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Post by Zany on Aug 25, 2024 21:49:17 GMT
I agree, times change. Yet the polls still indicate no desire to leave. When they do (just like with the EU referendum) I will be calling for a second vote. At the moment you are in the UK, giving nothing to England. again you are being a bit disingenuous .When you say no great desire to leave , I totally disagree. Since John swinney became first minister there have been twelve indy polls , averaging 47.5% yes , and 52.5% no. That represent a great desire to leave , if not a majority. However , to put this into context , back in 2012 , after the Edinburgh agreement had been signed , polls were showing averages of mid twenty per cent , and the result on the day was 45% . We currently have 47.5% without any campaigning. , or any great support for the new snp and unity among yes groups. I think its you who are being disingenuous. Vote after vote the majority poll to remain. So that means there's no great desire to leave, there's a minority. As for saying those numbers are without any campaign, that applies to both sides. |
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Steve
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Post by Steve on Aug 25, 2024 22:00:41 GMT
Oh no that lie about Starmer has reached this forum now Well those of us who were once in the Labour party have seen first hand what a lying bastard Starmer and those around him can be. He promised a load of stuff he had no intention of delivering to gain his position as Labour leader. Some of us - I know I have - have been saying if he could lie to us to get elected he can lie to the rest of the electorate to do so. And the above example is a typical one. There will be others. He will use the excuse of changed circumstances. In fact they are already doing so by claiming the books look a lot worse than they anticipated. The "change of circumstance" to be used to wriggle out of honouring what was a brazen lie in the first place. Regardless of how many good things the government does, or bad things, or how much of an improvement on the atrocious Tories they might be, there will be more of these promises being ditched now he doesn't need your votes anymore. He will do whatever he regards as politically expedient to do in the interests of his government, party, and the trappings of office, regardless of whether he promised to do it or not do it. But that picture + caption is a lie the SNP are pushing The actual words used were as here www.independent.co.uk/tv/news/energy-bills-labour-starmer-general-election-b2550795.html''Appearing on Good Morning Britain on Friday 24 May, Sir Keir was asked “how much cheaper will our bills be under a Labour government?”
“We want to set up Great British Energy - that’s a publically owned company, making money for the taxpayer,” he responded.
“That ought to bring down household bills by about £400 - and that’s a permanent drop.”So not until AFTER that Energy company was up and running and then only a £400 difference to what would pertain had the Tories been in power. Also worth reading this: www.independent.co.uk/business/fact-check-labour-s-pledge-to-cap-energy-bills-expired-in-april-2023-b2600997.html |
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Post by Zany on Aug 26, 2024 6:56:50 GMT
Why don't Labour go after the tax dodgers? Why don't they pursue foreign billionaires who are ripping off the country? Why don't they pursue the COVID PPE loan fraud both in government and outside of it? Why take money instead from fricking winter fuel allowance? Because pensioners are too frail to fight back and it's a politically easy move? I am not condoning the thinking when I say any of this by the way but I know what these Labour centrist types are like and how they think. They are coldly calculating when it comes to their popularity. They are no doubt aware that a majority of pensioners now making up the baby boomer generation never vote for them. And that the minority who do will tend to be the poorest ones on pension credit. So they know that the pensioners and their media backers will kick up a stink but the ones being hit rarely vote for them anyway. Meanwhile, millions of younger workers who often feel that they are slaving their guts out just to survive whilst pensioners enjoy a much more generous safety net funded by them might well approve. In short they have probably realised there will be a lot of sound and fury but probably believe they have more to gain than to lose politically by doing this. That thought process might well prove to be wrong but I suspect that is their thinking. And if you are going to be cynically calculating, if you want to be seen to be making tough choices, far better