all people living here,which is just me,my husband and 2 sons. I had to produce id which could not be a bank statement,god knows why. He said every council tenant in birm ingham was getting this.

Tonibel · Post by **Tonibel** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:37 pm

yahyah wrote:Cameron, reported to be going to say later today:

"For too long, we have been a passively tolerant society, saying to our citizens 'as long as you obey the law, we will leave you alone'.

Have to say I've not been one of those who get that hung up on the more notional edge of civil liberties, but that sounds decidedly odd. Maybe just out of context, hopefully so,

I read this in my hardcopy of I earlier and had to re-read in case I'd misunderstood. I'm glad you confirm my interpretation.
I have emailed the editor to say this should be front page news. Don't expect a reply.

rebeccariots2 · Post by **rebeccariots2** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:38 pm

JustMom wrote:Afternoon all, has anyone else noticed a change with their local councils. I have been a tenant for over 50 odd years,but never had a letter like we did recently. It said I was to receive my annual visit and would I have all relevant identification handy when he arrived.
He came today and asked for the names of all people living here,which is just me,my husband and 2 sons. I had to produce id which could not be a bank statement,god knows why. He said every council tenant in birm ingham was getting this.

That sounds rather off ... did he himself have satisfactory ID? And what did he say the purpose of the 'annual visit' was?

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:43 pm

StephenDolan wrote:http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/20 ... -you-think

Grim reading. Doesn’t seem to factor in changes to Tory, UKIP or Lib Dem VI in current Tory seats though?

"How badly did Labour lose? Worse than you think.

To secure a majority of one, Labour now needs a swing of 8.75 percent across the United Kingdom, analysis passed to the New Statesman has revealed."

That's as far as I got, StephenDolan, before recognising that jackass percentage swing must-haves as the lamebrained poll-speak it has demonstrated itself to be.

After reading Willow904's account of the BBC's social security sanctioning figures & now the NewStatesman's percentage swing, those news outlets should combine their mathematical, journalistic genius & get nowhere.

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:46 pm

Haven't had a chance to read all of the posts today so apologies if anyone has already mentioned this.

On Radio 4 today.

Undecided voters. They followed around eight undecided voters for a year. Checked in with them around four times.

Only one of them mentioned the NHS as being any concern in the way they'd vote, and that was because he'd just been to the States and seen their system. He said it made his stomach churn at the thought of losing it. And he finally voted ---- Tory!!!!!

Mr Ohso and I were gobsmacked. TV and the newspapers have a lot to answer for.

JustMom · Post by **JustMom** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:46 pm

Yes Rebecca,he said it was a new thing just bought in,but what worried me was several posts on facebook had the same,but the chap poked around their wardrobes and was counting their toothbrushes. I must be honest it scared me a little.

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:47 pm

rebeccariots2 wrote:
JustMom wrote:Afternoon all, has anyone else noticed a change with their local councils. I have been a tenant for over 50 odd years,but never had a letter like we did recently. It said I was to receive my annual visit and would I have all relevant identification handy when he arrived.
He came today and asked for the names of all people living here,which is just me,my husband and 2 sons. I had to produce id which could not be a bank statement,god knows why. He said every council tenant in birm ingham was getting this.
That sounds rather off ... did he himself have satisfactory ID? And what did he say the purpose of the 'annual visit' was?

Alarm bells are sounding.

rebeccariots2 · Post by **rebeccariots2** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:49 pm

JustMom wrote:Yes Rebecca,he said it was a new thing just bought in,but what worried me was several posts on facebook had the same,but the chap poked around their wardrobes and was counting their toothbrushes. I must be honest it scared me a little.

That is absolutely vile. It takes me back to the days of 'National Assistance' when similar 'men' used to come round to check women receiving it didn't have any evidence of men around the house ... My mum had to put up with that when she was trying to bring 4 children up on her own.

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:50 pm

Tonibel wrote:
yahyah wrote:Cameron, reported to be going to say later today:

"For too long, we have been a passively tolerant society, saying to our citizens 'as long as you obey the law, we will leave you alone'.

Have to say I've not been one of those who get that hung up on the more notional edge of civil liberties, but that sounds decidedly odd. Maybe just out of context, hopefully so,
I read this in my hardcopy of I earlier and had to re-read in case I'd misunderstood. I'm glad you confirm my interpretation.
I have emailed the editor to say this should be front page news. Don't expect a reply.

And on the news they were saying groups which stir up hatred...What about the Sun newspaper. And the Mail?

Willow904 · Post by **Willow904** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:52 pm

StephenDolan wrote:http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/20 ... -you-think

Grim reading. Doesn’t seem to factor in changes to Tory, UKIP or Lib Dem VI in current Tory seats though?

