Off Topic The QPR Not 606 Rolling Election Poll

Christ on a bike.

I was hoping that at the very least I could cast my vote for someone who would be a competent local voice, but where I am we haven't even got that. The Tory incumbent is Mr. Invisible, and his election 'pledges' are virtually apolitical, and the labour lady has pink hair, her only employment being a university researcher. Her 'pledges' are slogans. The others haven't bothered to stuff any literature through my door. And this is in a potentially marginal seat. The Labour canvasser did have the courtesy to close my front gate after sticking a leaflet through the letterbox, which is more than the postman can manage. Could be a clincher.

On the bright side have just rewatched the film of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy on the telly, and it was really good, nearly matching up to the classic Alec Guinness TV series and the excellent book.

 

I think she has been drinking
I would vote for her
woman of the people

 

With 3 weeks to go to the General Election, two huge and dishonorable examples of BBC left wing bias:

1. At the debate last night, it was painfully obvious from the applause that the audience had a massive lean to the left, unrepresentative of the country. UKIP are polling between 10-14%, yet there was no audible support for Farage all evening. Big credit to him to have the balls to call the BBC out on this. The only other credit goes to Nicola Sturgeon who will be a lioness in support of the people of Scotland in winning advantages for them over the rest of the country. It was farcical that after the debate, the BBC rolled out two audience members, one professing to be a UKIP member but who said he would not now be voting for them after Nigel had dissed the audience, and the other, a woman who said she was a conservative voter but was so impressed with Nicola Sturgeon she'd vote for her (but sadly didn't live in Scotland to enable her to do so.) Yeah, right.

2. Radio 4 Today programme. Second "major" BBC headline of the day was an incident on Friday in Worcester Hospital when there were queues in A&E and ambulance drivers brought in some doctors to see to their patients. No patients suffered. An unnamed whistleblower (could it be a labour supporter?) sent in an Armageddon report. So who do the BBC bring in to comment on this blown up story? The Health minister perhaps? The Health Minister and the Shadow Health Minister perhaps? No, a Unison representative whose message was that if we keep the current government, this will happen every day of the week in every hospital in the country AND WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE! Really, preens to BBC interviewer. And what effect will this have on NHS workers? The Unison rep claims doctors will leave, none will be recruited, nurses and medical ancillary staff will give up the ghost AND WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE! The interview ends and we then hear a cheerful, labour-supporting Jim Naughtie giving a weather update, telling us it's going to be a lovely day! No other news outlet I have seen covered this Worcester Hospital story. There was no mention of it at all on Sky News.

All this on a day when the BBC has been admit to report that its listeners are leaving BBC Radio in droves (mostly, I think, because LBC was rolled out nationwide and unlike the BBC, reports news in a balanced way)

 

There was an amusing moment last night when Dimbleby denied it was a biased audience and instead said that it had been 'carefully selected', to which Farage said sarcastically something along the lines of "yes, I can see they have been".

 

I am not going to change your views on BBC bias Goldie, but I think you see bias where it doesn't exist. I'll agree that the Today programme in particular is unbalanced, especially when Naughtie is on but:

1. Dimbleby dealt with this at the time, the BBC did not select the audience. Farage did get applause when he talked about helping ex servicemen, but his complaint came so early in the debate it was obviously premeditated. He has seen that the tide is turning against him and is trying to appeal to his core support only now with a Millwall style 'nobody likes us, we don't care' approach. Hence his drivel about HIV during the previous debate. It's a long standing right wing populist tactic to make people feel scared and isolated by unfair (and imaginary) forces ranged against them. As for the post match interviews, perhaps the Kipper supporters were too embarrassed to talk on camera........Farage's behaviour at the end, lurking behind his lectern while the others shook hands and stalking off rather than engaging with the audience was frankly churlish.

2. The Worcester Hospital story was about the fact that there was essentially no emergency ambulance cover for the area while this logjam was happening and the major incident doctor was also occupied dealing with routine stuff. The crisis was partly caused by the fact that all 4 A&E consultants at nearby Redditch hospital quit a couple of months ago, meaning they couldn't take some of the pressure. Why nothing on Sky? Perhaps the Murdoch empire is as biased the other way. Perhaps it was a BBC exclusive, they still happen you know. I agree that it is by far from a spectacular story, similar and worse stuff is happening at dozens of hospitals all the time, including Bart's, the biggest in the country. As it happens I don't blame the Tories for this or the many other failing hospitals around - the NHS is structurally knackered, throwing more cash at the existing system won't help in the long run. No parties are prepared to face up to that.

