I dont think it really matters because of the way our electoral system works. We are only voting for who is our local MP. Once elected they can sit with any party group they choose, or none. They are under no obligation to sit with the one the associated with prior to polling day, and dont have to go back to the electorate if they do.
As for who is Prime Minister that is upto the party that has the most MPs sat with it. They decide using whatever rules they dream up. Again the electorate get no say in the matter. Afterall there is no guaruntee that the party leaders are elected MPs in their constituency
Really??Don't they all come out with the same message on a local level...Health,roads, infrastructure, protecting the greenbelt etc etc.
No, they don't all come out with same message after election. Some do genuinely work for constituency and are not always toeing party line.
Although most of them are self-serving wan..rs 😀
NB If you don't think IDS is being too tough on the poor, mentally ill and disabled, consider benefit sanctions. We have created a parallel legal system for the poor / unemployed, only the odds are completely stacked against them eg:
In his oral evidence Dr David Webster of Glasgow University said that over the last twenty to thirty years there has been a shift to a 'parallel secret penal system' through a number of incremental changes. He urged MPs to ask fundamental questions about whether such a system is necessary or wanted.When asked why he describes it as a 'secret' system he said;
It is a secret penal system because the decisions are made in secret by officials. The claimant is not present. They are not legally represented. The punishment is applied before there has been any hearing. If they get a hearing it is long after the punishment has been applied. The scale of penalties are more severe than the scale of penalties that is available to magistrates courts or sheriff courts in Scotland. You are talking unmistakably about a penal system that has a set of characteristics which, I would suggest, are totally unacceptable in a democratic society.
http://www.crimeandjustice.org.uk/news/benefit-sanctions-parallel-secret-penal-system
Why should these people be allowed to get away with that?
[i]If you mean a tiny minority, then so what, all systems have a small number who abuse it and in most cases it's in the noise. [/i]
Is it a tiny minority though? Are you saying that we don't have huge areas where unemployment is way above the national average, where some people have never worked and have become reliant on benefits?
I don't think I know anyone who votes purely in their own self interest. Equally I refuse to believe that anyone votes in a purely selfless manner.
However, people will disagree on what is best for the country - both in terms of what the final outcome looks like and how we achieve it.
Example - IDS fundamentally believes that UC would/will create a fairer, better society. You may disagree with him but some people will agree and will vote to see it happen.
The aims of the "bedroom tax" were to encourage people to move out of large homes and into smaller ones. This would free up larger homes for larger families and also free up cash that could be spent on other people.
Both ideas that in principle were intending to have a positive influence on society.
However, they also have negative impacts. People need to weigh up whether they think these are the right methods, if they will have the right results and whether the positive/negative aspects are something they agree with.
It becomes harder to make these decisions when you are personally involved - not many people will vote to put up their own taxes significantly or otherwise decrease their own standard of living significantly*.
The other complicating factor is how the information is portrayed. You only have to look on this thread for the kind of emotive language that is used (mainly from lefties on here as they shout the loudest). IF you don't have accurate facts it is hard to make an informed decision. All sides will say the other is bending the truth and that their information is correct.
Is it a tiny minority though? Are you saying that we don't have huge areas where unemployment is way above the national average, where some people have never worked and have become reliant on benefits?
Not at all, but the main issue is we don't have enough traditional low skill jobs in the UK after outsourcing manufacturing to the Far East.
I vote for the mp, not a party. It depends which candidate will do the best for the constituency.
That's a different question. Despite my strong opposition to the Labour Party it is clear that not all individuals within the Labour Party are the same. For example if my local Labour candidate was a member/supporter of the Labour Representation Committee I would vote for them. This would be a vote to the individual not the Party.
For example I have no fundamental differences with Seumas Milne, Andrew Fisher, and John McDonnell, other than what the hell are they still doing in the Labour Party.
Is it a tiny minority though? Are you saying that we don't have huge areas where unemployment is way above the national average, where some people have never worked and have become reliant on benefits?
Like parts of south Wales? I don't know whether you go biking in south Wales, but the funding for those was largely achieved through the EU because the area required economic regeneration after the mines/industry closed. But spending on a few bike parks was never going to be enough.