It seems to ignore the very strange circumstance that the only places there was a substantial swing from Labour to Tories were in the Tory/Labour marginals where it counted. Nationally there was very little movement in the vote share for either Labour or the Tories, with Labour doing slightly better overall.

This wasn't a catastrophe for Labour. This was a catastrophe for our democratic system. Just 901 people got to choose between a Labour led government or a Tory majority. Very different from 1931 when over 50% of voters actively chose a Tory government.

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:54 pm

Tonibel wrote:
yahyah wrote:Cameron, reported to be going to say later today:

"For too long, we have been a passively tolerant society, saying to our citizens 'as long as you obey the law, we will leave you alone'.

Have to say I've not been one of those who get that hung up on the more notional edge of civil liberties, but that sounds decidedly odd. Maybe just out of context, hopefully so,
I read this in my hardcopy of I earlier and had to re-read in case I'd misunderstood. I'm glad you confirm my interpretation.
I have emailed the editor to say this should be front page news. Don't expect a reply.

Britain is too tolerant and should interfere more in people's lives, says David Cameron

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/po ... 46517.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Help me understand, please, this news from the Tories is unhinged.

utopiandreams · Post by **utopiandreams** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:56 pm

Willow904 wrote:I wonder if someone can help me with some strange figures.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-32719554" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

In the year to December, 605,595 Jobseeker's Allowance (JSA) claimants had payments stopped, compared with 899,576 in the previous year......

The number of people having ESA payments stopped rose from 21,219 in 2013 to 64,193 in 2014....

The Department for Work and Pensions says the sanctions regime is a necessary part of the benefits system.

It said 94% of JSA claimants, and 99% of ESA claimants, were not sanctioned.
So only 6% of JSA claimants were sanctioned. If 605,595 is 6% of all JSA claimants doesn't that mean that the total number of JSA claimants is something knocking on 10 million? This has been published on the BBC website and yet the figures quoted suggest one or other of the DWPs official figures are essentially very wrong. Does no one in the world of journalism give a stuff anymore? Do they not notice the figures they are being given make no sense? Or am I missing something? The current figure for JSA claimants is 764,000. How can the BBC print this stuff and not notice the discrepancy?

I'm not about to examine the figures, Willow, as have other stuff.to do. IIRC when Esther repeatedly claimed to a Select Committee that over 99% of ESA claimants were not sanctioned, published figures indicated such relationship between monthly sanctions and caseload. Even allowing for churn and secondary sanctions they were not representative of claimants sanctioned during a claim.

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:56 pm

Willow904 wrote:
StephenDolan wrote:http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/20 ... -you-think

Grim reading. Doesn’t seem to factor in changes to Tory, UKIP or Lib Dem VI in current Tory seats though?
It seems to ignore the very strange circumstance that the only places there was a substantial swing from Labour to Tories were in the Tory/Labour marginals where it counted. Nationally there was very little movement in the vote share for either Labour or the Tories, with Labour doing slightly better overall.

This wasn't a catastrophe for Labour. This was a catastrophe for our democratic system. Just 901 people got to choose between a Labour led government or a Tory majority. Very different from 1931 when over 50% of voters actively chose a Tory government.

I don't disbelieve you, Willow904, may I please have confirmation from your workings?

I get it, I think, I've been pursuing the number of extraordinarily close numbers making the difference in seats.

seeingclearly · Post by **seeingclearly** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:58 pm

ohsocynical wrote:
Tonibel wrote:
yahyah wrote:Cameron, reported to be going to say later today:

"For too long, we have been a passively tolerant society, saying to our citizens 'as long as you obey the law, we will leave you alone'.

Have to say I've not been one of those who get that hung up on the more notional edge of civil liberties, but that sounds decidedly odd. Maybe just out of context, hopefully so,
I read this in my hardcopy of I earlier and had to re-read in case I'd misunderstood. I'm glad you confirm my interpretation.
I have emailed the editor to say this should be front page news. Don't expect a reply.
And on the news they were saying groups which stir up hatred...What about the Sun newspaper. And the Mail?

What about the DWP? Or the Home Office? Or is it ok for government departments to do what the people shouldn't do. That moral compass just can't stop spinning.

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Wed 13 May, 2015 4:59 pm

rebeccariots2 wrote:
JustMom wrote:Yes Rebecca,he said it was a new thing just bought in,but what worried me was several posts on facebook had the same,but the chap poked around their wardrobes and was counting their toothbrushes. I must be honest it scared me a little.
That is absolutely vile. It takes me back to the days of 'National Assistance' when similar 'men' used to come round to check women receiving it didn't have any evidence of men around the house ... My mum had to put up with that when she was trying to bring 4 children up on her own.

Y'all this is crazy what is happening here?

