Monday 17th August 2015

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 6:14 pm

Experiments with photocopier.

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 6:37 pm

The UK government has fired the starting gun on the sale of the taxpayer’s stake in London’s King’s Cross development, as the sell-off of state assets gathers pace.

The entire estate, Europe’s largest city-centre development, is likely to be worth more than £5bn when it is completed in five years’ time. (Guardian)

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/201 ... evelopment

yahyah · Post by **yahyah** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 6:39 pm

Well, I have voted. Corbyn 1st, Burnham 2nd. Watson 1st, Creasy 2nd.

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 6:41 pm

yahyah wrote:Well, I have voted. Corbyn 1st, Burnham 2nd. Watson 1st, Creasy 2nd.

Watson? Anyway - congratulations on being able to make up your mind!

rebeccariots2 · Post by **rebeccariots2** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 6:42 pm

HindleA wrote:Rebel with some paws.

What are you on HindleA? It's definitely firing up the wit.

yahyah · Post by **yahyah** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 6:43 pm

Sorry PF. I hope we don't fall out over it.

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 6:43 pm

rebeccariots2 wrote:
HindleA wrote:Rebel with some paws.

What are you on HindleA? It's definitely firing up the wit.

On the photocopier, at the last count . . .

rebeccariots2 · Post by **rebeccariots2** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 6:45 pm

yahyah wrote:Sorry PF. I hope we don't fall out over it.

Anyone left standing on FTN at the present time has pretty much proved themselves unfalloutable ... (or at least certainly not permanently falloutable)

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 6:50 pm

RobertSnozers wrote:The way I read it, his cat was the actual Harold Wilson and we had a socialist cat, cunningly disguised with a pipe and raincoat, as PM. There might even have had to be several cats underneath the raincoat, standing on each other's shoulders.

Ha! For some reason, that conjures up memories of the cover of my paperback copy (which I'm very annoyed that I can't find) of "The Master and Margarita". That will niggle away at me all night. Thanks!

rebeccariots2 · Post by **rebeccariots2** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 6:57 pm

Tom Harris ‏@MrTCHarris 2h2 hours ago
@DPJHodges You may be right. The thing is, it's over. We've lost. Corbyn - and therefore the Tories have won. Now for the civil war.

Dan Hodges ‏@DPJHodges 2h2 hours ago
@MrTCHarris Yes. But the crucial thing is the New Labour coalition has to reform. David backing a non-Blairite could have helped that.

Someone please tell me what the 'New Labour coalition' is he's referring to?

I find both those tweets a bit disturbing. But then so is this one - in fact really disturbing after all this time.

John Rentoul ‏@JohnRentoul 1h1 hour ago
"As I have left politics.." What hope we lost in @DMiliband's departure. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... d-miliband" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; …

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 7:02 pm

Jon Swindon ‏@swindon81 4 hrs4 hours ago

David Miliband has backed Liz Kendall. That gives us an idea of what would have happened had we chose David in 2010. Thank god we didn't.

RogerOThornhill · Post by **RogerOThornhill** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 7:09 pm

No-one forced Miliband D to quit politics - he went off on a sulk when he didn't win the leadership.

A bigger man would have stayed and helped the fight.

TechnicalEphemera · Post by **TechnicalEphemera** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 7:17 pm

RobertSnozers wrote:
rebeccariots2 wrote:
Tom Harris ‏@MrTCHarris 2h2 hours ago
@DPJHodges You may be right. The thing is, it's over. We've lost. Corbyn - and therefore the Tories have won. Now for the civil war.

Dan Hodges ‏@DPJHodges 2h2 hours ago
@MrTCHarris Yes. But the crucial thing is the New Labour coalition has to reform. David backing a non-Blairite could have helped that.
Someone please tell me what the 'New Labour coalition' is he's referring to?

I find both those tweets a bit disturbing. But then so is this one - in fact really disturbing after all this time.
John Rentoul ‏@JohnRentoul 1h1 hour ago
"As I have left politics.." What hope we lost in @DMiliband's departure. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... d-miliband" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; …
I don't find that last one disturbing. I find it sidesplittingly hilarious that Rentoul is quite that tragic.

Dan Hodges has been remarkably good on - as I see it - the tragedy about to befall the Labour Party and by extension this country. (That is to say remarkably good for Hodges, i.e. not laughable). He published a mea culpa about the leadership election farce on his blog (I would have preferred him to sound a little more sorry about it).

