Tuesday 4th August 2015

Post by **refitman** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 7:09 am

Morning all.

yahyah · Post by **yahyah** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 8:45 am

Morning.

Remember the US journalist whose visa was withdrawn, and kicked out of the UK, was re-instated by Teresa May after pressure from some parts of the media and a handful of MPs ?

We never got an explanation as to why she was kept out of the country.
She was researching organised child abuse in Jersey. Her normal area of work is finance.
The name of a yacht loving PM who had boating trips there has featured in many blog entries over the years.

She was interviewed by LBC yesterday:

http://www.lbc.co.uk/the-journalist-kic ... ath-113992" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

If what she says is true, and MPs like John Hemmings [I know he doesn't have many fans here

] believed her then it suggests a loose cover up of sorts is still going on. She says people 'look the other way'. Someone certainly decided to make life difficult for her. Maybe that's just the way people get treated by the UK authorities.

At the end of the audio she says it is 'widespread' among Jersey islanders that Heath took children from care homes for rides on yachts and some 'did not return'. Allegations that children were 'loaned out' to visiting 'high level' dignitaries.

yahyah · Post by **yahyah** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 8:59 am

Also, have just been reminded by a tweet that Jersey is excluded from the Goddard inquiry into child sexual abuse.

rebeccariots2 · Post by **rebeccariots2** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 9:02 am

Labour’s failure had little to do with organisers in the field
http://labourlist.org/2015/08/labours-f ... the-field/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Arnie Graf speaks.

It's a rather depressing read. But it helps me understand why so many CLPs are nominating Corbyn and there seems such an appetite for his brand of something different. The 'machine' politics system has broken down - or rather we have been using the wrong machine/s. Humans need to be the order of the day.

rebeccariots2 · Post by **rebeccariots2** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 9:06 am

yahyah wrote:Also, have just been reminded by a tweet that Jersey is excluded from the Goddard inquiry into child sexual abuse.

And I've just heard someone on Radio 4 (missed hearing who) loudly protesting about anyone daring to investigate Heath because he was such a wonderful man ... should be above and beyond the usual processes apparently. I find it incredible that anyone would be able to air that view in these days.

rebeccariots2 · Post by **rebeccariots2** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 9:08 am

Ah - this is who it was on Radio 4 then:

Paul Waugh ‏@paulwaugh 46m46 minutes ago
ExMP Brian Binley "I wd be very very surprised" if Ted Heath allegations true. 'he kept himself under some considerable control' #r4today

Matt Chorley ‏@MattChorley 46m46 minutes ago
Ex-Tory MP Brian Binley suggests Heath abuse story was "kept back" for the "silly season" when "stories are at a premium" @BBCr4today

yahyah · Post by **yahyah** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 9:15 am

rebeccariots2 wrote:Ah - this is who it was on Radio 4 then:

Paul Waugh ‏@paulwaugh 46m46 minutes ago
ExMP Brian Binley "I wd be very very surprised" if Ted Heath allegations true. 'he kept himself under some considerable control' #r4today

Matt Chorley ‏@MattChorley 46m46 minutes ago
Ex-Tory MP Brian Binley suggests Heath abuse story was "kept back" for the "silly season" when "stories are at a premium" @BBCr4today

'he kept himself under some considerable control', an interesting phrase, probably best not to apply cod psychology to it, maybe someone more expert will though.

onebuttonmonkey · Post by **onebuttonmonkey** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 9:29 am

Morning all.

It's bleak looking at the news, as ever. The first tranche of RBS shares needlessly sold off at a loss (you can bet Osborne wouldn't be selling them if he thought of himself as an owner for his personal portfolio) predicated on a bunch of nonsense about how selling them cheap would stimulate a demand. There was lots of demand, apparently, which is exactly why they didn't need to be sold so cheaply. Then there's Ted Heath. Then there's the £2bn NHS funding-gap shortfall which I remember Ed Miliband being rubbished for raising before the election.

Over in leadership news, I saw this last night:

What happens if Jeremy Corbyn wins?
Would Labour split? Would Jeremy Corbyn last a week? In reality, he would likely stay in place for longer than you expect.
http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/20 ... orbyn-wins

It's an interesting piece in that it tries to answer the question set out in the strapline but does so in the same way that some senior figures think about the leadership - in a vacuum where the PLP is entirely removed from voters and supporters outside Westminster. It's all about strategy and positioning and how it would be played. Now, I'm not naive and I know this is the game. But the whole reason for Corbyn's popularity in the party's activists is exactly because of how different he seems (note: seems) and the fact he vocally and clearly proposes something different. The consideration of his future is devoid of references to what he might stand for and how popular it may or may not be. Which is telling.

In a similar vein, there's this from Labour List which is so accurate it smarts:

Labour’s failure had little to do with organisers in the field
http://labourlist.org/2015/08/labours-f ... the-field/

The image I have of how the Party works is Fed Ex. The corporate leadership make all of the important decisions for the company. The truck drivers deliver the goods with almost no input into the decisions made. The organisers are the men and women truck drivers for the Party. The leadership and the Party staff reside in separate quarters physically and mentally. Policies and major campaigns are developed with little or no input from the staff in the field. This leads to a lot mistakes and resentments.

