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.

The French stock exchange fell 38.66 points at opening Friday after the announcement of more miserable economic figures, notably the 24th consecutive monthly rise in unemployment.

UK unemployment 7.8% and falling, French 10.8% and rising and Eurozone
12.2% and rising.

France has a Socialist government, so the conclusion is clear if you want higher unemployment then vote Labour.

"UK unemployment 7.8% and falling"...... LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL

At least the French dont count someone who works 1 hour per week as a full unit ie, that of in full time work like we do now over here. LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL

Wise up and quick Hays.

Oh and this makes it even better...... "if you want higher unemployment then vote Labour"........... my god this man is an allien.

PATHETIC statement, everyone knows under a labour government more people are properly employed.

Thatcher used unemployment as a tool in which to try and beat labour and the Unions but in the long run it backfired and her own party cut off her head.

uk unemployment is arguably/probably falling from its current 7.8% (or thereabouts) and is certainly massively lower than in the eurozone where it stands at around 22/23%

that said, i'ld certainly like to see far greater help given to apprenticeships and to small companies so they can actually afford to take on these young guys/gals, many of whom will have left school without any qualifications of any sort
as it stands, uk still has a huge shortage throughout the building and associated trades, but even if a young chap(ess) gets through a course, he will still find it virtually impossible to get the necessary field experience to allow him to offer his services in the real world

uk economy is starting to pick up, though there is an inevitable considerable timelag before that and its accompanying feelgood factor feeds through to populace at large

uk housing starts and sales are at last on the way back up, and that will benefit the general economy and also help the feelgood factor

uk housing starts and sales are at last on the way back up, and that will benefit not only the general economy, but also certain share sectors


Blowing up bubbles again.


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I would have thought the con party would rejoice in having Mercer a member.

Similar qualities.


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Mind you can always do deals with others:

But you can always trust a con party rep.

fred - stop cluttering up the place with your Beano cartoons .... you are of course welcome to disagree with all and anything i write, as is indeed your wont!

I am on a train to Birmingham, then onto sunny west Wales to collect my son and the junk that he acquired at uni. The WiFi is not bad on the train.

What evidence do you have that UK housing starts are on the way up, Cyners?

There's nothing whatsoever in Table 208 to suggest it's turned, although I do acknowledge it's a lagging indicator.

The latest national statistics on house building in England were released on 21 February 2013.

The main points from this release are:

seasonally adjusted house building starts in England numbered 26,830 in the December quarter 2012, 1% higher than the previous quarter
completions (seasonally adjusted) numbered 27,890 in the December quarter 2012, 2% higher than the previous quarter
private enterprise housing starts (seasonally adjusted) were 2% higher in the December quarter 2012 than the previous quarter, while starts by housing associations were 10% lower
seasonally adjusted private enterprise completions increased by 5% and housing association completions fell by 5% from the previous quarter

Haystack,

Firstly, that data is one quarter out of date. It has been superseded by the 16 May release. Secondly, I think I'm right in saying that the data you refer to is only estimated at this stage, as it takes much longer to obtain the actual figures.

What those figures don't say, however, is that actual starts in Q4 2011 (from Table 211) were 28,640. So, if the provisional data is correct, Q4 2012 estimated starts were actually down 6.3% on the corresponding period a year earlier. Given that housebuilding is seasonal (you can't lay bricks when there's a frost), it's misleading to compare one dataset against the dataset from the previous quarter and, because it takes a year or two to turn even a small start into a completion, it's even more misleading to compare starts vs completions which is akin to comparing apples against pears.

Manuel,

When I read yours posting more often than not, I think of they are at Beano level.

But as I have pointed out, if you don't like, don't read it or squelch.

Also, I consider the cartoons point out quite succinctly, what a pile of rubbish the policies of this government are, but which you and Hays seem frequently and blindly support.

Also, I have seen no reason for your self appointment of yourself as a moderator.
You are becoming more inflated than your "dear leader".

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The result of the of the Cameron and Osborne economic policies is stagnation, or damn near to it.

His policies are creating more misery for many people than is necessary.



Hays, manic support and distortion base on "falsified" data is risible.

Yours is little better.

Like you and Hays the only achievements, which the present con leadership show is grandstanding and then flopping.

Interesting to see the result of the con party's former leading clown, I D Smith, has on Europe. Heard he is being laughed at in Brussels as much as he is in the UK.


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Have a look at the NHS and how "it is safe in our hands" is showing signs of failure.

Waiting times retreating to the Thatcher and Major period.

The public will tally up the bills for this calamitous coalition government.

UIKIP will fragment the tories and rightly so.

hilary - i think that the results from TW and the rest give exactly that indication .... certainly the property market in general is also slowly coming back to life

fred - i have never squelched anyone, not least because i refuse to be bullied into so doing ..... and merely as an aside, my post was pretty impartial; i would have written similarly whichever party was in power .... on the other hand, i suspect that you would have continued being your usual boring slagger of all and sundry, even though you consider it just faaaar toooo bourgeois and boring to bother to vote for any actual party

Cyners,

Just because a housebuilder is demonstrating positive earnings growth, that doesn't necessarily run hand-in-glove with a recovery in the property market as a whole. As it happens, I've known one or two hairy-arsed builders over the years who have been smart enough to be able to turn a profit during tough times when the sales market itself has been flat or contracting, through measures such as cheap funding, hard bargaining, general cost cutting and 11th hour purchasing.

Construction PMI is, importantly, still below the 50 level which indicates the construction industry is still contracting and very much under the weather. Why do you think the chancellor is introducing his crazy Help to Buy scheme if the sector doesn't need a shot in the arm?

you asked me about newbuilds .... if i want to know about the property market in general, i use my eyes around here and also talk to my older son who lives in yorkshire; we'll leave central london out altogether, as it has a life of its own, driven by different factors

the construction industry (road building and the like), should not be confused with house construction .... that is why they fall into different indices ..... and if the gov't help-to-buy scheme gives further stimulus, and probably helps first-time buyers the most (i hope), then so much the better

Hilary
The figures I posted do say seasonally adjusted.

Fred
The NHS is fine. The A&E problems are historical and due to increased use. The other cause is the stupid contracts that Labour allowed the GPs where they could opt out of evening and weekend cover.

The idiotic tory party were warned 3 years ago and could have change contracts during this period.

They didn't listen to advice and operated on outdated ideology.

It suits them to have chaos and they are unable to undertake their responsibilities and unfit for government.

Do you mean the outdated ideology of the Labour party that set up the system and did nothing to fix it for all those years? Or was it the idiotic Labour party that spent all our money and laughed about it? Perhap it was the stupid Labour party that wants to borrow even more to pay off the debt. Maybe it was the crazy Labour party that appointed a shadow Chancellor without GCSE maths. Is it possible it could be the nutty Labour party that is not trusted by its own supporters and not even by its biggest doner...............................

so fred, you smartarse who sits in his padded armchair and pontificates, what party do you suggest IS fit for gov't, and will you then get off your bum and actually vote for them?

How can he get off his bum when his head is up it. :-))