His central point is a good one though, Kendall isn't going to win and David Miliband endorsing her isn't going to help. A much better bet is for 80% of the parliamentary party to find a successor to Corbyn and wait for the implosion, that includes, as he sees it, the remaining Blairites throwing their lot in with the center left that Ed Miliband represented. By endorsing a non Blairite David Miliband could have signalled the first step in this process.

At which point I suspect Ed Miliband as a neutral elder statesman will be tasked with communicating to Corbyn that he has to go and helping to hold the party together by serving in a broadly centre left leadership team.

ephemerid · Post by **ephemerid** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 7:24 pm

RobertSnozers wrote:The way I read it, his cat was the actual Harold Wilson and we had a socialist cat, cunningly disguised with a pipe and raincoat, as PM. There might even have had to be several cats underneath the raincoat, standing on each other's shoulders.

Nooo!!!!!!

Harold was the cat, you're right there - but the PM was in fact Marcia Williams, now Baroness Falkender (or Forkbender, according to the Eye) who put a nasty spell on Harold and ran the country. With a Harold mask on.

Marcia had unfeasibly blonde hair (she's 80-odd now and a very curious shade of ginger) and teeth like piano keys.
She had eyebrows that go the wrong way thus giving her a permanent expression of either worry or confusion.

I think she might have been Thatcher, too, you know.....

tinyclanger2 · Post by **tinyclanger2** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 7:33 pm

PorFavor wrote: Bracket-related full stop relocation

I'm hoping you'll be publishing a festive tome of Punctuation Poetry that we can purchase for our loved ones as a "stocking filler".

PorFavor · Post by **PorFavor** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 7:46 pm

Goodnight, everyone.

rebeccariots2 · Post by **rebeccariots2** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 8:47 pm

Some wonderfully articulate and energised young people talking Labour leadership and politics with Cathy Newman on C4 news. This is good.

(Didn't like Newman's repeated attempts to rile Corbyn though over questions about donations to a holocaust denier some time ago. It felt like a deliberate needling - hoping to get him to lose his temper. Not necessary.)

rebeccariots2 · Post by **rebeccariots2** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 8:48 pm

Night PF.

onebuttonmonkey · Post by **onebuttonmonkey** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 8:49 pm

If Dan F. Hodges saying "Jeremy Corbyn and his alien brood .. see the party eaten alive by horrible monsters" is the same as "quite good", then... well, as Mr. Snozers says, I might have heard everything too. Just. Well...

TechnicalEphemera · Post by **TechnicalEphemera** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 8:58 pm

tinyclanger2 wrote:
PorFavor wrote: Bracket-related full stop relocation
I'm hoping you'll be publishing a festive tome of Punctuation Poetry that we can purchase for our loved ones as a "stocking filler".

Yep, fantastic piece of literary work.

Short punchy and very out there.

A bit of marketing and I see a three year residency at the Old Vic for PF.

TechnicalEphemera · Post by **TechnicalEphemera** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 9:00 pm

onebuttonmonkey wrote:If Dan F. Hodges saying "Jeremy Corbyn and his alien brood .. see the party eaten alive by horrible monsters" is the same as "quite good", then... well, as Mr. Snozers says, I might have heard everything too. Just. Well...

Firstly - that isn't what Hodges was saying, and secondly read the caveat.

TechnicalEphemera · Post by **TechnicalEphemera** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 9:05 pm

Living proof Byrne really is an idiot.

Burnham’s ovetures to Corbyn supporters were criticised by Byrne. “The fact he has said he would give Jeremy a senior job … It means that Andy’s argument about uniting the party is shot to pieces.

If by some miracle Corbyn doesn't win, he absolutely must be offered a senior job, whether he would take it who knows.

SpinningHugo · Post by **SpinningHugo** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 9:12 pm

TechnicalEphemera wrote:
RobertSnozers wrote:
rebeccariots2 wrote: Someone please tell me what the 'New Labour coalition' is he's referring to?

I find both those tweets a bit disturbing. But then so is this one - in fact really disturbing after all this time.
I don't find that last one disturbing. I find it sidesplittingly hilarious that Rentoul is quite that tragic.
Dan Hodges has been remarkably good on - as I see it - the tragedy about to befall the Labour Party and by extension this country. (That is to say remarkably good for Hodges, i.e. not laughable). He published a mea culpa about the leadership election farce on his blog (I would have preferred him to sound a little more sorry about it).

His central point is a good one though, Kendall isn't going to win and David Miliband endorsing her isn't going to help. A much better bet is for 80% of the parliamentary party to find a successor to Corbyn and wait for the implosion, that includes, as he sees it, the remaining Blairites throwing their lot in with the center left that Ed Miliband represented. By endorsing a non Blairite David Miliband could have signalled the first step in this process.

