Off Topic Political Debate

This is not me slating Corbyn it is an ex Labour Home Secretary. You need to ask why a senior fellow Labour politician feels the need to undermine his position at this time?

 

Interesting that Corbyn crops up in South Wales to meet union leaders at the Tata steelworks. I had just come in and he was giving his view on what should happen next. Having listened to him he clearly had no more idea than the Tory spokesman, but he did get out some soundbites that would appeal to some. It is always easier when you are in opposition to say what should be done, rather than be in the position when you have to take decisions. That is not a party statement as it applies to both sides.

 

I will quote Diane Abbott's words on this occasion - being a Commons vote in 2001. 'While no one denies the atrocities perpetuated by some groups on the list, what we are attempting to scrutinize tonight is the thinking and the procedure behind this type of proscription' 'The history of Britain's withdrawal from empire is littered with groups that were described as terrorists, but survived to take tea with the Queen'. This, to me, falls well short of the accusation of giving tacit support to terrorists. What it does do is to question how some people get labelled as terrorists but others not. Don't forget that it was the Americans who originally taught Al Qaeida, who armed them (as long as they were against the USSR) - it was the Americans who gave chemical weapons to Saddam Hussain (they were usefull in the war then against Iran) - so, who were the original terrorists, and who is to decide this in an objective and neutral way ? I would question why Charles Clarke chooses to make such accusations now and at no other time over the last 14 years ? Could it be that some top dogs in the Labour party feel threatened by their own rank and file ?

 

Fair comment ... and of course the Tories have all got the knives out too. Reports in the Telegraph of open hostilities behind the scenes at Westminster.

 

The Labour Party activists will f

I'm sure the moderate Labour hierarchy realise that this left wing revival will fizzle out as in previous years. They know a left wing dominated Labour Party will never be elected in the UK.

I'm old enough to have seen all this before. I'm not sure why you think Comrade Corbyn will do any better than the disastrous Michael Foot.

 

Do not forget that Harold Wilson gave his party a free vote on the EU in 1975 and the party tore itself apart. A year later Wilson had gone.

 

It is fairly obvious that the current Labour party has a second party operating from within it. We have seen this happen before and it probably stopped them being in power more. Groups that are so insecure in their own policies that they can only operate from within another, deserve little regard. If they have a message let them bring it out into the open, and stand on their own two feet.

 

But ofh, New Labour, was a new party operating within another. They hijacked our left. Why didn't they join/reform the SDP? Because they knew that to emerge, 'Alien'-style from the stomach of the Labour Party, was their best hope of election.
Foot faced the appallingly right-wing media of the 80s and people's remembrance of him, IMHO, is tainted by that. Benn seems to have been canonised, but Foot was the better man.

 

Just to return briefly to the possible consequences of Brexit. Of all Britain's exports the most lucrative is language itself - even if the Germans and the French appear to be dominating Europe - they are doing it in English ! Each year the UK. receives upwards of 600,000 international students at our Universities, Colleges and Boarding Schools. A further 600,000 come for short language courses - both together make up the lions share of Britain's 17.5 billion pounds education related export market, which helps communities throughout the UK. Related to money spent on tuition fees, accomodation and day to day expenses language students paid 771,454,897 pounds into the economy of London. If you add to this that the 5 biggest publishers, including Oxford and Cambridge University Press accounts for a quarter of the World total for global publishing services then language is truly our biggest product. The UK's ELT industry has grown by 34% since 2000. If you add to this the fact that the English language creates an easier environment in which the UK. can do business, then the accumulated worth of this industry is astonishing. Is Brexit a danger to this ? Can we expect a European community to keep on speaking English in its day to day business if there is no English speaking country left in it - at the moment English is the official economic language of the EU. French being the official political language (much to the chagrine of the Germans). Of those thousands of lang. students coming to Britain every year many are European (with the top 2 being Italy and Spain) are we placing this in jeopardy ?

 

Unlike French universities which purely exist to teach young people, UK ones are some of the best research centres in the world. Unfortunately most of the money to fund the research comes from the EU as the UKRC has less and less money to award grants with. The UK receives more than any other country within the EU because of it's outstanding results and attracts some of the best brains from around Europe. Such results are vital for the good of the UK and people in general, and to put this at risk is quite unforgivable. Some of the research into rare forms of cancer, or similar, that could be cured will probably only come to fruition to benefit our children or grandchildren, and to think this could come to a halt is not worth thinking about. If someone who wants to leave can show how these vast sums are to be replaced, perhaps they can say, as so far whenever the question is asked it is sidestepped.

