Will Ladbrokes catch a cold from the Manc C-Charge?
December 11th, 2008
Is it down to passengers against commuting motorists?
At 10pm tonight voting closes in what’s been, after the London Mayoral Race, the biggest single UK election of 2008. A total of 1.94m electors across ten boroughs in the Manchester conurbation have been voting by post to decide whether drivers should pay peak hour congestion charges.
If this was down to the punters there’d be an overwhelming NO vote. Ladbrokes has reported that 92% of all bets placed have been against the plan and their latest prices are YES 3/1 with 1/4 on the NO.
Latest estimates suggest that the referendum has already topped the Ken-Boris contest. The estimated turnout as of yesterday was 46% The top figures were Trafford, 55.6% and Tameside 54.4%. The smallest turnouts have been in Manchester itself with 39% and Wigan 39.9%.
To encourage late voters special collect points have been set up right across the region to receive the voting packs.
The challenge for NO punters is that a massive bribe inducement - of £3bn of investment in public transport will be made available to the region if the vote is YES. A NO vote means the region will get nothing.
So in the end this could be down to public transport users against the commuting motorist and in terms of sheer numbers there are many more of the former than the latter.
What polling there’s been has suggested that it’s neck and neck and it’s a hard call trying to work out what the turnout levels means.
My sense is that the outcome will be a lot tighter than the betting suggests and from what we know this is a 50-50 chance. Given the prices I’m putting a bit more on YES.
Because of the technicalities in the voting system the plan could go down, along with the £3bn, even if the aggregate YES vote is greater than the NO one. Ladbrokes are paying out on votes cast.
Mike Smithson
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First !!I am going to the count
Hopefully it’ll be a NO vote!
Scampi will like this - public transport thread coming up!
I’m actually a big believer in PT but I think drivers have enough costs to worry about.
re 2. so you want the region to be starved of public transport investment? Eh?
Mike, we’ve already done this.
The attempt to tie the C-charge and the investment together was a knowingly false dichotomy. One need not be dependent on the other.
The people of Greater Manchester have seen it as the blatant attempt to cajole and blackmail them that it is, and they don’t seem to be buying it.
5 - Mike, in my opinion the site runs better when you don’t put too much of your own personal feeling into it.
Both sides clearly have principled arguments and there will be significant costs & benefits to voters on either side.
What is your gut feeling Mike?
5 We’ve had this argument before - the public transport investment should be there whether people vote for the C Charge or not, the fact that it’s conditional makes it a big Government bribe for voting the “right” way.
5. Any thoughts on whether the high turnout in outlying boroughs has implications for national politics, as I suggested on the last thread? Discouraged Tories turning out en masse to overturn Labour stealth tax….?
5 Its the thin end of the wedge Mike, its nothing to do with public transport and everything to do with revenue generation. They could do the public transport bit without fleecing the driver. I hope the vote is no to every future congestion charge everywhere.
5. It’s a bit like the Irish Nice Treaty vote, in a little way. “We have your best interests at heart - as long as you vote the right way!”
I am fairly agnostic on road charging, but what strikes me is that this doesn’t seem necessary.
Manchester already has better public transport than most cities in the UK (Cardiff, Leeds, Glasgow) - matched only by Sheffield and Liverpool IMHO, and bested only by London.
Furthermore, much of central Manchester is easily walkable, and the road congestion isn’t that bad, even during rush hour. You move slowly, but not for that long, because it isn’t big enough to hold you in traffic for that long.
Compared to London, even now, the idea that Manchester has a congestion problem seems, to me, hyperbole.
10. Higher turnout in the ‘burbs. That’s effectively what got Boris elected in London.
11. I know nothing on this issue, but it’s never stopped me before.
Is there really no link between money going into the government and money coming out?
10. Exactly….
Replying to Martin Coxall on the previous thread
(re my comment that encouraging electric vehicles in London simply increased pollution for the rest of us)
“Possibly not, since there’s a good chance the electric vehicles will either be hybrid engines, or powered by Methanol or Hydrogen fuel cells.”
For a start, many hybrid engined cars are more polluting than some conventional cars such as small diesels. It’s pretty stupid to exempt the Prius and maybe hybrid SUVs when small diesel hatchbacks with lower emissions (and smaller footprints, also important in a crowded city) are charged. And fuel cells are years away. It’s a perfect example of Government not being flexible enough to respond to reality as it is, and of making brad sweeping generalisations that don’t stand up to scrutiny.
For example, it would be possible to charge road tax at say 50p per gram of CO2 (or maybe something like zero under 100 and £1 over 200), a fairly junior civil servant with a spreadsheet could work it out, and you could easily put it up by the rate of inflation every year. It would give people a small reward for “downsizing” even within the current band and wouldn’t penalise people too much who stray slightly over a band boundary. But government seems too stupid to be able to do things like this.
Previous thread - apols
the normally “Brown-friendly” The Mole
Mike - I thought “First Post” was reckoned to be a right of centre vehicle, on what basis do you consider The Mole to be Brown-friendly?
5. Mike, I hardly think a Labour ’stronghold’ is going to be starved of public investment. Vote no and they will get most of the money anyway.
In particular it seems to me much of Brown’s spending spree (RBS, Northern Rock etc.) is about shoring up the core vote before all hell breaks loose.
O/T I’ve never paid much attention to the Indy but I found Simon’s Carr’s sketch today quite entertaining.
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/simon-carr/the-sketch-we-not-only-saved-the-world-said-gordon-1061279.html
With that I’m off to Woolies to finish my Xmas shopping. Au Revoir.
17. Cars don’t pollute, drivers don’t pollute - internal combustion engines do…
20, and cows.
19 jsfl - You may be disappointed, Yahoo! news reported that shoppers complained about the miserly level of discounting, 10 - 15%, having expected at least 40% in the circumstances. Some said that lower prices were available from the likes of Tesco - says it all really.
Why the falling £ - if it is a policy - ain’t working:
UK’s manufacturers remain gloomy
“It is worrying that, despite the 20% depreciation in sterling over the past year, export orders remain so weak.”
“Our export competitiveness is increasing but many of our key export markets are contracting rapidly.”
Overall orders are also well below par, with a 35% balance of firms reporting lower-than-expected order levels.
“Figures for manufacturing continue to make depressing reading, with output still expected to fall rapidly in the coming months,” said Mr McCafferty.
O/T Germany
Some posters on the last thread said that Merkel’s CDU is in trouble.
Actually, they’re not, they have a very clear poll lead.
here is the last poll (3 december / Stern) with comparison with the last election:
CDU/CSU 38 (+2.8)
SPD 23(-11.2)
FDP 12 (+2.2)
Die Linke 12 (+3.30)
Greens 10 (+1.9)
Others 5 (-0.6)
The party in cris in Germany is the SDP, barely representing half of the left (SDP-DL-Greens) it dominated heavily before.
CDU/CSU + FDP look set to win the new election as many SDP and DL supporters simply refuse to consider ana alliance.
Steinbruck’s outburst against Brown and his keynesian politics must be read in this context: The SDP tries to salvage its credentials as a responsible governing party, trying to fight back the rise of Die Linke.
Afternoon all,
Simple way of curing the congestion. Tax the backside off all the mothers and some fathers who can’t walk the less than 1 mile to school, which is the distance most kids need to go. It would cure 2 problems at once. Rid the roads of thousands of unnecessary cars twice a day and stop hundreds of thousands of parents and children from resembling fat ba*tard in the Austin Powers films.
A friend just sent me this. Clearly no point in showing it to Flash Gordon who wouldnt understand it since he seems to understand very little about basic economics!
TAX CUTS EXPLAINED
Let’s put tax cuts in terms everyone can understand.
Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all ten comes to £100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:
The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing The fifth would pay £1 The sixth would pay £3 The seventh would pay £7 The eighth would pay £12 The ninth would pay £18 The tenth man (the richest) would pay £59
So, that’s what they decided to do.
The ten men drank in the bar every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner threw them a curve. “Since you are all such good customers,” he said, “I’m going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by £20.” Drinks for the ten now cost just £80.
The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected. They would still drink for free, but what about the other six men - the paying customers? How could they divide the £20 windfall so that everyone would get his ‘fair share?’
They realized that £20 divided by six is £3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody’s share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer. So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man’s bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.
And so:
The fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings) The sixth now paid £2 instead of £3 (33%savings) The seventh now paid £5 instead of £7 (28%savings) The eighth now paid £9 instead of £12 (25% savings) The ninth now paid £14 instead of £18 (22% savings) The tenth now paid £49 instead of £59 (16% savings)
Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to drink for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings.
“I only got a pound out of the £20,” declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man, “but he got £10!”
