I don't like living in England....

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Oldjohnw
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by Oldjohnw »

leftpoole wrote: 30 May 2021, 6:19pm
Oldjohnw wrote: 30 May 2021, 1:29pm
leftpoole wrote: 30 May 2021, 12:21pm

Of course, if all you lefties voted instead of sitting talking about how your vote does not matter-you might against all the odds-get a leftie Government. thankfully Labour had Jeremy to wipe Labour out! Planted by right wing possibly or simply a total idiot?
What an odd thing to say. I have voted in every election I could for over 50 years. And I have never once voted Labour. And I am not, nor have been for many years, on Facebook.
I’m not sure what Facebook has to do with this. But the general tone of the Forum is left wing. So maybe my ascertained thinking that meant Labour, maybe it is actually worse! Voting Liberal LOL!!!!
It was others who said Facebook friends. Please don’t make assumptions about my voting.
John
Jdsk
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by Jdsk »

Jdsk wrote: 17 May 2021, 11:15am And the NFU seem worried about small producers in the UK:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/arti ... s-bus.html

includes:

And it's clear that negotiators from Australia and New Zealand are sticking firm to their hardline demands for the complete removal of tariffs on all their exports to the UK.

This would make life unbearable for small British family farms, which, remember, must respect British laws governing high farm standards.
Not just the NFU:

Image

https://www.bestforbritain.org/britishfarmerspoll

Jonathan
Psamathe
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by Psamathe »

Jdsk wrote: 30 May 2021, 9:25pm
Jdsk wrote: 17 May 2021, 11:15am And the NFU seem worried about small producers in the UK:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/arti ... s-bus.html

includes:

And it's clear that negotiators from Australia and New Zealand are sticking firm to their hardline demands for the complete removal of tariffs on all their exports to the UK.

This would make life unbearable for small British family farms, which, remember, must respect British laws governing high farm standards.
Not just the NFU:

https://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/b ... 1622199628

https://www.bestforbritain.org/britishfarmerspoll

Jonathan
For me worse is the secret ISDS courts that allow companies to sue Government when Government action impacts their profits e.g. US drugs company Eli Lilly suing Canada for trying to reduce medicine prices, Vattenfall suing German Government/taxpayers for policies that cut water pollution and Veolia (French company) suing Egypt for increasing its national minimum wage. Government acts to protect its citizens and suddenly overseas companies sue for compensation (getting taxpayer money) and UK companies get nothing (as they can't use the same "agreements"/courts).

And those courts seem to be in the proposed Australian trade deal.

(Not that farmers are not also an issue but ISDS secret courts are a far bigger issue).

Ian
Ben@Forest
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by Ben@Forest »

Vorpal wrote: 30 May 2021, 1:06pm It's a good thing there is was no bias in the last couple of constituency boundary reviews, or that Priti Patel was not elected in a constituency deliberately created as a safe Conservative seat.
Really? - we haven't had a review since 2000. And political parties don't create seats. The New Statesman reports:

. .. the notion that boundary changes are inherently unfair is difficult to defend: the Boundary Commission in the UK is non-partisan and, since 2000, there has been a genuine shift in the shape of our electorate. Scotland and Wales have long been over-represented in the House of Commons, and while it could be argued this has provided protection against English dominance at Westminster, the creation and ever-growing influence of the Scottish and Welsh parliaments could mean this protection is not as necessary as it once was...
leftpoole
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by leftpoole »

ClappedOut wrote: 30 May 2021, 1:16pm I would encourage people to unwind from waiting baited breath on every word the media and parliament spin and lies say as your going to be ignored and disappointed unless writing large cheques.

Investment in time with friends and family who will actually reciprocate instead of your 1500 plus Facebook "Friends," :lol:
Life becomes a whole lot simpler without buying into hysteria.

:lol:
Facebook. I have ,,,,,,, wait for it,,,,,,,,,, 13 friends and I’m past 70, so not much hope of new friends now! 😳
ClappedOut
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by ClappedOut »

leftpoole wrote: 30 May 2021, 10:24pm
ClappedOut wrote: 30 May 2021, 1:16pm I would encourage people to unwind from waiting baited breath on every word the media and parliament spin and lies say as your going to be ignored and disappointed unless writing large cheques.

Investment in time with friends and family who will actually reciprocate instead of your 1500 plus Facebook "Friends," :lol:
Life becomes a whole lot simpler without buying into hysteria.