At which point I suspect Ed Miliband as a neutral elder statesman will be tasked with communicating to Corbyn that he has to go and helping to hold the party together by serving in a broadly centre left leadership team.

I will give Hodges this. He was very good on why it may be a bad option for those who oppose Corbyn to stay out of the shadow cabinet. I had assumed they would all just refuse to serve, but he makes a good case for why that may be wrong. Ceding party power and money to the far left may not be wise. The whole thing will be a soap opera for years though, and it presents Corbyn's supporters with a ready made story of betrayal from within however far-fetched (cf Miliband 2010-2015).

Dan Jarvis in 2018 is the best hope now I suppose, but unlike say AK I would expect Corbyn to be leader in 2020. Labour is just not ruthless.

May 2016 could be interesting. If we lose London, do badly in Wales, and regress still further in Scotland, that may be the end of Corbynmania.

Post by **letsskiptotheleft** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 9:17 pm

Much amusement around these parts at the "look at Gordon telling Labour how to win elections, the loser" how my sides ached. Thing is I have heard plenty who didn't rate TB but did rate McBrown, so in his own way he did help win elections.

Still amusing to see his one time supporters turn merely because he expressed a different opinion.

Post by **letsskiptotheleft** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 9:29 pm

I have no great hopes for Labour in next years Welsh Assembly elections, I honestly expect a few losses, been in power for a while, and that normally ends in some kind of kicking.

TechnicalEphemera · Post by **TechnicalEphemera** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 9:39 pm

letsskiptotheleft wrote:Much amusement around these parts at the "look at Gordon telling Labour how to win elections, the loser" how my sides ached. Thing is I have heard plenty who didn't rate TB but did rate McBrown, so in his own way he did help win elections.

Still amusing to see his one time supporters turn merely because he expressed a different opinion.

2005 was arguably won by Brown. But for the crash he would have won in 2010.

SpinningHugo · Post by **SpinningHugo** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 9:43 pm

TechnicalEphemera wrote:
letsskiptotheleft wrote:Much amusement around these parts at the "look at Gordon telling Labour how to win elections, the loser" how my sides ached. Thing is I have heard plenty who didn't rate TB but did rate McBrown, so in his own way he did help win elections.

Still amusing to see his one time supporters turn merely because he expressed a different opinion.
2005 was arguably won by Brown. But for the crash he would have won in 2010.

I am a soft target for his anti-Corbyn speech, but I found it rambling and filled with old anecdotes I had heard before.

One thing about Corbyn is it has put into perspective how trivial the Blair/Brown wars were.

ohsocynical · Post by **ohsocynical** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 9:45 pm

PorFavor wrote:Goodnight, everyone.

Night PF

TechnicalEphemera · Post by **TechnicalEphemera** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 9:49 pm

SpinningHugo wrote:
TechnicalEphemera wrote:
RobertSnozers wrote: I don't find that last one disturbing. I find it sidesplittingly hilarious that Rentoul is quite that tragic.
Dan Hodges has been remarkably good on - as I see it - the tragedy about to befall the Labour Party and by extension this country. (That is to say remarkably good for Hodges, i.e. not laughable). He published a mea culpa about the leadership election farce on his blog (I would have preferred him to sound a little more sorry about it).

His central point is a good one though, Kendall isn't going to win and David Miliband endorsing her isn't going to help. A much better bet is for 80% of the parliamentary party to find a successor to Corbyn and wait for the implosion, that includes, as he sees it, the remaining Blairites throwing their lot in with the center left that Ed Miliband represented. By endorsing a non Blairite David Miliband could have signalled the first step in this process.

At which point I suspect Ed Miliband as a neutral elder statesman will be tasked with communicating to Corbyn that he has to go and helping to hold the party together by serving in a broadly centre left leadership team.
I will give Hodges this. He was very good on why it may be a bad option for those who oppose Corbyn to stay out of the shadow cabinet. I had assumed they would all just refuse to serve, but he makes a good case for why that may be wrong. Ceding party power and money to the far left may not be wise. The whole thing will be a soap opera for years though, and it presents Corbyn's supporters with a ready made story of betrayal from within however far-fetched (cf Miliband 2010-2015).

Dan Jarvis in 2018 is the best hope now I suppose, but unlike say AK I would expect Corbyn to be leader in 2020. Labour is just not ruthless.

May 2016 could be interesting. If we lose London, do badly in Wales, and regress still further in Scotland, that may be the end of Corbynmania.

