Fire and Passion Vs Beermats

Last night’s well attended public meeting held by TUSC in Rawmarsh illustrated an age old problem for passionate, but small and resource-poor groups such as TUSC. How do you compete to get your message heard when others (in this case UKIP) have the money to ‘shout’ louder?

The meeting was about to get under way in the Earl Grey pub when someone noticed the beermats – specially commissioned UKIP beermats, both sides carrying the UKIP message. Clearly, UKIP have thrown a lot of money at this round of local elections, and a party political beermat is a stroke of genius. We all (well, me anyway) look at beermats when we’re in a pub. We play with them, flip them, pick at them, and even read them. I’ll wager that those beermats have been read by people who would not normally look at an election leaflet. The number of potential voters reached by a beermat may not be large, but every vote counts in an age of voter apathy.

It may seem frivolous to talk about beermats but the principle is important. TUSC’s anti-austerity message needs to be heard as widely as anyone else’s message. It doesn’t really matter whether you agree with TUSC or not, we should all agree that no candidate should be ‘priced out’ of the democratic process by the greater resources available to others.

As for the meeting, Rotherham TUSC displayed all the fire and passion that we’ve come to expect from them. Andy Gray, the candidate for Rawmarsh, concentrated on the bedroom tax, and made a compelling case against this insidious attack on the least affluent. Martin Hickman, an active trade unionist and TUSC member warned of the dangers of apathy in a spellbinding ten minute talk. Last, but definitely not least, was Mary Jackson, TUSC candidate in the recent Mayoral election in Doncaster. Regardless of your politics, if you get a chance to talk to Mary, you should grab that chance – an amazing woman with some great stories and an ability to cut to the heart of the issue that a top cardiac surgeon would envy. Kudos to Andy’s agent, Chris Bingham, for turning what might have been a bit of a non-event into a very worthwhile evening.

Warren Vale

PS: Rotherham TUSC are beginning a local campaign against the bedroom tax. If you want to join their fight, I believe there is a meeting next week in Rawmarsh at the Earl Grey pub at 7pm. I’m sure they will post details with Rothpol as soon as they are able. Remember, the bedroom tax doesn’t care who you vote for, so don’t let it put you off that it’s a TUSC initiative. Maybe a chance to see some joint activity between TUSC, Respect and any concerned Independents?

Rothpol’s thanks goes to Warren Vale for this excellent piece. Other reader contributions always welcome.

45 thoughts on “Fire and Passion Vs Beermats

  1. Having been at this meeting and seeing the UKIP beer mats I was reminded of an old Galloway saying and thought to myself instead of three bum checks it appears now to be four. People of Rawmarsh do yourselves a favour, don’t vote for bum cheeks.

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  2. Andy is a great guy and a great candidate and I hope that the voters of Rawmarsh see what he and TUSC have to offer. He is the only name on the ballot paper that offers a real alternative to the mainstream parties. He will always fight for what’s best for the people of Rotherham. He will speak out about the bedroom tax and all the other injustices ordered by the con-dem’s and forced through by labour councils, whilst being called too soft by UKIP. Best of luck Andy. VOTE TUSC!

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  3. May I also add that there was a TUSC public meeting in Maltby on Monday, in which there’s a community campaign being set up to lobby against the bedroom tax, similar to that in Rawmarsh. “Effects of the bedroom tax on Maltby residents” is being discussed at the next town council meeting – will be interesting to hear what’s said 🙂 and – Good luck Andy!

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    • I’ll just add that I as a TUSC councillor added that to the agenda. Just a little proof that when elected TUSC will act against the con-dem attacks, unlike labour. I’m sure Andy will do the same when elected.

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      • I wish you luck Joe. What a shame ALL the town & Parish Council’s don’t get together and pressure RMBC to act. I hope you can convince Maltby council to do something but I suspect that even if you do RMBC will either ignore you or say ‘we don’t know if it’s legal’ as they did to the only Councillor who had the temerity to raise the issue.