“Yeah, that’s right,” exclaimed the fifth man. “I only saved a pound, too.
It’s unfair that he got ten times more than me!”
“That’s true!!” shouted the seventh man. “Why should he get £10 back when I got only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!”
“Wait a minute,” yelled the first four men in unison. “We didn’t get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!”
The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.
The next night the tenth man didn’t show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had beers without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important. They didn’t have enough money between all of them for even half of the bill!
And that, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is how our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.
For those who understand, no explanation is needed. For those who do not understand, no explanation is possible.
Repost from previous topic, because I really would like some answers.
A relatively simple question from a simple soul. Mr Brown keeps telling me that all countries are following his example. Does anybody have any examples of countries which are genuinely doing this. I am sure that between the pro and anti Browns on this site we would get some semblance of the truth of what is actually happening as opposed to what the papers are being paid to tell us.
24. So, SPD haemorraging votes everwhere - left, right and centre.
On topic, any idea when a result will be announced?
I agree with Mike that 3/1 currently quoted by Ladbrokes for a Yes vote represents good value and have made a wager in order to help Shadsy balance his book.
22 PfP - I just popped in to our local Woolies to gape at the vultures picking over the carcass. There was a whole display stand dedicated to desktop cooling fans. With temperatures outside hovering around zero, these weren’t selling too well…
25, good post:)
Ugh, be boring waiting for F1 to start again when Strictly goes away.
I hope you’re proud of yourselves. I used to be a paragon of virtue, now I’m a vice-ridden gambler.
Canadian crisis heats up with Harper packing the Senate…
http://www.thestar.com/News/Canada/article/552046
29, so, buy them now for tuppence ha’penny, then flog ‘em in summer (assumign we get one next year) for sixpence.
Incidentally, has anyone else noticed that (excepting 7 days after Boris become King of London) since Brown seized power the weather’s been uniformly rubbish?
I thought the Germans were meant to be “isolated” in their ridicule of Gordox, the Sumerian Deficit God?
According to Boulton and Co:
“There should be no doubt that there is a growing rift in the EU on how to deal with the stimulus package, pitting Britain, France and Italy on one side against Germany, Denmark and Poland…”
So, not isolated then.
25 Easterross - your tale has featured on here a number of times (rather like my Kipper Tie joke I suppose), but bears repeating nonetheless. Welcome back BTW, you used to be on PB a good deal and then seemed to disappear.
27- David Herdson
“So, SPD haemorraging votes everwhere - left, right and centre.”
That’s often the case for a junior coalition partner: not rewarded by government supporters and attacked by the opposition just as much as the leading party.
A lesson for LDs in a NOM scenario?
26. Don’t know if it helps answer your question at all, but here are what some of the EU contries are doing to provide fiscal stimulus.
http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idUSLA42017620081210
Pound at new record low against euro blah blah blah - 1.122
(Down two cents on the day).
I say this is so often I might make it a hotkey on my laptop, so I can just press F4 and say the same.
It wouldn’t surprise me if some punters are backing “NO”, not realising that the market is not whether the proposal passes or fails, but on the number of votes cast, as Mike points out in the leader. This may have skewed the marked too far to the “NO”s
Can any FX experts on here tell me how much the £’s recent fall against the euro is down to the weakness of the pound and how much is due to the strength of the euro?
9, 11 - the idea that the C-charge is “nothing to do with public transport” is laughable. I cant believe people can seriously say that without cracking up.
33. Aha, if Denmark and Poland come out against it then things could get interesting.
@33:
What a surprise: Flash Gordon, Saviour of the Universe has picked sides with Italy, the most fiscally inept country in the EU by quite some margin.
25 - A very effective way to make that point.
BUT:
1 Surely the point of a progressive tax system is that you pays your taxes and then don’t have to worry about also buying the drinks?
2 Is it a fair sytem that ends up with one man earning that much while four earn very little anyway?
and 3 The other nine wouldn’t be so stupid as to beat up the guy who bought their drinks anyway!
42. Yes, when it comes to finance, if not food, I’d rather be with Germany and Denmark than France and Italy.
42, in a few years we may look back on that post wistfully, and remember the good times. When we had greater GDP than Italy. And were a less risky proposition than McDonalds.
With all of this government debt piling up I’m seriously thinking of shifting my meager savings over to the land of leather shorts. Kind of currency bet based on what I think about the UK economy. I simply don’t see the government being able to get out of this without a burst of some serious inflation. They are desparately trying to get some more inflation now, when inflation is already a healthy 4.5% and according to Madasafish and his charts unlikely to drop much below zero and even if it does it will not be for very long. Add to that Labour have an election coming soon so they will take any excuse they can get to crank up the printing presses (pushing inflation up still further) in order to distribute bribes.
23. Scampi.
No. Like others you want to believe something that isnt true. The point of a weak pound is that WITHOUT a weak pound, export orders would be worse. Just as the mad people who think that there will be no inflation as a result of a weak pound are wrong, because prices of imports will be higher than they would otherwise have been.
A weak pound does not mean that we will have a sterling crisis or that there will be a Gilt strike. As a Gilt purchaser, I am not worried that the pound halved in value yesterday, I am interested in what happens tomorrow. But, if the pound continues to weaken it may signal continuing lack of confidence in government policy and the worse case scenario is the Buiter view of the UK’s banking sector.
Well I’ve just placed a bet on this market. I have no idea which way it will go but if Mike thinks it’s a 50-50 chance then No looks great value at 3/1. I’m on!
Mike - I think you are confusing the way people are betting with their expectation of the outcome.
The fact that punters overwhelmingly think the ‘NO’ vote will win does not necessarily mean they think it will win overwhelmingly. They could all beleive it will win 52% to 48%.
If I was betting, which I’m not, I would bet on ‘NO’ winning, but not by a huge margin.
42 Iain Martin on threen line whip had suggested that Harriet Harman maybe is Lois Lane to Gordo’s Superman. I kinda find that difficult to believe. Lois Lane was in love with Superman…
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/david_hughes/blog/2008/12/11/if_gordon_brown_is_superman_is_harriet_harman_lois_lane
33- SeanT
Actually, the French plan is very different from Brown’s. The french socialists are criticizing sarkozy for that, asking him to follow Brown’s “socialist policies”.
France will not cut VAT and has repeatedly said it’s a bad idea.
The French stimulus plan contains:
- tax breaks for small enterprises hrining in 2009 (no health/pension contributions from companies on new employees)
- public investments (rail, road, hospitals, defense)
- tax beaks on private investment on research
- earlier payments from the State to companies (public contracts, VAT reflows,…)
The C-Charge vote in Manchester has made realise why so many outside the Capital were so bored by the Boris vs Ken contest.
Still, at least that was a proper electioooonnnnn - Oops, excuse me, I was just nodding off there!
45. What’s risky about Mcdonald’s? Surely it’s the ultimate, ‘know what you’re getting’ place.
51 companies hiring not”hrining”… sorry it’s still early in DC.
what gobsmacks me about the whole c charge debate in Manchester is the the Liberal Democrats - the party for which I have voted in every election since becoming eligable (and partly based on thier environmental credentials) - have chosen to oppose this massive, unprecedented and undoubtedly beneficial investment in public transport! Where are the bearded sandal wearing aging hippies when you need them.
Clearly, I am very much in favour of the proposals and I say this as someone who would pay the charge as a cummuter to the city centre by car. My support is based on the fact that it will make the city more attractive to businesses, more accesible to those who don’t have the luxury of a car, and more healthy and pleasant for both residents and the planet alike. I have heard no coherent opposition to the TIF that isn’t based on unalterated selfishness.
24- That seems to be an accurate assessment, and in fact the national polls in Germany have shifted remarkably little over the past few years (particularly compared to the polls in the UK which fluctuate wildly from season to season).
In other news, Illinois Governor Blagojevich ain’t going nowhere:
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20081211/D950GHDG0.html
State Attorney General Madigan is researching whether Blago’s being “unfit for office” could serve as a legal basis to impeach him in the current circumstances. I guess it shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise that Blago is conducting “business as usual” (according to his spokesman) rather than stepping down. After all, by his own apparent view of things, ‘why resign if there’s nothing in it for him?’ Just to please ‘that MF’er’ Obama? To please his party? No, I guess he won’t be going anywhere unless the value of what he has now is rendered useless by a certainty that he’ll be ousted. Until that time, he’s still the gov and still an ongoing nightmare for Obama and the Dems.