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:00 pm

seeingclearly wrote:
ohsocynical wrote:
Tonibel wrote: I read this in my hardcopy of I earlier and had to re-read in case I'd misunderstood. I'm glad you confirm my interpretation.
I have emailed the editor to say this should be front page news. Don't expect a reply.
And on the news they were saying groups which stir up hatred...What about the Sun newspaper. And the Mail?
What about the DWP? Or the Home Office? Or is it ok for government departments to do what the people shouldn't do. That moral compass just can't stop spinning.

Is there some place we can go for safety?

edited to write I'm not being a smart-ass. I'm quite seriously alarmed for us all.

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:00 pm

seeingclearly wrote:
citizenJA wrote:
AngryAsWell wrote: The result was not declared at the count at Margate's Winter Gardens until about 10.35 GMT on Friday, hours later than expected.

BBC reporters were told by officials at the time the delays were caused by the sheer volume of ballot papers and problems verifying the postal vote.

Turnout was 69%, up from 65% in 2010.

Claims of suspicious behaviour appeared on social media following the delays.

Labour's South Thanet candidate Will Scobie, who received 11,740 votes, said he thought the count took a long time because they were "trying to do two constituencies at once".

"If police are investigating we'll have to wait and see what the outcome is," he added.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-32725167" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I still cannot reconcile long voter queues, "sheer volume of ballot papers" quotes and voting stations having to bring in extra booths with a 66% average turnout, only up 1% from the last election.
Neither can I.
"The definition of harmful is to include a risk of public disorder, a risk of harassment, alarm, or distress..."
Dave makes someone being personally horrid to him a crime.

A friend in a neighbouring ward, same constituency posted a pic of queues. It wasn't a particularly nice day here quite cold, and the temperature dropped quite quickly, people were in coats. It's a safe seat but people weren't taking chances. He said they were nearly all talking of voting Labour. I'd been listening to the news and they were estimating an average of 73% with the highest turnouts hitting 80%. In hindsight I wish I'd kept some of the audio. I mentioned this here afterwards, perhaps Friday. It's baffled me because they used some generic phrase on the lines of an exceptionally high turnout.

I did a couple of spells of Telling last Thursday. We had Conservative councilors hanging around all day as well as their Tellers. They were predicting over 73% turnout. 80% was mentioned at one time. And we had queues which some of them had never seen before.
I'm a newbie only did the EU elections last year so had nothing to judge it against.

Turnout for the 2015 General Election in Bracknell was 65.58 per cent, with 53,300 people voting, a slight drop on 2010’s 67.8 per cent.

Dr Lee increased his 2010 majority of 27,327 to 29,606, which is 55.5 per cent of the total vote.

Labour candidate James Walsh was in second place with 8,956 votes, narrowly beating UKIP's Richard Thomas in third place, who received 8,339 votes.

In fourth place was Liberal Democrat Patrick Smith, with 3,983 votes, and fifth was Green Party candidate Derek Florey with 2,202.

Willow904 · Post by **Willow904** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:03 pm

citizenJA wrote:
Willow904 wrote:
StephenDolan wrote:http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/20 ... -you-think

Grim reading. Doesn’t seem to factor in changes to Tory, UKIP or Lib Dem VI in current Tory seats though?
It seems to ignore the very strange circumstance that the only places there was a substantial swing from Labour to Tories were in the Tory/Labour marginals where it counted. Nationally there was very little movement in the vote share for either Labour or the Tories, with Labour doing slightly better overall.

This wasn't a catastrophe for Labour. This was a catastrophe for our democratic system. Just 901 people got to choose between a Labour led government or a Tory majority. Very different from 1931 when over 50% of voters actively chose a Tory government.
I don't disbelieve you, Willow904, may I please have confirmation from your workings?

Whoops. It was the difference between a minority or majority Tory government.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/ampp3d/gen ... 00-5682492" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The point stands. The Tories got a smidgeon more vote share than last time. The change of government doesn't reflect a change in their support or the support for Labour, just a change of distribution. Labour did as badly as in 2010 is what I'm basically trying to say and the Tories no better. This article talks of it being tougher than you think for Labour to get back to power. I'm just saying it's no tougher than last time.

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:05 pm

Willow904 wrote:
citizenJA wrote:
Willow904 wrote: It seems to ignore the very strange circumstance that the only places there was a substantial swing from Labour to Tories were in the Tory/Labour marginals where it counted. Nationally there was very little movement in the vote share for either Labour or the Tories, with Labour doing slightly better overall.