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  4. I am very pleased to hear how Andy is opposing the Bed Room tax But I dont seem to have seen anything in the press or any whare else he as mentioned it except on this site and what he is doing about it.
    Again read the local press and you will see that UKIP have also opposed to this very unfair discrimative tax and will be challenging the Council on what they are doing to try and protect people from it.
    And I dont recall seeing Andy’s Election address outlining what is policy is.
    And as far as the Beer Mats go UKIP have for over 5 years now been fighting against PUbs Closing and am sure Beer Mats and our Save our Pubs posters have been seen throughout the country.

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    • After the con-dems autumn statement, which brought more misery to millions, UKIP leader Nigel Farage said “Its not enough, austerity needs to cut deeper and faster!” UKIP’s answer to the country’s problems is to increase the suffering of the lowest in society. You are little more than a hardcore tory party. TUSC are the only party offering an alternative to austerity, whether you claim to oppose the bedroom tax or not.

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      • If,as you claim UKIP is ‘little more than a hardcore tory party’ why did they win so many seats in the local elections? You forget they took seats from all three parties.
        A rather unfair comment from you. Do you not believe in healthy debate? Is’nt a contra-view allowed to be expressed?
        I notice you have not made any statements about the obscene salaries paid to RMBC ‘Executives’ or even Trades Union bosses.
        I expected you would do more than issue slogans.

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  5. UKIPs Letter to the press re: Bedroom Tax
    Caven Vines
    UKIP Chairman Rotherham Branch
    30 Whitley View Road
    Rotherham
    S61 2HL
    07802 498957
    cavenvines@aol.com
    Sir
    What timing for David Cameron to Introduce the Bedroom Tax Just as Mrs Thatcher Dies This tax is about as fair and sensible as the POLL TAX introduced by Mrs Thatcher or maybe her spirit and policies carry on in the Conservatives policy’s.
    This Tax is totally wrong and unfair. Someone living alone in a 2 bedroom house cannot avoid the tax unless they move house. Which would almost certainly cause them massive disruption and expense. That’s if they could find some where to move to. This in effect clobbering the poor in such a way that they cannot escape from it without turning their lives upside down. And what about if their family require to visit where do they stay in a tent in the garden of the one bedroom house.
    We recognise that the Benefits bill is far too high and the Philpott’s case illustrates how broken the system is. But the Bedroom tax is not part of the solution. The upset and heartbreak it will cause is not worth the comparatively small amount of cash that it will raise.
    Cameron and his head in the sand MP’s really should be looking at the wider picture and start to think outside the box. The country is broke the infrastructure is in pieces and we are overrun by immigrants claiming benefits. Yet they still shell out £53million per day to the EU and £23million a day in foreign aid with the Romanians and Bulgarians waiting in the wings to fill the empty 2 & 3 Bedroom houses left vacant when the people who can’t afford to live in them because of the Bedroom Tax.
    So maybe Mr Cameron is setting himself up as a never to be forgot Leader like the late Mrs Thatcher.
    Caven Vines
    Chairman
    UKIP Rotherham

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  6. UKIP gained seats in tory heartlands due to a protest vote. It was a rejection of the major parties, not an approval of UKIP. I am totally prepared to debate any issue you wish, and yes of coarse you are entitled to your opinion (however far right it may be). You are right about the ridiculous salaries payed to executives, and I and TUSC have actually spoken out about it on numerous occasions.

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  7. Who cares that UKIP claim to be opposed to the Bedroom Tax? They are a bunch of opportunists who will say anything to get votes. Apart from their xenophobic immigration policies and anti-EU stance they just make everything else up on the back of Nigel Farage’s fag packet.

    Good luck to my good friend Andy Gray – a decent bloke and a proper socialist.

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  8. Nothing new about UKIP beermats. I first saw them in East Anglia in 2005 although they had the brewer on one side and UKIP on the other. Maybe it is sponsorship/advertising.

