May's ultimatum to Russia

[pete75]

May is expelling 23 harmless individuals. I say harmless because these people are described as spies yet are known as such to the UK authorities. Probably a good idea to keep them here because their activities can be monitored. It's the spies they don't know about that are dangerous.

It seems to me the government is making a lot of fuss about a relatively minor incident. The country has loads of problems they should be addressing but aren't because Brexit seemed to have absorbed their entire attention but now they're spending so much time and effort on something which doesn't really matter to most people.

[reohn2]

Just to put the record straight,neither the USSR nor China have ever been communist states but only claimed to be by themselves and the west.By themselves to cover up their gross inhumanity and gross inefficiency,which suited the capitalist agenda as a threat as to how bad things could be under such regimes that cnveniently named themselves as "communist".
Communism was strangled at birth,much as democracy was in most of the west.

[Mike Sales]

Actually the paper didn't write it. The comment is free strand on their website is a forum for opinion. It is not the opinion of the paper only those who send in their opinion pieces which of successful get a public airing without the paper editing or condoning it. Having said that the CiF has a well known left wing bias that's so extreme that even left wing journalists have protested about it after one of the few right wing contributors got censored.

So whilst technically true the tories receive donations from Russians, it is likely to be very biased to the point it isn't a fair assessment of whether that's right or wrong to accept the donation. Plus it is very unlikely to have the same level of criticism and study of labour donations.

To put it bluntly, if the phrase "commentisfree" appears in the website link you should discount it as a credible source of information IMHO. The use of such links in an argument on a forum gives me a big clue on the politics of a poster even without having read any of their posts.

However I do feel that both main parties take money from very dubious sources. The more I think about it the more I actually start to think political funding needs to be radically overhauled. Perhaps even becoming controlled or publicly funded. Take direct donations out of it somehow. One big pot from all donors that gets doled out in a fair manner. Whatever the system right now every main party has received dodgy donations. At least tory ones gets a lot of airing fun the likes of blinkered CiF polemics.

You have made a fundamental mistake here, which invalidates much of what you say. The article is not a free strand from CIF on the website: it is in the print edition and is editorial matter.
In what sense are the donations to the Tories "technical"? What do you mean exactly? I can only think the word is an attempt to obscure what is happening.
Labour's main source of money is the Trade Unions. These legitimately represent British workers' interests. This is not a "dubious source."
One wonders why Russians should give what is in the context a large amount of money, to one party. What do they hope to get for it?
There is a lot of Russian dirty money in London.
The writer of the article clearly thinks it is wrong that these rich Russians put money into our politics. I agree. You are able to make up your own mind. The facts about the donations are there.
If you imagine that the funding of the Tories gets more scrutiny in our press than the Labour funding I would say you are delusional.
What do the off shore businessmen who fund the Tories hope to get for it?
Britain and its overseas territories are big tax havens for dirty money.
I agree that the parties should be publically funded to avoid this sort of thing.

[thirdcrank]

I've read a suggestion recently that one senior Labour Party figure has had a big donation from somebody I'll refer to as Mozzer, whose antecedents are not in the Labour movement.

I also hear lots of stuff about Russian money coming to the UK, some being used to buy property (note to DM readers: this pushes up house prices) some staying only long enough to be invested in a shell company before being moved to a tax haven. The cliché might be "money laundering on an industrial scale" but I doubt there's a laundry big enough to make the comparison valid. (I thought about working in a reference to the Hygienic Laundry, but it would be meaningless to anybody unfamiliar with post-war Armley, Leeds 12.)

[pete75]

I've read a suggestion recently that one senior Labour Party figure has had a big donation from somebody I'll refer to as Mozzer, whose antecedents are not in the Labour movement.

A British citizen though and further donations from that source now banned. Donations made in teh context of the Leverson enquiry and it's aftermath.

[Tangled Metal]

Actually the paper didn't write it. The comment is free strand on their website is a forum for opinion. It is not the opinion of the paper only those who send in their opinion pieces which of successful get a public airing without the paper editing or condoning it. Having said that the CiF has a well known left wing bias that's so extreme that even left wing journalists have protested about it after one of the few right wing contributors got censored.

You have made a fundamental mistake here, which invalidates much of what you say. The article is not a free strand from CIF on the website: it is in the print edition and is editorial matter.

Right! So there isn't "commentisfree" within the url? Must have imagined that. Just because they carry over some of that strand to their main news website doesn't mean it's not part of that whole flawed strand masquerading as journalism. Owen is a well known figure on left of politics I can see how a paper wanting to raise traffic would promote such a one sided opinion piece to their main site. He's a name that's a draw among the left demographic.

However our opinions on this will never agree. Acceptance of a product of this strand of the guardian does give us a clue to your politics as does my criticism of it to mine. The one thing to point out, you should look into the issues with CiF. I believe it's about 3 years ago that the strand got into a bit of trouble over its treatment of free comment, especially if it was of a right leaning. IIRC a right or centre right journalist with a good reputation among both political opinions got overly censored by the editors of CiF, thus indicating that it wasn't free.

[Tangled Metal]

However you could probably have quoted more reliable sources for the same information, even right wing papers have mentioned this. The basic fact may be right but the opinion surrounding that fact I disagree with.

[Tangled Metal]

If you assume any donation from Russian sources as attempts to gain contact and influence then that's what union money does. Whilst unions helped found the Labour Party I don't see their money as anything but about gaining influence. The bigger unions obviously have a huge influence right now.