to hit the ones who never vote for you than the ones who might, especially if you can claim to be protecting the poorest, who fortuitously enough are the ones more likely to vote for you. Fact is the under 50s are far more likely to vote Labour than pensioners. It is these working age voters they are after. There is probably also a degree of malice involved in that many metropolitan liberal Labour centrists have come to regard too many of the baby boomers as unreconstructed gammons, whom they have psychologically given up on appealing to. Back when I used to frequent Labour party forums I heard that sort of thing often. Working class pensioners who were not university educated in particular were often regarded as thickoes, all assumed to be like Jonksy. I still remember my time in the party and have inside knowledge on how they think and what they really think. For me its the opposite. For too long mentioning the word pensioner in regards to hard times and cuts was considered blasphemy. Fine for children not to have a bed to sleep on or a decent meal, but pensioners had to have their money triple locked and protected. Even when they had loads of savings and good private pensions. Its good news to see the WFA not given to people like my dad who's private pension was more than he could ever spend. So I say this is Labour left of centre, sharing out the limited funds more fairly. |
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Post by Amadan on Aug 26, 2024 9:01:55 GMT
 instead we have an estimated 10 per cent rise on the cards on October. no wonder support for labour is dropping like a stone. Oh no that lie about Starmer has reached this forum now Steve its getting pathetic now claiming everything you dont like on the interwebby is a lie. Cut the personal insults. Its not how we work on here. |
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Post by Amadan on Aug 26, 2024 9:05:59 GMT
again you are being a bit disingenuous .When you say no great desire to leave , I totally disagree. Since John swinney became first minister there have been twelve indy polls , averaging 47.5% yes , and 52.5% no. That represent a great desire to leave , if not a majority. However , to put this into context , back in 2012 , after the Edinburgh agreement had been signed , polls were showing averages of mid twenty per cent , and the result on the day was 45% . We currently have 47.5% without any campaigning. , or any great support for the new snp and unity among yes groups. I think its you who are being disingenuous. Vote after vote the majority poll to remain. So that means there's no great desire to leave, there's a minority. As for saying those numbers are without any campaign, that applies to both sides. the disingenuous part is claiming "there is no great desire to leave" , clearly just under half those polled before any campaigning has started shows otherwise zany. No multi national state can survive that level of discontent with Westminster rule , as has been shown over the last century with the split up similarly of the brit empire. It's merely retreating back to where it all began. |
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Post by Amadan on Aug 26, 2024 9:08:46 GMT
Well those of us who were once in the Labour party have seen first hand what a lying bastard Starmer and those around him can be. He promised a load of stuff he had no intention of delivering to gain his position as Labour leader. Some of us - I know I have - have been saying if he could lie to us to get elected he can lie to the rest of the electorate to do so. And the above example is a typical one. There will be others. He will use the excuse of changed circumstances. In fact they are already doing so by claiming the books look a lot worse than they anticipated. The "change of circumstance" to be used to wriggle out of honouring what was a brazen lie in the first place. Regardless of how many good things the government does, or bad things, or how much of an improvement on the atrocious Tories they might be, there will be more of these promises being ditched now he doesn't need your votes anymore. He will do whatever he regards as politically expedient to do in the interests of his government, party, and the trappings of office, regardless of whether he promised to do it or not do it. But that picture + caption is a lie the SNP are pushing The actual words used were as here www.independent.co.uk/tv/news/energy-bills-labour-starmer-general-election-b2550795.html''Appearing on Good Morning Britain on Friday 24 May, Sir Keir was asked “how much cheaper will our bills be under a Labour government?”
“We want to set up Great British Energy - that’s a publically owned company, making money for the taxpayer,” he responded.