This wasn't a catastrophe for Labour. This was a catastrophe for our democratic system. Just 901 people got to choose between a Labour led government or a Tory majority. Very different from 1931 when over 50% of voters actively chose a Tory government.
I don't disbelieve you, Willow904, may I please have confirmation from your workings?
Whoops. It was the difference between a minority or majority Tory government.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/ampp3d/gen ... 00-5682492" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The point stands. The Tories got a smidgeon more vote share than last time. The change of government doesn't reflect a change in their support or the support for Labour, just a change of distribution. Labour did as badly as in 2010 is what I'm basically trying to say and the Tories no better. This article talks of it being tougher than you think for Labour to get back to power. I'm just saying it's no tougher than last time.

Understand completely. Yes. Thank you, Willow904.

ephemerid · Post by **ephemerid** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:05 pm

Willow904 wrote:I wonder if someone can help me with some strange figures.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-32719554" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

In the year to December, 605,595 Jobseeker's Allowance (JSA) claimants had payments stopped, compared with 899,576 in the previous year......

The number of people having ESA payments stopped rose from 21,219 in 2013 to 64,193 in 2014....

The Department for Work and Pensions says the sanctions regime is a necessary part of the benefits system.

It said 94% of JSA claimants, and 99% of ESA claimants, were not sanctioned.
So only 6% of JSA claimants were sanctioned. If 605,595 is 6% of all JSA claimants doesn't that mean that the total number of JSA claimants is something knocking on 10 million? This has been published on the BBC website and yet the figures quoted suggest one or other of the DWPs official figures are essentially very wrong. Does no one in the world of journalism give a stuff anymore? Do they not notice the figures they are being given make no sense? Or am I missing something? The current figure for JSA claimants is 764,000. How can the BBC print this stuff and not notice the discrepancy?

DWP has published a press release today - that's where the figures come from.

The headline is what the BBC has chosen to regurgitate, as usual. It makes no sense whatsoever.

Below the headline statements is a link to a document which says JSA and ESA sanctions decisions made to December 2014.
That is a spreadsheet of sanctions decisions applied to ESA claimants. Not JSA claimants.

There is nothing there at all about sanctions applied to JSA claimants.

The ESA sanctions information covers the period October 2008 to December 2014. Eight years.
124,000 decisions to apply a sanction - 84,000 decisions reversed on reconsideration/appeal.
Over the full 8 years, about 40,000 ESA claimants had a sanction applied that stuck.
The majority of those were sanctioned from 2010, half of them last year.
That means that sanctioning ill people is increasing year on year under the new regime.
ESA claimants now lose 70% of their ESA - before, it was 25%.

There are 763,800 people claiming JSA according to the ONS.
Add to those people now on Universal Credit JSA element and not working - ONS figure is now 799,400.

There are also people on various "training" schemes or workfare etc. who are involved with the jobcentre, still claiming various different allowances, and still subject to sanctions. It is estimated there are 120,000 of them at any given time.
We are now at 919,800.

Now it gets more complicated - because some people get more than one sanction, but can't get more than three.
As we don't have the JSA figures on a spreadsheet (despite the headline claiming they are there) we don't know how that breaks down.
DWP is saying that there were 605,595 sanctions applied.
DWP doesn't tell us how many PEOPLE were sanctioned.

But - if all the people who were sanctioned got three, they would not be claiming JSA due to the three-strikes rule.
So we have to assume that the people sanctioned got one or two.
If they got two, that's 303,297.
6% of 919,800 JSA claimants is 55,118.

I am as pissed off with the journalists who look no further than the headlines of DWP press releases as you are, Willow.
Whoever put up that article has not noticed that there are no JSA stats on the spreadsheets because they didn't look.

Other figures I have seen in the labyrinth of DWP stats indicate that of all JSA claimants, those who claim for more than 3 months will get at least one sanction; claim for a year and they are statistically likely to get another.
One of the difficulties in keeping up with this is "churn" - 80% of JSA claimants sign off within 3 months. There is a constant churn going on; but the figures given and the lack of churn in people who claim for a long time suggest to me that two-thirds of them are being referred for a sanction and half of those will get a disallowance.
The average length of sanction disallowances currently is 12 weeks. Claimants must continue to sign on and jobsearch, whether they appeal or not. If they do, they have to have a Mandatory Consideration of Review during which their payments are suspended.

I have said this many many times - we are being lied to on a massive scale. Any journalist who is so lazy that they don't do what I've just done is a disgrace to their profession. It took me just a few minutes to see that the headline statement is a lie and the document it links to is not what the press release says it is.

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:06 pm

Swarthlander wrote:Good morning.

For the bird watchers and in my best Brian Blessed voice - The Swallows Have ARRIVED!

Two days ago here. I know my year has started when they swoop screeching over the house. We only get a few now.

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:07 pm

Oh, see there's how the Tories get to cheat. By making it plausible. This government has no mandate to do this. Interfering with law-abiding people wasn't in the Tory manifesto.

mikems · Post by **mikems** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:14 pm

The Evil Nanny State.