Why is the Party so out of touch with so much of the population if it has a number of organisers in the field? It is easy to understand when you examine what are the organisers’ main functions: First, they work on disputes that arise in local Branches and CLP’s. Oftentimes the disputes are related to personality clashes. Second, they do a good deal of data collection and data entry as well as some administrative tasks as needed. Third, they work on Voter ID and voter turnout. Since there are so many elections, much of the organiser’s time is spent on this work. This allows very little time for the organiser to meet new people or to develop and run local issue campaigns that come out of the interests from the people that he/she meets.

That disconnect goes some way to explain both the surge in support from party members for Corbyn and also the PLP's complete failure to comprehend how or why it's happening - or to formulate a response for it. Take Kendall as a for-example, with her bland, marketing-language statements of what the party will do that sound very much like the last manifesto that she so criticised earlier, and her failure to understand why it continues to fail to resonate with anyone; or Cooper and her "what are your priorities" poll which included a list of mindlessly pompous and simultaneously hollow things that people were asked to rank by top priority (eradicate child poverty is a great aim but the whole idea of taking one out of context above another so artificially reinforces how unjoined-up the thinking behind it is. It's about banging a drum that might act as a catchphrase, not about actually doing anything meaningful). It was clearly the result of a focus group rather than any idea of what people want or how they would express it. (And look how well this focus-group stuff turned out? "Hardworking families" was in as a phrase last time but not as an actual, coherent conversation that included anyone outside the focus group. It's almost as if the thing focus groups are best at telling you is only whether or not focus groups like something).

I don't think the others have nothing to say or offer, although I do think they appear sadly lacking. I do think they all appear to be as devoid of respect for and involvement with ordinary party members - and, in a funny way, the broader electorate - in a way that is fatal for the party to go on. The PLP aren't in a bubble so much as a self-constructed vacuum. If they want to reconnect they have to realise it can't be done top-down - that's how the problems started.

Edit: typo and additional ranting about focus groups.

onebuttonmonkey · Post by **onebuttonmonkey** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 9:35 am

rebeccariots2 wrote:
Labour’s failure had little to do with organisers in the field
http://labourlist.org/2015/08/labours-f ... the-field/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Arnie Graf speaks.

It's a rather depressing read. But it helps me understand why so many CLPs are nominating Corbyn and there seems such an appetite for his brand of something different. The 'machine' politics system has broken down - or rather we have been using the wrong machine/s. Humans need to be the order of the day.

Sorry for repeat posting the link - I took so long to type mine that yours appeared before mine by the time I submitted it. It's a very depressing but necessary read indeed.

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 9:54 am

Morning

"Perverse incentive" appears to be the new stock phrase of Governmental choice.

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

Families of failed asylum seekers to be stripped of automatic right to financial support
Home Office ministers to adopt more hardline approach to those who have exhausted appeal rights, to demonstrate that UK is not ‘land of milk and honey’

onebuttonmonkey · Post by **onebuttonmonkey** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 10:03 am

HindleA wrote:Morning

"Perverse incentive" appears to be the new stock phrase of Governmental choice.

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

Families of failed asylum seekers to be stripped of automatic right to financial support
Home Office ministers to adopt more hardline approach to those who have exhausted appeal rights, to demonstrate that UK is not ‘land of milk and honey’

It's absurd, isn't it? £36 a week they get - and housing which only costs so much because we don't have housing stock any more (isn't privatisation grand).

Did you see the landlord on C4 News last night claiming people everywhere else won't understand that we're overwhelmed with them, he said. That's Kent which has around 1.7m people being faced with - the horror - of around 3,000 more - at less than one per square kilometre of Kentish land.

It costs us more to punish and ringfence and protect and fail to deal with any of it than it does to support migrants. But then, this isn't about migrants, it's about the government benefiting from the easy populism of looking "tough on" them. *sigh*

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 10:30 am

@onebuttonmonkey
Reposting this from last night,apologies if seen.A response to the Government's intentions.

http://nearlylegal.co.uk/blog/2015/08/t ... s-edition/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

AnatolyKasparov · Post by **AnatolyKasparov** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 10:51 am

Re the Arnie Graf business - let us not forget the dread presence of "Wee Dougie" Alexander, who never got on with him and used the first excuse to bin him.

Ed's almost irrational loyalty to this truly disastrous figure was one of the most puzzling aspects of his leadership, and in the end it cost him.

Still, he is in the same political wilderness to which he consigned his own sister now

AngryAsWell · Post by **AngryAsWell** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 11:10 am

NHS told to fill only essential vacancies due to 'almost unprecedented' finances
Health service regulator Monitor warns that current plans are ‘quite simply unaffordable’, as Labour attacks evidence of deteriorating NHS finances

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015 ... ing-crisis" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 11:19 am

Good-morning, everyone.

AngryAsWell wrote:NHS told to fill only essential vacancies due to 'almost unprecedented' finances
Health service regulator Monitor warns that current plans are ‘quite simply unaffordable’, as Labour attacks evidence of deteriorating NHS finances

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015 ... ing-crisis" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

NHS told to fill only essential vacancies

No change then, Boss, thanks.
The NHS don't hire for sport.
This is depressing.

