An unexpected surprise No.2

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Profile William
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Message 1341968 - Posted: 1 Mar 2013, 11:38:40 UTC

*tiptoes in wearing heavy armour*

Ok, I'll start us by reposting Winterknights kind summary:

Turnout was 52.7%, down from 69.3% at the 2010 general election.


Mike Thornton (Liberal Democrat) 13,342 (32.06%, -14.48%)

Diane James (UKIP) 11,571 (27.80%, +24.20%)

Maria Hutchings (Conservative) 10,559 (25.37%, -13.96%)

John O'Farrell (Labour) 4,088 (9.82%, +0.22%)

Danny Stupple (Independent) 768 (1.85%, +1.56%)

Dr Iain Maclennan (National Health Action Party) 392 (0.94%)

Ray Hall (Beer, Baccy and Crumpet Party) 235 (0.56%)

Kevin Milburn (Christian Party) 163 (0.39%)

Howling Laud Hope (Monster Raving Loony Party) 136 (0.33%)

Jim Duggan (Peace Party) 128 (0.31%)

David Bishop (Elvis Loves Pets) 72 (0.17%)

Michael Walters (English Democrats) 70 (0.17%, -0.30%)

Daz Procter (Trade Unionists and Socialists Against Cuts) 62 (0.15%)

Colin Bex (Wessex Regionalist) 30 (0.07%)

A person who won't read has no advantage over one who can't read. (Mark Twain)
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Profile William
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Message 1341972 - Posted: 1 Mar 2013, 11:53:09 UTC

So, the LibDems retained their seat.

While I'm not particularly fond of the LibDems, vastly better than UKIP.

If UKIP voters make up 15% of the population, something is going massively wrong in the UK. Far right parties gaining that much support is always an alarm signal.

So the Conservatives came third, eh? Some people realised that Cameron maybe wasn't such a great idea?

And the massive loss for LibDem doesn't surprise me. They sold out too much of their ideals when they formed a coalition with the Conservatives.
A person who won't read has no advantage over one who can't read. (Mark Twain)
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Message 1342009 - Posted: 1 Mar 2013, 13:42:06 UTC - in response to Message 1342000.  

At the moment I think he is the best deal we can get. I might disagree with his politics, but no-one else comes close to his performances at the Dispatch Box. At PMQ he just slaughters Milliband, it's an artform in its own right.

I think that's one of the unplanned, and unhelpful, side effects of the media age on democracy. As we've just seen in Italy, the competent but drab technocrat lost out badly at the polls: the charismatic media tycoon, and the comedian, were big winners. What would UK PMQs be like if the protagonists were Silvio Berlusconi and Beppe Grillo? Great fun, and brilliant television - but I doubt the country would be better governed as a result.

I stayed up for the declaration last night, and one thing that struck me - but hasn't been mentioned in any of the commentaries I've heard - was the difference in personality between the two ladies - the UKIP candidate in second place, and the Conservative in third place. I suspect UKIP earned the protest vote - at least in part - because they fielded a plausible and personable candidate, and the tories didn't: at least, that's the impression I gained from those two brief TV speeches - they may come over differently when not dog-tired at the end of an intense campaign.
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Profile John Clark
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Message 1342276 - Posted: 2 Mar 2013, 2:07:13 UTC

I think Clegg and the winning Lib Dem candidate deserved the win, and on local issues.

The By-election came from a scandal, and the papers kept Clegg running with different statements as if that scandal is important to the voters.

Despite all this local issues got them back, quite rightly. The rest is unimportant to that electorate, the country and only important to the players in each scandal.

I hope the Parliamentary bubble media shut up some time rather than continuously stirying to break new non-news.
It's good to be back amongst friends and colleagues



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Message 1342333 - Posted: 2 Mar 2013, 8:16:54 UTC

After Eastleigh, Clegg can go back to Cabinet and say, look here, you can't ride roughshod over us any more, the country has spoken. It's too early yet to fully take in all the ramifications of recent events, but I feel it is exciting times for the countries politics. Most people alive haven't lived under a Coalition before, the last times was WWII for quite different reasons. We need to remember how to do it for the benfit of the Country.