“That ought to bring down household bills by about £400 - and that’s a permanent drop.”So not until AFTER that Energy company was up and running and then only a £400 difference to what would pertain had the Tories been in power. Also worth reading this: www.independent.co.uk/business/fact-check-labour-s-pledge-to-cap-energy-bills-expired-in-april-2023-b2600997.html eh? im not a member of the snp. I dont speak for the snp. I have publicly on various forums condemned the snp. The independent newspaper is a British paper , and isnt owned by the snp , nor does it speak for them . It's getting silly now Steve , how much turd polishing can you do in one day? |
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Post by Amadan on Aug 26, 2024 9:11:30 GMT
Well those of us who were once in the Labour party have seen first hand what a lying bastard Starmer and those around him can be. He promised a load of stuff he had no intention of delivering to gain his position as Labour leader. Some of us - I know I have - have been saying if he could lie to us to get elected he can lie to the rest of the electorate to do so. And the above example is a typical one. There will be others. He will use the excuse of changed circumstances. In fact they are already doing so by claiming the books look a lot worse than they anticipated. The "change of circumstance" to be used to wriggle out of honouring what was a brazen lie in the first place. Regardless of how many good things the government does, or bad things, or how much of an improvement on the atrocious Tories they might be, there will be more of these promises being ditched now he doesn't need your votes anymore. He will do whatever he regards as politically expedient to do in the interests of his government, party, and the trappings of office, regardless of whether he promised to do it or not do it. So not until AFTER that Energy company was up and running and then only a £400 difference to what would pertain had the Tories been in power. eh ? gb energy was ready to go ( another labour lie apparently) within days of labour winning the election. You are looking increasingly silly Steve. It's going to be a long hard five years or so for you running around defending your blairite chums in new labour with the shite that starmer comes out with.  |
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Post by Amadan on Aug 26, 2024 9:12:13 GMT
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Steve
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Post by Steve on Aug 26, 2024 9:35:15 GMT
Oh no that lie about Starmer has reached this forum now Steve its getting pathetic now claiming everything you dont like on the interwebby is a lie. Well what irony that that ^ by you is a false statement. And anyway I proved it was a lie, see a coiple of posts above ^ |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 26, 2024 10:41:14 GMT
I am not condoning the thinking when I say any of this by the way but I know what these Labour centrist types are like and how they think. They are coldly calculating when it comes to their popularity. They are no doubt aware that a majority of pensioners now making up the baby boomer generation never vote for them. And that the minority who do will tend to be the poorest ones on pension credit. So they know that the pensioners and their media backers will kick up a stink but the ones being hit rarely vote for them anyway. Meanwhile, millions of younger workers who often feel that they are slaving their guts out just to survive whilst pensioners enjoy a much more generous safety net funded by them might well approve. In short they have probably realised there will be a lot of sound and fury but probably believe they have more to gain than to lose politically by doing this. That thought process might well prove to be wrong but I suspect that is their thinking. And if you are going to be cynically calculating, if you want to be seen to be making tough choices, far better to hit the ones who never vote for you than the ones who might, especially if you can claim to be protecting the poorest, who fortuitously enough are the ones more likely to vote for you. Fact is the under 50s are far more likely to vote Labour than pensioners. It is these working age voters they are after. There is probably also a degree of malice involved in that many metropolitan liberal Labour centrists have come to regard too many of the baby boomers as unreconstructed gammons, whom they have psychologically given up on appealing to. Back when I used to frequent Labour party forums I heard that sort of thing often. Working class pensioners who were not university educated in particular were often regarded as thickoes, all assumed to be like Jonksy. I still remember my time in the party and have inside knowledge on how they think and what they really think. For me its the opposite. For too long mentioning the word pensioner in regards to hard times and cuts was considered blasphemy. Fine for children not to have a bed to sleep on or a decent meal, but pensioners had to have their money triple locked and protected. Even when they had loads of savings and good private pensions. Its good news to see the WFA not given to people like my dad who's private pension was more than he could ever spend. So I say this is Labour left of centre, sharing out the limited funds more fairly. Well I tend to agree with that as well, however much I suspect cold political calculations to be in the mix. For too long pensioners have been sacrosanct even though on average they have far fewer outgoings than working age people as well as being better off than the average working age person. When so many of them voted Tory, the Tories dare not hit them for coldly calculating reasons of their own. Labour has much less to lose by doing so for the very reason that they have fewer votes to lose. Of course the poor ones need to be protected and supported as should the poor of any age group. That the better off ones do not need taxpayers shovelling scarce funds their way is only a reasonable consideration in times of scarcity, all the more so since many of them vote consistently for cuts for everybody else. If we have to make cuts, monies paid out to those who dont need them - of any age - is the place to start. Better off pensioners should not be exempt from this. I do accept that there is an argument for saying the cut off point for winter fuel payments is too low and should kick in a little higher up the scale. I accept the arguments of Steve that including council tax banding and renters might be problematical. But involving the Inland Revenue is not without its difficulties either. Because the Inland Revenue might well be up to speed on earnings, but might not on wealth or savings whilst pension credit already takes both incomes and savings into account. It is therefore just easier to use pension credit as the deciding factor and thus far less costly to administer. I fully accept that some pensioners on just the wrong side of the cut off point might struggle as a result of this. Most of these will have small private pensions pushing them over the limit. Perhaps one solution would be to to exclude the first £300 per month of private pension from the eligibility criteria for pension credit, which would reward those who provided for themselves and address the legitimate complaint that they are no better off than those who saved nothing. This would also result in rather more of them being eligible for pension credit, and therefore also the winter fuel allowance. |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 26, 2024 11:09:40 GMT
Having acknowledged that the cut off point for winter fuel payments is probably too low, and that this will result in some pensioners struggling, and suggested a solution above, we do need to beware of pensioners pleading poverty. Not all of them are as badly off as they claim. I well remember many years ago hearing one pensioner moaning to his mate about how he couldn't afford to both eat and heat. This was just after I was stood behind him in the queue in the nearby shop and saw him waste £30 on scratch cards, and more on fags. This is an example of how sometimes bad budgeting choices can be a factor rather than lack of funds, though this can hold true for people of any age, not just the elderly.
