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General British politics discussion thread

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    #9242
    pixelburp
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Entertainment Moderators Posts: 36,292 CMod ✭✭✭✭pixelburp


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120699707#Comment_120699707

    I don't think anyone with their head screwed on believes the UK are apparently ascendent, while the EU stagnates or recesses; was the same self-mythologising crap spouted during CoVid and the vaccine rollout - trying to peddle this same idea of UK striding while the EU dithers. The stats clearly only tell half the story, as you say the story on the streets talks of tangible deprivation. But I guess if one keeps peddling a lie about those filthy, batty Europeans having it worse, suddenly those Warm Banks don't seem so bad. Keep Calm and Carry On, wot wot?



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    #9243
    ancapailldorcha
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 38,442 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    Yeah. I was talking to some consultants on a recent holiday who reckoned that London had gotten a bit nastier due to overcrowding and I was struggling to disagree, keen as I was to talk up the place's historical virtues and excellent public transport.

    There seems to be one of the Irexiter brigade who pops up here from time to time to tell us about how the Brits have played a blinder by being the first country in history to effectively sanction itself. The same country which used to fight wars for free trade.

    I was in Amsterdam last week and the place just felt... cleaner and nicer overall than London. I want to visit some friends in Dublin soon as I've not been since the pandemic. I'm keen to see how it's changed since I was last there. Wages here are lower than most other countries and the only real upside I see coming is the self-immolation of the Conservative party.

    Whether the UK is or is not technically in a recession is irrelevant. I've reached the stage where I'd leave if I could find someone willing to hire me on the continent but my efforts there have been in vain and Ireland's housing crisis looks worse than here.

    We sat again for an hour and a half discussing maps and figures and always getting back to that most damnable creation of the perverted ingenuity of man - the County of Tyrone.

    H. H. Asquith



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    #9244
    breezy1985
    Registered Users Posts: 25,627 ✭✭✭✭breezy1985


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120699822#Comment_120699822

    I've had 2 different sets of friends over from London recently and they were both blown away by how Dublin was buzzing.

    Took one group to Limerick and they just could not believe how lively it was compared to an English city. One was from the relatively sized Carlisle and was stunned by the vibrant independent pubs and cafes of our high streets compared to theirs.



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    #9245
    ancapailldorcha
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 38,442 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120699881#Comment_120699881

    Makes sense. The large chains will always be best placed to absorb economic shocks. Doesn't make for great streets though.

    We sat again for an hour and a half discussing maps and figures and always getting back to that most damnable creation of the perverted ingenuity of man - the County of Tyrone.

    H. H. Asquith



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    #9246
    retalivity
    Registered Users Posts: 14,231 ✭✭✭✭retalivity


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120699707#Comment_120699707

    Is it not just some massaging of the numbers that states are in or not in recession? Take Germany, if growth went from 1% to 2% to 3% to 0%, technically recession. But UK has gone from 1% to -5% to -3% to 1%. They are technically doing better, but working off a different base and focusing on a defined time window, and completely disregarding the 7 years of self harm that led up to it.



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    #9247
    breezy1985
    Registered Users Posts: 25,627 ✭✭✭✭breezy1985


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120699931#Comment_120699931

    I think in our minds are conditioned to think of "recession" as some apocalyptic abandon ship scenario which to us makes it sound like Germany must now be a massive bin fire because it is in recession.

    I don't know what life is like in Germany but I do know what it's like in the UK and the sense of depression is palpable. What they have does feel like what the Irish call "recession"



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    #9248
    L1011
    Registered Users Posts: 68,545 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120699959#Comment_120699959

    Half this site thought that it meant "I don't feel well off" - there were users insisting Ireland was still in recession in 2018



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    #9249
    Brussels Sprout
    Registered Users Posts: 7,076 ✭✭✭Brussels Sprout


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120698459#Comment_120698459


    This post really went on a journey....



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    #9250
    Peregrinus
    Registered Users Posts: 26,405 ✭✭✭✭Peregrinus


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120700075#Comment_120700075

    If disappearing up your own arse can be considered a journey.



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    #9251
    Danzy
    Registered Users Posts: 13,782 ✭✭✭✭Danzy


    https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-65871857

    Arrested and questioned for 7 hours.


    Nicola was always a bit off politically, hopefully she'll get jail, the SNP need to clear out her clique before the damage they do to the cause of Scottish independence is fatal.


