LEAVE the Conservative Party and save your country!
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You'll have to explain that one.
"I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
Well obviously. Which is rather why they got the push.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
What are you on about? Nobody has suggested they do .
Labour have to turn the economy around as the Tories will not be handing the election to them again. Honestly think you let your own biases blind you to seeing the political reality.
[Castle Donington Ladies FC - going up in '22]1 -
I think everyone lets their biases show when it comes to politics and think ‘what’s needed to get votes is what’s needed to get my vote’.
Immigration seems to be an issue that gets a lot of people exorcised but I genuinely don’t believe “self-gender identification” ranks on the top 10 issues for very many people if at all. I know plenty of people find the whole thing baffling but it doesn’t seem to get anyone much really bothered. I really can’t see it being an election winner for anyone.
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The immigration issue is spooky. The conservatives are possessed by it.
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Governments don't direct the economy - at least not here. Labour or Conservative, it's not within their gift to turn an economy around. They can help or hinder a bit, but whether economy is growing or not is mostly the result of larger forces like a significant restriction in the oil supply or a pandemic. One of those in the UK is that, due to demographic shifts and the long tail of Covid, there are not enough economically active people to provide for the number of people who are economically inactive, at least to the level they have come to expect.
I know a lot of people are uncomfortable with the current level of immigration, but without that level of immigration we'd be in a much bigger hole rather than just ticking along. Despite the rhetoric, the Conservative party appear to know this. If people want to lower immigration, we're all going to have to work a lot harder.
As for gender recognition, we still have the same Act of Parliament in place that we had in 2005. There are no plans that I'm aware of to follow Scotland's approach, so there's no self-identification policy in England and Wales.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
Possibly because its an important issue for voters?
"I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
In years and decades gone by we have had better rates of growth without having the current levels of immigration, so you'll need demonstrate why these levels are now necessary.
"I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
Exercised vs exorcised.
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Not sure what you mean, but I get the feeling that are doing what Labour are doing and trying to ignore the fact that this is an issue.
"I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
He kind of did that in his post?
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It doesn't really matter whether economic success can be significantly influenced by a govt it still reflects well on whoever is in power and allows them greater leeway to spend money on things that are popular with the electorate.
[Castle Donington Ladies FC - going up in '22]0 -
What did the Conservatives do about immigration?
Aside from issue record numbers of visas?
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We didn't have so many economically inactive people to support then. Now 9m people plus another 13m over 65. Covid took a lot of people out of the workforce. The proportion of the population over 65 is continually increasing. At the same time the population under 16 is pretty much flat (recovering slightly after a fall over the previous decade).
Put the question the other way: if immigration is going to reduce, how do you fill the gap? You clearly want tax rates to reduce, but the first attempt to adjust a universal benefit (that was introduced as a short term gimmick by Brown) and your favourite party is howling about it as some sort of betrayal.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
I don't think this is true tbh.
Gov't clearly isn't wholly responsible but in the long term I think it is easily the most important factor, and the longer term you look, the more important it is.
It is more complicated than just pulling the "grow" lever, but the rules and conditions of business or production or work or labour are absolutely critical.
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Governments don't really think long term, though. The results of any actions normally appear well after they have left office - look at the shortage of social housing which is the result of a policy from 40 years ago. The levers take decades to have an effect and nobody can sell 'vote for us, your grandkids might see the benefit if it works out'.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
You only need to take a look at what has happened to Eastern Europe in the last 50 years to see that government has a huge impact on economic development. Or indeed Cuba or Venezuela.
Or indeed Thatcher in the UK. Or Italy in the last 100 years. It's waxed and wained for all sorts of government related reasons - it was almost the richest country in the world by the late 90s. Take a look at Greece during the Euro crisis. These are all government decisions or related to government decisions.
I think this *shrug the shoulders, gov't can't do shit* apathy lot of people have s actually a result of poor governance and a consequence of being brainwashed by 15 years of zero productivity growth.
The means are there. We need the right political leadership to get the country behind those correct means so they can get on and enact them. It's not that complicated. It's just political.