The BBC won't determine the outcome of this election, but may be used as a scapegoat by some for their own failure. In the meantime have a cup of herbal tea and chill. Paranoia is not an attractive trait.

 

We can argue all day about how the figures are calculated, but the Tories will justifiably make a big thing of the fall in jobless numbers to 1.84 million, while the rest will make play on the fact that the average wage has gone up by just £35 p.a. since 2010.

In their manifesto the Tories talked about 'full employment' and creating 2 million new jobs. Now, my maths (Grade B O level 1977) is a little rusty, but wouldn't that leave us with a jobs deficit? How do we fill the gap....I know, immigration! Magic.

PS Goldie, The BBCs Robert Peston says that the Tories should be getting a bigger electoral benefit from the fall in jobless and recent rises in average wages than they seem to be. Biased twat.

 

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I doubt if Millband will lose too much sleep knowing that Plaid Cymru and The Greens would not go into Government with him, however he may have backed himself into a corner with the SNP if as appears likely they decimate the Labour vote in Scotland.

 

Dealing with each, Stan:

1. Last night, the audience was, what, 300 strong? Take an average of UKIP polling of 12%, there should have been around 36 UKIP supporters. We know they make themselves heard (remember the clamour of the Clegg-Farage debate?) yet silence greeted Farage in almost every instance. Compare that with Nicola Sturgeon who had a Tartan army there. The BBC has been asked directly what the political make up was. First, they refused to respond. Then, when pressure mounted, they said they didn't know. I'm not a UKIP voter, but something stinks. And no, I don't think the kippers were too embarrassed to cheer their leader!

2. On the Worcester Hospital report, get the Health Secretary and Shadow Health Secretary to comment, if the story's important enough. But, as you say, it wasn't (despite the fact that the Today program had it as their second most important story) and hence they asked the union to come in and predict apocalypse. That's not my bias, Stan. It's the BBC's.

PS Good news today. Unemployment has fallen to its lowest figure since 2008. Hopefully, the BBC won't ignore this.

 

The unemployment statistics are distorted by the fact the level of 'underemployed' people (those that would like to be working more hours) are not factored in. The underemployed total was 3.0million last year (9.9% of the working population), an increase of 1.0million since 2008. This suggests that 1.0million of the jobs 'created' are part-time or zero hours contracts.

http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/lmac/...-underemployment-and-overemployment-2014.html

 

Beat you to it, see post #626 above....

Balanced out by the 'over-employed' according to your link. Zero hours contracts are the Devil's invention. I think the nature of the job market is changing though, and not in the employee's favour, especially at the bottom of the scale. To be fair I don't think any politicians, including the Tories, wants people to be underemployed and poorly paid, it just adds to the in work welfare bill. I suppose if we just amalgamated these part time jobs into full time ones there would just be less jobs and more fully unemployed people.

 

.[PS Goldie, The BBCs Robert Peston says that the Tories should be getting a bigger electoral benefit from the fall in jobless and recent rises in average wages than they seem to be. Biased twat.]


Peston better watch out. He'll be looking for a job if he doesn't follow BBC party line!

 

The 'over-employed' level is pretty much unchanged, though, so doesn't really alter the fact that the 'jobs miracle' is largely based on increased levels of part-time and zero hours contracts.

 

Just a case of stage fright but funny anyway! I would have been no better.

 

100 votes cast on the QPR Not606 Rolling Poll of Polls@ election 2015.com.org, and UKIP move into second place with a vote more than Labour. Given that 21 of the respondents won't/can't vote that puts the Tory/UKIP axis in a big majority of QPR voters (though I suspect some of the votes are non QPR) expressing a preference.

I'm thinking of balancing out some of this immigration we've been having.

 

I put it down to the right wing media propaganda brainwashing the masses.

 

For the sake of parity, I should point out the the Worcester A&E story is one of the four main items on my msn news feed with a souce of the press association.

They have some quotes including the union.

A computer based on some criteria or someone in Microsoft presumably thought this was newsworthy.

 

Spot on.

 

The Tories are proposing to increase the amount someone can earn before paying any tax to £12,500.

Mean spirited, low earner haters!!