I would say losing London is highly probable, Labours mainstream candidates are all crap, Goldsmith is however an outstanding Tory choice. Wales has a decent First Minister but I bow to let's Skip's expertise. Getting hammered in Scotland is a nailed on cert.

Corbyn's survival depends on not losing ground in the locals, especially in the Midlands and Bristol.

Labour are that ruthless now, they won't stick with Corbyn unless he is a proven winner.

LadyCentauria · Post by **LadyCentauria** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 9:55 pm

ephemerid wrote: . . .
Showmaster is having his final checks today, and is off to have his arteries bypassed on Wednesday, cancellations notwithstanding.
He is in dire need of treats over the next few days, hospital food being what it is.

I am now planning his menu.

For this evening's dinner, I have the following in mind:
To start - Pate of blended pork brawn and raw tuna, served on toasted chelsea bun with raspberry coulis;
For main - Ostrich cooked sous-vide, haricot bean salad with a lemon meringue topping, peanut butter and marmalade sauce;
Pudding - Sardine and egg ice cream, with plum gravy and almond tuiles dusted with oregano.

On Tuesday, I will expect our Water Closet to be occupied. When Show is admitted, there will be no need for a pre-op purge.

Splendid.

In solidarity with your quest for Show's good health I have added your recipes to the Ernst's Kitchen Specials Menu for this week

Here's to success for his op - and his swift recovery from same!

TechnicalEphemera · Post by **TechnicalEphemera** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 10:04 pm

First up, all the best for Ephemerid.

Secondly, anybody else completely miss this piece of economic news:

BBC Peston:

Today we had confirmation that the economy of Japan - still the world's third largest (unless you count the lacklustre eurozone as a single homogeneous economy) - contracted in the three months to the end of June, and at an annualised rate of 1.6%.

Tubby Isaacs · Post by **Tubby Isaacs** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 10:15 pm

RobertSnozers wrote:
SpinningHugo wrote:
TechnicalEphemera wrote: 2005 was arguably won by Brown. But for the crash he would have won in 2010.
I am a soft target for his anti-Corbyn speech, but I found it rambling and filled with old anecdotes I had heard before.

One thing about Corbyn is it has put into perspective how trivial the Blair/Brown wars were.
I wouldn't say that. It sapped energy from the party for years, and kept it inward focussed. Moreover, it alienated a lot of people in the machinery of government, too. I was working for an NHS special health authority at the time, with a direct line to the DH. The crap we had to put up with with the No10 Spad ordering this or that and a Treasury Spad briefing against it, and No10 Spads giving something the go-ahead over the minister's head, then the Treasury blocking the funding. Moreover, the years-long Blair-Brown spat sowed the seeds of the monumental cynicism that now exists in the minds of the public about politicians. While the economy was more or less OK and Murdoch was on side it didn't matter too much, but it was stirring up a hell of a set of problems for the future.

I think he means in policy and political philosophy terms.

SpinningHugo · Post by **SpinningHugo** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 10:41 pm

https://docs.google.com/document/d/13YH ... RUpsY/edit" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

LadyCentauria · Post by **LadyCentauria** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 10:53 pm

yahyah wrote:
PorFavor wrote:
tinyclanger2 wrote: a PHOTOCOPIER?
well that's that then.
I feel truly betrayed. Surely he used a Roneo machine? (I think it was also known as a Banda - anyway, it stank to high heaven). I'm definitely voting for Liz Kendall now.

Can you make an image of your bum using a Roneo ?

Possibly a partial image - but only if you're willing to endure great pain until someone works out how to make the mechanism run backwards and releases you from your agony...

Tubby Isaacs · Post by **Tubby Isaacs** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 11:17 pm

Found some interesting figures from various sources, on Network Rail's debt.

Guardian 12 Aug 2015= £38bn
FT 12 Aug 2014= £34bn
Guardian 15 July 2013 not clear, but up £3.1bn in a year.

Quite a bit of this seems to be paying interest, but there must be extra borrowing too.

When you add stuff like this and health trusts going into debt, how much actual austerity has there been?

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 11:18 pm

@LC

Well,you learn something new everyday,even if you didn't particularly want to.

TechnicalEphemera · Post by **TechnicalEphemera** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 11:23 pm

RobertSnozers wrote:
TechnicalEphemera wrote:
onebuttonmonkey wrote:If Dan F. Hodges saying "Jeremy Corbyn and his alien brood .. see the party eaten alive by horrible monsters" is the same as "quite good", then... well, as Mr. Snozers says, I might have heard everything too. Just. Well...
Firstly - that isn't what Hodges was saying, and secondly read the caveat.
Er, that was an actual quote from his column.