Your beginning to sound like a "run of the mill politicians" here Chris!!
The country never speaks via bi-elections but only during general elections.
The swing away from the libs was greater than it was away from the cons. So
basically Cleg comes away from this election with no clout at all.


The Kite Fliers

--------------------
Kite fliers: An imaginary club of solo members, those who don't yet
belong to a formal team so "fly their own kites" - as the saying goes.
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Message 1342431 - Posted: 2 Mar 2013, 17:53:57 UTC
Last modified: 2 Mar 2013, 18:05:59 UTC

The country in the form of local by-elections does speak, always has done, it's like a half term school report.

In keeping with half term school reports, many tended to end with the note, "Must
do better". This for the main stream political parties is nye on impossible. Hence
a swing away, by the electorate, towards a fourth party; call it a protest party
if one likes. No ones listening to the protesters and acting accordingly,
politics is finally getting exciting...for the right reasons or is it for the wrong reasons??
The Kite Fliers

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Kite fliers: An imaginary club of solo members, those who don't yet
belong to a formal team so "fly their own kites" - as the saying goes.
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Sirius B Project Donor
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Message 1342525 - Posted: 2 Mar 2013, 23:06:51 UTC

This says it all....

"This isn't a crisis for a government but a crisis of governance. We're living in a country where politicians talk about fixing things... but they seem powerless to deal with it.

There is a real sense that the whole of the Westminster village is living in its own world talking in its own terms and has lost touch.

A small professional managerial class is running British politics and they have very little to do with the ordinary lives of ordinary people up and down the country.

If we're going to avoid an Italian situation where comedians start getting elected then the whole British political establishment has got to be forced to engage much more actively with what ordinary people are feeling."

Source: - Bernard Jenkin - Conservative MP for Harwich & North Essex.

Never a truer word spoken in jest!
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Message 1342619 - Posted: 3 Mar 2013, 8:11:56 UTC

Chris, I don't have any faith in the Libs being a genuine alternative to the
Cons & Labs. One thing we three here, You, me and Sirius have in common is that
we all recognised that "The system" is in desperate need of change. Less
politics, less politicians in our faces, less political interference, less Europe
hence allowing Great Britain to breath again. A Britain where the populous
decides on it's destiny but not a destiny decided on by politicians for the
latter has failed us miserably.

The Kite Fliers

--------------------
Kite fliers: An imaginary club of solo members, those who don't yet
belong to a formal team so "fly their own kites" - as the saying goes.
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Sirius B Project Donor
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Message 1342668 - Posted: 3 Mar 2013, 13:42:43 UTC - in response to Message 1342619.  

Chris, I don't have any faith in the Libs being a genuine alternative to the
Cons & Labs. One thing we three here, You, me and Sirius have in common is that
we all recognised that "The system" is in desperate need of change. Less
politics, less politicians in our faces, less political interference, less Europe hence allowing Great Britain to breath again. A Britain where the populous decides on it's destiny but not a destiny decided on by politicians for the latter has failed us miserably.


Unfortunately Nick, while we have thieves in important departments doing deals under the table like HMR&C, the ordinary man in the street is screwed & will continue to be unless very serious changes are implemented from the top downwards.

Let's see: - Vodafone, Barclays, Microsoft, Amazon, Starbucks, Google etc, all doing deals or avoiding their share of tax.

Major banks making serious losses & yet continue to pay out big bonuses....

...AND from next month we see this......

Tax Cut Countdown

& don't forget December 31st 2013...... Another EU fiasco!

Great Britain breathe again? You must be joking! It suffered a serious cardiac arrest in 1979....

.... lost a lung in 1997 & it's remaining one is failing.
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Message 1343019 - Posted: 4 Mar 2013, 18:45:30 UTC - in response to Message 1343004.  

Vodafone, Barclays, Microsoft, Amazon, Starbucks, Google etc, all doing deals or avoiding their share of tax.