In still other news, apparently all Blagojevich-related questions are being censored from Obama’s new and ironically titled website feature “Open for Questions.” His sycophantic minions are flagging as “inappropriate” even the most fair and reasonable Blagojevich-related questions and Obama’s team is, at least so far, doing nothing to indicate they disapprove of this practice. Foreshadowing of the ‘Fairness Doctrine’ in practice?
http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/1208/Blagojevich_questions_censored_on_Transition_site.html
Finally, with the settling of the last House contest, the final composition of the U.S. House will be 257 Democrats to 178 Republicans (a 21 seat Democratic gain), while in the Senate, the Dems will have 58 or 59 and the Republicans will have 41 or 42 (depending on the outcome of the Coleman/Franken recount; thus a 7 or 8 seat Democratic gain). Obama beat McCain 52.9% to 45.7%. Based on these numbers, my September predictions were off by 1 House seat (I predicted a 20 seat gain for the Dems), either right on or 1 seat off in the Senate (I predicted a 7 seat Dem gain), and within 1 point each for Obama and McCain (I predicted Obama would win 52% to 46%. I believe my predictions (which anyone could verify by looking back through the September threads) likely top any of those made by the other pundits who weighed in pre-election (even allowing them the advantage of crediting their election eve predictions). Am I bragging? Sure I am.
My electoral vote total was off, though. I predicted Obama would score about 330 EV’s and he ended up with 365. Those extra EV’s came from the extra fractions of a percentage point that Obama managed to win in his closest victories. The moral of the story: even avowed partisans can be objective political analysts, contrary to the sentiments sometimes expressed by others here at PB.
43-The other nine wouldn’t be so stupid as to beat up the guy who bought their drinks anyway!
Alas not true!! Tax flight to better climes is well documented.
Have just done two YouGov surveys. One (deadline 5pm Friday) looks like a standard public poll for a Sunday paper, with all the uusal quesitons as well as things of little interest in a private party poll, such as our opinion on TV coverage of assisted suicide.
The other was an odd one, asking about flat tax and a total ban on immigration. In both cases, it first asked what we thought, and then offered arguments in favour, and asked whether these arguments seemed good ones and whether we were now more favourable (no chance!). A private UKIP or BNP survey, maybe?
26: The obvious example is America - Obama’s spending proposals make the British plan look cautious by comparison. I think I’m right in saying that France, Italy, Spain and Japan have all announced lartge spending boosts. Canada has announded a spending CUT, which is part of the row over there. Germany wants to sit tight.
35: I think that’s right - being a junior partner is often death (cf also LibDems in Scotland). The SPD problem in Germany is not new - the polls have been similar for over a year now, and mostly rlate to the breakthrough of The Left Party - the classic right-left divide still varies either way around 50-50, so Merkel is far from sure of re-election. The SPD are not willing to form a national coalition including the Left for the next parliament, but if CDU/CSU+FDP don’t get a majority then the current unconfrtable coalition may continue. Both the CSU attack on fiscal resraint and the SPD endorsement of it should be seen against this background.
If the package gets through in Manchester I’ll be delighted but surprised. The public just aren’t in the mood to vote for more taxes, however desirable the outcome.
48 stjohn - Are you sure you haven’t got those odds the wrong way round?
My question at 26 was obviously harder to answer than I expected. But as no great rush of suggestions of countries following Mr Brown has been forthcoming I will take it that we have been successfully lied to by a compliant press. In this case the non answer has been as enlightening as many questions that have produced rafts of replies.
55. Shows the Lib Dems haven’t lost their touch for staying on the right side of local issues, and ignoring any principles they are supposed to have, if necessary…good luck to them…
58: correciton, the latter poll was asking about a policy of total expulsion of all illegal immigrants regardless of situation, not a ban on new immgration.
40: I disagree. A good public transport system can supply a need without perhaps changing the physical strucure of a town or city (especially if it is underground in places). If the system is good and caters for the routes that people wish to use, then as long as it is reasonably priced, then it will overcome the need for private transport (except bicycles which require separate facilities).
A congestion charge would only then be required to limit the impact of private transport on that city - this can be done in other ways e.g. by overpricing parking or not allowing on-street parking. (as in areas of London).
However, unless efficient public transport is supplied first, then there will be a constant conflict with private transport users who may then not use the city centre and go elsewhere, and a city centre can die.
58
“The public just aren’t in the mood to vote for more taxes, however desirable the outcome”.
Correct, it is a tax as you suggested, that’s why any sensible person would vote no.
56: impressive, S&S!
Differential turnout means little, as it’s the number of Boroughs which vote no rather than the number of people who vote no that counts. According to the most recent polls, it’s only really the voters of Rochdale who matter - every other borough seems to have made its mind up. If they vote no, no C-Charge.
Having said that, I imagine the samples in each borough were so small that the margins of error could exceed what appear (in referendum terms) reasonably healthy leeds (typically 55-45 everywhere but Rochdale).
STILL can’t imagine a yes vote anywhere but City of Manchester. No-one else is getting enough goodies to make the cost worthwhile AFAICS. But we really don’t know which side’s going to be more motivated in this sort of election.
49. PTB. Mike is basing his betting on the polls. He says “What polling there has been suggests it’s neck and neck.” This suggests 3/1 YES is value.
Daily SPOTY update. Betfair prices.
Adlington 0.88/1, Hamilton 2.6/1, Hoy 4.3/1.
Like many posters on here I think Gordon Brown is completely inept - but unlike most psters here I want him to continue forever!
But Why I hear you cry - easy really - I get paid in Euros!!
I have had a 25% pay increase already this year - LOADSAMONEY£$£$£$£$£$£$
58-The public just aren’t in the mood to vote for more taxes
But presumably you are in favour of Gordon’s tax rises? So, you once again ignore the will of the public? Or politicos know best o best to ignore the hoi polloi?
PfP - your winnings are on their way; apologies for not picking it up at the time but IIRC the 15% poll came out on a Saturday and I must have missed it. Congrats - perhaps I will get a chance to win it back sometime!
48/59. Correction. PfP you are quite right. YES is 3/1, No is 1/4. I have just backed YES. As I said, I’ve no idea about this market and I think I’ve just proved it! But I do understand value.
Don @ 26 which countries are following Brown?
As you can see from the other replies, if “following” means applying any fiscal stimulus at all, then most of them, so Gordon really is saving the world. If “following” means cutting VAT to 15 per cent, attacking benefit claimants and deriding the opposition as the do-nothing party, then Brown is pretty isolated.
It is curious that Dollybots use the former definition and Tory astroturfers the latter. Who’d have thunk it?
UK Government suggesting term extension to 70 years for performers
http://www.musicweek.com/story.asp?sectioncode=1&storycode=1036434&c=1
It’s no doubt comforting to many to see the government is responding to appeals to improve the quality of the wood preserver that it uses to paint the Titanic’s deck chairs. After all, the ship can look forward to at least another century of working life once the wee leak is repaired.
58. I don’t think UKIP have the funds to carry out Yougov’s, but they do have a flat tax policy, if memory serves.
72. Have any other countries cut VAT ?
Martin Coxall @ 73 copyright extension is not for artists but for the talentless relatives of artists.
65- Thanks Nick. I can’t guarantee that level of accuracy every time but I have a lot of faith in my method of prediction (which clearly gives fairly small importance to the twists and turns of the late stages of campaigns, or I wouldn’t have made the prediction as early as I did and stayed with it to the end).
S&S If there were to be a special election for Illinois Senate seat, do the republicans have any credible candidates? It’s an obvious pick up opportunity, with the entire Dem establishment having to pretend they don’t know who the Governor is.
I’ve been told Fitzgerald is an R, but i suppose he couldn’t go for it, though he’s clearly got some very big opportunities ahead of him, should he wish it.
70 Aaron - Many thanks, appreciated.
@76:
Aye, Copyright term extension is bloody stupid. Unfortunately, Tory MEPs seem to be supporting the EU’s ill-advised efforts in this area. Remind me, I must pin Syed Kamal down and beat some sense into hum.
66-Thought it was a double majority election?
YES wins if it wins across Gtr Manchester AND a majority (?) of boroughs?
Why do Labour enjoy inventing strange electoral systems?
75-Yes! Kaz will cut it on 1 January from 15% to 12% (or 13%) but this was preannounced some time ago. And yes, it’s permanent!!
78- HS, the Democratic establishment in Illinois is apparently very concerned about the possibility of the seat flipping in a special election. The one name that I have seen remarked upon is Rep. Mark Kirk, a moderate Republican from the Chicago suburbs. I’m actually surprised that Sen. Dick Durbin, as partisan a fellow as any in the Senate, is at the center of the effort to have a special election rather than waiting for Blagojevich to be ousted and letting the lieutenant governor make an appointment. Apparently, Durbin’s personal dislike of the lieutenant governor (a fellow Democrat) has a lot to do with this. At this point, and necessarily based on fairly little information about how such a race would take form, I would have to say its about 50/50 whether the Dems would keep the seat in a late winter special election.
