[Closed] Nick Clegg in growing a pair and actualy talking some sense shocker!!!

I'm still waiting to hear this explanation about how Gove was born into wealth Binners 😉

See my post above then....

😉

You're not seriously going to try and suggest that this present lot are in some way representative of a 'Meritocracy', are you?

I'm not suggesting anything - it was you who told us that the cabinet were [b]all[/b] born into wealth

Even the one who adopted at four months old 😳

Zulu-Eleven - Member

I'm still waiting to hear this explanation about how Gove was born into wealth Binners

...is that really all you can find in this thread to call him out on? 😉 and indeed 😆

David Davis is a better example of what happens to uppity commoners who have the temerity to try and establish themselves in the party above their 'betters'

That is david call me dave Davis

A rarity in either party in that he has actual principles.

Bet he never joined in with The Tory high jinls of clanging glasses and shouting steward at Prescott.

Neither party is that good these days at having a cross section of society but The Tories have never really had a tradition of this

Labour do seem to be getting more "elitist" or white middle class graduate etc but have some way to go to achieve the heridatry millionairre status of the Tory cabinet

but have some way to go to achieve the heridatry millionairre status of the Tory cabinet

[img] [/img]

The difference is Z-11 is that he was the exeption, rather than the rule. In the same way Gove or DD are for the Tories

As far as the present labour party is concerned, I went to school with a present Labour shadow minister, and I'm proper northern working class scum

*polishes chip on shoulder* 😉

It's true, I've met him. He really is frightfully common.

Zulu: Benn: oh the irony. You even hotlinked the picture from the coalition of resistance website: I expect you will have to have a little lie down after all that. 😆

I can't see Osborne setting up workers co-operatives to help failing industries, and joining the Stop The War coalition after he retires.

Still, if there is any merit in that old-fashioed idea of political extremism being a 'horseshoe' shape, then Z-11 and Tony Benn should be about ready to jump off their respective ends and swap political places altogether. 😉

Your patheticness knows no bounds Zulu-Eleven. You come on here playing the smart arse with your truly pathetic point scoring, in this particular case absurdly pretending that the present cabinet doesn't represent wealth and privilege.

Anyone with an ounce of sense knows that your moronic claims are false, and yet that seems to have no effect on you at all - you just keep banging on the same old bollox regardless, without the slightest hint of shame.

Even the Daily Mail, yes that's right, the Daily Mail - standard bearer of right-wing voters, fully accepts that Cameron's cabinet represents the privileged few :

[url= http://www.****/news/election/article-1280554/The-coalition-millionaires-23-29-member-new-cabinet-worth-1m--Lib-Dems-just-wealthy-Tories.html ]The coalition of millionaires[/url]

[i]It is the £60million Cabinet. [b][u]David Cameron’s coalition Government may have adopted ‘fairness’ as one of its defining slogans, but his team of Ministers has been drawn almost exclusively from the ranks of the financial elite[/u][/b] – leading to accusations that politics is once again becoming the preserve of the wealthy.

Of the 29 Ministers entitled to attend Cabinet meetings, 23 have assets and investments estimated to be worth more than £1million.[/i]

But of course you Zulu-Eleven, would like to pretend otherwise. As you always do - when you find the truth inconvenient.

in this particular case absurdly pretending that the present cabinet doesn't represent wealth and privilege

Where did I suggest that?

I simply pointed out that the widespread perception that [b]all[/b] the current cabinet were born into wealth was false, indeed I could also point to the number of millionaires on the Labour front bench (Miliband, Harman, Balls, Cooper, Byrne, Woodward, Benn Jr, not to mention the wealth of Blair, Benn Sr, Mandelson) as proof of the shallowness and hypocrisy of allegations being pointed towards any particular party, as opposed to the majority of the entire 'political class'

That's a tad disingenuous though isn't it Z-11, to be fair.

For example: Millibean's parents arrived here as penniless migrants, escaping persecution, so are the very advert for the kind of post-war social mobility that has now all but disappeared

All the present Tory lot (with the exception of Pob) just got handed an absolutely mahoossive (offshore tax free) trust fund as they were packed off to Eton to embark on their life of inherited privilege inside the establishment - where every door is opened for them

Establishment?

You mean the tories who studied PPE at Oxford? Boris, Dave, Osbourne et al?

