he’s an utter ****:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/9717537/Kelvin-MacKenzie-overtaxed-South-needs-its-own-party.html

He’s a troll, just not a very good one. A good troll wouldn’t be so obvious and go for fruit hanging so low it makes him look an imbecile.

His opening lines sum him up perfectly:

Sick and tired of subsidising folk from the rest of the country? You belong to a select club – the club of the hard-working, clever and creative people living in London and the South East who single-handedly are giving the rest of the nation a standard of living they can’t, or won’t, create for themselves.

As a person who was born and raised in the south, i was clever enough to move to the north. It was in the north i learnt about a theory called the spatial division of labour developed Doreen Massey (born in the north, lives in the south). This theory explains that the spatial unevenness of the economy is created and reinforced by power relations between places. In simple terms, the north is less productive than the south because the south is more productive, and therefore has the resources to stay productive (in part by drawing on the resources of the north, and therefore making the north less productive).

I read this the other day, and just laughed.

Does anyone actually listen to a single word Kelvin Mackenzie says? As journalistic credibility goes, he’s up there with Piers Morgan or Richard Littlejohn. Basically… a joke!

Like a child having a tantrum, he’ll just shout louder and louder, to try and get some attention, while everyone either ignores him, or laughs at his pathetic need to feel relevant.

Disappointing that the domain name he’s registered doesn’t go anywhere.

But perhaps if independence for London and the South-east meant fewer property developers coming to East Anglia to drive up house prices then it wouldn’t be such a bad idea?

You have got to ask

a) Why isn’t he in prison?
b) Why do people keep paying him to rant in this way?

I’m afraid the answer will because its not just Kelvin McKenzie who is a grade A bellend. The world is full of them.

oldnpastit – Member
Disappointing that the domain name he’s registered doesn’t go anywhere.

But perhaps if independence for London and the South-east meant fewer property developers coming to East Anglia to drive up house prices then it wouldn’t be such a bad idea?

I imagine Kelvin will want to take East Anglia with him into the brave new world – it would be silly to give up all those clever people in Cambridge.

Can’t we just shoot him into the sun or something and then move on…

In fact the test I apply to Northern and Southern attitudes is this. If a your tree falls into your neighbour’s garden they will come round with a chain saw and help you clear it away. Down south they will just send you a solicitors letter

Love this comment 😀

I live and work in London, and one thing that really does annoy me is the way lots of “Londoners” think London is the best place in the country. Yeah it’s “ok” but I wont be here forever!

Just out of curiosity, and the question is in no way meant as an endorsment (I read it yesterday as well and I think he’s a cock also), but is there any truth in the stats he quotes, regarding whether other regions are net contributors to or consumers of GDP?

but is there any truth in the stats he quotes

Well Kelvin has a faultless track record for verifying his facts before publishing…

😉

But perhaps if independence for London and the South-east meant fewer property developers coming to East Anglia to drive up house prices then it wouldn’t be such a bad idea?

It’s the flippin railways which cause the problem. All the new flats in Cambridge are snapped up by City workers who can commute into the City quicker by train from Cambridge, than they can from the London suburbs by tube…..

Its a bit of a ridoculous argument to suggest that one area of the country works harder than the rest. More people live there per square mile than anywhere in the country. The main banks are there, etc etc etc.
Like most countries, there is a financial centre which draws the most work, money etc. Its not realistic to decentralise or split these functions to other less dominant areas, as they are often codependant on each other.
To also suggest the North is not working as hard or putting the hours in is quite frankly insulting to everyone in the North and just serves to reinforce the pre-existing stereotypes.
He needs to keep his head down before someone removes it and puts it on a pike. Esp after his comments about the Hillborough disaster and how it wasnt his fault they published completely bollocks information.
*edit* and Im in the south.

Just out of curiosity, and the question is in no way meant as an endorsment (I read it yesterday as well and I think he’s a cock also), but is there any truth in the stats he quotes, regarding whether other regions are net contributors to or consumers of GDP?