56. “The moral of the story: even avowed partisans can be objective political analysts, contrary to the sentiments sometimes expressed by others here at PB.”
Call me paranoid, but I think I felt my ears burning at that point. Well, now that you’re the self-styled master of partisan objectivity, perhaps you could turn your attention to refining still further the other qualities we so admire in you - your immense modesty, for example.
Personally, I’ll be more impressed by your ‘objectivity’ once you can bring yourself to extend it to the highly complex Canadian situation. Even with Ignatieff installed as Liberal leader, it’s still very unclear what will happen next month.
82. Kaz = Kazakhstan ?
33
I believe you can add Holland & Sweden to the other well managed economies that are against the Brown plan of further unfunded spending binges.
It was in fact Sweden’s bank rescue plan of a few years ago that Brown copied and pretended it was his idea.
83 Stars and Stripes
Kirk seems to be a good candidate.
however he will have to avoid gaffes like his “if we see Obama there’s a shoot-on-sight order.” last June…
57. well-documented but massively exaggerated
86. So that’s Sweden, Denmark, Poland, Germany and the Netherlands all “isolated” against the mighty forces of Gordon’s fiscal genius.
lol.
Re 58, Nick Palmer “The other was an odd one, asking about flat tax and a total ban on immigration. In both cases, it first asked what we thought, and then offered arguments in favour, and asked whether these arguments seemed good ones and whether we were now more favourable (no chance!). A private UKIP or BNP survey, maybe?”
I got teh same poll, but when I answered (I suspect opposite to you) I got statements against and asked to reconsider. So I doubt it is UKIP or BNP.
39. you can make some deductions based on EUR/USD, i.e. at the moment the euro is strong and strengthening against both the pound and the dollar.
the answer to your question depends a lot on the timeframe.
85-Yep!
85. Yakshemak
87- Kirk isn’t the only possibility but he seems to be the first one mentioned and seems to inspire the most fear in Democratic hearts. There also seems to be a belief that he will go for it if a special election indeed materializes, as it has been stated that he was intending to run for statewide office in 2010 anyway.
Re 25 etc
HERE IS THE UPDATE TO THE STORY
Suppose that every day, ten men go out for oxygen and the bill for all ten comes to £100. It would go something like this:
The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
The fifth would pay £1.
The sixth would pay £3.
The seventh would pay £7.
The eighth would pay £12.
The ninth would pay £18.
The tenth man (the richest) would pay £59.
So, that’s what they decided to do.
The ten men breathe each day and seem quite happy with the
arrangement, until one day, the richest man throws them a curve.
“I’m tired of paying the most when you all use the same amount of oxygen.
I’m not going to pay for you to get oxygen anymore. Go buy your own air.”
the 1st and 2nd men (poorest) can’t afford oxygen and die within minutes.
The 3rd poor man gets his wages reduced by his boss (the seventh man who needs to pay more now) and can no longer afford oxygen either. He dies within days.
The 4th poor man, pays for oxygen and continues to breathe. How? He loves his wife and kids and so to continue to allow them to breathe, he was driven to steal the rich man’s car to pay for oxygen
for his family. Crime increases, not because men want “beer” and bling, but because they will do anything to provide for their families. He gets caught and sent to prison where he earns no money.
His disabled wife and small children all die now that they have no provider of oxygen.
The 5th & 6th men make their living selling products (like food) and services to the first 4 men. Having more than half of their customers die, they can no longer afford to stay in business. They both close shop and die within weeks.
The 7th & 8th men own or work for companies that sell products and services to the 9th & 10th man. Unfortunately, the workers they rely on to plant and harvest the crops, manufacture goods, and deliver
the services have all died. Within months, the 7th and 8th men die.
The 9th man has enough money to buy oxygen for a year. Unfortunately, the guy that refills oxygen bottles was man number 1. The guy that maintains the regulators and oxygen safety equipment was man number 2. The owner of the trucking company that delivers the oxygen was man number 7. Man number 9 dies in 4 months when the supply of safe, available oxygen disappears.
Now we come to good, ol’ man number 10. The guy that wants to stop paying because he is blind to the value others bring to him and his lifestyle. Man number 10 has stocked away 5 years worth of oxygen. He’ll survive…at least for awhile. As long as he can build his own roads, make his own electricity, maintain his own equipment, grow his own food, provide his own healthcare,
clean his own air & water, and protect himself from fire, flood, hurricane, and the occasional attack from anyone else who might have survived and wants to take HIS oxygen.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, journalists and college professors, is how our tax system would work if we let the short-sighted run our economy. The people who pay the highest taxes need to understand
that they truly get the most benefit when the people who supply, buy, and work for them can afford the necessities of life. Bitch too much, attack the middle class and poor for not paying enough, and they just may stop producing, showing up, or DIE.
For those who were naive enough to except the “beer” analogy, think about where YOUR money goes and what would happen to you. (hint: You aren’t the 10th man)
By David Stuck
94- in other news Jesse Jackson jr denies having offered money to Blago..
94- in other news Jesse Jackson jr denies having offered money to Blago..
97. Obviously - we all know that the Democrats are the party of rectitude and decency. The party which has given us all outstanding moral examples such as the Kennedys and the Clintons.
72 Should add that normal meaning of “following” is planning or doing something as a result of a pathfinder doing it first. In this case many countries started stimulus measures (tax cuts, infrastructure spending) before the UK made any concrete proposals. President Bush led the world in tax cuts for example (but Gordon Brown doesn’t for some reason use Dubya’s name to support his actions).
Its interesting that Gordon Brown cannot defend his actions on the basis of his character and what he believes is the right thing to do but needs the approbation of others.
Good thing Raoul Wallenberg, Martin Luther King Jr., Robert Kennedy, Nelson Mandela, Edith Cavell, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Cicely Saunders & Aung San Suu Kyi were willing to go out on a limb otherwise who would Gordon have found to write about?
David Cameron though has made a stand, at first without obvious support from other countries. Political courage.
74: yes…or maybe the Tories have doing a little test marketing of the idea? I promise not to claim they have no policies if they promise to replace income tax with a flat tax in the nhexty parliament - that would really be…interesting.
69: Brown is reducing tax, Peter2 - do keep up! It’s your lot who think he shouldn’t.
Format for tonight’s ID debate, in case anyone is interested - from 6 to 7 (i.e. quite short, with 5-minute speeches and Q&A), Clement House, D Building, at LSE off Aldwych. The Conservatives were “unable to find anyone available to speak on this subject” (make of that what you will), so it’s just Chris Huhne and me: it’s chaired by Tony Travers.
these analogies are all stupidly long winded. I prefer a briefer statement.
Socialism kills.
95. Yes, but that’s stupid unless you can think of something that is the equivalent of oxygen which the lowest tax band produces.
Aloha, all (even TIM, the speaking cock). Early start, off to the cloud forests to see some birds before they become extinct. Not a great strategy for their longevity, all living on one side of an active volcano. Bit like Gordon’s economic strategy!
Saw a humpback whale breach yesterday - and about fifty spinner dolphins throwing themselves out the water. Which was nice….
Freak show special on QT tonight
The panel includes Esther Rantzen, schools minister Jim Knight, the Conservative party’s Nadine Dorries, Liberal Democrat Lembit Opik and author Will Self.
90: that’s interesting, Benedict. Who do you suppose it might be?
100 NickP “The Conservatives were “unable to find anyone available to speak on this subject” (make of that what you will), ”
Too busy preparing for government, I expect, Nick. There’s a lot to be done, you know!
102. if you are talking about the lowest tax band of working people, you will struggle to name an everyday essential item or service that would not go into chronic shortage if these people stopped turning up for work.
96- I read an amusing article today speculating on whether Blagojevich is “crazy” as an explanation for his behavior. To the credit of the journalist, an actual psychologist was quoted as saying that he doesn’t appear to be clinically insane but rather merely has various unappealing character “traits.” The article also speculates about whether his attorneys may use an insanity defense, but I’m more interested in whether Democrats like Jackson will use the insanity defense (i.e., Blago is crazy/hallucinating/making it all up… I never offered him any money!).
Just taken a look at the Manchester Lib Dem website and was greeted with, ” Happy Advent! ”
Happy Advent?!?
HAPPY ADVENT?!?
104. “Freak show special on QT tonight”
Bit harsh. With the obvious exception of Jim Knight, they’re as normal as you or I.