Yesterday on LBC on the Carol Vorderman show - I happened to be driving home from work at the time with the radio on - I heard one pensioner relating her tale of woe since she could not get pension credit and thus would lose the winter fuel payment. When asked why she wasn't getting pension credit she said they wouldn't pay it because she had money set aside for emergencies, aka savings, and everyone was being very sympathetic. But I happen to know - because I have looked into it for my mum - that your savings need to exceed £12k before you lose pension credit. So this lady must have at least that in savings, which is surely enough for her not to have to worry about the bills. Why should taxpayers be expected to give handouts to people who have over £12k of their own? And if she had only a little over she could easily have got some of it looked after by trusted friends or relatives so it doesnt get counted. Probably a fair few already do such things or else spend some of it on holidays or whatever so that they never have more than £!2k in their name. So I suspect that this lady probably has substantially more than £12k. But I cannot know that. So even if she only has a little more than £12k is it reasonable when you have such a sum to expect taxpayers to help you with your bills? And if £12k is considered too miserly a threshold, then perhaps it should be increased a bit. But expecting taxpayer help with the bills when you have £12k at least in the bank is in my view wholly unreasonable.
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Post by Amadan on Aug 26, 2024 11:38:13 GMT
Having acknowledged that the cut off point for winter fuel payments is probably too low, and that this will result in some pensioners struggling, and suggested a solution above, we do need to beware of pensioners pleading poverty. Not all of them are as badly off as they claim. I well remember many years ago hearing one pensioner moaning to his mate about how he couldn't afford to both eat and heat. This was just after I was stood behind him in the queue in the nearby shop and saw him waste £30 on scratch cards, and more on fags. This is an example of how sometimes bad budgeting choices can be a factor rather than lack of funds, though this can hold true for people of any age, not just the elderly. Yesterday on LBC on the Carol Vorderman show - I happened to be driving home from work at the time with the radio on - I heard one pensioner relating her tale of woe since she could not get pension credit and thus would lose the winter fuel payment. When asked why she wasn't getting pension credit she said they wouldn't pay it because she had money set aside for emergencies, aka savings, and everyone was being very sympathetic. But I happen to know - because I have looked into it for my mum - that your savings need to exceed £12k before you lose pension credit. So this lady must have at least that in savings, which is surely enough for her not to have to worry about the bills. Why should taxpayers be expected to give handouts to people who have over £12k of their own? And if she had only a little over she could easily have got some of it looked after by trusted friends or relatives so it doesnt get counted. Probably a fair few already do such things or else spend some of it on holidays or whatever so that they never have more than £!2k in their name. So I suspect that this lady probably has substantially more than £12k. But I cannot know that. So even if she only has a little more than £12k is it reasonable when you have such a sum to expect taxpayers to help you with your bills? And if £12k is considered too miserly a threshold, then perhaps it should be increased a bit. But expecting taxpayer help with the bills when you have £12k at least in the bank is in my view wholly unreasonable. the labour peer in the House of Lords Prem Sikka was calling out his own labour government for removing the winter fuel payment , the politics of misery and cruelty. We are also reading how the cash grab has had no assessment apparently on how this might plunge millions into misery and difficulty .  |
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Post by Amadan on Aug 26, 2024 11:47:35 GMT