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 11:31 am

"...the true existential threat to us might come from ourselves. If we can look at another human being and categorise them as “illegal”, or that chilling American word “alien”, then what has become of our own humanity? To support policies that dehumanise others is to dehumanise yourself. I think most people resist that, but are pressed towards it by an increasingly sadistic elite. If you’re worried about threats to your way of life, look to the people who are selling your public services out from under you. The people who will destroy this society are already here: printing their own money, printing their own newspapers, and responding to undesirables at the gates by releasing the hounds."

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/comm ... nts-calais" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 11:52 am

onebuttonmonkey wrote:
HindleA wrote:Morning

"Perverse incentive" appears to be the new stock phrase of Governmental choice.

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

Families of failed asylum seekers to be stripped of automatic right to financial support
Home Office ministers to adopt more hardline approach to those who have exhausted appeal rights, to demonstrate that UK is not ‘land of milk and honey’

It's absurd, isn't it? £36 a week they get - and housing which only costs so much because we don't have housing stock any more (isn't privatisation grand).

Did you see the landlord on C4 News last night claiming people everywhere else won't understand that we're overwhelmed with them, he said. That's Kent which has around 1.7m people being faced with - the horror - of around 3,000 more - at less than one per square kilometre of Kentish land.

It costs us more to punish and ringfence and protect and fail to deal with any of it than it does to support migrants. But then, this isn't about migrants, it's about the government benefiting from the easy populism of looking "tough on" them. *sigh*

Slightly tangentially -

Did you (or anyone else here) see the interview with the man from Afghanistan who believed that, should he make it to the UK, he'd be fine because he would be able to make a success of it here because he (and others like him) work harder than the British? He'd obviously picked up from somewhere (I wonder where?) that British workers are lazy.

This government is perverse in everything it does and says.

Good morfternoon, everyone.

PS I'm looking forward to hearing a report-back here from our own correspondent at the Jeremy Corbyn hustings. (Sorry - I can't remember who it was who said that they hoped to attend.)

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 12:11 pm

PorFavor wrote:
onebuttonmonkey wrote:
HindleA wrote:Morning

"Perverse incentive" appears to be the new stock phrase of Governmental choice.

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015 ... -rights-uk" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Families of failed asylum seekers to be stripped of automatic right to financial support
Home Office ministers to adopt more hardline approach to those who have exhausted appeal rights, to demonstrate that UK is not ‘land of milk and honey’
It's absurd, isn't it? £36 a week they get - and housing which only costs so much because we don't have housing stock any more (isn't privatisation grand).

Did you see the landlord on C4 News last night claiming people everywhere else won't understand that we're overwhelmed with them, he said. That's Kent which has around 1.7m people being faced with - the horror - of around 3,000 more - at less than one per square kilometre of Kentish land.

It costs us more to punish and ringfence and protect and fail to deal with any of it than it does to support migrants. But then, this isn't about migrants, it's about the government benefiting from the easy populism of looking "tough on" them. *sigh*
Slightly tangentially -

Did you (or anyone else here) see the interview with the man from Afghanistan who believed that, should he make it to the UK, he'd be fine because he would be able to make a success of it here because he (and others like him) work harder than the British? He'd obviously picked up from somewhere (I wonder where?) that British workers are lazy.

This government is perverse in everything it does and says.

Good morfternoon, everyone.

PS I'm looking forward to hearing a report-back here from our own correspondent at the Jeremy Corbyn hustings. (Sorry - I can't remember who it was who said that they hoped to attend.)

(my bold)
Propaganda is indeed scary powerful.

The only lazy British workers are those currently sitting on the Tory front bench.
Dave
Chancellor Jeff
IDS
JHunt

Perfect irony.

yahyah · Post by **yahyah** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 12:32 pm

ExaroNews ‏@ExaroNews 1h1 hour ago
‘Nick’, regarded by police as a credible witness, alleges that Sir Edward Heath sexually abused him multiple times. More on Exaro soon.

ExaroNews ‏@ExaroNews 1h1 hour ago
The Met started to investigate Sir Edward Heath last October after Exaro arranged a meeting between ‘Nick’ and detectives…

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:06 pm

I notice that the Guardian is running a Politics Blog Readers' edition today (re our conversation yesterday, or maybe the day before). James Walsh is the MC.

AnatolyKasparov · Post by **AnatolyKasparov** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:12 pm

Final nomination figures for CLPs re the Labour leadership are out - JC 152 AB 111 YC 106 LK 18.

Actually a slight dip in the total choosing a candidate compared to 2010.

EDIT - DL figures are TW 174 SC 77 CF 64 AE 32 BB 20.

yahyah · Post by **yahyah** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:13 pm

We had a phone canvassing call from the Burnham campaign this morning.
I gave the young woman a sympathetic ear, and told the truth that I had leaned to Corbyn but was now wavering.

She sold Andy as the unity candidate, and wished Labour's public infighting to stop.

