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| Personally I'd change the voting system so that you vote twice at the same time.
One vote goes to the national, one for the local. Change the whole system, what we have at the moment is ridiculous.
Seat are then based on a percentage of the vote not on if you win a constituency.
Councils just a straight vote for the winner.
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| Quote ="The All New Chester Wire"Other polls have it closer. See what happens after Thursday.'"
I am expecting that Clegg has had his day in the sun and the prospect of a big Lib Dem vote resulting in a Labour controlled balanced parliament will put people off voting yellow. (I think that is the Tories stongest argument). We all know we are tired of Labour, they stink now, and they are due to be in the wilderness for a bit when Andy Burnham or a Milliband will take the reins and become "the future" again, offering "change".
A wise old man told me that Labour always foobar up the economy. Things never change, despite the reasons.
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| Quote ="Wire_Yed"Personally I'd change the voting system so that you vote twice at the same time.
One vote goes to the national, one for the local. Change the whole system, what we have at the moment is ridiculous.
Seat are then based on a percentage of the vote not on if you win a constituency.
'"
That's sort of the German system, although you have to win 5% of the national vote to get a share of seats. You can also win a constituency direct. Then it gets complicated with Uberhangsmandaten.
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| Quote ="Wire_Yed"just seen the new polls on the news seems the public are bored of the Lib Dems already, Tories have a 9 point lead (biggest so far).'"
Latest Yougov - Lib Dems 34% (!!!), Tories 31%, Labour 26%.
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| Quote ="The All New Chester Wire"Latest Yougov - Lib Dems 34% (!!!), Tories 31%, Labour 26%.'"
Polls imo dont give a fair judgement
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| Polls are polls.
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| Quote ="The All New Chester Wire"Latest Yougov - Lib Dems 34% (!!!), Tories 31%, Labour 26%.'"
in the words of Alan Partridge " Lynn, I hate the general public"
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| Quote ="Wires71"
A wise old man told me that Labour always foobar up the economy. Things never change, despite the reasons.'"
What about the Tories record for foobaring up the economy:
Ted Heaths government: energy crisis, three day week, unemployment shoots up, Heath tries to inflate away unemployment, he just gets 16% inflation and unemployment keeps rising....
Margaret Thatcher's government: early 80s, deepest recession since the war, inflation in double figures, unemployment triples. Inflation briefly gets under control for about 3 years in the mid 80s as the economy rides on a North Sea oil boom. By the end of the decade inflation is back at 10%, unemployment shoots up again and Thatcher is forced out just as Britain goes into another deep recession.
John Major's government: Comes in with high inflation and high unemployment. Major pins his strategy on ERM membership and uses the exchange rate as the target of monetary policy. This finally gets on top of inflation but the recession is lengthened due to us trying to match Germany for high interest rates to maintain the pound in the ERM boundaries. High levels of repossessions and unemployment. In the end we fall out of the ERM anyway and Major's credibility is permanently damaged.
In fairness to Major I will say this - he achieved the holy grail which had been beyond Thatcher, Callaghan, Wilson and Heath, of pulling down inflation and establishing a permanent low inflation economy, and AFTER we fell out of the ERM and interest rates could be cut, Major got on top of unemployment as well. He was already destined for defeat in the 1997 election once the ERM had happened anyway....but in terms of quietly efficient economic management, the Major/Clarke era was IMO the best example of Conservative economic performance.
Mrs Thatcher never got on top of unemployment, hence her welfare benefit bill was bigger than any of her predecessors and sowed the seeds of todays dependency culture, ironic that this is one of her legacies as she hated doss culture. And also I don't buy this talk that Thatcher had to give a dose of unpleasant medicine because of the legacy of the previous Labour government....Labour had only been in for one term, in which they inherited a messed up economy from Ted Heath. They hadn't gone on a spending free for all because they borrowed from the IMF, who then imposed strict spending rules on Callaghan's government, and Callaghan was the first post-war British PM to challenge the Keynesian consensus.