AngryAsWell · Post by **AngryAsWell** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:16 pm

citizenJA wrote:
Willow904 wrote:
StephenDolan wrote:http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/20 ... -you-think

Grim reading. Doesn’t seem to factor in changes to Tory, UKIP or Lib Dem VI in current Tory seats though?
It seems to ignore the very strange circumstance that the only places there was a substantial swing from Labour to Tories were in the Tory/Labour marginals where it counted. Nationally there was very little movement in the vote share for either Labour or the Tories, with Labour doing slightly better overall.

This wasn't a catastrophe for Labour. This was a catastrophe for our democratic system. Just 901 people got to choose between a Labour led government or a Tory majority. Very different from 1931 when over 50% of voters actively chose a Tory government.
I don't disbelieve you, Willow904, may I please have confirmation from your workings?

I get it, I think, I've been pursuing the number of extraordinarily close numbers making the difference in seats.

There form here
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/ampp3d/gen ... 00-5682492" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

ScarletGas · Post by **ScarletGas** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:16 pm

seeingclearly wrote:
citizenJA wrote:
AngryAsWell wrote: The result was not declared at the count at Margate's Winter Gardens until about 10.35 GMT on Friday, hours later than expected.

BBC reporters were told by officials at the time the delays were caused by the sheer volume of ballot papers and problems verifying the postal vote.

Turnout was 69%, up from 65% in 2010.

Claims of suspicious behaviour appeared on social media following the delays.

Labour's South Thanet candidate Will Scobie, who received 11,740 votes, said he thought the count took a long time because they were "trying to do two constituencies at once".

"If police are investigating we'll have to wait and see what the outcome is," he added.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-32725167" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I still cannot reconcile long voter queues, "sheer volume of ballot papers" quotes and voting stations having to bring in extra booths with a 66% average turnout, only up 1% from the last election.
Neither can I.
"The definition of harmful is to include a risk of public disorder, a risk of harassment, alarm, or distress..."
Dave makes someone being personally horrid to him a crime.

A friend in a neighbouring ward, same constituency posted a pic of queues. It wasn't a particularly nice day here quite cold, and the temperature dropped quite quickly, people were in coats. It's a safe seat but people weren't taking chances. He said they were nearly all talking of voting Labour. I'd been listening to the news and they were estimating an average of 73% with the highest turnouts hitting 80%. In hindsight I wish I'd kept some of the audio. I mentioned this here afterwards, perhaps Friday. It's baffled me because they used some generic phrase on the lines of an exceptionally high turnout.

I have to say that generally I do not set too great a store on conspiracy theories and not sure I should go too far with this generally, although the South Thanet apocryphal reports do raise an eyebrow.

This,however,from personal experience.

My wife and I live in a part of rural Oxfordshire that have never (and I mean never) elected anything other than a tory in with less than 45% of the vote. In fact the local elections allowed us to vote for up to six candidates. Of the seven listed six (yes six!) were tory.

On the way to vote last Thursday she commented on two unusual occurances.Firstly spotting some houses that had vote Labour posters proudly displayed (which is tantamount to announcing you have some sort of nasty,communicable disease in these parts.Secondly the volume of people walking to the voting location and, when we arrived the length of the queue, something we had never seen before.

We both commented on how strange this was and that it should (my how we were proved wrong!) benefit Labour (although neither of us entertained the ridiculous notion of them getting close).Imagine our surprise when the tory increased his percentage to over 60% and that the turnout was 66% down 2% on the last GE.

Now please do not misunderstand me I am not even countenancing any jiggery pokery but it does explain to me that people (especially in those high profile seats) that are particularly hard fought and emotional can have doubts.

Or am I being very naive?

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:25 pm

ScarletGas wrote:
seeingclearly wrote:
citizenJA wrote:Neither can I.
"The definition of harmful is to include a risk of public disorder, a risk of harassment, alarm, or distress..."
Dave makes someone being personally horrid to him a crime.

A friend in a neighbouring ward, same constituency posted a pic of queues. It wasn't a particularly nice day here quite cold, and the temperature dropped quite quickly, people were in coats. It's a safe seat but people weren't taking chances. He said they were nearly all talking of voting Labour. I'd been listening to the news and they were estimating an average of 73% with the highest turnouts hitting 80%. In hindsight I wish I'd kept some of the audio. I mentioned this here afterwards, perhaps Friday. It's baffled me because they used some generic phrase on the lines of an exceptionally high turnout.
I have to say that generally I do not set too great a store on conspiracy theories and not sure I should go too far with this generally, although the South Thanet apocryphal reports do raise an eyebrow.

This,however,from personal experience.