Just like the rest of them

Miliband (PPE degree from Oxford)
Miliband (PPE degree from Oxford)
Purnell (PPE degree from Oxford)
Balls (PPE degree from Oxford).
Smith (PPE oxford)
Cooper (PPE oxford)
Kelly (PPE oxford)
Mandelson (PPE oxford)

They're all the same - the idiots are the ones who think that the parties represent anything different, they're all from the same mould.

they did that argument ^^ on another thread the other week zulu. As you would doubtless be keen to point out if it was being discussed within, say, the context of failiing social mobility with regard to the advantages and tax breaks of the private school system, studying PPE at Oxford is hardly a measure of "born into wealth and priviliege" any more.

As I recall the 'cabinet/shadow cabinet CV's comparison' just highlighted the difference in real-world experience the current shadow cabinet has over the real one. 😕

Just going to Oxford surely represents a minor part of the overall package that allows the likes of Dave and Gideon to coast through life, insulated from the harsh realities that the other 99.5% of the population have to endure

I'll concede this point if you can find me any photos of any labour frontbencher in this kind of set up.....

[img] [/img]

I went to school with the Shadow Health Minister Andy Burnham. We went to a comp in Newton. Every morning we passed the picket line at the local coal mine, during the miners strike. So witnessing, first-hand, the divisive poverty and misery created by Thatcherism. I'm sure Frances Maude had similar experiences 😉

St Aelred's or Selwyn Jones binners?

Binners ...and to be completely fair, your final paragraph is not strictly true is it?

Of more concern to me is that fact that modern politics is dominated at the top level by a very narrow strata of society especially in terms of tertiary education and importantly the same degree. [u]And this is a cross-party issue.[/u] To some extent that is a natural outcome as the best universities are more likely to be the breeding grounds for the successful than the worst ones (albeit not in an exclusive sense). Which is not the same thing as arguing that current access to them is correct BTW. But look at how many members of the front benches on both sides of the house read PPE at roughly the same time and often at the same place and then ask why is it that none of them have an idea of how to tackle the current economic crisis? They were all taught the same models and frameworks for understanding a reality that is completely different from the one we are facing now. Hence the stalemate and paralysis.

But are politicians ever going to sort out social mobility, or the lack of it, in the UK? Sadly I doubt it. The OECD concluded that:

Parental influence still makes a big difference to a child's education in the UK, especially compared to other countries - i[b]n fact in the UK the influence of your parents is as important as the quality of the school [/b]- unlike Germany, say, where the school has a much bigger role

So shouldn't the real focus be in our homes, not the Palace of Westminster. Perhaps its not just charity that begins at home?

{edit: sorry this was a X-post with the list of PPE students!]

As I recall the 'cabinet/shadow cabinet CV's comparison' just highlighted the difference in real-world experience the current shadow cabinet has over the real one

Aye this- I believe i did the list till I got bored
What surprised me was milliband taught economics at Hravard iirc.

Doing PPE is what prospective politicians do these days it is like complaining that your Doctor has a degree in medicine. It is however part of the debate of the Labour party reducing its broad appeal and taking "commoners " [I assume you recal how the true blues used to jeer Prescott by banging their glasses and shouting steward at him]

It is not proof that they are as wealthy or privledged as the Tories but you know this.

St Aelred's Coyote. I is a left-footer innit? 😉

JY - why use Prescott as an example? There are surely better examples of people across parties who had less traditional routes to their current roles. Yes, Prescott got further than most (unbelievably) but his long list of policy failures and non-starters is an embarrassment to the cause of social mobility in politics IMO. Like most failed politicians he is given the respect and forgiveness that is due in retirement now (and Labour kept him marginalised in effect while in power despite his title) but without better role models or poster boys/girls, the cause is unlikely to be furthered much in the future.

Did you know it has shut down and been flattened? Merged with Selly's to form the Hope Academy.