    She was basically a stickie.



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    #9252
    Francis McM
    Registered Users Posts: 3,305 ✭✭✭Francis McM


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120699692#Comment_120699692


    Our HSE is such a shambles that one Kerry TD has sent 75 bus loads of patients to Belfast for cataract procedures.

    https://www.radiokerry.ie/news/kerry-td-has-sent-75-buses-to-belfast-for-cataract-procedures-257228

    So no surprise we are exporting our young people to another jurisdiction for training too. The 250 places our government is funding in N.I. have to be given to applicants from the Republic.



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    #9253
    breezy1985
    Registered Users Posts: 25,627 ✭✭✭✭breezy1985


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120704549#Comment_120704549

    That's a good lad. Spain it so it's Ireland that is the dump somehow.

    The fact is Northern Ireland has cut 300 nursing places. That is nothing to do with us. We are just filling the gap.



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    #9254
    Hermy
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 11,370 Mod ✭✭✭✭Hermy


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120704494#Comment_120704494

    For what crime should she be jailed?

    Is there any indication of what exactly the allegations are against her?

    Genealogy Forum Mod



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    #9255
    Sam Russell
    Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 19,631 Mod ✭✭✭✭Sam Russell


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120704918#Comment_120704918

    I think they are looking for the GB£660,000 that was donated to the 2nd Ref project.

    I doubt it was in the garden shed of their house and garden thoroughly searched for three days.

    I also doubt that it is all in one place. There either has been embezzlement or their has not. If not, was it misused or used for some other SNP project to cover for the reduction in member subscriptions?

    Or is this all part of a Tory dirty tricks plot?

    Will it be like the Tory Gov lying to the Queen to get an illegal dissolution of Parliament that was quietly dropped when it did not matter anymore?



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    #9256
    PommieBast
    Registered Users Posts: 2,715 ✭✭✭PommieBast


    There was also that loan for £100k or so that was not properly reported to the electoral commission. Also recall something about membership numbers being overstated. Seems to be a bunch of things that on their own could be brushed off, but together look like something seriously rotten.



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    #9257
    Sam Russell
    Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 19,631 Mod ✭✭✭✭Sam Russell


    Yes, there were a lot of £100 k sums floating about.

    £660,000 donated towards a referendum that did not happen (yet). £100 k motor home outside her mother-in-laws home. A £100 k loan to the party by the party CEO - her husband. Party membership overstated - and obviously membership fees falling short.

    There is certainly a smell, but is it a stench?



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    #9258
    Peregrinus
    Registered Users Posts: 26,405 ✭✭✭✭Peregrinus


    The main issue is the 600k, which was donated to fund the SNP campaign in a second referendum and was to be ring-fenced for that purpose. As we know, the second referendum hasn't happened, and it seems likely that the money was spent on the SNP's general election campaign.

    As I understand it donors who asked for their money back once it became clear that there would be no second referendum did (eventually) get it — the party borrowed money in order to repay them — so they haven't technically been defrauded. So the charges or likely charges are of false accounting rather than fraud. But we'll see.



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    #9259
    pixelburp
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Entertainment Moderators Posts: 36,292 CMod ✭✭✭✭pixelburp


    Continuing the trend of Labour pointedly refusing to push back against the Tories when it counts: a motion to kill the Tories anti-protest bill was not backed by Labour in the House of Lords, citing "convention" and "tradition" and all those other vacuous little nothings that stymy UK politics IMO.

    https://www.thenational.scot/news/23587904.public-order-bill-labour-peers-abstain-key-anti-protest-vote/




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    #9260
    Podge_irl
    Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 26,515 Mod ✭✭✭✭Podge_irl


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120716798#Comment_120716798

    Considering they didn't oppose it in the HoC its not exactly all that surprising.



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    #9261
    ancapailldorcha
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 38,442 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    It's very cynical. I suspect Labour fancy the powers they'll get while allowing the Conservatives the political fallout for enacting them to begin with.

    We sat again for an hour and a half discussing maps and figures and always getting back to that most damnable creation of the perverted ingenuity of man - the County of Tyrone.

    H. H. Asquith



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    #9262
    breezy1985
    Registered Users Posts: 25,627 ✭✭✭✭breezy1985


    Privileges committee report has just been published.

    As expected it reports Johnson deliberately misled parliament.