My wife and I live in a part of rural Oxfordshire that have never (and I mean never) elected anything other than a tory in with less than 45% of the vote. In fact the local elections allowed us to vote for up to six candidates. Of the seven listed six (yes six!) were tory.

On the way to vote last Thursday she commented on two unusual occurances.Firstly spotting some houses that had vote Labour posters proudly displayed (which is tantamount to announcing you have some sort of nasty,communicable disease in these parts.Secondly the volume of people walking to the voting location and, when we arrived the length of the queue, something we had never seen before.

We both commented on how strange this was and that it should (my how we were proved wrong!) benefit Labour (although neither of us entertained the ridiculous notion of them getting close).Imagine our surprise when the tory increased his percentage to over 60% and that the turnout was 66% down 2% on the last GE.

Now please do not misunderstand me I am not even countenancing any jiggery pokery but it does explain to me that people (especially in those high profile seats) that are particularly hard fought and emotional can have doubts.

Or am I being very naive?

Hardworking troll friends tell us 'They all voted Tory!'
From the result in your constituency, it does sound like people walked & stood in line to increase the Tory incumbency's percentage.
I'd love to be wrong.
I'd love to find out of skulduggery on the part of Tories.
Soon.
By the end of this week at the latest.

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:40 pm

What's happened to David Cameron's announcement? Did I miss it?

Willow904 · Post by **Willow904** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:46 pm

There were approx 5.5m postal votes in 2010. Has anyone seen a figure for this time?

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:50 pm

Do they do a percentage breakdown of parties voted for with postal votes, and those from polling stations? Just wondering if the percentages talliy...In theory they should shouldn't they?

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Wed 13 May, 2015 5:59 pm

jimmy sutherland retweeted
Will Thorpe ‏@Withorpe 5 hrs5 hours ago

Jon Swindon account suspended for "targeted abuse" (prob code for "criticising Tories"). He needs your support. His new account @swindon81

seeingclearly · Post by **seeingclearly** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:08 pm

ohsocynical wrote:
seeingclearly wrote:
citizenJA wrote:Neither can I.
"The definition of harmful is to include a risk of public disorder, a risk of harassment, alarm, or distress..."
Dave makes someone being personally horrid to him a crime.

A friend in a neighbouring ward, same constituency posted a pic of queues. It wasn't a particularly nice day here quite cold, and the temperature dropped quite quickly, people were in coats. It's a safe seat but people weren't taking chances. He said they were nearly all talking of voting Labour. I'd been listening to the news and they were estimating an average of 73% with the highest turnouts hitting 80%. In hindsight I wish I'd kept some of the audio. I mentioned this here afterwards, perhaps Friday. It's baffled me because they used some generic phrase on the lines of an exceptionally high turnout.

I did a couple of spells of Telling last Thursday. We had Conservative councilors hanging around all day as well as their Tellers. They were predicting over 73% turnout. 80% was mentioned at one time. And we had queues which some of them had never seen before.
I'm a newbie only did the EU elections last year so had nothing to judge it against.

Turnout for the 2015 General Election in Bracknell was 65.58 per cent, with 53,300 people voting, a slight drop on 2010’s 67.8 per cent.

Dr Lee increased his 2010 majority of 27,327 to 29,606, which is 55.5 per cent of the total vote.

Labour candidate James Walsh was in second place with 8,956 votes, narrowly beating UKIP's Richard Thomas in third place, who received 8,339 votes.

In fourth place was Liberal Democrat Patrick Smith, with 3,983 votes, and fifth was Green Party candidate Derek Florey with 2,202.

Thanks Ohso, I heard those % figures either on BBC NEWS channel or whichever BBC radio channel was doing coverage, I dont do radio much, I was flicking between because I was too wound up to watch anything. And coming here, which was better.

By pure coincidence my son, who is a devil for not seeing stuff on the floor inadvertently brought a leaflet from my MP in on his shoe today, it dropped off right by my sofa, I picked it up exasperated and on the back is some stuff about changes made to ballot paper numbers and the way they are listed, which used to be alphabetical. So he advised looking for the logo to check against his name in case it wasn't clear. Well the bit about numbers I don't understand, it's ambiguous, and I didn't know there had been changes. Wondered if you knew anything about them. Rogers seat was very safe and I simply never bothered with anyone's junk and never looked at it till today. I haven't heard these changes mentioned.

seeingclearly · Post by **seeingclearly** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:12 pm

Willow904 wrote:There were approx 5.5m postal votes in 2010. Has anyone seen a figure for this time?

Again remembered from BBC coverage on the Thursday night, 'over 4 million'.

yahyah · Post by **yahyah** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:15 pm

Kent Police (UK) ‏@kent_police 58m58 minutes ago
Officers haven't found any evidence of #SouthThanet election fraud.
Concern raised by nonKent resident who saw comments online #ThanetRigged

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:16 pm

Marcus Chown ‏@marcuschown May 12

BBC chose to appease the Tories. Now they will see how much appeasement works.