Pretty sure London is heavily subsidised.

I live in ‘the north’.

My parents were employed in the primary (mining) and secondary (manufacturing) sectors.

The government killed off/did nothing to help these sectors over time and put all its our eggs in the tertiary (financial/service/insurance etc) sector. The most globally mobile sector. They took the piss and now unless gov cuts them some slack they’re leaving.

Yes it’s my fault.

Who is this clown? I’d rather he be unemployed and my taxes pay to keep him than be employed for this drivel.

I’m going out on a limb here, but i suspect that the textile industries in the north west, the mining and shipbuilding in the north east, potteries in…erm… the potteries, the automotive industry in the midlands etc, etc, etc, etc might have had something to do with building up this countries wealth, infrastructure, and global position in the first place.

Oh yeah… I forgot… nothing actually existed prior to Thatcher being elected, did it? 🙄

he has a teeny tiny bit of fact on his side:

(generalisation alert) London and the SE are the most productive in terms of GDP certainly. Thats becuase it has more more-productive sectors (as defined by economists) such as fiannce and business services where as the north has more less productive sectors such as manufacturing.

BUT

You could question whether we should infact value the producutivity of finacial sectors differenty given the mess it has left us with in the last few years. This governemnt once talked about rebalancing the economy back to manufacturing but i wont hold my breath.

Also, it has not always been like this (e.g. 1870s textile industry manufacturing in manchester, ship building in NE c. 1900s) places rise and fall.

Also, The headline figure also masks huge inequalities within london and the SE.

In terms of subsidy, it is open to arguement who puts most in and gets most out. the North has a higher spend on benefits and welfare, but the south has higher spend on transport and infrastructure, arts, musuems etc.

It could be argued that with a london mayor and devolution in wales and scotland, there are very powerful voices speaking for anywhere but the north, midlands and sw. And that the economic potential of the North, for example, is supressed because of this lack of voice at a national level.

edit: so it nothing to do with working hard or not, see also ‘path dependance’ 🙂

To be fair, he did once invite “Mystic Meg” in for a redundancy interview which he started by saying “Well Meg, we’re letting you go, but you already knew that, right?”

Who is this clown? I’d rather he be unemployed and my taxes pay to keep him than be employed for this drivel.

Former editor of The Sun. As an aside, he went to the same school as me. The school didn’t really publicise the fact that Kelvin was a former pupil…

And that the economic potential of the North, for example, is supressed because of this lack of voice at a national level.

If you read some of the material written about cluster economies, it makes a compelling argument for regional government with devolved powers that allow them to create the conditions that can propogate a cluster.

What Kelvin also fails to note is the gleeful and vengeful abandon with which George is focussing his austerity measures. To those northern cities that continually wave two fingers at the Tories – 25% cuts from central government! To our friends in the blue-rinse shires – no cuts at all!

It all makes perfect sense to morons like him!

I kindly submit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/44950467@N06/4127096187/in/photostream

And..

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mnr9tf0-3ew[/video]

He’s a troll, just not a very good one

You’re talking about him here, therefore he’s doing okay

This man has actually done nothing productive in writing an article. One man dig holes, somebody else take the spoils.(joat’s own philosophy)

Binners your post doesn’t make sense. What were you driving at?

An odious waste of skin

Correct me if I’m wrong but isn’t he one of Liverpools favourite folk?

What’s he doing writing in the Torygraph, I thought it was supposedly a serious newspaper?

If you factor in the costs of bank bailouts, libor rate fiddling, rogue UBS traders, and endless bank mis-selling scandals, I suspect you would find that actually the rest of the country is subsidizing London and the South-east, rather than the other way around.

What’s he doing writing in the Torygraph, I thought it was supposedly a serious newspaper?

They gave up being serious about a year ago. I’ve given up reading it for the news.

What’s he doing writing in the Torygraph, I thought it was supposedly a serious newspaper?

The people who made the Mail the paper it is today….. now run things at the Telegraph