Became more uneasy about what might emerge re: Islington after watching a BBC investigation by Roger Cook called An Abuse of Trust. It was made in 2011 and there were some strange allegations about an Islington Labour figure's connection to a convicted paedophile & sexual sadist.

rebeccariots2 · Post by **rebeccariots2** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:14 pm

Michael Savage ‏@michaelsavage 2h2 hours ago
Very interesting @ConHome leadership poll - Osborne springs ahead of Boris, Liam Fox now ahead of Theresa May: http://www.conservativehome.com/thetory ... -poll.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; …

Liam Fox .....

Start stockpiling the garlic.

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:16 pm

rebeccariots2 wrote:
Michael Savage ‏@michaelsavage 2h2 hours ago
Very interesting @ConHome leadership poll - Osborne springs ahead of Boris, Liam Fox now ahead of Theresa May: http://www.conservativehome.com/thetory ... -poll.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; …
Liam Fox .....

Start stockpiling the garlic.

Liam Fox? That's the stuff of nightmares.

yahyah · Post by **yahyah** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:18 pm

PorFavor wrote:
rebeccariots2 wrote:
Michael Savage ‏@michaelsavage 2h2 hours ago
Very interesting @ConHome leadership poll - Osborne springs ahead of Boris, Liam Fox now ahead of Theresa May: http://www.conservativehome.com/thetory ... -poll.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; …
Liam Fox .....

Start stockpiling the garlic.
Liam Fox? That's the stuff of nightmares.

Where's Adam Werrity ?

RogerOThornhill · Post by **RogerOThornhill** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:23 pm

rebeccariots2 wrote:
Michael Savage ‏@michaelsavage 2h2 hours ago
Very interesting @ConHome leadership poll - Osborne springs ahead of Boris, Liam Fox now ahead of Theresa May: http://www.conservativehome.com/thetory ... -poll.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; …
Liam Fox .....

Start stockpiling the garlic.

It'll be Osborne save for anything terrible happening on the economic front (which is always possible).

The press would love it to be Boris as there's always a chance he'll make for good copy when he insults someone random or comes out with something idiotic. A bit like having Prince Phillip as leader...

onebuttonmonkey · Post by **onebuttonmonkey** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:25 pm

So. I've just been to the Jeremy Corbyn meeting in Leeds where he was announcing some of the findings from his Northern Futures consultation; he's having a bigger event at the weekend in Leeds as part of the general campaign, but today was focused on that. It was a small room with an admittedly self-selected audience but it was still diverse and engaged - invites only went out a couple days ago, but there was no difficulty filling it. Sat in front of me was a certain Nicholas Watt from the Graun (I presume he was allocated an interview slot for when the event finished). Outside, people were putting up a fair on a very deserted Millennium Square - the kind of city feature they sweep the homeless people out of to keep up the look of modern Leeds.

A couple of thoughts - firstly, the message of inclusivity from him was evident as well as looking genuine. An end to days of forming policy at the top by consensus in a nice hotel and rolling it down the hill to everyone else (see that article by Arnie Graf). A repeated urge to contact him with ideas and a short document as much focused on the responses he'd had as anything else. The other people on the platform not allowed to demur with a "they came to hear you, Jeremy." A consistent, underlying theme of how Labour needed to listen, engage and include people outside the PLP while fronting something exactly that was part of it.

Secondly, he is exactly as I imagined him to be - wry, articulate, measured, sensible and credible. His ideas aren't the stuff of a throwback to the past - they are what would be straightforwardly centre-left in pretty much every country in Europe. He was focused on infrastructure, supporting local areas with investment in businesses and green initiatives, a constitutional convention to seek ideas rather than dictate them in opposition, a "let-the-franchises-lapse-and-take-them-back" approach to railways, sharp on his critique of the differences between the rail and bus network in the south and the north. Everything was framed within the anti-austerity message you'd expect. None of this has made me forget that he forgot to stand up and take the lectern at the beginning.

There's obviously a part of this that involves people like me hearing the kind of things we like. But more than that: he's obviously not the frothing 1980s throwback, the humourless far- or hard- or extreme-left (whatever the misnomer du jour is) dinosaur he's made out to be. He might ramble slightly, but he's assured and reassuring and never fell back on the kind of massaged marketing slogan you'd get elsewhere (even if his occasionally reliance on detail-free support-in-principle is a symptom of the older left everywhere). Most of all, he may not be as different as he's made out but he's clearly a different style of politician with a clearly defined message that is for a change rather than just against That Lot.

In response to a question, he made reference to how he wouldn't be drawn on the way others may or may not be - as the questioner had it - plotting against him, some in the press, some in the party - and called this focus on that element of the leadership question - and the larger ability to debate - part of the depoliticisation of politics. And he's right: my take is that's exactly what he's against: all strategy, no purpose; all focus-tested message, no content. It's something shared across all the parties as well as being a very hollow orthodoxy (thanks for so eloquently pointing this out the other day R. Snozers) that precisely no one has voted for. Corbyn is exactly not any of that, and it's hard not to find him appealing precisely because he's so obviously not standing for himself - ironic or paradoxical, I suppose, but he benefits in modern personality-first shallow political debate precisely because he's so obviously not constrained by it.