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  9. Maybe Andy Gray is a good chap and will do wonders for all But what is the TUSC manifesto what do you stand for you have todate not told any one any thing except you dont like the Bed room tax so whats new we all dont like it except the the Conservatives and labour cos we aint had any feed back from them only that it may not be legal to do owt about it. You see we also got involved with trying to save our Pubs as well as Saving us from Europe and the Bedroom Tax. and many more things people may not like all we say but at least we say what we are about and what we want to acheive So come on put your heads above the parapit and lets here what it is you truly represent then people would know if TUSC was worth voting for.If you dont tell us how can peole truly decide.

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  10. TUSC stands to ahieve socialism. Our policies are to make the rich pay for the financial crisis they caused rather than inflicting devastating austerity on the poorest in society.
    We would nationalise the commanding heights of the economy, as well as utilities, railways and buses, to run for the benefit of all.
    We are anti EU, because the free trade agreement allows for reckless gambling across borders by bankers and almost actively encourages tax evasion, not for your nationalistic reasons.
    We call for the anti trade union laws to be repealed to protect the rights of the workers.
    We call for a large program of house building to cure Britains housing shortage, a practical solution to the bedroom tax. Every council in the country has a large pot of money from Thatchers sale of council houses that she made it illegal to spend. This should be challenged and the money used to build council houses in every borough and county.
    These are just a few things we campaign for. Unlike UKIP, TUSC have a full manifesto of policies that would actually help the people of Rotherham.

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    • “We are anti EU, because the free trade agreement allows for reckless gambling across borders by bankers and almost actively encourages tax evasion, not for your nationalistic reasons.”

      Joe,
      I can understand many reasons for leaving the EU, even those I don’t accept, but this one just doesn’t make any sense to me.
      Whilst being in the EU does possibly facilitate some forms of transfer-price based tax avoidance by non-banking corporations, most schemes use off-shore centres not in the EU – for example the British Overseas Territories of the Cayman Islands and the British Virgin Islands which are both outside the EU.
      …and as far as the bankers are concerned, their gambling is almost entirely across three centres, London, New York and and any one of Hong Kong/Singapore/Tokio/Sidney in the Far East .
      (London dealers start work before the Far East market closes, and don’t go home until after New York opens. )

      From the BIS Triennial FX survey 2010:
      “Banks located in the United Kingdom accounted for 37% of global foreign exchange market turnover, followed by those in the United States (18%), Japan (6%), Singapore (5%), Switzerland (5%), Hong Kong SAR (5%) and Australia (4%).”
      (http://www.bis.org/publ/rpfxf10t.pdf )

      I would almost say that the EU are the good guys in this, and UK is more than a little bit naughty.
      Where the EU has failed is in not enforcing standard corporate tax rates across all member states, something which UK would by the nature of things oppose, but it makes this all possible:
      http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c638f73a-978f-11e2-97e0-00144feabdc0.html

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  11. Very commendable post, at least you’ve set out what you (TUSC) believe in.
    I have a problem with what you have written:
    Can you direct me to any country with a successful Socialist economy that has adopted your policies? I’ll be honest, I’ve searched and cannot find one. Perhaps I’ve missed one?

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  12. Thats great so ware are they the full range of policies that will help the people of Rotherham no one I know has seen them
    And are you wanting to turn the clock back to the 60’s & 70’s When the Unions played their part in dismantling our car industry with poor productivity poor build quality Just look at British Leyland Speke Plant in Liverpool,for a prime example of when it was left to trade unions to rule the roost, and that was long before Thatcher I think Wilson was around then.
    I agree we need to take hold of Utilities and Transport and the Banks But it was Blair and Brown who allowed them to get us in this mess then they both bailed out with their own pockets full and the Tories have just helped them along
    But I would be most interested in knowing just how you propose to do all this
    Yes you a right it should be challenged but to date I haven’t read or seen any challenge from the TUSC but if i missed it please point me in the right direction.
    I thought Trade Unions was main bank rollers to Milliband havn’t you got a say in how Labour would do things. if so why did they get us in this mess in the first place