105. Those questions sound quite think-tanky.
102 That’s why the first one falls down as well, beer is a luxury for a start and so in the first example when #10 doesn’t show if the other 9 stop drinking beer he has no leverage. There’s also no baseline in the first example and no suggestion of “If you can’t afford it, don’t pay for it” things that people have to have like food, shelter, health care etc are the real baseline, anything above those be it beer, DVD’s, jewellery or anything can be use in the example in 25.
97 He would wouldn’t he.
110. Knight..another political corpse…
Sterling is tanking:
http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/fds/hi/business/market_data/currency/11/13/intraday.stm
@104:
Oh gawd, Mad Nad’s out of her box and on the tellies. May god have mercy on us.
110.
Mad Nad is ‘Normal’?
About as normal, in her own way, as Mark Oaten. Jim Knight is surely the most ‘normal’ of all those, even if he is as boring as hell.
100.Nick, Pass my regards onto chris Huhne!
Not long to wait for the yellow taxi graphic that he will feature in!
Along with the chap with Neil Kinnock latex masks! 
107. The argument seems to hold that if the richest tax band stops paying tax, the lowest tax band will die, and therefore society will fall apart with the result being the eventual death of the rich people. That’s, shall we say, dubious.
98 - As opposed to Richard Nixon, you mean.
Re 105 Nick Palmer “90: that’s interesting, Benedict. Who do you suppose it might be?”
No idea.
I was not (and your party is not either) in favour of an amnesty for illegal immigrants (though Boris is) and am in favour of a flat tax in the long term because it is harder for high earners to fiddle their tax. I was amused to have the poll argue with me
107. And still the question arises, what the hell is oxygen supposed to stand in for in this analogy?
100 Nick P,
I’m sure David Davis would have been there but he was/is still hoping to be arrested so didn’t want to make definite bookings just in case.
117. Expect half the show to be wasted on euthanasia and Woolworths.
Only interesting question will be the one covering Germany laughing at our misery.
119 - As is the laughable assertion that crime is because “people will do anything to provide for their families”.
@117:
Mad Nad’s about as centred as the orbit of Pluto.
With respect to the “cooling”. What we are seeing now with global temperatures is very likely simply a result of year-to-year variability.
It has been unusual, at this time of a warming trend, for a year to be cooler than the one ten years ago [ie 2008 compared with 1998]. The most recent previous example would be 2000 compared with 1990 and 1993 compared with 1983.
Taken together, all of these examples indicate the influence of El-Nino [warm] and La-Nina [cold] on the year-to-year variability. 1998 was a strong El-Nino year and 2008 La-Nina, so it is not surprising that this overcomes the background trend.
Likewise, 2000 was a La-Nina, whereas 1990 was neutral. 1983 was a strong El-Nino and 1993 weak. See:
http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/people/klaus.wolter/MEI/
You can either understand the world, or you can ignore the evidence and derive temporary comfort from an incomplete understanding. You will then be surprised when there’s next a strongish El-Nino and the 1998 record is broken.
[Incidentally, the much derided climate models capture this effect, and the global warming projections also include ten-year periods of "cooling" within the context of 2-4 degree temperature rises over the next century. I've planted an olive tree in the garden.]
@124:
The euthanasia *of* Woolworths, surely?
I wonder if there’ll be a question about Gordon’s saving the world.
126.
Mad Nad’s eyes ARE the orbits of Pluto!
Or maybe the orbits of Goofy?
99 - Politcal courage would be telling the British people the truth. That whoever wins the next election taxes will have to go up and spending will have to be drastically reduced.
119. it is of course dubious, but society doesn’t work very well for very long if the working classes all go on strike - it has been tried
125. some of it is
@ TLZ:
You are a caricature of all warmists, rolled into one.
The oxygen analogy to taxation is crap.
It misses the most basic point of all, that the argument is NOT about letting the richest off tax altogether but how any reduction in taxation is spread around.
And even when Man No 10 is still expected to pay the most AFTER any tax cut, the bile and envy of those lower down the tax scale at him getting the biggest reduction ensures that in missing this point, the system kills the goose that lays the golden egg - Man No 10.
130. political “courage” eh.
Michael Foot, William Hague, and Ted Heath have all shown it
124 - To be fair, you seem to be getting a lot of pleasure from it yourself.
132. “You are a caricature of all warmists, rolled into one.”
Do you also habitually refer to the rather large majority who no longer believe the earth is flat “roundists”?
135. Yeah really - I’m so pleased I can’t afford a holiday in the sun next year
@119:
I would have thought it was considered uncontroversial to say that, on the whole, we need to avoid having entire tranches of society dying en masse?
The reactions of Obama and his team to the Blago scandal have been quite disappointing if one was expecting a “new kind of politics” from the president-elect:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/12/11/america/11fallout.php
“Obama stayed out of sight Wednesday, calling for Blagojevich’s resignation through an aide and only after other Democrats had already done so. Aides were told by transition lawyers not to comment.”
…
“Emanuel was among the few people in Obama’s circle who occasionally spoke to Blagojevich. He declined to answer questions Wednesday, waving off a reporter who approached him as he walked across Capitol Hill.”
…
“A Democrat familiar with Illinois politics and the Obama transition, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said there likely were calls between the Blagojevich and Obama camps about the Senate seat. It was not clear whether any calls were recorded by federal agents, who had tapped the governor’s telephones.”
Maybe Obama and his team are being so cagey at this point because they don’t know what has been recorded and what my be disproven should they choose to offer “their version” of events.
133. both analogies miss the point. they are just leftovers from class war.
society works when everyone pulls together. man no. 10 does not lay golden eggs. man no. 1 does not provide the foundation for everyone else to live off.
@136:
Are you still playing that tiresome envirotrot game where we pretend that there’s no controversy?
Bad news: you lost.
138. The silly bit is the idea that if the richest group of people stop paying tax, the poorest will all die.
117. “Mad Nad is ‘Normal’?
About as normal, in her own way, as Mark Oaten. Jim Knight is surely the most ‘normal’ of all those, even if he is as boring as hell.”
Wage Slave, I was being sarcastic. If I ever master smileys, maybe I’ll find a way of making that more obvious next time.
134 - I happen to think that the worst thing the Tories could do would be to win the next election on a nod and a wink that taxes won’t go up and spending will not be massively cut. That’s because when they are elected they will have to raise taxes and make huge cuts. They will then be accused of lying to get into power and that could kill them off. As an anti-Tory, that does not bother me too much, but I am surprised that so many Tories on here are happy to accept that a few fibs will have to be told to get to Number 10.
144. I’m under the impression Osborne has said that taxes will have to go up to pay back the debt.Am I wrong? I don’t think the Tories are going to claim this isn’t necesssary.
137 - We are due a drought over here. There has not been one for a couple of summers now.
It does seem that a lot of people do get a bit of a kick from the bad economic news as it is a weapon with which to hit Gordon Brown. That’s fair enough, but they shouldn’t pretend they are not enjoying it. If you are not one of those, however, I apologise.
@142:
That presupposes a lot, but one assumes that Middle England would be far less tolerant of bailing out the resource drains clinging to the bottom of society’s ladder than the rich are. So, trying to make up the shortfall by f*cking over middle earners is likely to be a non-starter.
In the end, Middle England will decide that it’s fairer to let the poor starve.
145. i doubt either party is going to be boasting about it
144. Should imagine line will be spending will not be cut on topic A,B & C
Items D-Z can either be cut, sold off or cancelled.
129.
I always presumed that she was just too embarrassed to correct her name when it was mispronounced:
“Naggin’ Tories”.
146. I’m livid at the way the economy is going. The bad news is the worse it gets the longer it will be until a GE.
They are both daft analogies, I just wanted both sides of the coin to be badly represented. Both show examples of Game Theory that don’t work in the real world.
££ record low is now top story on the Beeb website.
145 - I was under the impression that Cameron had said only a couple of days ago that taxes may not have to rise under the Tories because they would find many more savings than would Labour. However, I could be wrong.
It would be interesting if we went into an election in which both major parties were promising tax rises. How would that play out?
141. “Are you still playing that tiresome envirotrot game where we pretend that there’s no controversy?
Bad news: you lost.”
You mean, like I lost when I said that Princess Diana probably wasn’t murdered by Prince Philip? And that the CIA probably didn’t bump off President Kennedy? And that the Earth probably wasn’t created 6000 years ago over a period of seven days? Yeah, sure, because there’s still ‘controversy’ over those topics, isn’t there?
Yours sincerely,
A self-confessed rounditrot
115. Or perhaps it’s not tanking.
http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/fds/hi/business/market_data/currency/11/12/intraday.stm
Which is why I asked my question earlier about how much of the fall against the euro was due to the weakness of the £ and how much was atributed to the strength of the euro.