At the end, there was a cluster of people around him, ordinary people not just press or member sof this-or-that. The person in front of me said, “I’m only 21 and I just wanted to say thank you so much for standing up for me and people like me. I mean, no one else will and it just… well, I can’t tell you how much it means.” She described briefly how, being Asian and poor in a rundown part of town with very few opportunities or options and no voice, she felt abandoned by everyone else. She welled up a bit. And he continued to be as human and as approachable as he'd been throughout.

I'm not sure the Blairites with their talk of unelectability, of how principles will hurt everyone we can't help when we don't win, or in their endless strategising-without-purpose-beyond-winning-for-winning's-sake have any idea of the power of that. Does it win elections? I don't know, but it certainly should do. It's something both emotional and principled, not either/or of the two or in need of a transplant, Mr. Blair. And it is directly connecting to the kind of people left behind by Labour and all the parties - who are exactly the kind of people Labour need to focus on remembering and including for all of our futures.

I'm biased, because, well, I'm a lefty who's colour hasn't changed in years - not through rigidity but through not having seen anything to disavow those ideas and arguments. And yes, Jeremy's is not not an unramshackle campaign. But I tell you what, I have more hope in politics for him being in this race and doing so well than i have in more years than I can accurately remember. I believe politics is a thing that, at its best, helps us remake the world in a better form and nobody else is even coming near to showing that they share that message, that belief.

No wonder he's been doing so well. This isn't Labour's UKIP or SNP moment: although there are some similarities with the latter, the difference is the SNP have no content at all. It's simply the kind of sense there used to be, at least the will to engage and discuss and not be ashamed of ideas that there feels like there used to be more of before the spin and calculation. And it certainly worked on me.

citizenJA · Post by **citizenJA** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:33 pm

RogerOThornhill wrote:
rebeccariots2 wrote:
Michael Savage ‏@michaelsavage 2h2 hours ago
Very interesting @ConHome leadership poll - Osborne springs ahead of Boris, Liam Fox now ahead of Theresa May: http://www.conservativehome.com/thetory ... -poll.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; …
Liam Fox .....

Start stockpiling the garlic.
It'll be Osborne save for anything terrible happening on the economic front (which is always possible).

The press would love it to be Boris as there's always a chance he'll make for good copy when he insults someone random or comes out with something idiotic. A bit like having Prince Phillip as leader...

(my bold)

Out this morning after last night's private investor sell-off.
Corruption with eyes wide open.

Ask yourselves, how come what I've posted below isn't catapulting Osborne into electoral oblivion?

RBS sell-off: George Osborne defends £1bn loss
Critics brand the UK government’s overnight sale of a 5.4% stake in the bailed-out bank as ‘short-changing the taxpayer’

http://www.theguardian.com/business/201 ... s-1bn-loss" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:38 pm

@onebuttonmonkey

Thank you for that full account - and apologies for not remembering that it was you who was our eyes and ears on the campaign trail.

You can now take time to recover from your brush with greatness (ie Nicholas Watt).

yahyah · Post by **yahyah** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:39 pm

Thanks for your reportage OneButtonMonkey.

Have just read it to my husband, and he appreciated your views [as did I].
Can feel a wavering back again.

onebuttonmonkey · Post by **onebuttonmonkey** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:39 pm

PorFavor wrote:I notice that the Guardian is running a Politics Blog Readers' edition today (re our conversation yesterday, or maybe the day before). James Walsh is the MC.

Thanks for pointing that out. I've now posted my comment from here over there - but I'd rather people read it here.

onebuttonmonkey · Post by **onebuttonmonkey** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 1:48 pm

yahyah wrote:Thanks for your reportage OneButtonMonkey.

Have just read it to my husband, and he appreciated your views [as did I].
Can feel a wavering back again.

Honestly, I'm entirely confirmed in my decision to vote for him. And I wasn't initially intending to, so, you know - it's a pragmatic choice not simply a stubborn, ideological one. For me, the other candidates simply don't compare in style or content.

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 2:30 pm

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015 ... t-56911805" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Benefit cut 'could make thousands of vulnerable young people homeless'

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 2:44 pm

HindleA wrote:http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015 ... t-56911805

Benefit cut 'could make thousands of vulnerable young people homeless'

Thanks for the link.

From it -

“The government could be in danger of inadvertently taking away support from the young people who need it most, and in doing so, exposing many more vulnerable young people to the risk of becoming homeless,” it [the YMCA] said.

There's nothing inadvertent about it. You could be charitable and say that this isn't the Government's prime aim (which is probably true - although I don't agree with their prime aim, either) but they've weighed up the options and have come down on the side of not giving a toss. Why do critics always couch their comments in this soggy fashion? "I welcome but . . . . " is one that always riles me.

Edited

Brackets

Edited

Yet more brackets. Blighters get everywhere . . .

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 2:53 pm

Of course it is intentional ,supposed exemptions will be put in place.In the real world not clear cut at all.Measures to ameliorate,police and ward off legal challenge will cost as much,if not more than supposed savings and that isn't accounting for increased expense elsewhere.As ever.