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    • “I agree we need to take hold of Utilities and Transport and the Banks But it was Blair and Brown who allowed them to get us in this mess then they both bailed out with their own pockets full and the Tories have just helped them along”.
      Not really:=)

      Notable privatizations in the UK under Thatcher included British Airways (1987), British Petroleum (gradually privatized between 1979 and 1987), British Aerospace (1985 to 1987), British Gas (1986), Rover Group (formerly British Leyland; 1988), British Steel (1988), British Telecom (1984), Sealink ferries (1984), Rolls-Royce (1987) and the regional water authorities (mostly in 1989). After 1979, council house tenants in the UK were given the right to buy their homes; one million had done so by 1986. (wikipedia).
      Electricity privatisation began in 1990 – again under Thatcher.

      The problems within the banking sector can be traced back to the so-called “Big Bang” in late 1986 (under Thatcher), which effectively deregulated the sterling banking sector, and in that same year little building societies were allowed to become fully-fledged banks (they had previously been heavily very regulated) and allowed to de-mutualise. .
      _______
      Brown’s main contribution to the crisis in the banking sector was by setting up the tripartite regulatory regime for the banks – made up of the Bank of England, Financial Services Authority, and the Treasury . He could of course control the Treasury – and he was control-freak.. He then introduced the “light-touch” level of regulation.
      (The Tories are now unwinding all Brown’s mess-up).

      * the Co-op Bank’s current problems seem to stem from some over-expansionist (weak?) management buying the Britannia Building Society when it had got itself into lending on Commercial Properties at a time when perhaps it was not a good idea to be lending to that sector along with an overrun on costs on a much needed new banking system
      Sadly nothing ever changes.

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  13. You keep saying TUSC have a full manifesto of policies that would help the people of Rotherham so ware are they no one seems to have seen them plus you dont say how you would implement them.

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    • TUSC do stalls in town and on Maltby high street, if you’ve ever been to one and had a chat with the people there they explain the policies, or if you receive one of the many Socialist newspapers handed out there is a policy list in there; during the Maltby by-election campaign leaflets were distributed ward wide explaining what TUSC is and its policies and how they would be implemented, as well as in the Maltby-wide bedroom tax leaflet, plus you can always do a 2 second Google search, but seeing as that seems to be too much effort for you I’ve saved you the trouble: http://www.tusc.org.uk/policy.php

      The reality is Labour have abandoned the working class, and in a working class town like Rotherham, Labour have failed us – a statement I’m sure you agree with.

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  14. I see you are backed by the RMT Union and others so that why you want to nationalise the Railways
    And you have the Nerve to complain about being underfunded arnt we all.

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    • Or maybe it’s the other way round:
      .. because they support re-nationalisation of the railways, the RMT decided to support them.

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  15. If you need a strictly econnomic example of successful mixed market economies, look at china and the soviet union. Obviously their social policy is draconian but economically it works. In terms of social policy great strides have been made in latin america. And need I point out that southern europe is seeing million strong demonstrations involving our sister organisations. We aren’t stuck in the 70’s we are very much a new breed, we are the future.
    Our main priority for Rotherham is to set a needs budget to stop austerity from causing any further harm to the town. The legal challenge to the bedroom tax is currently being looked at by the RMT, who as you point out are strong backers of TUSC, though if elected andy could try and force the issue within the council, as I have. The brutal cuts at Rotherham hospital must also be stopped. And we have campaigned against the EDL and other fascist groups. TUSC have numerous campaigns and policies that are well known by the public in Rotherham. UKIP merely turned up at the by-election and from what I can see it is they who have no local policies whatsoever. Your answers to the mess we are in is to ramp up the cuts, implement new taxes and crush the poorest among us. You say you aren’t tories, yet talk of joint candidates and coalition is common place in both parties? Already in this debate you have shown your parties vile opinion when you blamed the benefits system for the phillpots terrible actions. They were the actions of evil people, and to try and use that for political gain (as george osbourne did!) Is utterly appalling.