So people are trapped in towns and villages where there are no jobs. Other manufacturers moved in, and have moved out again to the far east as Footflaps has said. I suppose they could do what Tebbit said, and get on their bikes? Tebbit has since said that was a mistake, among many from the Government of the time.
So they could move where the jobs are...if they can afford the rent/house prices...
Not at all, but the main issue is we don't have enough traditional low skill jobs in the UK [b]after the invention of technology[/b]. Low skilled jobs have pretty much gone in the numbers they existed previously and there is nothing the politicians can do about it.
Think of the Apple effect, many millions of people buying the same product on credit so that Apple top brass can earn multiples of millions every year. And you can apply that to loads of products now. Globalisation means the the rich will get richer and the poor will take on ever more debt or look to charities for food, just so the can keep Sky, their iphone and send seflies on Facebook.
My guess is that you are less keen on this JFK quote, EL
In short, it is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high today and tax revenues are too low and the soundest way to raise the revenues in the long run is to cut the rates now.
Lets all just volunteer to pay more tax
I'd be happy to given a more equitable distribution of the country's wealth.
I'd be happy to given a more equitable distribution of the country's wealth.
Bit selfish to just consider the UK though? If we are going to redistribute let's do it properly, why just restrict ourselves to the UK. On a global scale if we distributed wealth I guess most people in this country would end up poorer.
My guess is that you are less keen on this JFK quote, EL
Yes I'm no fan of JFK, my username might be a clue.
Apparently JFK stole the quote from his old headmaster.
Voting - is it purely about what's in your own interests
Yes - although those interests ought to include the impacts on others if you are a rounded human being(!)
But ultimately, everyone should vote for the party that they think represents them best. Then we ought to end up with the majority of people getting their way.
Ignoring reality - of course.
I vote for the mp, not a party.
I wish more people did this our local MP seams to be an example of 'If we put a ___ rosette on a donkey it would get in' being taken too literally. In the 25 odd years he has been the local MP I think he voted against his party once and I can't recall him ever expressing an opinion in public that wasn't written party policy.
MP's....bunch of idiots. In the austerity years they ALL voted for a 9% pay increase. This says a great deal to me. However I firmly believe the Queen and Prince Philshould run the country...bring back a medieval system etc etc....heheheh 😀
[i]Why should these people be allowed to get away with that?[/i]
Why use language like that?
People on benefits are on the breadline, often far far below it, the idea that all that claim benefits are work shy scroungers surely by now has been discredited? Most people who receive benefits are the working poor.
MP's....bunch of idiots. In the austerity years they ALL voted for a 9% pay increase.
MPs do not set their own salary increases. It is beyond their powers. They do not vote on their own pay.
jonba - Member
Equally I refuse to believe that anyone votes in a purely selfless manner.
Spoken like a true Tory.
I have enough, more than enough. But that is still massively less than the average earner. If a government was prepared to increase my tax to enable the poorest in our society to not live in abject poverty, people in the rest of the world to have the basic fundamental human rights of access to safe living conditions, clean water, enough to eat, and education for their children, then I'd vote for them regardless of the colour of their rosette.
I vote for what I feel is best for most. I've tended to vote Labour in the past, voted Lib Dem once and I will be voting Green this time. I run my own business. We're comfortable, we have enough. I help others when I am able and I don't expect anything in return other than they try and help spread the love.
I'd rather eat my own sh!t than vote tory.
Spoken like a true Tory.
I don't follow or belong to one political party, I have already voted this year and did not vote Tory.
I have enough, more than enough. But that is still massively less than the average earner. If a government was prepared to increase my tax to enable the poorest in our society to not live in abject poverty, people in the rest of the world to have the basic fundamental human rights of access to safe living conditions, clean water, enough to eat, and education for their children, then I'd vote for them regardless of the colour of their rosette.
Come back when you've sold your bike/computer/phone and sent the money to Nepal.
Come back when you've sold your bike/computer/phone and sent the money to Nepal.
That's a rather silly comment.
The poster said that they were prepared to pay an increase on their tax to enable the poorest in our society to not live in abject poverty.