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 2:56 pm

It worked so well when they removed benefits from the young in the early '80's.

onebuttonmonkey · Post by **onebuttonmonkey** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 3:10 pm

And here's Alan Johnson wading in:

Labour must 'end the madness' over Jeremy Corbyn, says Alan Johnson
Former home secretary says party should back Yvette Cooper because she can unite the party to win power

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/201 ... an-johnson

This is the same Cooper who, just last year, tried to ditch Miliband but couldn't stop squabbling with Burnham about it, right? Remind me: what does "unite" mean again?

gilsey · Post by **gilsey** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 3:12 pm

RobertSnozers wrote:My apologies if this has been posted already - my internet has been down since the end of last week and I've only been checking FTN intermittently. I took to heart the comments last night (I think by AAW?) that many of us have bought into the media narrative that only Corbyn of the Labour candidates was offering anything concrete, so have had another look around the candidate's websites. While I still feel Corbyn is saying a lot of the right things, in the right way, I was somewhat struck by this speech by Andy Burnham last week

" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I must admit I initially rolled my eyes a little at the 'spirit of '45' stuff, but Burnham is absolutely right that Labour is basically a pale shadow of its former self, and needs to recapture a bold vision. His plans for social care I can absolutely buy into. (My wife is a lecturer/researcher in gerontology, by the way, so I have a bit of insight into the issues around the ageing society). I'll even forgive him for using the appalling 'Going forward', which is such dreadful use of the language it sets my teeth on edge.

For the last six years, I have tried to persuade our Party to embrace a major reform of the way we care for older people.

Here we are, fifteen years into the century of the ageing society, and we are still saying that the generation who built the NHS after the war are only deemed worthy of a 15 minute care visit.

We are still saying to people who work in care that looking after someone else’s mum, dad, brother or sister is basically the lowest form of work — lower than the minimum wage because you don’t get paid the travel time between your 15 minute visits.

And we are still saying to the most unfortunate amongst us — with the highest care needs — that it is acceptable for people to pay for that care with everything they have worked for — home, pension and savings.

Didn’t the Labour Party create the NHS in the last century to free people from the fear of medical fees?

So why is the Labour Party of the 21st century standing by while people with dementia are not just wiped out physically by their condition but financially too?

How many more people are going to have to suffer before the Labour Party is prepared to act?

I have been on a mission to reform social care in England ever since I saw my own grandmother go on a depressing journey through the care system 15 years ago.

I am determined to make Labour the Party that helps everyone protect what they’ve worked for.

And I believe the only way we can do that is to extend the NHS principle to social care — where everybody is asked to make a contribution according to their means and when everybody then has the peace of mind of knowing that all their care needs, and those of their family, are covered.

And yes, let me be clear: I would have to persuade people of a difficult financial change to bring this about.

And this is where the modern Labour Party has always backed off, fearing difficult headlines in the Tory press.

But that timidity is leaving a broken care system in place and seeing many more family homes sold like my gran’s.

I believe Labour needs to rediscover the self-confidence to make a big argument. It’s time to trust the people. If what we’re saying is right, and provides people with an answer, they will support us, whatever the media says.

On care, our case is quite simple: would people prefer to pay what would be in effect an insurance payment to allow everyone to protect what they’ve worked for; or do people want to stick with the status quo of entering later life with everything on the roulette table — home, pension and savings — and take their chances?

I remain utterly convinced that we can make this argument to the public and win it. I believe it would help win more than just the 26% of over-65s who voted Labour at the Election.

That may be a very popular policy but I don't agree with it, it's basically about protecting inheritances.
'people with dementia are not just wiped out physically by their condition but financially too?'
Dementia, and indeed old age, are irreversible, the person is not going to suddenly get better and need the money. My father worked in local government and lived modestly, like many of his generation. After we'd all left home he started investing in the stock market and built up a decent portfolio by their, again modest, standards. He used to tell Mum that she'd be a wealthy woman after he died, only half joking. But he was very, very, clear that the wealth was for her, to make sure she would have everything she needed no matter what happened to her in old age. Passing it on to us came very low in the reckoning.
Unlike most people, I was brought up thinking 'saving up for your old age' meant exactly that, not saving up to pass it on to your kids. If you have money and your kids need it, give them it now.

I should make it very clear that wiping out everything down to the last £20k as we do now is outrageous, a figure of about £120k was mentioned at one time which seems about right.

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 3:43 pm

onebuttonmonkey wrote:And here's Alan Johnson wading in:

Labour must 'end the madness' over Jeremy Corbyn, says Alan Johnson
Former home secretary says party should back Yvette Cooper because she can unite the party to win power

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/201 ... an-johnson
This is the same Cooper who, just last year, tried to ditch Miliband but couldn't stop squabbling with Burnham about it, right? Remind me: what does "unite" mean again?

I've never seen wherein Alan Johnson's charm lies. Similarly, Kenneth Clarke's. (Nothing to do with the current allegations.) It seems that if people are told enough times that someone (despite appearances to the contrary) is a "good egg" then they swallow the fiction without further thought.

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 3:51 pm

P(re)C(hristmas) gone mad.

