How has Clegg sold his soul?

He implicitly said he do a deal with the party with the most votes and seats, which is exactly what he did.

Sounds like someone with integrity to me.

Have you started taking the Daily Mail Jim?



Answers below, in r=#FF0000ed of course

Brown did much more than he was credited for but was a victim of his own personality and the media.

TV is a very powerful; it would be interesting to see the ratings had the debates been on radio. Most experts accept that the classic Kennedy V Nixon debate was won on TV by the slick Kennedy, but radio listeners said Nixon had the better arguments and substance.

It was time for a change but I suspect that the Tories will revert to robbing the poor to feed and house the ducks of the rich. Time will tell if they genuinely want to make life better for everyone, or if they expect the many to carry the burden (and mistakes) of the few.

I'm a bit disappointed that the Liberals tried to sell the future of the country to the highest bidder, but was pleased to see that some of those senior in the labour put an end to the nonsense and accepted to fight the cause from the opposition benches.

I'm not a staunch supporter of any party. We have seen recently what a bunch of cheats and liars they can all be, but for the next few years we need a government who will do the right thing for the [iwhole[/i country

Stelth re Clegg selling his soul, first of all the idea of politicians working together in theory is good.

However the fact he spouted along with Labour the fact by taking £6 billion out of the economy now would create the real risk of a double dip recession his words not mine and which I happen to agree with but all of a sudden he got sniff of power despite being 3rd in the election he ditched this idea shows to me he has no firm beliefs he will stick to.

The tories have promiseda referendum on an alternative vote system, again not what the Liberals had as core belief, he bottled this.

Then we hear he says he got tories to POSTPONE not DITCH the inheritance tax increase that would have benefitted the very few. t even that is a trick as he agreed to DITCH his plans for the so called mansion tax.

There is nothing in what he has done that will ultimately help folk generally as he got snared by the trappings of power their results and he clearly does not deserve.

Already and it will become clearer at the weekend how many Liberal party members and mps are defecting to Labour.

If you think about the way Gordon Brown conducted himself in the way the negotiations over the last week showed Clegg how someone with strong beliefs puts his party above himself, by this I mean when he realised it may help Lbour if he stood down he did, then when it became clear liberals had already made mnd up to jump in bed with the tories he did the right thing immediately by resigning as Prime Minister straight away so the coalition could form government straight away. That is sign of the man and conviction politician Clegg will never be.

Question for Jim inparticular regarding the minimum wage as prime example, most of your customers would I assume to be on the young side and most with not very well paid jobs assume, just think if thee was no minimum wage we would have kids on £2 per hour as in the days of thatcher that would impact of folk like your customers.

AJ you made succintly some really good points and which can not be improved on.

How can you blame the Tories, labour have been in power for 13 years. Labour were happy to go along with the way things were going.
The banks were in free fall, because the government did not keep a eye on them.
Thats the reason we are so far in the poo.



They are a waste of time. The stupid tick-box mentality of the labour party has put the wrong type of pressure on schools.
Schools focus to much on the stupid things. This then stops them doing other things.
Teaching should be all about education and allowing gifted teachers to do there job. Sats stop teachers doing that. Instead they have to teach for the tests.
Is the kids leaving school at the end of year 11 worse than you were/the same/better?



Glad you admit that they have got something wrong. Isn't a governments job to sort things out, instead of leaving me or you to come up with the answer?

If it was up to me i would put a lot more police on the beat. Instead of those silly community support officers. Let the police, police the area.



Labour have also adopted the european ruling on Immigration. So once again to try and blame the conservatives is silly.
Labour have had 13 years to try and do something.



I will agree that the unions have done a lot of good. But they have also done a lot of bad. I have worked with ex miners and you want to hear what they had to say.
The way they carried on made the job harder to do. Thats not the way it should be.
Seeing as the labour party are so reliant on the money from the unions they cannot try to hard to go against them. This in turn makes them weak.

You go on about Lord Ashcroft and how he carries on. If it was that bad, why in the 13 years labour have been in power, didn't they do something about it.



It makes them as bad as the ex labour leader. This is the trouble with most of the PMs. They have lost touch with the real world because they don't live in it.




Mortgage rates will go up as well as down. They have done in the past and will always continue to do so.
Public services will have to be cut, because of the mess the labour party have left us in.

Mervyn King came out today and said that cuts would have to happen. He then went on to praise, the new ways they are going to be cut by the new government.
He said it was better than what labour were proposing to do.

Go to a well known video sharing website and type in [iDavid Cameron Common People[/i - its the 2min 57 sec version

Whether you agree with it or not it is very, very funny - I actually chuckled out loud.

Whenever I see him now I just think of that







[i"and then gideon and I will go for a drinky poo"[/i he, he, he.

There have been media interpretations, especially "spitting images" that ruined people. If this goes viral it could do the same.