:lol:
Facebook. I have ,,,,,,, wait for it,,,,,,,,,, 13 friends and I’m past 70, so not much hope of new friends now! 😳
Lol I know people who use Facebook, but Facebook friends I have none :lol: dreadful platform
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661-Pete
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by 661-Pete »

and I’m past 70, so not much hope of new friends now!
Eh? I too am past 70, and while I'm not a gregarious sort of guy, I do seem to have more friends than I used to ('ordinary' friends, that is, not FB 'friends').
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Oldjohnw
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by Oldjohnw »

My problem with Johnson is not so much his politics or those of his party, although heaven knows how much I do detest conservative entitlement: but that is politics and others either make a case at the next elections which persuades the public or they don’t. Others failed in 2019 and the other parties and their leaders have to accept the blame.

What I think means that Johnson is entirely unsuitable for this role is his complete lack of principle, integrity and decency and his inherent corruption. Sadly, that appears to extend to the entire government due to their sycophancy and in some cases their active involvement.
Last edited by Oldjohnw on 31 May 2021, 11:33am, edited 1 time in total.
John
Vorpal
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by Vorpal »

Ben@Forest wrote: 30 May 2021, 10:16pm
Vorpal wrote: 30 May 2021, 1:06pm It's a good thing there is was no bias in the last couple of constituency boundary reviews, or that Priti Patel was not elected in a constituency deliberately created as a safe Conservative seat.
Really? - we haven't had a review since 2000. And political parties don't create seats. The New Statesman reports:

. .. the notion that boundary changes are inherently unfair is difficult to defend: the Boundary Commission in the UK is non-partisan and, since 2000, there has been a genuine shift in the shape of our electorate. Scotland and Wales have long been over-represented in the House of Commons, and while it could be argued this has provided protection against English dominance at Westminster, the creation and ever-growing influence of the Scottish and Welsh parliaments could mean this protection is not as necessary as it once was...
I perhaps sacrificed information in favour of making a quip. I am aware that the Boundary Commission is non partisan. But that does not mean it is without bias. The current system is designed to keep power for the party in power.

Priti Patel's seat, Witham, was created in 2010 after the boundary review which occurred in 2000 - 2007 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_Per ... tituencies

Witham is an interesting area in that the town itself was a Labour stronghold, and to the north-northeast, the villages had, for many years voted Labour. This was enough for the former constituency of Braintree to be Labour in a couple of elections. However, most of the other villages are rural or wealthy commuter villages, and strongly Conservative voting. So the Labour stronghold was divided & the bits put into two otherwise Conservative constituencies, giving Priti Patel one of the safest Conservative seats in England, and making Braintree another safely Conservative seat. The influence of the Labour stronghold in Witham and the industrial villages was completely eliminated by this means. If that was not intentional, it should certainly have been considered. I doubt that a specialist in gerrymandering, such as the ones hired by US politicians could have made a better job of it.

There are some interesting studies/analyses on bias in the UK electoral boundary system. Despite the supposedly independent nature of the boundary reviews, there is bias. Some is inherent in first past the post, but other elements come from the nature of the rules, or the implementation by government.
https://www.geog.ox.ac.uk/research/tran ... id1322.pdf
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10 ... 11.00941.x
https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpoli ... -election/
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals ... 8F151966AD
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Ben@Forest
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by Ben@Forest »

Vorpal wrote: 31 May 2021, 11:16am I perhaps sacrificed information in favour of making a quip. I am aware that the Boundary Commission is non partisan. But that does not mean it is without bias. The current system is designed to keep power for the party in power.

Priti Patel's seat, Witham, was created in 2010 after the boundary review which occurred in 2000 - 2007
Those statements can't both be true as Labour was the party in power for all of the period 2000 - to May 2010 - by which time the seat was created. I'm sure there are some decisions where one can point at outcomes which seemingly dictate the party which is likely to win - but as the loss of a slew of 'Labour' seats in the last ten years shows this obviously is not a given. And at the moment some commentators are predicting the loss of the 'safe' Conservative seat of Chesham and Amersham to the Lib Dems at the forthcoming by-election.
Vorpal
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by Vorpal »

Ben@Forest wrote: 31 May 2021, 11:46am
Vorpal wrote: 31 May 2021, 11:16am I perhaps sacrificed information in favour of making a quip. I am aware that the Boundary Commission is non partisan. But that does not mean it is without bias. The current system is designed to keep power for the party in power.