Yule love it! Selfridges' Christmas shop launches 143 days ahead of big day

Central London department store transforms 3,000 square feet of its fourth floor into festive winter wonderland – despite the summer weather (Guardian)

I think I'm going to throw up.

onebuttonmonkey · Post by **onebuttonmonkey** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 3:54 pm

PorFavor wrote:
onebuttonmonkey wrote:And here's Alan Johnson wading in:

Labour must 'end the madness' over Jeremy Corbyn, says Alan Johnson
Former home secretary says party should back Yvette Cooper because she can unite the party to win power

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/201 ... an-johnson
This is the same Cooper who, just last year, tried to ditch Miliband but couldn't stop squabbling with Burnham about it, right? Remind me: what does "unite" mean again?
I've never seen wherein Alan Johnson's charm lies. Similarly, Kenneth Clarke's. (Nothing to do with the current allegations.) It seems that if people are told enough times that someone (despite appearances to the contrary) is a "good egg" then they swallow the fiction without further thought.

Exactly. you stick around long enough and you might suddenly benefit from the received wisdom you're all right. God knows how wise it is or where it was received from. I agree on Clarke, too - i remember him as a younger firebrand and also that he never left a department he was in charge of without having made it empirically worse. He might be a laugh down the pub, who knows, but other than that? I've no idea.

Here's Johnson, (rightly) deriding the use of the term "virus" from some on the left while simultaneously suggesting that supporting Corbyn is madness. As GrimlyFiendish pointed out to me on Twitter, if you support Corbyn, it's not a matter of opinion - it's grounds for prescribing a heart transplant and sectioning. *sheesh*

So Johnson can, in simple terms, take his kindly postman act and get in the f(lipping) sea as far as I'm concerned.

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 4:02 pm

Sitting in bed this morning thinking about life in general...

We have lived through times where dreadful child abuse was covered up by our 'great and supposedly good'.
Would government have been brought down if the facts had been public knowledge then? Would there have been mass resignations? It would have been a strong possiblilty once.

Although, thanks to social media we live in a far more open society, I feel nothing has changed. In fact in some ways it's become worse.

Our 'great and supposedly good' are still trying to cover up.
I wondered if such massive wrongdoing would/could bring a government down now, and/or trigger resignations? I don't think so. It appears that unless they're dead, it's business as usual.

Are sufficient safeguards being put into place to protect children in future given that it would cost a lot of money? Again I don't think so.

Where does that leave us as a supposedly caring society?

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 4:16 pm

Selling a house to pay for someone's care isn't a new thing. I used to clear houses and often the old person had been taken into care and the family home sold in order for them to live in a slightly better class home because council run homes could be a bit basic.

Nowadays with most care homes in the private sector and councils unloading the ones that are left, selling an old persons house to cover the cost of care isn't necessarily going to get them into a top quality care or rest home, and at the rates they charge, won't cover them til death.

SpinningHugo · Post by **SpinningHugo** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 4:39 pm

I'd give more credence to Mr Graf's views if

(i) he could count: see the last five paragraphs

or

(ii) anyone could justify the 100ks Ed decided to spend on this American whizz.

SpinningHugo · Post by **SpinningHugo** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 4:45 pm

onebuttonmonkey wrote:And here's Alan Johnson wading in:

Labour must 'end the madness' over Jeremy Corbyn, says Alan Johnson
Former home secretary says party should back Yvette Cooper because she can unite the party to win power

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/201 ... an-johnson
This is the same Cooper who, just last year, tried to ditch Miliband but couldn't stop squabbling with Burnham about it, right? Remind me: what does "unite" mean again?

Nope.

This would be the Cooper who never made any move whatsoever against Miliband.

Wrongly in my view.

SpinningHugo · Post by **SpinningHugo** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 4:53 pm

Peak Corbyn has passed I think. Thankfully from my perspective. The interventions from everyone to the right of Galloway saying it wouldn't be clever seems to be having some impact

http://www.oddschecker.com/politics/bri ... our-leader" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Burnham back as favourite.

i don't think he'd be very good, but at least we wouldn't go backwards.

AngryAsWell · Post by **AngryAsWell** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 5:01 pm

Totally of topic but many of us here may be taking one or other of these medications - I am

Products for which the marketing authorisations are recommended for suspension by the CHMP on 22 January 2015

http://www.ema.europa.eu/docs/en_GB/doc ... 180894.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 5:35 pm

AngryAsWell wrote:Totally of topic but many of us here may be taking one or other of these medications - I am

Products for which the marketing authorisations are recommended for suspension by the CHMP on 22 January 2015

http://www.ema.europa.eu/docs/en_GB/doc ... 180894.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Thanks for posting. I was on Clopidogrel until I had a stomach bleed last year. They took me off it. Makes you think.