IMHO of you take out private donations you should take out union donations too. Let politics separate from outside interests even if those interests claim democracy like unions. Let it be member funded only. Perhaps state funded but not funded by outside organisations with the potential to have their own divergent agendas. Put it simply, who should union bosses answer to? Who should the Labour Party answer to? The answers to those are not exactly the same so IMHO they should not be entangled like they are. Same with big business in the tory party. It's all the same cesspool IMHO.

[pete75]

If you assume any donation from Russian sources as attempts to gain contact and influence then that's what union money does. Whilst unions helped found the Labour Party I don't see their money as anything but about gaining influence. The bigger unions obviously have a huge influence right now.

IMHO of you take out private donations you should take out union donations too. Let politics separate from outside interests even if those interests claim democracy like unions. Let it be member funded only. Perhaps state funded but not funded by outside organisations with the potential to have their own divergent agendas. Put it simply, who should union bosses answer to? Who should the Labour Party answer to? The answers to those are not exactly the same so IMHO they should not be entangled like they are. Same with big business in the tory party. It's all the same cesspool IMHO.

Of course the Unions want to influence policy in a way that benefits their members who are mostly ordinary working folk. There's more chance of teh Labour party being sympathetic to the such people than the Tories and that's why they donate to Labour. In a similar way wealthy people make donations to influence policy in a way which benefits them. That's why they donate to the Conservatives.

[Mike Sales]

If you assume any donation from Russian sources as attempts to gain contact and influence then that's what union money does. Whilst unions helped found the Labour Party I don't see their money as anything but about gaining influence. The bigger unions obviously have a huge influence right now.

IMHO of you take out private donations you should take out union donations too. Let politics separate from outside interests even if those interests claim democracy like unions. Let it be member funded only. Perhaps state funded but not funded by outside organisations with the potential to have their own divergent agendas. Put it simply, who should union bosses answer to? Who should the Labour Party answer to? The answers to those are not exactly the same so IMHO they should not be entangled like they are. Same with big business in the tory party. It's all the same cesspool IMHO.

Since you ask, the Unions answer to their members, who are British citizens. The Labour Party answers to its members and the electorate, also British citizens. This is called democratic politics. When a small number of wealthy individuals use their offshored wealth to influence our politics things are a bit less acceptable.

[Mike Sales]

However you could probably have quoted more reliable sources for the same information, even right wing papers have mentioned this. The basic fact may be right but the opinion surrounding that fact I disagree with.

You don't like the Guardian. I get that.
Do you, or do you not accept the facts, basis or not?

[Mike Sales]

If you assume any donation from Russian sources as attempts to gain contact and influence then that's what union money does.

What is your explanation for the astonishing generosity of these Russian oligarchs?

[Tangled Metal]

However you could probably have quoted more reliable sources for the same information, even right wing papers have mentioned this. The basic fact may be right but the opinion surrounding that fact I disagree with.

You don't like the Guardian. I get that.
Do you, or do you not accept the facts, basis or not?

I like the guardian but do not like the CiF strand. There is a difference. BTW I used to buy the paper version for years before switching to Internet. With a year of getting the indy paper version between because of a really good year deal I got. I dislike the DT and the DM, prefer guardian over those two but I mentioned DT because even their bias has acknowledged tory funding from dubious sources. My point was there is enough credible and unbiased links you could have used but you used a CiF source. It's partly credibility of the opinions and editorial policy of the strand (I think it should be ditched/re-worked) and partly that I don't hold with the very left wing opinions of Owen what's his name. I find his arguments are often questionable. Not least he ignores the good in opposing views and the negative from his side.

The other point about democracy in unions. Very well, half the members often bother to vote. At least it's a vote. But they're not the Labour Party. If you put it into a Venn diagram the circles are not superimposed. If a union votes one way doesn't mean the Labour Party votes the same way. Indeed at times the big unions seemed to be at odds with the Labour Party. I bet funding by unions dropped in those times. If that's the case it's purely about union influence. If it's not about influence the same as tory businessmen making donations then what is the difference?

Nationality is problematic but I do not hold that union democratically determined interests (I find it questionable at times due to turnout of members on ballots at times) are the same as Labour democratically determined interests.

I think you'll find in among my various comments that I find both sources of party funding dubious and IMHO to be returned. I only hold that parties should only be funded by party membership (direct and actively sought) or limited direct funding by such members. If this doesn't generate enough revenue for party politics as it had become then perhaps so be it. Or in limited cases state funding. There is too much money being spent by parties already.

Time to separate unions from Labour Party and top businessmen from the tories.

[Tangled Metal]

If you assume any donation from Russian sources as attempts to gain contact and influence then that's what union money does.

What is your explanation for the astonishing generosity of these Russian oligarchs?

I equate the Russian oligarchs funding to union funding. Isn't that clear from that quote? It's self interest and influence on both sources of funding. Unions and oligarchs are both bad sources of party funding in my opinion. They both distort democracy.

[Mike Sales]

I like the guardian but do not like the CiF strand. My point was there is enough credible and unbiased links you could have used but you used a CiF source. .

I am loosing patience with you wilful misunderstanding.
The article, which by the way talks also about the Saudi money going to the Tories, is printed in the physical newspaper. Like all of the articles in the newspaper it is also transferred to the website where anyone who registers can comment. IT IS NOT A CIF SOURCE
If you dispute the facts of these donations do so, just don't wriggle about because you don't like the place you read it.