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    #9263
    Nody
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Arts Moderators, Business & Finance Moderators, Entertainment Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 18,297 CMod ✭✭✭✭Nody


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120716894#Comment_120716894

    The report concluded:

    “We have concluded above that in deliberately misleading the House Mr Johnson committed a serious contempt.

    The contempt was all the more serious because it was committed by the Prime Minister, the most senior member of the government. There is no precedent for a Prime Minister having been found to have deliberately misled the House.

    He misled the House on an issue of the greatest importance to the House and to the public, and did so repeatedly. He declined our invitation to reconsider his assertions that what he said to the House was truthful.

    His defence to the allegation that he misled was an ex post facto justification and no more than an artifice. He misled the Committee in the presentation of his evidence”

    Former prime minister Boris Johnson would have faced a recommended suspension of 90 days from the Commons for deliberately misleading MPs and "being complicit in the campaign of abuse and attempted intimidation" of the Privileges Committee, had he not quit his seat in protest.

    Following in the footsteps of Trump of doing country first's that you simply don't want to be remembered as...



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    #9264
    Timberrrrrrrr
    Registered Users Posts: 25,520 ✭✭✭✭Timberrrrrrrr


    Recommended 90 day suspension (if he was still an MP and loss of his ex MP pass to parliament.


    Can't wait to read his rebuttal.



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    #9265
    breezy1985
    Registered Users Posts: 25,627 ✭✭✭✭breezy1985


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120716966#Comment_120716966

    He will use the extra suspension for abusing the privileges committee as proof it was corrupt.

    The man has never owned up to a mistake or accepted consequences. He is bred to believe these things are only for other people.



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    #9266
    Timberrrrrrrr
    Registered Users Posts: 25,520 ✭✭✭✭Timberrrrrrrr


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120716987#Comment_120716987


    And as I suspected, it's everyone else's fault.


    https://www.lbc.co.uk/news/read-in-full-boris-johnsons-damning-response-to-privileges-committee-report/




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    #9267
    breezy1985
    Registered Users Posts: 25,627 ✭✭✭✭breezy1985


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120717012#Comment_120717012

    "Damning response"

    Probably just more damning for himself at this stage. Seems to have gone full Trump with this response.



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    #9268
    ancapailldorcha
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 38,442 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    Truly pathetic. This man was supposed to be some sort of heir Churchill and now he's having a hissy fit because he's finally been held to a small degree of account by a woman.

    He's gone full on Trump but there's no cult of personality here beyond his few loyalists. Most people have moved on. The Conservatives are on course to lose the next election. It'll be many years before they're back in, at which point Johnson and this piece of diarrhoea will be forgotten about.

    We sat again for an hour and a half discussing maps and figures and always getting back to that most damnable creation of the perverted ingenuity of man - the County of Tyrone.

    H. H. Asquith



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    #9269
    Nody
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Arts Moderators, Business & Finance Moderators, Entertainment Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 18,297 CMod ✭✭✭✭Nody


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120717205#Comment_120717205

    I'd say Labour has two elections in power until they are most likely out again and the second election only with another party supporting them. That would give the Tories around a decade to re-invite themselves and they will be on their third or fourth leader by that point and most likely hit someone who's half way decent. I'm saying that based on that Labour can't really make any drastic changes in the first round and even giving them the best of hopes I don't think the economy is going to exactly burst at it's seams which will be what allows Tories to come back into power. The way Labour could avoid that is of course moving away from the current system of first by the post but they will hold on to the belief that they will regain the power again with it.



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    #9270
    HalloweenJack
    Registered Users Posts: 7,197 ✭✭✭HalloweenJack


    I've been reading Chums by Simon Kuper and its quite evident that Johnson (Gove, Hannan and Cameron also feature prominently) has always believed he can do what he likes and that rules apply to everyone else.

    It seems to be the inherent philosophy of those who went to Eton and Oxford, specifically those who studied politics, philosophy and economics, were members of the Oxford Union and went on to work in journalism. Being a Bullingdon member is another trait.

    I'd thoroughly recommend it to get an idea of how this generation of Tories was formed.



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    #9271
    breezy1985
    Registered Users Posts: 25,627 ✭✭✭✭breezy1985


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120717351#Comment_120717351

    It's on my list. Just haven't picked it up yet.

    I am enjoying the fact the Bullingdon club boy was taken down by the fact that he just couldn't go without partying for a few months.



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