Off Topic The Politics Thread

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Should the UK remain a part of the EU or leave?

  • Stay in

    Votes: 56 47.9%
  • Get out

    Votes: 61 52.1%

  • Total voters
    117
  • Poll closed .
It was a long rant, repeating all the posts between us. I understand you found it cathartic, but judge by the reaction of other posters (Ellers and Staines) who greeted the length of it with exclamation marks. You were trying to convince me that Honest John's reputation has been wrongly tarnished, despite the fact that he went down to the worst ever Conservative election defeat AND you rightly pointed out that the electorate did not know of his affair with Currie at that time. And you said that if they had known, he would have had to resign. So you haven't persuaded me. If you want to have another go, fine, but please, try to be concise.
Bloody hell is he still bitching on from yesterday? What does he want a pound of flesh? Boring, I gave up after his second post... And that was too long. zzzzzzzz
 
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In case you're interested, you can see a full breakdown of Soubry's expenses on the IPSA website here:

https://www.theipsa.org.uk/mp-costs/your-mp/anna-soubry/

I went through the most recent full year and couldn't see anything unreasonable. Couldn't see much to complain about personally. Biggest chunks, beyond travel, were London accomodation, constituency office rent and staff travel. Nothing (that I could see) that isn't justifiable for her to be able to fulfill her role as an MP.
Would be interesting to find out how many staff the £134 thousand is split by, and what they actually do.

Good website, thanks

You can see them listed on the site somewhere I think. Typically an MP has at least one caseworker (often two) who handle all sorts of issues on behalf of local people, such as late payment of benefits, migration issues, issues with schools, complaints about local NHS care etc. They will have one political assistant, helping with speeches and research on national policy issues, and one diary secretary/administrator to keep the whole thing going and organise local constituency advice surgeries etc.

The pay isn't brilliant - I started my career as a political assistant and my first salary was £17k per annum.

Edit - forgot that it's becoming trendy to have a 'chief of staff' who are more political but help with everything and often a constituency manager to help with all the local visits on weekends, normally part time role.
 
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Just heard John MacDonnell being interviewed by the soon to retire (at ****ing last) John ‘me, me, it’s all about me’ Humphreys. MacD has really sharpened his act up, a much more impressive performer than Corbyn, you have to pinch yourself to remember that he is a proper Marxist who has actually read Marx. Humphreys tried the old ‘give me a socialist government that has actually worked’ routine and he came straight back with Labour 1945 and skillfully dodged around all the challenges, happily throwing Venezuela under the bus as an example.

MacDonnell is a much cleverer, more polished and convincing politician than Corbyn, talks compromise convincingly, and he is consequently more dangerous. I’d probably vote for him, by mistake, forgetting what he really stands for.
 
Just heard John MacDonnell being interviewed by the soon to retire (at ****ing last) John ‘me, me, it’s all about me’ Humphreys. MacD has really sharpened his act up, a much more impressive performer than Corbyn, you have to pinch yourself to remember that he is a proper Marxist who has actually read Marx. Humphreys tried the old ‘give me a socialist government that has actually worked’ routine and he came straight back with Labour 1945 and skillfully dodged around all the challenges, happily throwing Venezuela under the bus as an example.

MacDonnell is a much cleverer, more polished and convincing politician than Corbyn, talks compromise convincingly, and he is consequently more dangerous. I’d probably vote for him, by mistake, forgetting what he really stands for.

There's really nothing to be scared of.
 
Just heard John MacDonnell being interviewed by the soon to retire (at ****ing last) John ‘me, me, it’s all about me’ Humphreys. MacD has really sharpened his act up, a much more impressive performer than Corbyn, you have to pinch yourself to remember that he is a proper Marxist who has actually read Marx. Humphreys tried the old ‘give me a socialist government that has actually worked’ routine and he came straight back with Labour 1945 and skillfully dodged around all the challenges, happily throwing Venezuela under the bus as an example.

MacDonnell is a much cleverer, more polished and convincing politician than Corbyn, talks compromise convincingly, and he is consequently more dangerous. I’d probably vote for him, by mistake, forgetting what he really stands for.