I completely agree, they are doing it because they were allowed to get away with it under 13 years of Labour rule.

During which, the then Conservative opposition were making incessant calls to "reduce the burden of regulation" on business.

Note that regulations are only a burden on badly run businesses, such as the crooks and spivs above. In twenty years of self-employment, I think I only came across three regulations: pay your taxes, pay your National Insurance, and register under the Data Protection Act (as it then was). None of them was a burden - I just got a letter from the tax office each year, saying "We are pleased to accept your calculations".
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Profile Gary Charpentier Crowdfunding Project Donor*Special Project $75 donorSpecial Project $250 donor
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Message 1343089 - Posted: 4 Mar 2013, 21:35:07 UTC - in response to Message 1343039.  

Perhaps we should have a world government which outlaws tax havens .....

Or we could outlaw taxes on pieces of paper and only impose them on flesh and blood. I know it won't work, it wouldn't have enough loopholes to stand a chance of passing.

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Message 1343107 - Posted: 4 Mar 2013, 22:18:23 UTC - in response to Message 1343104.  

Rolls Royce

I'll post this before Sirius or Nick do, to demonstrate that I am always open to seeing both sides of the story. This does not seem right to me at all, that company of all people. And rather than giving immediate typical sarcastic comments, I want to know more facts about it before I can sensibly comment.

But I have to say that upon the face of it, it does not make good reading.


To be quite honest, I read the whole story & not from the "Waily Fail" either. With their history, especially with providing the Spitfires & Lancasters with those famous Merlin engines of theirs, I was dismayed.
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Message 1343123 - Posted: 4 Mar 2013, 23:27:36 UTC - in response to Message 1343110.  

I am horrified if this is true

Why would you be horrified of your tax code?

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Message 1343158 - Posted: 5 Mar 2013, 2:13:34 UTC - in response to Message 1342668.  
Last modified: 5 Mar 2013, 2:14:08 UTC

"Let's see: - Vodafone, Barclays, Microsoft, Amazon, Starbucks, Google etc, all doing deals or avoiding their share of tax.

Major banks making serious losses & yet continue to pay out big bonuses...."

This is a world wide problem. They want to use our infrastructure, they want access to our markets, they want the political stability our societies provide and they do not want to contribute. I say let them go to Somalia or the like. Others will spring up to fill the economic void.
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Message 1343167 - Posted: 5 Mar 2013, 3:45:02 UTC - in response to Message 1343158.  

They want to use our infrastructure, they want access to our markets, they want the political stability our societies provide and they do not want to contribute.

Who is "they"? Is that your pension fund that owns shares in each of them?

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Message 1343256 - Posted: 5 Mar 2013, 14:36:58 UTC - in response to Message 1343218.  

What I meant Gary was that the name of Rolls Royce is respected around the world as the very essence of Britisness and quality in both the automotive and aerospace areas. To think that they haven't been upfront in paying due taxes I see as a bit of a blow to our national pride. Bear in mind though that this is the aerospace engine builder, Rolls Royce motors are owned by BMW.

They are just doing their fiduciary duty to their shareholders as every other corporation on the face of the planet should. Why should there by any surprise that they are obeying the law? Do you expect them to violate it? Are you unaware of the law?

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Message 1343309 - Posted: 5 Mar 2013, 21:54:20 UTC - in response to Message 1343304.  

Ah, the ways of the press ...
The cleaner they are ...
we love dirty laundry


Gary, we seem at complete cross purposes here....

It was being suggested that Rolls Royce paid little or no Corporation Tax which was being seen as wrong when they were making a profit. There has been no suggestion that they were breaking the law, any tax avoidance is not illegal. I am just surprised that Rolls Royce of all people are seemingly not squeaky clean and would attract this sort of criticism.

Economist Richard Murphy, director of campaign group Tax Research UK, said it did not appear to be fair that a profitable company was not paying any UK tax.

He said: "Legality is not the question. The big question is, is it right, is it fair and we have got the proper tax system?"

A spokesman for HMRC said: "HMRC ensures that multinationals pay the tax due in accordance with UK tax law.




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