Still not what he is saying though.

Anyway here is Boris.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politic ... orbyn.html

Who correctly perceives the biggest danger to winning big in 2020 is now the risk their heads might fall off from laughing too much.

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 11:33 pm

It's a plan.

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 11:52 pm

For those interested.

DWP publishing information concerning mortality rates of benefit recipients on the 27th August

https://www.gov.uk/government/publicati ... l-releases" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Mon 17 Aug, 2015 11:54 pm

Of course it is far from what people requested,and will not tell you very much at all.

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Tue 18 Aug, 2015 12:09 am

Salient point is.Is it justifiable to subject proven sick/disabled,some terminally ill and/or have progressive degenerative illnesses to an ever nearer equivalent system ,both in income and conditionality/sanction regime to JSA.We've rather moved on ,and not in a good way.

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Tue 18 Aug, 2015 12:19 am

Though it will be interesting to watch both the support group and PIP(claims at least) numbers when WRAG group income equalises with JSA.

LadyCentauria · Post by **LadyCentauria** » Tue 18 Aug, 2015 12:24 am

In that Speccie blog linked to earlier:

There are currently 20 departments, all of which incur costs simply by replicating back office operations for policy areas that overlap: for instance, DECC could sit neatly in the Business department, or as a merged operation including the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs department.

So, back in the Ministry for Agriculture, Fisheries, and Food - sort of back where it began...

And, thinking of being sort-of back where we began, have we always had a Paymaster General or has that job/title been recently revived after a long absence? Apparently, that's Matthew Hancock's job title. He was dire on the bit of Sky News I saw this morning.

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Tue 18 Aug, 2015 12:32 am

Believe it was Francis Maude,previously.

LadyCentauria · Post by **LadyCentauria** » Tue 18 Aug, 2015 12:47 am

HindleA wrote:Believe it was Francis Maude,previously.

Ah, thanks. I've clearly had a brain-block of some sort - couldn't remember hearing the words 'Paymaster General' since days when the GPO still ran telephones (and ISDNs) as well as the Royal Mail...

Those stats you mentioned will have some uses but you're correct, they are not answering the questions the FOIs have been asking - and are not releasing the data that the courts ordered IDS' DWP to publish.

Tizme1 · Post by **Tizme1** » Tue 18 Aug, 2015 1:00 am

Hello all,

I had a meeting to attend this evening in the town centre. As ever these days, I set off extremely early to walk there because I can never be sure from one day to another, or even from one hour to another, how Arthur will affect me. As it happened my walking was fine and I arrived 30 minutes early. I sat on one of the benches outside and then happened to see one of our local Labour councillors so I started chatting with him. He does know me btw.

He's young [22] and sometimes comes across as arrogant, aggressive, pompous, and self opinionated. But this is because of his age. Partly perception because he is young, and partly a lack of experience and tact due to his youth. In the year and a bit since he was elected, he has learnt a lot and is less abrasive than he was initially. I rather like him actually and applaud his willingness to take a stand and try and 'do' something for his community.

I don't entirely agree with his outlook. He was pro David Miliband and is now pro Liz Kendall. In fairness to him, he first suggested to me that he thought Liz was 'one to look to for the future' a good 18 months ago. And there were a number of things during our conversation this evening [and other chats in the past] that I agreed with him about.

Three thing struck me though:

1) How much young people today just accept the neoliberal status quo.

2) How much cross over there is and maybe we should stop using terms like right and left and Blairite Brownite, and certainly get rid of 'tory lite' etc [though I realise I've just used the term Neoliberal and I'd be prepared to differentiate that].

3) I don't believe in god. When I look at different religious beliefs, what strikes me is the similarities between the different religions [and indeed with non believers]. Likewise with 'leftwing' views. Why can't we work together to build on our common agreements and strengths?

Sorry, these are just some random thoughts from a somewhat frustrated Green Liberal Leftie!

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Tue 18 Aug, 2015 2:01 am

http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/20 ... ou-thought" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The Tory rape exception for tax credits is worse than you thought

HindleA · Post by **HindleA** » Tue 18 Aug, 2015 3:04 am

Well this Tory-lite,betrayer of values,deviator from the righteous path of Corbynista ephemeral bandwagon hystericalum delusionalum has risked the wrath of the expected majority.Crucial point is does he have a brother?

LadyCentauria · Post by **LadyCentauria** » Tue 18 Aug, 2015 3:13 am

Rather late in the 'day' but this is especially for @PF:

Edit: This is The Independent's Daily Cartoon for Mon 17th August 2015...