Why would they have to sell their bike/computer/phone and send the money to Nepal for that to happen ?
It is perfectly feasible to have a tax increase to enable the poorest in our society to not live in abject poverty, without selling personal items and sending the proceedings overseas.
jonbaCome back when you've sold your bike/computer/phone and sent the money to Nepal.
I have more than enough to do both. I don't want to get in to willy waving about the amount I do give to charities, but it's a significant %age of my income.
A bit of both for me.
[i]Why use language like that?
People on benefits are on the breadline, often far far below it, the idea that all that claim benefits are work shy scroungers surely by now has been discredited?[/i]
Sorry...language like what? You are implying that I am suggesting that all benefit claiments are work shy scroungers, which I am certainly not!
bigblackshed - Memberjonba
Come back when you've sold your bike/computer/phone and sent the money to Nepal.
I have more than enough to do both. I don't want to get in to willy waving about the amount I do give to charities, but it's a significant %age of my income.
I'm not doubting your generosity - it wasn't meant to be a personal attack, sorry if it came across that way.
I'm still doubting the concept of a purely selfless act. Surely the purely selfless act would be to vote for the party that would redistribute the wealth to the point where you don't have luxury items and people in the world aren't dying prematurely due to issues that could be solved with money.
Keeping a bit for yourself isn't purely selfless. So what you end up with is people who vote in varying degrees in their own self interest and that of the wider community in which they live.
It is interesting as to how people come to conclusion that they do. And I assume that the same thought processes are used in voting. I spent about £2k on a cycling holiday - that money probably could have saved someone from dying prematurely - something uncomfortable to dwell on.
Country. What's best for the country is generally what's best for individuals. The strength of the overall economy is a far bigger driver of personal benefit than individual issues for the majority of us.
Country. What's best for the country is generally what's best for individuals. The strength of the overall economy is a far bigger driver of personal benefit than individual issues for the majority of us.
surely that depends on how well the benefits of a strong economy are distributed e.g. as an extreme example, go back 100 years and the cotton industry in the Southern US states was booming but the Slaves doing all the work weren't very impressed by it...
Rockape, the use of the phrase "getting away with it" as if they're living the life of reilly on benefits
And this is what the press and politicians have managed to do, you're either in favour of millionaire benefit fraudsters with 200 children or you're not.
Anyone saying "Hmm, actually, I'm not sure it's a good thing that people are having their disability benefits taken off them because ATOS have decided that their cerebral palsy will clear up in a week or two" is now in league with the fradusters. Any doubting of cutting welfare is met with "but there are people who have never worked, 'huge areas' where no-one has a job and gets rich off benefits". As if that's:
1. true, or
2. got nothing to do with an economy that's relying on the SE/London's house prices overheating to make it look like there's a buoyant recovery.
And then there's this kind of thing " The strength of the overall economy is a far bigger driver of personal benefit". Where the only thing that seems to matter is the total GDP. Doesn't matter how it's distributed, socially or geographically. The rich got richer, the poor got poorer, but not by quite as much, so that's a win for society?
[i]Rockape, the use of the phrase "getting away with it" as if they're living the life of reilly on benefits[/i]
Fair enough, but some of the people on benefits have got used to living like that as maybe you and I would too, if we were born into these situations....but they have to be pushed, prodded and cajoled back into work, not just for the Country's benefit, but for their benefit too.
I'm not doubting your generosity - it wasn't meant to be a personal attack, sorry if it came across that way.I'm still doubting the concept of a purely selfless act.
Who has suggested that voting is a purely selfless act ? As far as I can see no one has.
But there is a significant difference between voting for who you think is best for yourself personally and voting for who you think is best for the country.
Just the fact that you are voting for what is best for the country can have selfish implications, eg, even if they don't personally benefit some people might be happier living in a fairer and more just society, ie, they are selfishly thinking of their own happiness.
I vote for the greater common good, I benefit from the greater common good in many ways.