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  16. ” Caven said: “as far as I am concerned any pact with the tories is pure speculation on thier part to cover up their failings AND I WILL STATE HERE AND NOW IN PRINT THAT IF UKIP EVER DO HAVE A PACT WITH THE TORIES I WILL NOT BE A MEMBER OF UKIP I DID NOT JOIN UKIP TO BECOME A TORIE Dont take every thing you read in the paper as being true.”

    Forage has just been on the Politics Show – BBC 12 Noon Monday 13th May 2013.

    He admitted UKIP have and are undertaking deals and pacts with local Conservative Offices and Tory MP’s re the General and other elections. I will hold you to your word Caven. .

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  17. Joe
    Just as I thought China and the Soviet Union and the old 70’s Trade Unions Communisum
    Much like the Demercratic republic of Rotherham
    But I hope I am wrong and you are a new breed of Trade Unionists and I wish you well in your quest.If that is true.
    And Just to enlighten you UKIP just dont turn up and neither do I I have also been challenging Rotherham Council for well over 15 years before Joining UKIP.
    and yes beleive it or not I do admire people like you Joe who will stand up and have ago choose what party they stand for and I realy do hope you can stay the distance with all the knock backs you will have over the comming years like I have had but the seceret is to keep comming back eventuly it stops hurting as you keep banging your head on the brick wall of the staunch Labour following in Rothrham but it is slowly breaking The old Labour Monkey can,t last for ever.
    Good luck on thursday I think politics apart we are both after the same thing for our town just got different view points on how to acheive it

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  18. Regular Reader
    Well put and reserched but to me one thing stands out from this The Labour party when in government have never tried to reverse any of Thatchers doings only added to them so like you say nothing changes But we have to try

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    • Thatcher sold off (AKA privatised ) all the state assets she could, and then spent the money.
      Where could any incoming government ever find the money to buy them all back? Taxation? There just was no way!
      __________
      Compare what she did with the money coming in from North Sea Oil to what the Norwegians did.

      One view on this is at: ( http://paulcolemanslondon.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/thatcher-disputed-legacy-squandering.html )

      Other way Norway
      North Sea Oil’s other beneficiary – Norway – stashes revenues in a national deposit or ‘sovereign wealth’ fund. By 2013, Norway enjoys a growing $700 billion fund.
      Thatcher did not follow Norway’s example. Nor did she allow the British National Oil Corporation – created by Labour energy secretary Tony Benn in the mid-1970s – to take a majority stake in the North Sea oil fields and invest in onshore industries, infrastructure and jobs.
      In fact, Thatcher privatised BNOC in 1982, clearing the way for BP to buy it. She spent oil revenues on tax cuts for the wealthy and on welfare benefits for the growing mass of unemployed people.

      Sovereign wealth
      PriceWaterhouseCoopers economist John Hawksworth calculated in 2008 that had Britain saved and invested its oil revenues, the British people would’ve now enjoyed one of the world’s biggest sovereign wealth funds – comparable to the Arab oil state funds now buying up huge chunks of prime central London land and property.
      _________________________

      I think it was Martha Gellhorn, the great WW2 war reporter who wrote “growing up is learning that not everything that’s broken can be repaired”.
      …but it was definitely Joni Mitchell who wrote :
      Don’t it always seem to go
      That you don’t know what you’ve got
      Till it’s gone

      …. and then there’s nout that you can do about it.