Priti Patel's seat, Witham, was created in 2010 after the boundary review which occurred in 2000 - 2007
Those statements can't both be true as Labour was the party in power for all of the period 2000 - to May 2010 - by which time the seat was created. I'm sure there are some decisions where one can point at outcomes which seemingly dictate the party which is likely to win - but as the loss of a slew of 'Labour' seats in the last ten years shows this obviously is not a given. And at the moment some commentators are predicting the loss of the 'safe' Conservative seat of Chesham and Amersham to the Lib Dems at the forthcoming by-election.
You are correct that they can't both be true. I'm not sure what I was thinking about when I wrote that. But the outcome nonetheless, is that a marginal seat is now a safely Conservative one, and a new seat is an even more safely Conservative one. A few thousand votes can be explained by Lib Dem. losses and a few by new candidates, Green and independent, but Priti Patel got 66% of the vote in the last election, and the Braintree MP, James Cleverly, 67% of the vote.
“In some ways, it is easier to be a dissident, for then one is without responsibility.”
― Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom
Ben@Forest
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by Ben@Forest »

Vorpal wrote: 31 May 2021, 1:16pm
Ben@Forest wrote: 31 May 2021, 11:46am
Those statements can't both be true as Labour was the party in power for all of the period 2000 - to May 2010 - by which time the seat was created. I'm sure there are some decisions where one can point at outcomes which seemingly dictate the party which is likely to win - but as the loss of a slew of 'Labour' seats in the last ten years shows this obviously is not a given. And at the moment some commentators are predicting the loss of the 'safe' Conservative seat of Chesham and Amersham to the Lib Dems at the forthcoming by-election.
You are correct that they can't both be true. I'm not sure what I was thinking about when I wrote that. But the outcome nonetheless, is that a marginal seat is now a safely Conservative one, and a new seat is an even more safely Conservative one. A few thousand votes can be explained by Lib Dem. losses and a few by new candidates, Green and independent, but Priti Patel got 66% of the vote in the last election, and the Braintree MP, James Cleverly, 67% of the vote.
I think it's likely (and it's an unresearched guess!) that as part of the process UK-wide there were boundary changes that favoured Labour and they gained advantageous prospects for seats elsewhere; but of course those seats could easily have gone SNP or Conservative in the intervening years. Nobody would have predicted 75% of MPs in Scotland would be SNP back in 2000. Or that half the north-east England seats would be Conservative.
Tangled Metal
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by Tangled Metal »

Our seat used to be a fairly safe tory seat but now its a very safe libdem one. The result of a time for a change attitude in 1997 and a very good constituency mp.

Of course being a mostly rural area it was always Tories then libdems. Labour never got a look in ever.

I think the constituencies where I used up live down the road got changed in that period. It produced a more urban constituency that flitted between tory and Labour and a safe tory seat. I think before the area had two more marginal seats.

I did once read that the boundaries favour Labour more than Tories overall. The net result was giving them extra seats that the tories needed a bigger swing to win than if the positions were switched. So brown had an advantage over Cameron. Without that boundary advantage there would probably be no need for the coalition. I don't think that's the case now because of Labour collapse.
Oldjohnw
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by Oldjohnw »

The Berwick parliamentary seat, the largest geographically in England, was Liberal then Lib Dem for 40 years with a single MP, Alan Beith, having been Tory before that for 30 years.

In 2013 it fell, just, to the Tories and the Tory majority has increased every election since.

I believe misunderstanding the consequences of Brexit was the main reason. Perhaps also wanting a change of representation.

A moderately good MP was changed to a terrible MP, who quickly gained office and is now absent. She is entitled disinterested. A climate change denier until recently she is now the climate “champion “ for Africa and South America and developing nations. She still doesn’t understand and endorsed the potential UK coal mine, fracking, more roads and airports, HS2...

She’s actually quite nice. I worked with her for a while when we were both trustees of a prison charity. But she is deeply in love with Boris Johnson.

Basically, what I am saying is that the most stubborn of constituencies can change hands over the long time.
Last edited by Oldjohnw on 1 Jun 2021, 2:42pm, edited 1 time in total.
John
Tangled Metal
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Re: I don't like living in England....

Post by Tangled Metal »

It probably happened due to Brexit. Tories are opportunistic and with libdem remain policy there's grounds to exploit. You can be a remain supporting mp and represent leave constituencies but if the mp doesn't listen to their constituents over such issues then I can see how they'd lose out eventually.

In our area we have a libdem mp who's a very good constituency mp who does seem to listen and react. No guarantee but I'd put money on him retiring as mp. He is a former party leader too. Aiui he became leader on the back of speaking to constituency party members up and down the country. When the other more fancied candidates were doing London/ Westminster soundbites.

He's a listener which is why he'll probably get my vote.

My first constituency I had the vote had a tory with the then highest tory majority. He retired after I turned 18 and I never got to vote with him in position. They foisted a head office candidate on the local party members against a local candidate. The majority dropped considerably. From a certain tory seat to a potential target seat. It took that mp some time to get a better majority back. He became senior in the party in the end. Niger Evans btw. Probably a better mp than the local butcher who iirc was the local choice.
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