Far be it from me to sing the praises of "New Labour", but if we are doing an analysis of economic management, they have been far better than the Tories: 10 years low inflation, sustained growth, low unemployment, then 3 years of a global recession which started in the US. The only arguments the Tories have had against Labour's economic management is about this recession, which lets be honest would have smashed a Tory government as they would have allowed unemployment to shoot up.
History has shown us Tory governments are poor at dealing with recessions, once they get into one they tend to last for a long time.
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| Quote ="sally cinnamon"Far be it from me to sing the praises of "New Labour", but if we are doing an analysis of economic management, they have been far better than the Tories: 10 years low inflation, sustained growth, low unemployment, then 3 years of a global recession which started in the US. The only arguments the Tories have had against Labour's economic management is about this recession, which lets be honest would have smashed a Tory government as they would have allowed unemployment to shoot up.
History has shown us Tory governments are poor at dealing with recessions, once they get into one they tend to last for a long time.'"
Do you not think that the collossal amount of money that NuLiebour smashed into the economy over that 10 years might have something to do with their "favourable" record - that is until it all collapsed at which point they stuffed more of our money into bailouts to banks.
The saying goes that Labour bankrupts the country and the Tories then come in and put it back together (takes about 10 years) at which point the public are bored of the Tories, vote in Labour who increase spending which bankrupts the country so the Tories are voted back in and etc etc ...........
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| Quote ="Monmouth Wire"
The saying goes that Labour bankrupts the country and the Tories then come in and put it back together (takes about 10 years) at which point the public are bored of the Tories, vote in Labour who increase spending which bankrupts the country so the Tories are voted back in and etc etc ...........'"
Were we not in recession in the late 80s and early 90s?
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| Quote ="Monmouth Wire"Do you not think that the collossal amount of money that NuLiebour smashed into the economy over that 10 years might have something to do with their "favourable" record - that is until it all collapsed at which point they stuffed more of our money into bailouts to banks.
'"
Not really. It was more the other way round, ie New Labour were able to ride off the proceeds of economic growth to spend on public services. They didn't spend at a level which inhibited economic growth. Yes a global recession came, but it wasn't caused by UK public spending being too high.
The Tories are being misleading when they are saying Gordon Brown didn't mend the roof when the sun was shining etc, because the national debt went down in proportion to GDP until the recession hit, the banks were bailed and the government pumped money into the economy to replace the money that had dried up from the private sector.
To put it in context, the Tories had left the national debt standing at around 42% of GDP. Labour brought it down and generally operated around the 30-36% mark. Yes they were spending more than the Tories, but the economy was growing at a rate where the spending was sustainable, certainly more sustainable than the rate the Tories had been spending in the mid 90s.
The big spike came in 2008, one because the government spent a lot suddenly (eg bailing out the banks) and two because the recession meant GDP fell backwards, so the proportion of debt against GDP rose sharply. But for the Tories to criticise Labour for that is misleading, because they would have bailed out the banks anyway, which accounted for the big part of the spike, so a Conservative government would have seen the same sharp rise at the end. It is normal for governments to spend more in a recession to limit its impact, and this was the worst global recession since the 1930s. The usual pattern is that that percentage settles back when the economy returns to growth and the debt starts to be repaid.
The Tories talk a lot about Labour's record on debt, but the reality is, for the 10 years before the recession, the national debt was more under control than it had been when Labour took over from the Tories, so the Tories are just trying to attack Labour for taking action to help out the economy in the face of a severe recession.
It's a bit like if you got stranded abroad with the flights being cancelled, and your Dad shouted you a few hundred quid to keep you going, and then your Mum telling you when you got back that your Dad doesn't know what he's doing with money, he's blown hundreds of pounds in the past week.
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| Not withstanding the fact Labour have balanced the books without having a decent resource to privatise.