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/10112936.stm This will hit everyone the 1st of many tax rises despite them trying to pretend none will be needed. news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8679441.stm

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/10112936.stm This will hit everyone the 1st of many tax rises despite them trying to pretend none will be needed. news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8679441.stm

Quote ="girl power"news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/10112936.stm This will hit everyone the 1st of many tax rises despite them trying to pretend none will be needed. news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8679441.stm'" It says in your first link [iVAT is set to rise under the new coalition government, according to a BBC survey of influential economists.[/i As yet it hasn't happened, but don't let that stop scaremongering. We all know it had to happen. It had to happen to clean the mess the Labour party had left it in. It says in your second link [iThe NHS may need to make more savings than has been planned for, health secretary Andrew Lansley has hinted.[/i And its about time this happened. The amount of wasted that is wasted by spending it were it doesn't need spending is shameful. All we can expect is the Labour party scaremongering from now on. If they had done a good job, they would still be in power. Do you really think if labour had still been in power, that no cuts backs and raising of tax wouldn't have happened?

Quote ="girl power"news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/10112936.stm This will hit everyone the 1st of many tax rises despite them trying to pretend none will be needed. news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8679441.stm'" It says in your first link [iVAT is set to rise under the new coalition government, according to a BBC survey of influential economists.[/i As yet it hasn't happened, but don't let that stop scaremongering. We all know it had to happen. It had to happen to clean the mess the Labour party had left it in. It says in your second link [iThe NHS may need to make more savings than has been planned for, health secretary Andrew Lansley has hinted.[/i And its about time this happened. The amount of wasted that is wasted by spending it were it doesn't need spending is shameful. All we can expect is the Labour party scaremongering from now on. If they had done a good job, they would still be in power. Do you really think if labour had still been in power, that no cuts backs and raising of tax wouldn't have happened?

Jim

It's Labour's job to oppose now, they are in opposition. What would you have them do? Let the Government do whatever they want? I don't recall the Tories being quite in opposition despite the fact that they 18 years in power to "sort it all out".

On the subject of VAT, of course revenue has to be raised, but do you consider VAT to be fair and equitable? i.e. will we all be affected in the same way?

Personally I couldn't wait for Labour to get the hell out of there. I wanted conservative to win due to their policies on the debt, immigration, special needs and a few others. Though I am glad that miserable old man has gone, I know it isnt a leaders popularity contest but my god he was so bloody boring and dull. Leave them out to grass for a couple of terms and hopefully see this government recover their mess.

Every incoming government complains about the "mess" left by someone else. As has been said, the Tories had 18 years to sort out the last "mess" and only helped create the type of institutionalised greed and "me first" attitude that ultimately led to the worldwide collapse. They also governed the inexorable decline in manufacturing (because its full of those nasty union type oiks) in favour of their buddies in the "city". They swapped real wealth generation for mumbers on a computer.

I didn't particularly like Brown either, but without him the collapse would have been much worse. That's not just me saying that, there are a lot of financial guru's that would agree.

I am not die cast red, blue, or yellow; I think if you do that you do the country a disservice. We need people who can make good, fair decisions. I really hope the new coalition get to grips with the economy quickly but I get the horrible feeling that the recovery (when it comes) will be off the back of our taxes and yet again a privileged few will get rich quick.

Good Post.

I have mixed feelings about what Blair, Brown and Labour did whist in power

As a 15 year old in 1997 my abiding memory of the election campaign was 3 words, "Education, education and education".

My first memory of them in power was scrapping student grants and charging to go to university. The people who were affected weren't old enough to vote yet, it was a blatant cheap shot that went against everything a labour party was meant to stand for.

Then the greatest stealth tax of them all, the minimum wage, brilliant idea, gave the lowest paid a living wage and had them all paying more income tax as a result.

Massive reductions in waiting times in NHS hospitals.

The Iraq war certainly divided opinion.

Brown selling our gold reserves when the price was a third of what it is now.

Using terrorism as an excuse to try to force I'd cards upon us.

Brown signing the Lisbon Treaty when Labour promised a referendum on it in their manifesto. An act of treason in my opinion.

I'll save my judgement on this new government until they've actually had time to do something. But the one thing I hope they do is get rid of the entitlement culture that Labour has created in the last 13 years. Make the choice (and in a hell of a lot of cases it is a choice) between working for a living and having kids/watching Jeremy Kyle/sitting in the Bus station (delete as appropriate) for a living a lot more favourable towards working.

Excellent post.

And another excellent post.

Labour's problem has been where to draw the red line between welfare/car and dependency/freeloading.

The minimum wage and the NHS being great things as you say.

The challenge is to get people out of benefits mentality. That's where Labour will need to readjust it's mentality and policies over the next parliament.

That and adopt an honest approach to immigration, which none of the parties have, even now.

VOTE Keighley Cougar's.

Neil Spencer for Chancellor of the Exchequer!

Scott Law for Minister of Justice!

My feelings also.

He even had to sneak in and sign it when others had left.