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I'm not saying they have no impact, but I think it's far, far easier to make things worse (mini-budget, start a war) than better. For the economy to improve we need to become more productive or have access to some resource that we can extract and sell. Wind is probably our best bet unless we discover a pile of lithium. Planning reform will help a bit, but is still pretty marginal and will take decades to take effect.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
So, Maggie gets the credit for a growing economy, but the blame for starting the housing crisis.
Balance overall good or bad?
The above may be fact, or fiction, I may be serious, I may be jesting.
I am not sure. You have no chance.Veronese68 wrote:PB is the most sensible person on here.0 -
Look the impact was huge. You can't tell me the decisions that government didn't have a gigantic impact on the economy of the country, both nationally but also across the individual towns and counties.
It's just nonsense the gov't can't do anything. What people really mean is that the political environment is such that it's hard to do the things that do have an impact.
I spend a lot of time in South Yorkshire - tell me gov't policy has not had a huge impact there over the last 50 years.
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No, R2B would work fine if stock was replenished, the problem is they weren't. And that's only part of the current shortage.
And at the time, there was no housing shortage. That came much later.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
it's a mix
revenue from selling off public assets helped boost the economy, but the price is being paid now - bad
stop subsidizing (some) uncompetitive industries, brutal but needed doing - good
right to buy without ploughing revenue back into new stock - bad
pro eu with the determination to get a good deal - good
shaking up the city - pure good
reasonable degree of integrity, puts most since to shame - good
my bike - faster than god's and twice as shiny1 -
Again I didn't say nothing can be done. I'm just pushing back at the idea that the government is 'behind the wheel' of the economy. The best analogy I can think of is trying to manage a river.
What else do you think could be done to see an improvement visible to the man in the street within 5 years?
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
Exactly. Short term thinking for short term gain. You cannot claim the benefits without acknowledging the long term costs. Those costs may take time to materialise or become obvious but they will come.
Flip side is any government taking the long term view will probably be voted out on the basis of costs before the benefits are felt.
The above may be fact, or fiction, I may be serious, I may be jesting.
I am not sure. You have no chance.Veronese68 wrote:PB is the most sensible person on here.0 -
Actually reformed building planning, rather than not. Not piecemeal stuff. But I mean actual reform.
Re-entering single market and customs union of the EU.
Coming to an agreement to stop strikes.
Reforming adult education to reflect that funding for non-university skilled work is as important.
etc etc.
There’s loads of reform around incentives for capital markets, knowledge transfer from universities to private sector, etc. UK is not the easiest place to invest but that can change.
Plenty to be done.
A lot of that you’d notice after 5 years.
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Think your first two completely ignore the 5 year cycle.
An agreement to stop strikes? How could that possibly work without removing the right to strike?
Adult education is easily a 5 year+ project
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
You’d already notice it though. An agreement as in a compromise!
Honestly, the bulk of the lack of growth is down to lack of investment, and a big part of that is money tied up in unproductive real estate. The rest is productive skills, conditions for investment to encourage it, which is mixture of rules on investment, quality and availability of labour and regulatory stability.
The problem is not we don’t know how to do this. The problem is the political will to.
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I think Osbourne's austerity shows that with the correct PR governments can continue to get votes for policies where any potential benefit would be long term.
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As someone who works with the planning system every day, please take my word for it that the planning system cannot be completely overhauled in 5 years. Even if it could, this would not in itself be helpful either. Nearly 80 years of legal precedent out of the window would just create chaos. Nobody would know where they stood.
It took us 10 years to join the Common Market.
The strikes are essentially just about pay and have already been partly addressed but it's lots of individual disputes and others will arise in the future. You can't make some overarching agreement not to strike.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition1 -
I suppose if the effects are slight, as in nothing much happens, then any party can continue. I'm struggling to see the long term benefits of austerity though.
The above may be fact, or fiction, I may be serious, I may be jesting.
I am not sure. You have no chance.Veronese68 wrote:PB is the most sensible person on here.0