The Joseph Rowntree Foundation published a study in December testing whether there were three generations of the same family that had never worked. Despite dogged searching, researchers were unable to find such families. If they exist, they account for a minuscule fraction of workless people. [b]Under 1% of workless households might have two generations who have never worked[/b] – about 15,000 households in the UK. Families with three such generations will therefore be even fewer.[b]There was no evidence of "a culture of worklessness" [/b]– values, attitudes and behaviours discouraging employment and encouraging welfare dependence – in the families being passed down the generations. The long-term worklessness of parents in these families was a result of complex problems (particularly related to ill-health) associated with living in long-term and deep poverty. In an already tight labour market, multiple problems combined to place people at the back of a long queue for jobs.
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/apr/06/welfare-britain-facts-myths
Saying "there's a couple of people defrauding the system so we'd better dismantle the system and ruin things for people in genuine need" is pretty daft.
Their dogged research wasn't very good then. I could take them to half a dozen such families including my dad's new family who are very proud to be jobless and think of those who do work as mugs. Needless to say I don't see him much now.
Being poor I can vote for what's best for me and what's best for poor people.
How smug am I? 8)
"The Joseph Rowntree Foundation published a study in December testing whether there were three generations of the same family that had never worked. Despite dogged searching, researchers were unable to find such families."Their dogged research wasn't very good then. I could take them to half a dozen such families .....
You know half a dozen families where three generations of the same family that had never worked ? Is it your job or do you socialize extensively with a very untypical and small minority of society ?
.
Saying "there's a couple of people defrauding the system so we'd better dismantle the system and ruin things for people in genuine need" is pretty daft.
It would be better if they were at least consistent and called for the NHS to be dismantled since it's widely accepted that some people abuse it.
And maybe scrap the 999 emergency service too.
You know half a dozen families where three generations of the same family that had never worked ? Is it your job or do you socialize extensively with a very untypical and small minority of society ?
I come from a council estate, many of the people I went to school with were the same. Some of the non working families I knew from school. As a kid their parents never worked, when I bump into them now they and their parents aren't working and their kids are working either.
Others I know are from my brothers past association with various families in the Gipton area of Leeds.
So I'll take that as the latter then.
Well their dogged determination did eventually pay off :
[i]After further searching, we managed to recruit 20 families where there was long-term worklessness across two generations and interviewed family members in depth. [/i]
But their initial attempt was fairly extensive :
[i]Together with Andy Furlong at Glasgow University and researchers Johann Roden and Robert Crow, we undertook fieldwork in very deprived neighbourhoods of Glasgow and Middlesbrough. We used every method available to try to locate families with three generations that had never worked, such as spending days surveying clients of job centres, interviewing dozens of organisations that worked in these neighbourhoods, advertising via posters, newsletters and newspaper stories through leafleting and door-knocking and spending months in these neighbourhoods talking to hundreds of residents.
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Despite this, we were unable to find any such families. [/i]
The conclusion they came to was :
[i] "It just doesn't exist on the scale people seem to think it does."[/i]
Which I suspect is fair.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/dec/14/worklessness-culture-myth-exposed
Ernie, I was reply to third generations not working. I know of lot more than half a dozen second generation families not working.
Are you telling me you don't any at all? If so you must mix in some privileged circles.
I wouldn't call it epidemic in society like the Conservatives have made out but it certainly is a problem that needs addressing.
My mates brother was proud to be out of work, his kids were also out of work and still are. He was forced to take a job at Sainsburys saying it would only last a couple of weeks. He's still there and loving the job.
Are you telling me you don't any at all? If so you must mix in some privileged circles.
I'm telling you that I accept Joseph Rowntree Foundation conclusion summed up here : [i]""It just doesn't exist on the scale people seem to think it does."[/i]
And no, I can't say that I'm personally aware of three generations not working. Yes some of the circles I mix in are privileged, but as a building worker from Croydon I can assure you that I don't exclusively, or even predominately, mix in those circles.
Not sure if it's a North - South thing but come round Leeds/Bradford and I'll gladly introduce to such families.
Croydon has some of the highest levels of unemployment, including long term unemployment, in the country. Specially on the New Addington estate.
http://insidecroydon.com/2012/06/23/croydon-isnt-working-long-term-unemployment-up-110/