Yes, Prescott got further than most (unbelievably) but his long list of policy failures and non-starters is an embarrassment to the cause of social mobility in politics IMO

Yes... because at the other end of the social spectrum, Gideon is presently proving that the most expensive education money can buy leads to some fantastic policy decisions, isn't he? Dear God! Not in Prescotts wildest dreams would Blair have given him the free reign to cause the absolute carnage to the countries economy that Dave's good old Eton chum is presently wreaking! 🙄

Coyote. I did know, but I've not actually seen it. Will have to have a look next time I'm over that neck of the woods

Binners, perhaps the real problem is that GO has little if any formal economics training. He read modern history. Leaving aside the small fact that they were not actually at school together (pedantic I know), I am not sure how he caused the carnage of excess leverage throughout all parts of the economy, but I will certainly agree that he shows no sign of understanding how to deal with it.

JY - why use Prescott as an example

I used him as an example of how the Tories treat those from normal backgrounds,

GO has little if any formal economics training

you are right given the loud and near deafening voices we had from economists about the imment danger pre craqsh and the need for regulation and whow we could not trust the markets or bankers to behave responsibly what we need is more economists to grip the tiller for us ...what could possibly go wrong?
We may as well have soothsayers in the cabinet as an economist for all the good it will do.

IIRC Cable warned about this and we know how much you respect him.

 

First off, let me be clear, I hate toffs and their upper middle class privileged snivelling little existences, whatever their political leanings. These ruling classes are like a disease to UK PLC. We need doors opened for anyone with the drive and ability to reach the top, not some chinless wonder from yet another mafia like dynasty! Down with the old boy network!

Clegg, let's face it, he's a naive as they come! Like so many modern day politicians, they have no idea what real life is like.

I heard he wants to impose a new inheritance tax. If that's the case, the liberal party are finished.

Why? Because, like all political manovres, the only people hit hard without fail, regardless of which party is in power, are those who earn a shade or two above average. Including your typical middle ground liberal voter!

Misguidedly, socialists believe that people who earn around double the national average are rich, but they are not. Those caught in the middle ground are also the silent and passive majority who contribute a disproportionate amount in taxes, and due to means testing, will never receive any state support if they should run into difficulties. I am talking about people who have taken responsibility for their futures and saved some of their income over a long period of time. Due to their sheer numbers, this section of society are the cash cows for all political experiments. But I digress somewhat...

Over the last 25 years, house prices and the cost of living have rocketed. Lots of young people have gone and got degrees, worked hard and are out there making what most would consider to be a good wage. But the left wing's politics of and jealousy are incredibly destructive! The fact is that these young people canot afford to get on the housing ladder and are merely passing their supposed wealth on to their landlords etc.. There are other young people, just as well educated, but who don't have above average incomes. These people have an impossible challenge.

It is forecast that the younger generation will become increasingly disgruntled with the older population, who have benefitted from owning a home whilst watching house price inflation dwarf that of the official inflation figures. The increased taxes the young will bear to keep public sector and state pensions enriching the lives of the older people, who already seem to have all the money, will cause huge resentment.

Enter Clegg and his great idea to impose a new inheritance tax. The hardworking overburdened young will have been thinking about when they will eventually inherit from their parents, or family, believing that their lives will get a lot easier. With the Liberal's new tax, they will get a lot less. They will feel like their just deserts are being stolen from them, redistributed to a bunch of unworthy ****less spongers and to pay for the inefficient and often pointless government schemes/initiatives etc etc. ultimately, they will no longer be the beneficiaries and that they will feel robbed. The last straw!

The Liberals could not be more out of touch with the people they need to keep on their side. They are a lost cause, clueless and ineffectual. Just like they have always been!

The democratic system isn't working. We have too many people who aren't contributing. We need free enterprise and as in the past, we need circumstances that enable and encourage small businesses to lead us out of recession. Red tape and taxes are the product of the public sector. The public sector is far too over bloated, far too many are employed by councils and government agencies. To reduce red tape and taxes, to grow our economy and become remotely competitive, we need a much reduced public sector.

We also need the the ****less benefit spongers to do some work too! If you promote growth at the grass roots level, people, not big corporations benefit. Perhaps even some of the unfortunate victims of the recession would find they have some job opportunities as well.

But before any of this, the charade that is going on in Europe over the single currency needs to play itself out. This uncertainty is what is killing any recovery.

JY - behind the sarcasm are many grains of truth. There were plenty of economists and bankers warning of the coming crisis. Go and read the Bank of Englands Financial Stability Reviews over the period. The nightmare was that these warnings were ignored even within the Bank of England. And Mervyn King is a man who is meant to have earned respect? At least people realise that Greenspan was at the root of this not the master of a new economic miracle.