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| Quote ="sally cinnamon"Not really. It was more the other way round, ie New Labour were able to ride off the proceeds of economic growth to spend on public services. They didn't spend at a level which inhibited economic growth. Yes a global recession came, but it wasn't caused by UK public spending being too high.
The Tories are being misleading when they are saying Gordon Brown didn't mend the roof when the sun was shining etc, because the national debt went down in proportion to GDP until the recession hit, the banks were bailed and the government pumped money into the economy to replace the money that had dried up from the private sector.
To put it in context, the Tories had left the national debt standing at around 42% of GDP. Labour brought it down and generally operated around the 30-36% mark. Yes they were spending more than the Tories, but the economy was growing at a rate where the spending was sustainable, certainly more sustainable than the rate the Tories had been spending in the mid 90s.
The big spike came in 2008, one because the government spent a lot suddenly (eg bailing out the banks) and two because the recession meant GDP fell backwards, so the proportion of debt against GDP rose sharply. But for the Tories to criticise Labour for that is misleading, because they would have bailed out the banks anyway, which accounted for the big part of the spike, so a Conservative government would have seen the same sharp rise at the end. It is normal for governments to spend more in a recession to limit its impact, and this was the worst global recession since the 1930s. The usual pattern is that that percentage settles back when the economy returns to growth and the debt starts to be repaid.
The Tories talk a lot about Labour's record on debt, but the reality is, for the 10 years before the recession, the national debt was more under control than it had been when Labour took over from the Tories, so the Tories are just trying to attack Labour for taking action to help out the economy in the face of a severe recession.
It's a bit like if you got stranded abroad with the flights being cancelled, and your Dad shouted you a few hundred quid to keep you going, and then your Mum telling you when you got back that your Dad doesn't know what he's doing with money, he's blown hundreds of pounds in the past week.'"
Is there a graph for before 1997?
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| Quote ="The All New Chester Wire"Latest Yougov - Lib Dems 34% (!!!), Tories 31%, Labour 26%.'"
Out of curiosity, what sort of scores do we have to reach before the Lib Dems would actually become the top party seats-wise, and Mr Clegg would become Premier?
It really is a bizarre system we have that under those latest ratings, Labour would hold power in a hung parliament, though it is a huge irony that Cameron and his party are the only ones who oppose electoral reform, yet are the likeliest to be stung by it in this election.
It is now also becoming painful watching Cameron appealing like a desparate man to the British public, to not vote positively for a candidate that they actually want to vote for, but rather to vote for him and his unappealing crew just to stop 'nasty' Gordon and his evil Labour Party.
Whilst I fear that Clegg and the Lib Dems may indeed blow themselves out in the next fortnight, I really hope they can maintain a healthy percentage of the vote, just to give a bloody nose to the 2 main parties and most of all to p!$s off Cameron, who, quite brilliantly, has had that smug smile wiped off his face in the last week or so.
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| Labour now at 25% in a poll tonight. Is this the worst performance ever for a governing party?
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| Quote ="Greg- YamYamwire"Labour now at 25% in a poll tonight. Is this the worst performance ever for a governing party?'"
Trying to side up to the Lib Dems has made them look very weak, if the Tories don't win this now they never will.
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| Quote ="Wires71"I am now beginning to think that the Conservatives have blown it. Cameron's "wooly" big society vision manifesto then Clegg's superb performance in the debate.
I can see that sinister, dour, jock grinning at us again, with Clegg as his puppet. Spunking NHS money hand over fist whilst the benefit culture grows and grows.'"
poor little you you do make me laugh at times! having just facilitated a 12 hour shift of spunk redistribution in A&E I have to confess the NHS is no different now to how it was under the tories, same different decade in my opinion, no change in real terms on waiting times, the figures etc are just as well manipulated under labour as they were 23 years ago when i first started nursing, there just appears to be more managers (a trend started by the tories in the 80's and built upon by new labour)
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| Quote ="The Angry Pirate"Out of curiosity, what sort of scores do we have to reach before the Lib Dems would actually become the top party seats-wise, and Mr Clegg would become Premier?