 

Even old Liz is going to come out in support of staying in, now that is honestly something I didn't expect....

I lot of the dribbling Brexiters will change their mind as some of them are actually stupid enough to care about what she says

The royal family is seriously considering making a dramatic intervention in the referendum debate with an announcement that it supports Britain remaining inside the European Union.

That the royals are prepared to risk provoking a potential constitutional crisis shows just how deep their anger is at parts of the British press and senior politicians.

According to a senior source close to official figures, there was particular resentment at the Sun’s newspaper’s depiction of the Queen as a Brexit supporter.

But the anger runs through the generations at Buckingham Palace: there was fury at the claims about “workshy” Prince William, a campaign mounted by two papers with an anti-EU stance, the Daily Mail and the Sun. And there was a feeling last week that rock bottom had been hit with a story in the Mail that Kate was now posher than the other royals.

Using outside experts who advised that the intervention would need to be presented by a figure with impeccable European credentials, a strong affinity with the continent and the character to speak out, the family has decided that the move should fronted by Prince Philip.

“He has been hugely impressed by the way the EU stepped in, not just once but several times, to save Greece,” said one official with knowledge of events. “He admires what Tsipras and Varoufakis achieved – in fact he told friends he sees something of his younger self in the charismatic, motorbike-riding, eye-for-the-ladies Varoufakis. Mind you,” added the source, “he also thinks the Greeks would never have got into this mess if the colonels had still been in power.”

Another well-connected source explained that the royals now see a tightening conspiracy between the pro-exit papers, notably the Sun, Telegraph and Mail, and certain politicians. “The leader of Vote Leave is Michael Gove – that awful little leaker who put it about that the Queen wanted out. They can’t stand him. And as for Boris, the other main outer – he’s a cycling maniac from Islington. All he has done for the royal family is make it difficult to get around London in a decent-sized Daimler. And the third of the trio – Farage – what another awful little man.”

Part of the reason for stepping into the debate in such an unprecedented way is huge disappointment in the prime minister, David Cameron.

“The feeling is that we can’t leave it to him. Look what happened at the last referendum we had, on Scotland. We nearly lost Balmoral and the shoots. Nicola Sturgeon could be sat in that castle now – we know she had her eye on it –
it was a damn close-run thing.”

Royal circles found particularly offensive Cameron’s portrayal of the Queen as having “purred down the line” when he telephoned her to tell her Scotland had voted against independence. “The cheek of the man. There was real fury about that comment. And the irony of it – coming from a fat cat,” said a source.

Remaining questions of strategy are being resolved by an inner circle at the palace. On timing, the date picked for Philip to make a nationwide address is 10 June, crucially just two weeks before the referendum on 23 June. Courtiers have noted the added poignancy of 10 June – it is Philip’s 95th birthday.

On which platform to use, the source said: “We want to avoid that ‘bloody little man’, as Charles called BBC royal reporter Nicholas Witchell.”

Kensington Palace sources say the choice is a tight one between ITV’s news anchor Tom Bradby, who is preferred by Prince William, and Prince Harry’s strong favourites Ant and Dec. Harry argues that the Saturday Night Takeaway presenters would reach a different demographic and be particularly appealing to “people in the north with accents”.

“William says that chap at ITV, Bradby, sees things like us. And there is a strong feeling that we should do over the Bleating Broadcasting Corporation. Serve them right for cocking up the Queen’s water pageant with those disc jockeys instead of using a Dimbleby.”

Another insider said early proposals to do a live broadcast have been rejected in favour of a pre-recorded session because of Philip’s propensity for swearing. “The words have to be perfect,” she said, “but we’ve got time to iron things out between today – 1 April – and June.”



PS: this is a wind up

 

What date is it? Oh yes 1st April...

 

LOL!! Got me for a mo....

 

I put a disclaimer at the bottom of it...

It was a joke...

 

Ex-Labour MEP, Peter Skinner, faces jail after being found guilty of fraud.

Why are nearly all of the politicians caught fiddling are from the Labour Party?

 

i got it after about the 6th line LOL very good

 

The word is "nearly" we all think that to many put there dirty fingers in the pot

 

Because most of the Tories are silver-spooned tax dodging scumbags?

 

Dont pull your punches say what you think red ?

 

Obvious baiting, SH.
I think the Tories have the greater share of dodgy dealers. How many high up Tories, many of whom were Secretaries of State, got to know (let alone should have got to know) the inside of our prisons?