152. Funny that. Who would have thought that a theory cooked up by a bunch of nerds wouldn’t be able to model human behaviour? (cough,cough, the City of London)
@155:
I saw this and thought of you:
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/12/10/soft-911-sculpture-b.html
Interesting theory from Labour insider
http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/3080806/cutting-deals.thtml
The Telegraph’s Iain Martin quotes a “Labour man,” who offers the following take on the next general election:
“Brown holds the election, fights on the economy and emerges at the head of the largest party. Vince Cable becomes leader of the Lib Dems, is made Chancellor in a coalition and demands a deal on Proportional Representation which Gordon gives him. PR means the Tories can never win again. Gordon stays as PM for a while and then walks off into the sunset having destroyed the Conservatives.”
158. You’ll have to explain, because the joke is a little too sophisticated and elliptical for me. Or is the satisfaction meant to be derived from the insult going over my head?
@159:
“PR means the Tories can never win again.”
How does that work, then?
47. Ken - I think you are wrong. The reason exports are tanking is that no-one wants to buy British goods at any price. Therefore the sliding pound - which is a mirror to what the rest of the world thinks about our economy fails to help exporters while the rest of us get shafted abroad and when we buy most of the decent stuff in our own shops. Many thanks Gordo - you have really played a blinder.
did it not occur to you, Penny, that the pound is tanking against the dollar too and most major currencies?
163 Test… yes of course it occurred to me that it might be tanking against the dollar too, which is why I checked and found that it has been pretty stable against the dollar over the past 3-4 weeks. Wehn Osbourne was accused of talking the £ down nearly 4 weeks ago, it was $1.48. Today it is a little above that. Which is why I posed the question.
It has tanked against the euro in the past month, but has remained relatively stable against the dollar.
On Thread. Prices have altered. NO 2/7, YES 5/2.
163 - The pound is up against the dollar.
The Euro will continue to be an attractive currency for as long as the Euro interest rate is relatively high. However, here’s an interesting snippet for you:
However, some analysts have expressed doubts that the rise of the euro against the pound is a sustainable trend, particularly if European economies also continue to weaken.
“If the eurozone is being perceived to still have rates at substantially higher levels, then obviously there’s a positive rate spread, but I’m not convinced that its ultimately going to be positive as the dynamics of the eurozone economy are pretty weak,” Rabobank markets strategist Jeremy Stretch said.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7777448.stm
161. Cons in present form would be facing an uphill battle under PR.
the scenario presented is fanciful though.
161 - Most people in this country are not Tories
140 “man no. 10 does not lay golden eggs.”
Actually, he does metaphorically. He and his colleagues, the top 10% of income tax payers contribute 53% of all income tax revenue.
If that’s not a golden egg, it’s at least the tastiest bit - the yoke. Which the other 90% wouldn’t fancy having to make up between themselves.
168 Re 161. And most people in this country are not Labourites - Nu or any other variety. Or LibDems, for that matter.
166. And presumably, if the Euro is up against most of the rest of the major currencies for a sustained period, it will have the effect of making their exports more expensive and therefore it is likely to hit their export trade in the coming months, thus making life difficult for exporters in the Eurozone countries.
159. I don;t buy the Tories can’t ever win with PR. They won’t ever get 50% of the vote but the “winner” in PR elections is not the party with 50% of the vote but the party with the most votes. They get the chance to try and form a coalition. If, say, the Tories in opposition to a Lib/Lab colaition got 44% at a GE, Labour 32% and the Lib Dems 18% could a Lib/Lab colaition really carry on under those circumstances?
159 Oh, the arrogance of Labour that they think they can be the largest party after the next GE.
170. on current voting trends, Lab+LD would be almost certain to get > 50% even in a bad year, and they are also by far the more likely of the possible coalitions.
of course that would change over time as people adapted to voting in a different system.
@168:
Most people in this country support no one party.
If we used STV, the outcome of the next election would be a minority Conservative government, supported on an informal basis by the LDs.
169. this is a complete fallacy built on the false premise that the bands are not connected. making a lot of money is dependent on having people beneath you ready to do the dirty work.
naturally capitalism results in a pyramid shaped system of rewards. if the top 10% band were all to leave, a new top 10% band would immediately step up to replace them in the new, smaller, economy. someone would always end up being the “fat cat”. likewise at the bottom.
To all the armchair currency experts and to any real experts what impact does a high level of private sector borrowing have on a currency - particularly if a lot of this debt was made available by bank borrowing in the money markets and securitised products distributed to foreign investors - most market comment seems to be on the government finances . There is big difference in personal debts in the UK compared to Germany and France for example . Any currency strategist care to comment on this ?
165 StJohn
That is probably because a number of punters put their money on Yes when they intended to put it on No.
162 - Really? No-one wants to buy our whisky or music or oil or agricultural produce or meat or books or magazines or cars or films or TV programmes or PL football matches or clothes or food.
172. By all accounts Gordon Brown and Menzies Campbell - outrageously going over the heads of the supposedly autonomous Scottish Liberal Democrats - had a secret deal in advance of last year’s Scottish Parliament elections to keep the Lib-Lab coalition going, even if Labour slipped to second place. They were only thwarted by the fact that the two parties in combination were three seats short of a majority.
But as long as the negotiations are above board, there’s nothing wrong in a PR system with a coalition led by the second-largest party. There was discussion earlier about how the SPD are lagging in the German opinion polls - but I think I’m right in saying that most previous SPD-led coalitions were in circumstances where they were not the largest single party. Similarly, Fine Gael have never been the largest party in Ireland, but have frequently been able to freeze Fianna Fail out by forming a coalition with Labour.
171 - You’d have thought so, yes. But apparently no-one wants British exports however cheap they are and that’s all Gordon Brown’s fault.
I don’t think the coalition scenario is necessarily too fanciful, and Cable is far closer to Labours view of the economy than he is of the Tories.
WTF is doing the Tory PR at the moment, Grieve all over the TV all day then Nadine Dorries on Question time.
When I said they needed less posh people out their it didn’t mean putting the political equivalent of Kerry Katonas mum on a Q&A
172. i guess the alternative you are suggesting would be some sort of informal Con/LD alliance - which would seem sure to be unstable in present form.
i suspect that PR would actually change the nature of british political parties completely anyway. both Con and Lab have spent considerable periods of the last 50 years being absolutely awful poltiical organisations, propped up by the impossibility of coming any worse than 2nd at a GE.
if people are ever able to vote with more granularity than the current “incumbent MP or nearest challenger?” the result will be a major splintering of all existing parties.
173 - While, presumably, the non-arrogant Tories think they will probably lose.
Pur-lease.
174, 175, 180: If we had a different voting system, we’d probably end up with different parties in various formal and informal coalitions, so any extrapolation from the past would be highly flawed.
172/175. I’d take a hard look at what’s going on in Canada, if I were you…
185. results of the first PR election would probably be quite predictable based on the past - things would then change pretty rapidly.
@180:
“Nothing wrong with” is an interesting choice of words. Consitutionally acceptable, perhaps, but I can’t imagine the electorate would be terribly happy.
The LDs have an almost unpreternatural sensitivity to such issues, and how it would play locally. I can’t imagine a situation in which the Lib Dems wouldn’t support a minority Tory government on an issue-by-issue basis if Her Majesty invites Dave to form a government.
For them to refuse to do so, and then support a losing party, against the will of the people, would be politically suicidal.
Which is as I say: PR would mean that the next government would be a Tory one.
187 ed - Agreed.
166
The Euro will eventually fall as the ECB come to recognise economic reality.
And the longer they take to do that, the worse their economies become.
Germany is the home of many highly sophisticated capital goods companies making products which are used in factories to make more products.
As Rio showed yesterday on a GRAND scale, big companies are cutting back capital expenditure on a HUGE scale. As lead times are years, the effects are often not seen immediately but the effects last for years.
Mining, cars , airplanes and ships coupled with computers are all affected.
So anyone who talks about short term recessions is ignoring what is actually happening. The world economy is like a sprinter who has run 800 metres at the pace of a 100 metre race. he’s exhausted and worn out and requires 3 years’ rest to recover.
When long term capital expenditure cuts are made on this huge scale, the effects last for half a decade.
And pumping the sprinter full of performance enhancing drugs leads to a weak spasm of activity and then an even longer period of recovery.
184 That’s not what I said though is it?
188. seems pretty unlikely, for reasons of policy, personality, and electoral maths.
Calling former Spreadfair account-holders
Has anybody got their money back from the firm yet. I agreed a final settlement a week last Tuesday and am still waiting for my cash. Are others in the same position?