TechnicalEphemera · Post by **TechnicalEphemera** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 5:41 pm

gilsey wrote:
RobertSnozers wrote:My apologies if this has been posted already - my internet has been down since the end of last week and I've only been checking FTN intermittently. I took to heart the comments last night (I think by AAW?) that many of us have bought into the media narrative that only Corbyn of the Labour candidates was offering anything concrete, so have had another look around the candidate's websites. While I still feel Corbyn is saying a lot of the right things, in the right way, I was somewhat struck by this speech by Andy Burnham last week

" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I must admit I initially rolled my eyes a little at the 'spirit of '45' stuff, but Burnham is absolutely right that Labour is basically a pale shadow of its former self, and needs to recapture a bold vision. His plans for social care I can absolutely buy into. (My wife is a lecturer/researcher in gerontology, by the way, so I have a bit of insight into the issues around the ageing society). I'll even forgive him for using the appalling 'Going forward', which is such dreadful use of the language it sets my teeth on edge.

For the last six years, I have tried to persuade our Party to embrace a major reform of the way we care for older people.

Here we are, fifteen years into the century of the ageing society, and we are still saying that the generation who built the NHS after the war are only deemed worthy of a 15 minute care visit.

We are still saying to people who work in care that looking after someone else’s mum, dad, brother or sister is basically the lowest form of work — lower than the minimum wage because you don’t get paid the travel time between your 15 minute visits.

And we are still saying to the most unfortunate amongst us — with the highest care needs — that it is acceptable for people to pay for that care with everything they have worked for — home, pension and savings.

Didn’t the Labour Party create the NHS in the last century to free people from the fear of medical fees?

So why is the Labour Party of the 21st century standing by while people with dementia are not just wiped out physically by their condition but financially too?

How many more people are going to have to suffer before the Labour Party is prepared to act?

I have been on a mission to reform social care in England ever since I saw my own grandmother go on a depressing journey through the care system 15 years ago.

I am determined to make Labour the Party that helps everyone protect what they’ve worked for.

And I believe the only way we can do that is to extend the NHS principle to social care — where everybody is asked to make a contribution according to their means and when everybody then has the peace of mind of knowing that all their care needs, and those of their family, are covered.

And yes, let me be clear: I would have to persuade people of a difficult financial change to bring this about.

And this is where the modern Labour Party has always backed off, fearing difficult headlines in the Tory press.

But that timidity is leaving a broken care system in place and seeing many more family homes sold like my gran’s.

I believe Labour needs to rediscover the self-confidence to make a big argument. It’s time to trust the people. If what we’re saying is right, and provides people with an answer, they will support us, whatever the media says.

On care, our case is quite simple: would people prefer to pay what would be in effect an insurance payment to allow everyone to protect what they’ve worked for; or do people want to stick with the status quo of entering later life with everything on the roulette table — home, pension and savings — and take their chances?

I remain utterly convinced that we can make this argument to the public and win it. I believe it would help win more than just the 26% of over-65s who voted Labour at the Election.
That may be a very popular policy but I don't agree with it, it's basically about protecting inheritances.
'people with dementia are not just wiped out physically by their condition but financially too?'
Dementia, and indeed old age, are irreversible, the person is not going to suddenly get better and need the money. My father worked in local government and lived modestly, like many of his generation. After we'd all left home he started investing in the stock market and built up a decent portfolio by their, again modest, standards. He used to tell Mum that she'd be a wealthy woman after he died, only half joking. But he was very, very, clear that the wealth was for her, to make sure she would have everything she needed no matter what happened to her in old age. Passing it on to us came very low in the reckoning.
Unlike most people, I was brought up thinking 'saving up for your old age' meant exactly that, not saving up to pass it on to your kids. If you have money and your kids need it, give them it now.

I should make it very clear that wiping out everything down to the last £20k as we do now is outrageous, a figure of about £120k was mentioned at one time which seems about right.

Why should tax payers, often quite poor ones, subsidise your inheritance? How is that in any way consistent with left wing principles of equality?

onebuttonmonkey · Post by **onebuttonmonkey** » Tue 04 Aug, 2015 5:45 pm

In which Paul Krugman gets more right in five paragraphs than much of our domestic press has managed in four months:

Corbyn and the Cringe Caucus
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/0 ... =auto&_r=1

Here's three of those paragraphs:

First, it’s really important to understand that the austerity policies of the current government are not, as much of the British press portrays them, the only responsible answer to a fiscal crisis. There is no fiscal crisis, except in the imagination of Britain’s Very Serious People; the policies had large costs; the economic upturn when the UK fiscal tightening was put on hold does not justify the previous costs. More than that, the whole austerian ideology is based on fantasy economics, while it’s actually the anti-austerians who are basing their views on the best evidence from modern macroeconomic theory and evidence.

Nonetheless, all the contenders for Labour leadership other than Mr. Corbyn have chosen to accept the austerian ideology in full, including accepting false claims that Labour was fiscally irresponsible and that this irresponsibility caused the crisis. As Simon Wren-Lewis says, when Labour supporters reject this move, they aren’t “moving left”, they’re refusing to follow a party elite that has decided to move sharply to the right.

...

I don’t fully understand the apparent moral collapse of New Labour after an election that was not, if you look at the numbers, actually an overwhelming public endorsement of the Tories. But should we really be surprised if many Labour supporters still believe in what their party used to stand for, and are unwilling to support the Cringe Caucus in its flight to the right?

Can't help but think the fourth paragraph is worth a click on its own, too...