Having acknowledged that the cut off point for winter fuel payments is probably too low, and that this will result in some pensioners struggling, and suggested a solution above, we do need to beware of pensioners pleading poverty. Not all of them are as badly off as they claim. I well remember many years ago hearing one pensioner moaning to his mate about how he couldn't afford to both eat and heat. This was just after I was stood behind him in the queue in the nearby shop and saw him waste £30 on scratch cards, and more on fags. This is an example of how sometimes bad budgeting choices can be a factor rather than lack of funds, though this can hold true for people of any age, not just the elderly. Yesterday on LBC on the Carol Vorderman show - I happened to be driving home from work at the time with the radio on - I heard one pensioner relating her tale of woe since she could not get pension credit and thus would lose the winter fuel payment. When asked why she wasn't getting pension credit she said they wouldn't pay it because she had money set aside for emergencies, aka savings, and everyone was being very sympathetic. But I happen to know - because I have looked into it for my mum - that your savings need to exceed £12k before you lose pension credit. So this lady must have at least that in savings, which is surely enough for her not to have to worry about the bills. Why should taxpayers be expected to give handouts to people who have over £12k of their own? And if she had only a little over she could easily have got some of it looked after by trusted friends or relatives so it doesnt get counted. Probably a fair few already do such things or else spend some of it on holidays or whatever so that they never have more than £!2k in their name. So I suspect that this lady probably has substantially more than £12k. But I cannot know that. So even if she only has a little more than £12k is it reasonable when you have such a sum to expect taxpayers to help you with your bills? And if £12k is considered too miserly a threshold, then perhaps it should be increased a bit. But expecting taxpayer help with the bills when you have £12k at least in the bank is in my view wholly unreasonable. to be honest Steve I understand the point you are making but I dont think 12 grand is that much for a lifetimes worth of savings at all. you also have to take into consideration the psychological barrier of these old folk , who dont want to dip into these savings because they fear they won't be able to replace them and may then have to live the rest of their life without anything. If you see what im saying. It's the government who takes handouts from us , remember? its down to us surely to decide what is reasonable for a govnermnt to tax , and how that money is spent wisely .I dont agree with starmer promising 11Billion in climate money to Africa , or promising 3 billion to Ukraine. . |
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Steve
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Post by Steve on Aug 26, 2024 12:52:47 GMT
Agreed, £12k isn't very much at all. I was helping an OAP the other day and she was saying how she had just been quoted £3k to have all her remaining teeth out and false teeth (no she can't get an NHS dentist)
So keeping £12k for rainy days seems not a lot to me. The Universal Credit limit is £16k but even that doesn't seem a lot.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 26, 2024 13:31:50 GMT
Agreed, £12k isn't very much at all. I was helping an OAP the other day and she was saying how she had just been quoted £3k to have all her remaining teeth out and false teeth (no she can't get an NHS dentist) So keeping £12k for rainy days seems not a lot to me. The Universal Credit limit is £16k but even that doesn't seem a lot. There has to be a cut off point. After all if someone had a million in the bank it would not be reasonable to give them taxpayer funded assistance with their bills. £12k might not seem very much to those of you who have significantly more than this, especially for any such person who still wants to receive tax funded freebies, but it seems like a king's ransom to those of us living from pay packet to pay packet who cannot make any savings at all due to cost of living pressures. Why should we have to pay taxes to support those with such savings when millions of others are far worse off? We have to make choices on who needs help the most. Having said that, due to cost pressures in recent years it would not be unreasonable to increase the £12k threshold, perhaps to as much as £20k. And trust me, to those of us who have nothing, £12k does seem like a lot, £16k even more so. It is in fact fairly generous to say that if you have nearly £12k, you can still get taxpayers to help you with your bills. Those of you who are fortunate enough to be able to think of £12k as not a lot clearly have no idea how much it seems to millions of us. And the UC threshold might be £16k, but you start losing some of your UC as soon as your savings top £6k. |
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