191 - No, you said it was arrogant of Labour to believe it would be the biggest party after the next election. The implication being that no other party thinks in such “arrogant” terms. In other words, no other party thinks it will win most seats at the next election. My point, which could have been slightly too sophisticated for you (in which case I apologise) was that this was, in fact, probably not the case, and that the Tories may believe they will win the next election. Which I am sure they will.
159. Amusing fantasy - but a revealing take on the ‘power at any cost’ mindset of Labour ‘insiders’.
186. “I’d take a hard look at what’s going on in Canada, if I were you…”
I’d have said so too, but Stars and Stripes assured us a few days ago that the coalition has completely fallen apart. I know there seems to be some evidence to the contrary, but S&S is the objective analyst on this board, his predictions have been proved correct to within five decimal places time and time again, so we need trouble ourselves by looking into the matter no further.
188. Your own choice of words is telling. In PR, except on rare occasions, there are no outright ‘winners’ or ‘losers’, there is just a parliament of minorities, with various permutations of how a government can be formed that will command a majority. After centuries of FPTP it might take the British some time to adjust to that new concept, but adjust we would, as every other country with PR has.
194. actually, (and even more ridiculously), “EdP” said it was arrogant to think that they _can_ be the largest party
@192:
Policy, personality and electoral maths would take a back seat to stone cold pure political calculation. We are talking about the Lib Dems after all.
So, we’ve had a PR general election. Tories have around 45% of the seats, Labour have around 30%, the LDs around 20%.
Her Majesty asks Dave to form a government. He accepts.
What do you, as Virtual Vince, do next?
193 Mike - I got my settlement from SpreadFair within two days, IIRC.
188. It *tends* to depend on a number of factors;
If the public are told in advance of a coalition, before polling day, it tends to be quite acceptable for the second party and a smaller party/parties to form a majority government (see Sweden). Then they can see the coalition parties as a combined ‘opposition’ when going to vote. However, it’s arguably less acceptable when nobody knows about this before polling day and then it looks like two losing parties getting together to dump on the most popular party. This could disenchant the electorate.
Most systems have an unwritten convention that the most popular party gets first shot at forming a coalition, and if this fails anything goes. I can’t see why it would be different here.
After a few rounds of PR in this country it’s pretty obvious Labour would split into a socialist party and a NuLab party, the Tories would probably split into a centrist ‘one nation’ party and a Eurosceptic, right-wing party and even the Lib Dems could split into Economic Liberals and Social Democrats. Bear in mind you’re also likely to have the Greens, UKIP and sadly the BNP potentially winning seats in Parliament and you have to realise UK politics under PR would be fundamentally different.
It wouldn’t surprise me if Brown tried to do something like what was outlined above, but it would be a short-lived victory. It would never keep the Tories out of power forever - in a big country like the UK with a centrist to centre-right majority it just wouldn’t happen. We used to say FPTP kept Labour out of power forever. Didn’t happen.
199 cont - by CHAPS transfer.
196. Jesus, stop fighting, you two!
198 HM will only ask Dave once her current Prime Minister resigns or doesn’t get a coalition together. Gordon Brown (based on the Ted Heath case) would get a couple of weeks to try to form a Government, while Palace watches and lets it be known through “channels” that time is limited.
Afternoon all
Re: 188 - Afternoon, Martin, good result in Mile End by the way. Yes, there are clearly significant areas where Conservatives and Liberal Democrats are fairly close and could come up with mutually acceptable legislation.
As to what would happen were PR to be introduced, a lot would depend on the system introduced (the LDs prefer STV) but if we went down the STV vote, I think oddly enough the LDs would be the main losers at least initially.
I think you would see (as in many other countries), a recognisable bloc of centre-left parties and a similar of centre-right parties. There would likely be a significant Green party, Nationalist parties in Wales, Scotland and England and possibly extreme right and left blocs. Power would osciallate between coalitions of broadly centre-left and centre-right parties.
The other (possible) scenario is one dominant party, a main opposition party and a series of minor parties. The dominant party would be in Government more often than not but would lose enough support to enable a coalition of the main opposition party and some of the smaller parties to take over.
On a completely different tack, my thoughts on the demise of Woolworths here:
http://aloadofoldstodge.blogspot.com/2008/12/woolworths-rip.html
198. was your hypothetical election fought on handling of the economy at all? if so, for Cable to side with Cameron/Osborne would be a major initial flip-flop.
152. Neither is an example of game theory. I am not a game theorist, but I know enough to be able to describe both jokes as not being game theoretic in nature. The Oxygen joke is weaker as it requires absurd assumptions, although I would say that it is analogous to the Marxist view of historical progress - if the social democratic compact had not come about, perhaps the poor would have revolted and hung the Kulak.
162. Scampi. Well. That’s an opinion. But here in the real world - I tend to go for prices lower = more demand. I have no doubt that global demand is falling - even the Chinese, Japanese and Germans are seeing demand for their exports fall - the only certainty in this situation is that if the pound had not fallen, export demand would be lower still.
198. Is it fair to suggest this as the vote share in a PR election? Wouldn’t the prospect of a vote meaning more get the “Labour but 5/10 likely to vote” down the polling station?
@201:
Well, I thought we’d take it as read that the Lib Dems wouldn’t be suicidal enough to be seen to be propping up a government that had just lost a general election.
There’s also the thought as to whether the Lib Dems would be comfortable with propping up a government that had just lost its majority and wasn’t even the largest party. They could fear the backlash. Ming would probably have been fine with it. Kennedy probably too. But Clegg? Not entirely sure about that.
208. Got there before me!
202. the LDs would be sure to eventually split down the middle under any PR system, they have a significant minority of activists who really hate the Cons, for starters.
the other 2 parties would be more likely to splinter at the extreme edges, as hardliners realised there was no longer any need to put up with centre ground, managerial, broad-church leadership.
@202:
Thanks, Stodge. We were delighted at being able to hold off Respect in such a massively Bengali area. Makes the Poplar and Limehouse race seem even more fascinating!
206 They considered it in 1974.
208 - Do you think Galloway will stand?
205. well, yes. along with all sorts of other unpredictable tactical unwind.
206. that would be applying FPTP logic to a PR system.
198. “So, we’ve had a PR general election. Tories have around 45% of the seats, Labour have around 30%, the LDs around 20%.
Her Majesty asks Dave to form a government. He accepts.
What do you, as Virtual Vince, do next?”
Wrong question. A much more like scenario after a PR election is that the Queen would not invite anyone to form a government until it becomes clearer whether there is any prospect of a coalition - the incumbent PM would stay in power until then, even if he/she is the leader of the second-largest party. That, after all, is exactly what happened in 1974.
It’s a funny world. I’ll never forget going to university in the early 80s and discovering that there were 19 and 20 year old Tories who had not been to public school. I honestly did not think it was possible. How naive I was.
@210:
I’m counting on it…
196- Allow me, for the first and (I promise) last time, respond with a simple, “LOL!”
214 - Hmm. We’ll see.
Sorry Mike
I can only repeat what I have said before, London got extra investment without needing a congestion charge, granted it brought one in that was 8km2 then enlarged the size, but this Manchester charge zone will be 87km2 the largest in the world (and we are assurred by the GMPTE that they will be looking to extend it to include all of Greater Manchester, No government will take money of me so I can have the pleasure of getting to my home and acting on my consituents behalf). Frankly I think it is also a disgrace that Prestwich councillors will have to pay the charge to get to their own town hall to do their job.
Yet again Manchester will get huge investment but the suburbs will not get much more. In my area’s two villages it will still be difficult getting a bus to the metrolink stations and that is the same in Hyde and Stalybridge in Tameside and countless other suburban areas. This is public money how dare southern based pundits tell Northern cities they can have investment only s a loan, they wouldn’t stand for it and hopefully neither will GREATER Manchester.
193 Mike
No, I was paid promptly.
@212:
But Gordon could only do that if Virtual Vince agrees to be seen to be propping up a government that had just lost a general election.
Vince is smarter than that.
Why can so many other countries manage so well with a PR system? The state we are in is hardly a glowing advertisement for FPTP. If the focus of our system was the achievement of consensus rather than the perpetuaiton of division we would surely be in a much btter state than we are now. PR would also tame our pernicious press and would allow us to have the very many grown-up debates we need in this country.
In fact, I would suggest the introduction of PR and the abolishment of the 3 Line whip.
193. I got my money in three days, I went for the cheaper BACS option.
210 - Hasn’t he already said that he will not?
Re: 206 - I think East London will be “interesting” next time though I fear not even your confidence will stretch as far as to predict a Conservative win in East Ham though Ave It no doubt would
On the “coalition” question, Heath approached Thorpe in Feb 1974. If memory serves, Labour won more seats than the Conservatives (301-297) but the Tories won more votes. I suppose given the disparity in boundaries, it’s possible to construct a scenario where the Conservatives win more votes in 2010 but Labour win more seats.
