Thought Id start this one going because its rather dead on this board at the moment and I suppose all my usual muckers are either at the Stella tennis event watching Dim Tim (lose again) or at Henly Regatta eating cucumber sandwiches (they wish,...NOT).

Anyway please feel free to just talk to yourself blast away and let it go on any company or subject you wish. Just wish Id thought of this one before.

cheers GF.

Harry - having owned Saabs for 25+ years - I doubt I'd buy another even if they were still made.

Unfortunately the build quality is much like the rest now.

Could never get used to having to put it into reverse before the ignition keys came out! I'm a Peugeot man myself....so far.

and mine is german though it masquerades as frightfully british!

GF,

I agree with many points you have made, but one thing which I would hold Thatcher and governments guilty of is the squandering of the cash from the North Sea bonanza and the flogging off of the "National Silver" at cut down prices, to fund tax rebates for her mates.

This was done at allowing the infrastructure, school buildings, universities, hospitals and public services to become dilapidated and to be repaired and replace by subsequent governments.

The selling off of "social housing"while good for those purchasing the properties, probably stimulated the "housing bubble", like the present governments stimulus may do again.

It showed a lack of moral social responsibility to the less enabled in a modern society.

.

It was brown who flogged off the countries gold at rock bottom prices, hence the name the 'brown bottom' for gold.

Cynic, you mean one of those little hairdresser's cars? ;o)

Chris Carson

good post , wonder how many of our loony left friends on here thought Derek Hatton done a good job running Liverpool.

British Study Reveals the Most Popular Hairdresser’s Car in Real Life :-))

The selling off of "social housing"while good for those purchasing the properties, probably stimulated the "housing bubble"
an interesting and quite popular view, but i'm not sure it holds up to scrutiny - and it is certainly pretty silly to judge it with the hindsight of 20/25 years

surely, by allowing people to buy their own homes, it actually increased the housing stock on the market and thus surely would have depressed house prices if anything

hilary is far better than any of us here in telling us why house price inflation, but my simpleton's brain says it's to do with supply and demand, generally increased affluence and the correct view that houses are a very good hedge against general inflation

as we, unlike the dutch, no longer make land (all MT's fault of course!), that has became an ever scarcer commodity with an inevitable increase in price and thus the cost of a house

i don't think anyone could have foreseen the massive demand for new houses, let alone affordable ones ..... however, the current mantra seems to be to wreck more and more of our countryside rather than buying up and refurbishing the huge swathes of derelict property ..... there is also the anomaly that those being offered cheap housing or similar, are quite likely to turn their noses up and demand something smarter, larger and more expensive

harry - none of those :-)

greekman

What you are missing is that their Rent has to come out of the cap some high rents in Tory owned properties are so high the clamant could be left with nothing.

Chris Carson

What is your problem what don’t you understand about a divided nation (Marmite) winners and looses. The rich gained and the workers suffered to pay for it simple, those that loved and those that Hated

You don’t have to be “red shite, loony left commi parentless ones” as you put it although I think you covered me somewhere in there, you just have to be one of the family’s that suffered.

See my post 23026

One of the most effusive tributes to Margaret Thatcher today came from Labour former prime minister Tony Blair.

While the former Conservative leader was a hate figure to many on the left, Mr Blair lauded her as a "towering political figure" who would be "sadly missed".

Baroness Thatcher apparently once joked that her greatest achievement was Tony Blair and Labour's longest serving PM acknowledged how he retained some of the changes she had made in Britain.

But not only did he talk glowingly of her political legacy, Mr Blair also praised her "kind and generous" spirit.

"Margaret Thatcher was a towering political figure," he said. "Very few leaders get to change not only the political landscape of their country but of the world.

"Margaret was such a leader. Her global impact was vast. And some of the changes she made in Britain were, in certain respects at least, retained by the 1997 Labour Government, and came to be implemented by governments around the world.

"As a person she was kind and generous spirited and was always immensely supportive to me as Prime Minister although we came from opposite sides of politics.

"Even if you disagreed with her as I did on certain issues and occasionally strongly, you could not disrespect her character or her contribution to Britain's national life. She will be sadly missed."

aldwick - Derek Hatton, not enough space on here, scally, gangster take your pick! LOL

Cyners,

Flattery will get you everywhere. :o)

You're right, it's nothing more than good old fashioned supply and demand.

The main point which is worthy of note and which has fuelled both supply and demand sides is that population density in the UK is very high. Unlike in other parts of Europe, we can't just build a new town whenever it suits, we don't have a large stock of social housing which would help curb demand and, in addition, net immigration over the last 10 or 15 years has helped make a bad situation worse.

greek - not sure if it's relevant to your last post, but when i ran my little brasserie between 1978 and 1985, we had a waitress who lived in some very nice council flats in the middle of chelsea ..... she was paying £40 pw and complaining like hell!

GF. As a past, one parent full time working mother with two children who were troublesome know-it-all teenagers, but never feral, I think your 'latch Key children theory's a bit too simplistic. Parents who really don't care about and are happy for anyone but them to deal with their children, along with the eroding of discipline in all aspects of life, the blame and claim culture that exists now and the willingness to find excuses for all sorts of 'feral' behaviour contribute. But that's a different debate.

Cynic,

Hiliary's explanation is simplistic.

The problem with that "simplicity", is that the cash for sale of "social houses" did not go directly back into general circulation, or replacement of "stock", but into the pockets of those who didn't need it by "tax" or "rates", or reductions.

Maggie,

Do you mean like off loading their kids and responsibility onto "penal institutions", to have them indoctrinated in current elitist political theory and helping them to be detached from the Hoi Polloi.

Seems to me to be like "kennelling the family trophies".

so who got the money? .... the councils of course ...... nevertheless, wherever the receipts went, it certainly increased the retail housing stock

==========

maggie - you're quite right in many respects ..... it is a matter of fact that more and more parents are unwilling to accept responsibility for their own actions (having children in the first place) and that of their children ..... they think strange amorphous bodies like "the schools" or "the gov't" should take the responsibility and liability

and then of course, the children grow up with a similar mindset