But there are economists and economists - and my point is that many of the current political elite were schooled with the same economy frameworks. Hence the similarities in policies (behind the differing rhetoric), the failure to correctly diagnose the causes of the crisis and the subsequent failure to deal with it.

I agree with the Tory behaviour towards Prescott - making fun of people's backgrounds is not really acceptable is it!!!??? 😉

like all political manovres, the only people hit hard without fail, regardless of which party is in power, are those who earn a shade or two above average. Including your typical middle ground liberal voter!

socialists believe that people who earn around double the national average are rich, but they are not.

The fact is that these young people canot afford to get on the housing ladder and are merely passing their supposed wealth on to their landlords

I cant be arsed it's a tirade and not a very well thought out one form the 1/3 I read do you then rant about benefits the public sector andf then big up business as our only possibel saviour?]Does thatcher get a mention ...i bet you dont mention council house sales and how this affected the housing market or say anything bad about the tories despite them heading us back into recession with right wing free markey=t policies that are encouraging enterprise, giving tax cuts to the rich and shafting the publi sctor as if it is responsible for the excesses of the capitalist market.

Ia m tempted to out up Nicks comment when you ranted about immigration again

But there are economists and economists - and my point is that many of the current political elite were schooled with the same economy frameworks. Hence the similarities in policies (behind the differing rhetoric), the failure to correctly diagnose the causes of the crisis and the subsequent failure to deal with it.

I agree with the Tory behaviour towards Prescott - making fun of people's backgrounds is not really acceptable is it!!!???

my only issues with poish toffs is that they canno tundersatnd what iot is like for the majoirty of the population and it is difficult [ though no timpossibl;e] for them to represent well.
GO and his 11k winter holiday during a recession for example. as David Blunkett said to him when he was annoucing the public sectors cuts

"which one of the essential services do you think you will miss most"

They have never needed the sate/help so why should they respect it?

Poor cmd having to go to cornwall to appease the masses.

James Dyson is another worthy of mention for being a decent hard working honest British taxpayer.

Who moved his business to the Far East thus deprived 800 other honest British workers of a job and thus chance of paying tax?

Cough [url= http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/news/article-2106379/Offshore-tax-British-engineering-champion-Sir-James-Dyson.html ]Offshore move of Mr Dyson[/url]

That's a very entertaining polemic, Spongebob. My cup of tea has gone cold, while I read it and tried to fathom out what it meant. I don't wish to appear rude, but it is full of stunning contradictions, such as espousing 'free enterprise', yet bemoaning the fact that so many young people are forced to rent off private landlords. Pouring vitriol on 'benefit scroungers', yet calling for cuts in the public sector, at a time when there aren't sufficient alternative private sector jobs for these people to transfer to. Meaning they'd all end up unemployed. And an increased burden to the state. Which would have to then increase the public sector to deal with the increased demand.

The gross overinflation of the property market is largely a result of ideological greed; people wanting more than they actually need. Not content with simply having 'enough', they buy property with a view to making profit, to add to their incomes. Exercising their 'free enterprise' spirit. This coupled with the desire to own, to increase your economic status. To be bigger and more potent than you were.

I think it would be more useful to try to address why we have become so greedy, and look at ways of helping people feel more contented, than to attack everything that you think is to blame.

Junkyard - Member
dont disagree but I dont have as much "Faith" in economists as you do.

Faith in economists? One of my favourite economics books at the moment is Steve Keen's Debinking Economics, so perhaps you can understand my responses to the insults that others used to throw my way!! Like many sciences, its gives us useful frameworks for understanding yesterday's problems!

I agree with your comment about understanding other people. But then again, who really does understand others who live in completely different sectors of society? Oh, heck perceptions and bias again.....not a good subject for STW! Any way time for a ride now before the next band of rain!

I liked Will Huttons comment on the subject. Ask 3 economists and you'll get 4 different opinions 😀

THM - suns out here too. And the forecast ain't bad either. Have a good ride! Riding Tomorrow and Saturday, hopefully. 😀

So after all this have we found a painless way to magic up a pile of cash that pays of the national debt. Thought not, shame. Like a family we are really shouting about lack of money while not listening to each other. We all know it's about money or the lack of it, do we have any real idea on how make some without adding to the national debt. 🙂

Like many sciences, its gives us useful frameworks for understanding yesterday's problems!