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  19. Joe:
    You wrote-‘Our policies are to make the rich pay for the financial crisis they caused rather than inflicting devastating austerity on the poorest in society’ and in your next post you wrote;
    ‘.successful mixed market economies, look at china and the soviet union.’
    That is not true. China has one of the largest concentrations of multi-millionaires and billionaires in the world while 15% of the Chinese population is classed as living in poverty and China’s tax rate is 20%, much lower than the 40-50% tax rates in the West. Russia also has a large number of billionaires and millionaires (and a thriving criminally controlled black market) There are no state owned steelworks in Russia. There are 12 oil companies in Russia, only one is owned by the Russian state and Russian electricity suppliers are privately owned.
    Both China and Russia realised years ago State monopolies do not work. The introduction of capitalist methods and finance has enabled both these countries to attract more investment and given them the impetus to grow and compete with the West. Therefore I do not agree with your assertions that public ownership is for the ‘common good’, after all even Blair ditched Clause 4.

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    • If public ownership isn’t for the common good, then what is? We have privatised industries in the past and we have in many cases ended up with inefficient, price fixing oligopolies; look at the energy industry for example.

      Do you think austerity is right then? I’ll ask two questions and it will be interesting to hear your response: a) who caused the financial crisis? – and b) who should pay for it?

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    • You have misunderrstood my meaning, I do not by any means hold china or russia (though I actually said USSR) as examples of perfection. Far from it. These states are mearly examples of successful MIXED markets. They aren’t socialist or commmunist, they are both deformed workers states.
      State run monoploys may not be as efficient as their capitalist counter parts the oligopolies that syphon the money into pockets of the rich. But the benefits of state ownership aren’t all economic, the social policy is equally important.

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  20. Alan Greenspan.
    Mervyn King.
    Gordon Brown.
    Bill Clinton.
    Andy Hornby.
    Fred Goodwin.
    Plus many more.
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/aug/06/financial-crisis-25-people-heart-meltdown

    I do not disagree with the notion bankers-in the loosest term- should repay their obscene bonuses and payoffs. The Labour party is fond of saying ‘tax cuts for millionaires’ Really? The current tax rate for wealthy people is 45%, under the last Labour government it was 40% for 11 years out of 13. Milliband is a multi-home owning millionaire Labour toff.
    Every country in the western world has cut public services-not just Britain- but we cannot continue with a system where there were more Admirals than ships or where procurement procedures for our armed forces was out of control and not audited properly, or where civil servants abused government credit cards. We also have the admissions by former Labour governmnet ministers that immigration into Britain was used as a form of wage restraint, not to fill spurious vacancies that ‘will not be taken by British workers’.
    Alistair Darling’s budget plans for 2010-2014 included raising Vat to 20% (Brown had overidden this plan in November 2009) and cutting public services so while we are all suffering, the current austerity is not the preserve of the Coalition government-which I do not support.

    I hope I’ve answered your questions.

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    • I assume that your list of names, and link are in answer to my comment regarding the origins of the recent crisis in UK banking.
      Your Guardian link (from August 2012 is simply a follow up to a somewhat better piece of journalism from January 2009:
      http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/jan/26/road-ruin-recession-individuals-economy?
      Of the people listed 18 were based in the US, one in Iceland and 6 in UK.
      The UK ones are:
      Mervyn King, governor of the Bank of England
      Gordon Brown, prime minister
      Andy Hornby, former HBOS boss
      Sir Fred Goodwin, former RBS boss
      Steve Crawshaw, former B&B boss
      Adam Applegarth, former Northern Rock boss

      Prior to Thatcher’s 1986 Building Societies Act:
      HBOS had been Halifax Building Society,
      B&B had been Bradford and Bingley Building Society,
      Northern Rock had been Northern Rock Building Society.
      The Act allowed them all to de-mutualise and become banks, but the older craftier banks and big corporate borrowers saw how limited these new guys understanding of the international financial markets were and just took them to the cleaners.
      Maybe that will help you get some understanding of how Thatcher’s 1986 Building Societies Act contributed to the later crisis.