Interesting.

All those letters and phone calls of protest to the BBC and their standard reply of, 'We consider we have been fair and balanced', was a crock of shit!

rebeccariots2 · Post by **rebeccariots2** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:17 pm

George Eaton ‏@georgeeaton 13m13 minutes ago
It was the working class, not the middle class that sunk Labour - @Jon_Trickett's data analysis on @TheStaggers http://bit.ly/1A0obnm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Look at the data.

I think my guts have been telling me the same as this.

yahyah · Post by **yahyah** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:26 pm

ohsocynical wrote:
Marcus Chown ‏@marcuschown May 12

BBC chose to appease the Tories. Now they will see how much appeasement works.
Interesting.

All those letters and phone calls of protest to the BBC and their standard reply of, 'We consider we have been fair and balanced', was a crock of shit!

Radio Times had a letter from a viewer who complained about historical inaccuracy in a TV programme.
Good old BBC stock response was to grudgingly admit the viewer was right, but they justified being wrong claiming they were trying to make things easy for viewers.
In other words, being historically inaccurate because viewers were too thick to realise !

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:29 pm

seeingclearly wrote:
ohsocynical wrote:
seeingclearly wrote:
A friend in a neighbouring ward, same constituency posted a pic of queues. It wasn't a particularly nice day here quite cold, and the temperature dropped quite quickly, people were in coats. It's a safe seat but people weren't taking chances. He said they were nearly all talking of voting Labour. I'd been listening to the news and they were estimating an average of 73% with the highest turnouts hitting 80%. In hindsight I wish I'd kept some of the audio. I mentioned this here afterwards, perhaps Friday. It's baffled me because they used some generic phrase on the lines of an exceptionally high turnout.

I did a couple of spells of Telling last Thursday. We had Conservative councilors hanging around all day as well as their Tellers. They were predicting over 73% turnout. 80% was mentioned at one time. And we had queues which some of them had never seen before.
I'm a newbie only did the EU elections last year so had nothing to judge it against.

Turnout for the 2015 General Election in Bracknell was 65.58 per cent, with 53,300 people voting, a slight drop on 2010’s 67.8 per cent.

Dr Lee increased his 2010 majority of 27,327 to 29,606, which is 55.5 per cent of the total vote.

Labour candidate James Walsh was in second place with 8,956 votes, narrowly beating UKIP's Richard Thomas in third place, who received 8,339 votes.

In fourth place was Liberal Democrat Patrick Smith, with 3,983 votes, and fifth was Green Party candidate Derek Florey with 2,202.
Thanks Ohso, I heard those % figures either on BBC NEWS channel or whichever BBC radio channel was doing coverage, I dont do radio much, I was flicking between because I was too wound up to watch anything. And coming here, which was better.

By pure coincidence my son, who is a devil for not seeing stuff on the floor inadvertently brought a leaflet from my MP in on his shoe today, it dropped off right by my sofa, I picked it up exasperated and on the back is some stuff about changes made to ballot paper numbers and the way they are listed, which used to be alphabetical. So he advised looking for the logo to check against his name in case it wasn't clear. Well the bit about numbers I don't understand, it's ambiguous, and I didn't know there had been changes. Wondered if you knew anything about them. Rogers seat was very safe and I simply never bothered with anyone's junk and never looked at it till today. I haven't heard these changes mentioned.

I'm afraid I don't. I am a bit of a dummy with facts and figures, and am not very knowdedgeable about postal votes, and like you I didn't bother to read the opposition's literature. That's a lesson for me for next time.

I thought I read somewhere that they are loosely sorted into parties just before polling day, and are then put into the general count.
It might be me, but I don't like the sound of that.

Also I read somewhere that the Tories were known to have fiddled votes via many old people's homes and that helped them get in last time.
I tried to pin a Conservative councilor on exactly who is responsible for making sure old people are helped to make a choice between a proxy, or postal vote, or even get taken to a polling station but he was a bit vague. Said the person running the home was responsible for seeing to it...He just delivered leaflets to them.
I asked because my uncle is in a home. When I asked him if they'd arranged for him to vote, he didn't know anything about it.
I find that quite disquieting.

yahyah · Post by **yahyah** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:29 pm

I realised that in all the pain and shock of the last week I had not seen how Mike Hancock had done in Portsmouth South.

Apologies if Por Favor posted it and I missed it through tear filled eyes.

Hancock got 716 votes, I suppose perverts have to have someone to vote for.

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:32 pm

yahyah wrote:I realised that in all the pain and shock of the last week I had not seen how Mike Hancock had done in Portsmouth South.