Economics falls some way short of all of these.

JY, that's a trifle harsh IMO. Not sure any sciences genuinely pass your test. As an undergrad, many moons ago, you could study Econ in the arts and science faculty. Given that I have an MA, I tend to agree with your sympathies, but to a lesser extent! The bllx that is "rational expectations" was becoming very mainstream at the time and look where that got us. It felt like being in lectures on the Emperors New Clothes even then!!!

Of course, if we were smart, we should have used the subjects weaknesses to our advantage. Michael Porter became the highest paid academic in the world in the 1990s by basically relaxing the key assumptions of the new-classical theory of the firm. He was charging $100k [b]an hour[/b] to give a lecture on his simple, yet effective five forces model. So if Harvard makes you that savvy, then perhaps there is scope for Ed Milliband yet.

(Binners, I hope your conditions are better than mine were tonight!)

Its just has been Nick Clegg shaking the biscuit tin to show he is still alive and taking a fat wage off the state, while being on holiday, it means absolutely NOTHING to most of the working classes and will probably send Daily mailers into a catatonic state of rage.

and its a god cover for pob rearrangening the exam results ,and the catholic church in scotlandshire have a petty little letter reading competion.

Basicly its not news as nothing will ever be allowed to change.

Here's the one economic theory that'll work for ya ("theory" because I can't think if an insulting enough word for what economists dream up):

It'll go boom. Bankers/traders/etc will **** it up. Then it'll go bust. And the lower two thirds will get hit hardest rescuing them. Not to mention the world's neediest. It's broken. It doesn't work. America is brightening its outlook this week. Why? ****ing house prices. They've just kicked off an world economic crisis because of a house price bubble which allowed crooks, conmen and shysters to sell mortgages to those they plainly knew couldn't afford them. Hello? HELLO?

We need to try something different.

We won't of course. But we need to.

If we need to try something new then what about not spend what we do not have. Domestically, socially and politically. We could try an old thing save up then buy.

Couldn't be bothered to read the full thread, but had a chuckle when I saw the title!

Nick Clegg is as barkingly mad as they come; he wants to do this AND he's opposed to the third runway at Heathrow.

What a nut-job!

They are all nut jobs, if you can't do anything else be an MP. It's the ultimate job for the hypocritical, support by the deluded. What gets me is that so many actually support their stupid out dated political arguments of the left and right, while these same politicians are trying be on the "middle ground" or even the "third way".
It's been a pity that this so called coalition has not done a little better, after all what we need at present is politicians that put personal (self interest) and party ideology to one side and work for the common good. First though they'd have to have the brain to figure that out. Have heard that it's a blue moon tonight.

if you look at his 'career' before politics, it'll go a long way toward explaining why we have such a bunch of useless halfwits as MPs.

Why can't we get industry leaders and experts to run the country, not the usual idealogical academics who've as yet not done anything of use in their lives??

Ho-hum, it isn't going to change anytime soon.

industry leaders

They rarely give a shit about anything other than industry. I can't see industry leaders ever having introduced, say, a minimum wage. In fact, it was industry leaders that railed against it and had to be dragged kicking and screaming to the party when it was finally introduced.

Vince Cable used to be the financial Director of Shell, among other things, so has had plenty of real life experience. And if I remember rightly he was a lone voice in parliament issuing apocalyptic warnings about the [s]economic miracle[/s] emperors new clothes that was the banking industry.

Of course he was ignored by everyone, as he wasn't telling them what they wanted to hear. Whereas Bob Diamond and Mervyn King were/are.

He's still being studiously ignored now, as they continue to listen to the same totally discredited, self-interested voices as if the whole crisis never happened. And shape policy accordingly around their narrow needs, to the profound detriment to the rest of us in the 'real' (unimportant) economy

It must be pre-conference, judging by the behaviour over the last 48hours. So Cable and Oakeshott plotting now against Clegg. Would you really want these kind of people in your team? Certainly not in the trenches. The Coalition could have been an interesting political experiment, but the amount of briefing and counter-briefing that is going on makes it look like another Tucker episode....wait a minute...?

Oakeshott's business analogy is an interesting one - how many businesses would re-employ a worker who had been fired for fiddling their expenses? Why is this OK in politics?