'"
The tipping point for the Lib Dems is between 38%-40%. They are badly discriminated against in our political system at anything lower than 36%. At this point they would be coming 2nd in many seats, which means any extra shift translates into seats falling to them like dominos.
At 38% they would be the largest party in terms of seats in a hung parliament. At 39-40% they would come into power. Anything over 41% and they would win with a landslide. If they were to get 42% or above it would be all time record territory in terms of size of majority. Oddly, Labour or the Conservatives would not nearly get as big a majority if they polled 42% (which is quite common for winning an election in the past). Such are the quirks of our system, it works against the Lib Dems on the lower numbers but once they get into their tipping point they surge quickly.
This still might look a long shot but the political correspondents are a bit edgy because in the modern internet driven generation 'people power' can get out of control quickly, and the big volatility factor with the British electorate is that usually so few of them vote anyway....if a decent proportion of the 'non-voters' were to turn up and vote Lib Dem then the other two parties could be in big trouble. The Lib Dems were polling 16-20% before last week, after Clegg's been on one debate they are up to 30%....if he has another good debate and they start going up to 34% (which one or two rogue polls had been forecasting them on last week anyway) then people will start to think they might win, which could encourage a lot of lukewarm Labour/Tory voters to switch to them out of fascination.
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| Quote ="Wire_Yed"Trying to side up to the Lib Dems has made them look very weak, if the Tories don't win this now they never will.'"
People said that when Labour lost in 1992 in the middle of one of the worst Tory recessions, but in John Major's book he said as soon as the 92 election was over he pretty much knew the Tories wouldn't win again because they would have been stretching the democratic elastic too far to expect to win 5 in a row and get over 20 consecutive years in office. Hence they were smashed in 97 when the economy was in a far healthier state than it had been in in 83, 87 and 92 when the Conservatives had defended their government at an election.
So if it was to stay 'first past the post' system, I would say if the Conservatives lose this time they will be in with a landslide next time, and enjoy a lengthy period in office, which won't happen if they sneak home this time (they will probably lose next time if that happens)
If it's a Lab-Lib coalition government though, and the Libs barter a change in the electoral system as their terms for a hung parliament, then the game changes, it will be very difficult for the Tories to ever get an overall majority again because there is too big a section of the electorate who fundamentally don't like them. Because the Tories won't be keen on offering electoral reform to the Lib Dems, they make it much harder to entice them into a coalition, so for the Tories it is a case of win a narrow overall majority or bust.
If the Conservatives fail to get a majority this time then they may never get one again and Cameron will go down in Conservative history as the man who dealt a fatal electoral blow to them by managing to blow what should have been one of the easiest election wins in history.
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| Vicious attacks from the Sun, Mail, Express and Telegraph today. That tells me that the Tories think this is more than a blip; they must be hearing on the doorstep that the Lib Dems are popular. Tonight should be thrilling TV.
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| Quote ="The All New Chester Wire"Tonight should be thrilling TV.'"
I expect crap TV. All three basically supporting the war in Afghanistan, but competing over who can pay the most lavish insincere tribute to the armed forces. Then they will argue about who would put in the most money into the war effort, have a go at Gordon Brown about lack of helicopters, Brown will say we will continue to do everything we can to support the troops, they've had everything they need, the others will say well I've got a quote from Major General Butterworth-Smythe saying that the army didn't get helicopters in time, Brown will just repeat that they have had everything they need.
Nobody will talk about the real issue, ie what is the point of fighting a spurious war.
Then there might be a bit of chat about the Euro, all three parties will claim they are the party who would be in Europe but not ruled by Europe, their policies would see Britain "take a lead" in Europe. Heard it all before.
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| Worst Kraftwerk gig ever.
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| I've seen better finals of 15-to-1.
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| Give it to this bloke;
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