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  21. Yes you have a very valid point But I do not agree with our front line troops paying the price for the procurement civil servants out of control spending. we now see that with the massive cuts already on our front line troops and more to come they are now expected to serve nine months tours on the front line with the threat of the sack when they get back. I dont see any ministers or top civil servants taking the hit for this waste and being put under the pressure our young service personal and their families are.
    Theirs nothing to chose between the LIB/LAB/CON on this issue
    1} Labour under Blair and Brown sent our troops to war with poor protection and equipment costing many lives.
    2) The coalition sent them to war with the threat of the sack hanging over them.
    then expecting them to make up the numbers by going on extended tours of duty.
    We can’t look after our troops but can send millions abroad
    You really could not make it up and they call UKIP clowns and fruitcakes.

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    • There is no basis for you to keep opposing the cuts, where would you cut? Austerity is the capitalist policy, UKIP’s policy! You want faster, deeper more brutal cuts! So I must draw the conclusion that you are an unpricipled party who are merely trying to say what voters want to hear, while offering nothing real.

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      • This doesn’t read very clearly, I apologise. I meant to ask you is, you keep stating opposition to cuts on here, why when UKIP policy is for more cuts? Playing to the public perhaps?

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  22. Joe you have to realise that if we didn’t give so much of our money to the wasteful and corrupt EU and on top of this £23 million per day in foreign aid, we would perhaps not need to have such serious cuts!

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    • To put it in perspective, our net contribution to the EU together with our Overseas Aid spending add up to about 2% of government spending.

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      • Really good point Colin, well said! 🙂

        But there are no loose-change amounts in government spending.
        If you ever need to make sense of the numbers, it’s best to divide them by 55 million to get the per capita cost.

        Look, I remember Norman “Badger” Lamont idiotically throwing away £3.2 billion in one day trying to “defend” sterling and Gordon Brown throwing away far more than that selling UK’s gold stocks.
        … and it was far richer people than we that took “our” money then!
        At least its likely that some people poorer than we are getting something positive out of our ODA spending.
        … and remember some of it flows back to the UK – I remember Caven Vines saying that ODA had funded some of his work in the 3rd World.
        … and, via the World Bank and the UN I guess they must have contributed to funding my work out there.

        Which of course means that you must have helped fund me! I just hope you don’t want your money, back with interest. 🙂

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  23. Regular reader
    yes you are correct in saying the oversea’s aid did pay for some of my work in Africa and South america but them days it was controlled through the Crown Agents and the aided work went to British company’s I remember
    not like now where its not controlled.

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    • Hi Caven, I accept that, Please understand that I consider you an utterly OK man. I would never think of questioning your integrity,
      Have you ever worked with UNCTAD? – they were the best people I ever worked with.

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  24. Hi No I dont think so I think all our projects was controlled in part by the Crown agent in Africa and parts of the Middle East
    Other countries such as Canada Funded in part with the Crown projects south America In the Amazon But i think that was for extracting Minerals they funded local villages with water and health care projects out of the profits I think.Now thats a scary place to be when the Sun Goes Down all the Nasties come out to play.
    Maybe we should write book so people know just what they have got here and how they should get off their backsides and vote to preserve the freedom and democracy we have enjoyed over the years instead the apathy that has set in today.
    They would not beleive the things that go off in some of these countries
    People disapear for just trying to go to work, Children allowed to die with such preventable illness like measels. all because of the greed and coruption of those in Power.
    I have put in projects in Africa only to go back 12 months later to see them totaly distroyed and the operators killed all because some power crazed tyrant thought they was getting too educated and may become a threat to their power.
    Ware people are made to watch puplic exicutions including us westerners working their such things like Beheading, stoning to death all for so called crimes we just take for granted as part of every day life Rape of young women and children is common place with no redress taken by the authorites.
    If more people actualy saw this they may just value what we got and make the effort to preserve it
    Because who would have thought in modern day europe we could have had a Bosnia.after 1945.

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