159. Thats what you call planning for the long term. How do they keep coming up with all these convaluted schemes to try and destroy the Tories?
@220:
Cartels are not an improvement over competition, Mr Observer.
The fundamental problem we have is the existence of a political class. In practice, the only way to abolish the political class is to abolish elections.
194 I was ridiculing the Labour Man for arrogantly assuming that they would be the largest party after the next election and would be in a position to stitch up the Tories over PR. If you want to spin it around and make the assumption of arrogance on the part of the Conservatives that’s your problem.
I pity anyone who has the misfortune to work for your business if thats the way your warped mind works, simpleton.
193. Mike. I was paid within a few days.
223. “I suppose given the disparity in boundaries, it’s possible to construct a scenario where the Conservatives win more votes in 2010 but Labour win more seats.”
It’s perfectly possible to construct a scenario where the Conservatives win the popular vote but Labour form a majority government.
Just heard from a friend in Sweden. The Gordon Broon, saviour of the world, clip has been played to great hilarity on Swedish TV
225. under PR it is easy to imagine small parties (greens, UKIP, respect, BNP, nationalists, etc. etc. and some new ones) getting a heck of a lot more votes, and big parties getting a lot less votes.
this would make it harder to forge a career in the “political class” without at least being committed to a cause of some sort.
The problem I see with PR if Labour and Lib’s form a coalition is that I think a lot of the PLP would vote against it? Remember in a hing parliament Labour will have more heartland MP’s than marginal MP’s. Why would Labour MP’s sitting on 10,000+ majorites vote to weaken their own seats. PR would effect Labour just as much as it would effect the Tories. So, the Tories vote no, and theres a large rebellion on the Labour benches, and thus PR is killed stone dead and the Lib’s are left propping up a lame dunk Labour PM.
201 and 212: Brown wouldn’t have long if he were in second place in terms of seats after the next election. Heath only had the weekend to try to form a government before the Queen called for Wilson in 1974. And Heath had teh moral victory of winning more votes than Labour, which is v unliklely this time.
229. It’s been on in Denmark, too.
£1 = €1.1248
http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/fds/hi/business/market_data/currency/11/13/intraday.stm
:-0
226. All those clever constitutional wheezes Labour brought in in the early years haven’t exactly had the desired effect, so why assume “PR means the Tories can never win again”? Scottish and Welsh devolution haven’t given Labour perpetual control in those areas.
There are plenty of councils up and down the country that provide evidence enough that Tories and Lib Dems can work together, and indeed that Tories and Labour can work together. There is a belief that PR means a permanent centre-left government. No it wouldn’t. The parties would realign to ensure the pendulum continued to swing - and that’s assuming that the parties were able to hold themselves together.
232. “And Heath had teh moral victory of winning more votes than Labour, which is v unliklely this time.”
Constitutionally, that point should make no difference whatsoever to the Queen’s stance - her sole function is to appoint a PM who can command a majority in the House of Commons. If Labour and the Liberal Democrats had a parliamentary majority between them, Brown would arguably be in a slightly stronger position with the Queen than Heath was, because the irony is the proposed Conservative-Liberal coalition in 1974 was never even workable from an arithmetical point of view. They’d have had to get the anti-Sunningdale Ulster Unionists on board as well, which given the context of the time would have been extremely implausible.
Merkel backs Brown. German coalition partners at war with each other.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/dec/11/germany-gordonbrown
235. Quite. All these Labour fantasies remind me of the ‘Thousand year Reich’ idea an Austrian corporal once had…
231. And Labour would lose the chance to ever govern alone again. It would mean sacrificing that possibility to cobble together a coalition for a term. I doubt they’d do it. Better to return to government as the outright government.
235. Actually, the introduction of PR would ironically remove the one really large obstacle to a Tory-Lib Dem coalition that exists at the moment. It can’t happen at the moment simply because the Lib Dems would be bound to name PR as their price, and the Tories would be bound to refuse.
235. the scottish and welsh do seem to have kept the Cons well away from having any power so far
238. Why should a party have the right to govern alone if it gets 40% (or less) of the vote?
238. The big obstacle to such an arrangement is the nature of the Lib Dems, not electoral systems.
240. The only thing that kept the Conservatives from a share of power in Wales last year was the casting vote of a chairman on some obscure Liberal Democrat committee. And in Scotland the Tories have made a tactical decision that they’re not interested in coalitions.
241. I was saying Labour wouldn’t choose PR for that reason. I don’t think you’re question is the relevant one. PR = coalitions = politicians cherry-picking which of their policies to roll out , therefore the already shaky democratic system is reduced to voting on faces and just liking whatever you get. At least we can vote on manifestos.
Marf’s Thursday Special - New thread
225 - In most cases I would agree with you. But with politics I do not. That’s because politics is hardly ever black and white, it is almost always about shades of grey. And to my mind that makes consensus building the most productive course of action. Consensus building, rather than knee-jerk conflict, leads to intelligent discussion and the best long-term decision-making. It certainly seems to have worked in the world’s most prosperous and socially mobile countries. And we need some of that here. Our political system has been letting us down for decades and it needs changing.
PR and the abolition of the 3 Line whip is the future.
FPTP can consistently produce coalition governments, *if* there is a proliferation of political parties (unlikely in this country perhaps). Indian elections over the last 10 years provide good examples:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_general_election,_1999
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_general_elections,_2004
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_general_election,_2009
232 Agree that HM would try to get Gordon to resign if Labour were second largest party and the Lib Dems said they wouldn’t form a coalition. If however the Lib Dems said they would discuss terms then Palace would have to give the parties a reasonable time.
Though on experience of the Welsh Lib & Scots Dems they would probably choose to stay out and not oppose a minority government rather than prop up a party that had lost the election.
244 - Countries such as Germany, Sweden, Denmark, Finland and the Netherlands seem to have done pretty well on the back of PR. Why not the UK?
244. Party A get 35% and party B get 25%. A + B = 60% so a coalition between A and B represents a majority of the electorate. No?
236: Only if Labour and the Liberals were prepared to work together would Brown be stronger than Heath. The point of the argument is whether the Liberals would prop up a government who finished second. There would be a huge downside for them (the Tories would make hay about the Liberals denying the British people their choice of PM as Harper is doing effectively in Canada at the moment).
The stigma against the liberals going into government with the Tories has gone. Therefore I expect a hung Parliament with the Tories and Labour close in seats would lead to a bidding war. Neither party can smugly assume now the Liberals would go for them.
127
“You can either understand the world, or you can ignore the evidence and derive temporary comfort from an incomplete understanding. You will then be surprised when there’s next a strongish El-Nino and the 1998 record is broken.”
Interesting that you use the comncept of ‘understanding the world’ as the basis for your arguments. One of the main arguments used by those of us who oppose the mantra of Anthropogenic global warming is exactly that - that a theory is being promulgated which ignores the way the planet has operated for the last 750 or so million years. This is a consequence of the short life span of humanity both as individuals and as a species. The inbuilt perceptual bias which results from us only experiencing an instant of the earth’s history leads us to place false emphasis on our own ability to alter the climate in a significant manner.
Unfortunately it also leads us to the misconception that the world is essentially a static, Aristotalian reality. One of the reasons we have 80% of our world’s population living within 100m of sealevel. Which given what we now know about natural sea level changes in the past is a bloody stupid thing to do.
By the way TLZ, whilst an evil consulatant geologist in the pay of the satanic oil companies my background area of speciality is Palaeo-climatology and Palaeo-environments.
What’s yours?
252. Well what has happened could happen before. But what caused the Ice Age to end? It couldn’t have been GW:
http://www.grahamhancock.com/underworld/
258 - Of course it was global warming. It was just not man-made global warming.
sorry should have said 257.
259
The crucial point and one that is used to confuse many people.
O/T but, I think the questions about GBs ’slip’ yesterday are the wrong questions - it’s not about whether that’s what he really thinks - it’s about the way it has been handled since…
I ask myself two questions:
1) Could Tony Blair have made that kind of slip? Well, frankly yes!
2) Would it have been such a big news item? No - because he would have shrugged it off in a far more effective way than Team Brown have managed it.
As TB is now irrelevant to future Elections, ask the question about Cameron:
Could he make that kind of slip? Yes I think he could.
Would he deal with it well? I doubt he would gloss over it as well as Blair could, but I’m not sure he’d have let it be such a cock-up as Team Brown let it become?
Where’s the latest/hottest news from the C-charge count?
So - not that close! Such a massive No vote must have been obvious ‘on the ground’ in the lead up to the vote?