Apologies if Por Favor posted it and I missed it through tear filled eyes.

Hancock got a massive 716 votes.

Oh well. I suppose there is some justice in the world.
Would be even better if he wasn't getting a massive pay off.

Tubby Isaacs · Post by **Tubby Isaacs** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:37 pm

Prince Charles Memos published.

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/ng-i ... os-in-full" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:42 pm

rebeccariots2 wrote:
George Eaton ‏@georgeeaton 13m13 minutes ago
It was the working class, not the middle class that sunk Labour - @Jon_Trickett's data analysis on @TheStaggers http://bit.ly/1A0obnm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Look at the data.

I think my guts have been telling me the same as this.

I haven't seen any data, but living in a ex-council maisonette on a large estate the news doesn't surprise me at all.

I have a feeling they didn't even bother to turn out here. And we couldn't blame the weather. It was a lovely day.

That's where the Tories always beat Labour into a cocked hat...They were very pushy getting people's addresses if they didn't have their voter card, and were knocking on doors to get the non-voters out up 'til 9:30. They had someone on a computer all day putting the numbers in and checking against addresses....
They were also using two Tellers where it's only supposed to be one from each party, to make sure they didn't miss anyone.

We had a BNP vote for the EU elections. I was mortified, and our Labour PPC only just beat UKIP by a few hundred votes.

thatchersorphan · Post by **thatchersorphan** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:44 pm

JustMom wrote:Afternoon all, has anyone else noticed a change with their local councils. I have been a tenant for over 50 odd years,but never had a letter like we did recently. It said I was to receive my annual visit and would I have all relevant identification handy when he arrived.
He came today and asked for the names of all people living here,which is just me,my husband and 2 sons. I had to produce id which could not be a bank statement,god knows why. He said every council tenant in birm ingham was getting this.

My housing association also does annual visits now, however they don't ask for bank statements

TheGrimSqueaker · Post by **TheGrimSqueaker** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:49 pm

Andy Burnham has now officially announced that he is standing for the Labour leadership.

seeingclearly · Post by **seeingclearly** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:50 pm

JustMom wrote:Afternoon all, has anyone else noticed a change with their local councils. I have been a tenant for over 50 odd years,but never had a letter like we did recently. It said I was to receive my annual visit and would I have all relevant identification handy when he arrived.
He came today and asked for the names of all people living here,which is just me,my husband and 2 sons. I had to produce id which could not be a bank statement,god knows why. He said every council tenant in birm ingham was getting this.

Hi, JustMom,

I haven't had anything like it, My home is a private let.

I wonder if this is to do with th lifetime tenancies stuff Cameron has announced. Or it could be some kind of housing stock audit. Have you been having annual visits throughout the years? I wouldn't read too much into your bank statement not being used, in my dealings with them they have always requested a utility bill, and they may have a policy on people not showing document that contain account numbers sort codes etc.

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Wed 13 May, 2015 6:51 pm

Willow904 wrote:There were approx 5.5m postal votes in 2010. Has anyone seen a figure for this time?

No.

edited to include Electoral Commission website electoral data with a link to electoral data without data

http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/o ... toral-data" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Wed 13 May, 2015 7:04 pm

And I'll add once again. Very few young voters.

We or rather Labour mustn't forget that we have to re-register every time we want to vote, so each time it'll be the same thing. A lot of time and energy spent on even getting them to register. Let alone vote.

Proud to say my two eldest grandchildren voted. They've never bothered before.
My son and d-i-l had registered their autistic daughter who was 18 in 2014, to vote, but she balked at going into a booth on her own.
As they weren't allowed to go in with her, they had applied for a postal vote [they thought in plenty of time] but were told it was too late.

thatchersorphan · Post by **thatchersorphan** » Wed 13 May, 2015 7:07 pm

Been looking to see what happened in other elections like 2010, including fraud, because I've seen various suggestions on twitter of rigging by fraud, on top of the media and brainwashed population suggestions
Seems postal fraud is the easiest but they do have success catching it or finding it afterwards
http://democracy-uk-2012.democraticaudi ... procedures" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; 2.1.2 Registration & voting procedures
How inclusive and accessible for all citizens are the registration and voting procedures, how independent are they of government and party control, and how free from intimidation and abuse? long but as someone who hasnt looked closely at it before, I found it interesting

Also https://blog.lboro.ac.uk/general-electi ... -report-5/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

thatchersorphan · Post by **thatchersorphan** » Wed 13 May, 2015 7:13 pm

http://www.secularhumanism.org/library/ ... t_23_2.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; A reminder - warning signs of fascism

thatchersorphan · Post by **thatchersorphan** » Wed 13 May, 2015 7:22 pm

http://www.ukpolitical.info/Turnout45.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; 2015 results coming soon