Funny a mate of mine said the same a few days ago. I think Labour are missing a trick by not getting McDonnel in charge, I like Corbyn but feel McD comes across a lot better.
On a footnote, I’ve talked to a few people who have actually met him and I’ve always heard positive things and that he has always done his best to sort out issues for his constituents......isn’t that what ours MPs should do ??
 
There's really nothing to be scared of.
....if you share his core beliefs. I don’t, though I did once, and they are very tempting.


On another point, I read through the first 25 pages of this thread yesterday, in search of something which I failed to find. It was brilliant until a couple of twats who are banned/no longer post joined in. All pre Brexit stuff, varied, passionate and mostly polite . Swords (not one of the twats) winding people up but man he was clever. Shame we are all now single issue obsessed and not listening to each other.
 
Funny a mate of mine said the same a few days ago. I think Labour are missing a trick by not getting McDonnel in charge, I like Corbyn but feel McD comes across a lot better.
On a footnote, I’ve talked to a few people who have actually met him and I’ve always heard positive things and that he has always done his best to sort out issues for his constituents......isn’t that what ours MPs should do ??
Yep, MPs, particularly ones like Corbyn and McDonnell who for decades haven’t had any position in government or shadow government, should be really good at looking after their constituents, it’s their main job. I imagine McDonnell is rather effective at it. He can do charm, gravitas and also rabble rouse.
 
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....if you share his core beliefs. I don’t, though I did once, and they are very tempting.


On another point, I read through the first 25 pages of this thread yesterday, in search of something which I failed to find. It was brilliant until a couple of twats who are banned/no longer post joined in. All pre Brexit stuff, varied, passionate and mostly . Swords (not one of the twats) winding people up but man he was clever. Shame we are all now single issue obsessed and not listening to each other.

What did you say ? I wasn’t listening :)
 
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It's utterly exhausting and really quite depressing to see how it's divided the nation. My thoughts are similar to yours - and I do despair at the notion that the world's fifth biggest economy is being bullied by an evil empire when we voted for over 90% of its legislation and actually drafted a lot of it. But you cant change peoples minds or the way they feel. just wish they'd get on with it so we can in some way move on.

I can see the emotions here but has anyone actually seen debates come out about brexit? My family, my friends and my colleagues the few times i have debated/heard debate has all been civilized. The only anger i see is what the news reports and obviously any marches that go on but from a day to day perspective nothing really
 
What did you say ? I wasn’t listening :)
I didn’t read the one syllable posts mate :emoticon-0103-cool:

What was interesting (to me) was how angry and passionate I was about the Greek situation and the EU bail out. Since then I think I have fallen into a default defensive mode about the EU in response to the extreme anti EU stuff. I was right back then, what the EU and banks did to the ordinary people of Greece stinks. Note to self - no knee jerk reactions. Think man think!


It would be a disaster, but I’d vote for Yanis Varoufakis, the biker academic revolutionary, without a second thought. Just for the laughs.
 
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....if you share his core beliefs. I don’t, though I did once, and they are very tempting.


On another point, I read through the first 25 pages of this thread yesterday, in search of something which I failed to find. It was brilliant until a couple of twats who are banned/no longer post joined in. All pre Brexit stuff, varied, passionate and mostly . Swords (not one of the twats) winding people up but man he was clever. Shame we are all now single issue obsessed and not listening to each other.

I don't reckon that Corbyn and McDonnell necessarily aspire to the workers owning the means of production. I think what we would see under Corbyn or McDonnell is a bit of overdue re-balancing towards the kind of mixed economy we had before Thatcher and Major sold everything off. Re-nationalisation of the railways and utilities is a vote-winning manifesto pledge.

I might take a look back at some of the early stuff on here, but I often cringe when I read stuff I've posted. I really enjoyed Swords's stuff.
 
Yep, MPs, particularly ones like Corbyn and McDonnell who for decades haven’t had any position in government or shadow government, should be really good at looking after their constituents, it’s their main job. I imagine McDonnell is rather effective at it. He can do charm, gravitas and also rabble rouse.

When we had a dispute at BA he actually made a personal appearance at a union meeting to give us his support.....he made a very good speech that certainly got the crowd going.
 
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