The Labour Party policy almost kept Brendan out.

What would you have advocated?

Some very good posts from both sides of the spectrum even though some I disagree with.

Back to vat, the tories for months have done nothing but talk the country down and go on about getting the recovery going, as we know businesses whether self employed or running any type of business can claim vat back through various methods, I have no issue with that but by putting vat up to say 20% will hit those not able to claim vat back mainly those on the lower end of the financial scale, how on earth can this help revive the economy when prices go up therefore folk cannot afford to spend as much.

Lets remember in 1979 tories came in vat was set at 8%, later that year Geoffrey Howe increased this to 15%, in 1991 it was increased to 17.5%, there is a pattern here do you not think, also the tories cannot blame vat on labour government in that period as from 1979 to 1997 they were in charge.

I agree there will be waste in nhs etc, however to bring in private companies to run parts of the nhs will only make matters worse, remember how they screwed up privatisation of the rail network.

Now onto the pay cut of 5% government ministers have been told to take, do not get me wrong this sets a good example, however based on government figures the average cabinet ministers payment at 1st april 2010 was £145k.

The fact all the tories ministers and also Clegg are multimillionaires as were some labour ministers, nothing wrong with that but 5% of ministers income will not be felt as much compared to say someone on £16k.

Benefits now, there is no disagreement that some folk and this is a tiny amount of claimants play the system we all wil probably know someone. Bt as someone who has worked most of my life or should I say been employed and currently in receipt of job seekers allowance Ican give a real insight. In order to get £65 per week it takes up to a month initially to get accepted and then this large sum is paid fortnightly I defy anyone to try survive on this. So before just reading the odd ones that screw the system do not tarnish everyone the same far too many folk read headlines forgetting to read the full story.

One thing that labour did when the GLOBAL recession started was to bring from 39 weeks down to 13 weeks the time you have to be out of work for before being able to claim interest on the mortgage being paid by the state this has helped protect millions from possibly losing homes including possibly myself.

I am under no illusions labour made numerous mistakes but compared to what is in place now and what is coming labour everytime for me.

All I want is folk are treated fairly but sadly yet again the folk at lower end of scale suffer.

Regarding VAT, when Labour temporarily reduced it by 2.5% to kick start the economy during the recession did it make you go out and spend?

On a £500 TV for example 2.5% was the equivalent of £10.40 off. It's not going to make you rush out and buy one. So likewise it's not going to stop you buying it if it goes up.

Now regarding benefits, we definitely need a welfare system to help the most vulnerable in society who genuinely need it.

However, where I disagree with you is regarding is "the tiny amount of claimants play the system" for a start (and I'm not aiming this at anyone in particular just generalising) there are jobs available out there which the vast majority of unemployed can do, but won't do, which is why a lot of immigrants come to this country. The amount of people fiddling the system in Keighley is huge, mainly through apathy, lots taking advantage of the rules, quite a few fraudulently.

Has anyone looked in the shopping centre/ bus station recently during the week? It's full of them, the lazy ones, the career parents, alcoholics, drug abusers, chavs. Then there's the ones that hobble around on one crutch, claiming they're cripples. They aren't, if we can have a half blind PM and a blind Home Secretary these people can contribute to society too, after all regarding disablities should it not be about what they can do, not what they can't? Why is it you hardly ever see people with CVs in hand looking for work? After all, isn't that we pay jobseekers to do? Seek out jobs?

I know someone who works with single mums who have many kids to many dads so they get a free house and loads of benefits and believe me it's not a small problem or a small amount of people doing it, there's hundreds in Keighley at it.

Regards waste, you wouldn't believe how much goes on. My sister used to work in Airedale Hospital as part of the purchasing department. She was always telling me about the ridiculous amounts of money which was being wasted. Doctors asking for and being given new Parker pens every week when a 10p biro would suffice, food costing more than the equivalent product in a Supermarket, likewise with things like dressings. And why is this happening? Because there's no bottom line no profit to be made, any surplus is taken off them. The NHS is world's 3rd largest employer behind Indian Railways and US Armed Forces, can you even believe to imagine just how much money could be used elsewhere if they ran it efficiently like a good business?

On paper the NHS is the best in the world but the amount of admin cripples it. It needs a really good buisiness mind to work with top health specialists and get to grips with it. So far no one has either wanted/been able to.

My issue on immigration is that there are too many people coming in unchecked. The cap will make sure we know who and how many people from outside the EU are coming and with them having to be skilled workers they will put into the economy. Rather than the spongers who come here and claim everything then can without lifting a finger.

I think you will find, it was more to do with a form being filled out wrong

With respect to Brendon, he's a very good player for us. (And a hard barsteward)

Should the government be letting players of his calibre in anyway?

The Haynes, Slaters and Moi-Mois of this world I'm all for because they're world beaters and better than anything we've got over here so would add to our game.

But at Championship level? I'm not sure politically it's the right way to go about things.