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.

Always takes a while Fred to get back into any game.

So Hilarys a ginger nut is he.

LOL just look at this guys and it wasnt meant to be a set up. Parody I D Smith from twitter.........................

goldfinger- 10 Oct 2013 08:34 - 30845 of 30878

Iain Duncan Smith MP ‏@IDS_MP 30m
It's World Mental Health Day... Let's remove the stigma by applauding those with mental issues (be careful though, they are dangerous)

doodlebug4 - 10 Oct 2013 09:44 - 30851 of 30878

A stupid comment by IDS - "It's World Mental Health Day... Let's remove the stigma by applauding those with mental issues (be careful though, they are dangerous) "- that's like implying all dogs are dangerous.

goldfinger- 10 Oct 2013 09:52 - 30852 of 30878

Check the spelling of his name.

hilary- 10 Oct 2013 09:52 - 30853 of 30878

Doods,

I'm guessing the IDS Twitter account is a parody account...................ENDS


Havent laughed as much for a long long time.

Labour has acknowledged that it still has its work cut out to win the argument on welfare, after a party pollster said it faced a "very severe" challenge to overcome a Tory lead on benefit cuts.

A spokesman agreed that the party would have to work hard to sell to voters its plans for a social security cap, after the leak of a recording of a briefing by James Morris, from Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research. Reflecting a belief that the Tories are scoring better with the public on the welfare issue, Morris is quoted as saying: "The challenge is very severe … if you look at politically salient target groups those numbers get worse."

Morris told a meeting at the Trades Union Congress last Friday that a poll of 3,000 voters had found that 53% of those questioned supported changes to the benefits system. Just over a quarter (27%) opposed the changes.

The poll also found that the only groups of voters who opposed the government's changes were likely to be Labour supporters, indicating that the party was not well placed to win over floating voters on the issues. Opponents included Labour voters and people who identified with the party, as well as Guardian and Mirror readers.

Morris told the meeting at the TUC, which commissioned the poll, that support for the government's reforms increased among voters that would be targeted by the Tories and Liberal Democrats. More than three quarters (77%) of Conservative/Lib Dem voters supported the reforms. Nearly two thirds (64%) of Labour/Conservative swing voters supported the government.

Priti Patel, the Tory MP for Witham, said: "Labour's rocketing welfare bill is what got us into this mess in the first place. Ed Miliband is the same old Labour; he has opposed every one of the £83bn of welfare savings so far, and he still wants unlimited benefit handouts. It's taxpayers who would pay the price for this, through higher taxes and higher bills."

A Labour spokesman said: "We always have more to do to win the welfare arguments. We have to make people recognise our spending cap on social security spending will tackle the underlying causes of rising social security bills."

The party announced in the summer that it would cap the structural elements of social spending, on areas such as long-term worklessness and on housing costs. The cap is designed to target the long-term pressures on welfare spending.

Another poll out today.........no change labour still hold overall majority.

electionista‏@electionista
UK - YouGov/Sun poll: CON 32%, LAB 38%, LDEM 11%, UKIP 13%

fred and others - I can't help it if you don't like my views but at least they're made without political claptrap

But to instigate your "view" or "policy" you have to have a political support for that "policy" and acquiescence by others.

Now you are attempting to duck that responsibility but still prepared to vote.

UUMUMM

Mind, in general, I would prefer "non-smoking", but there are a few I might buy a packet cigarettes, if I knew they would smoke them.

Before I stopped smoking 40 years ago I smoked 40+ Gitane a day and still keep my pipe in a draw. (Just in case.)

Madness. #

Smoking?.. Oh that's so working class -):

I am afraid it is. Smoking among the middle classes is falling very fast. I now don't know a single person who smokes and that includes my son's friends parents. I hardly ever see smokers unless they are outside buildings or outside a cafe now and then. I sometimes go to East London and I see lots of smokers everywhere walking down the street smoking. The same can be said of obesity.

Sad guy gf, got nothing better to do with your life other than post supposed twit comments on bulletin boards for laughs. Why don't you get out your fishing rod and see what you can catch, or go and chat up your local barmaid in the vague hope you might land something there. Well named 'fishfinger' by whoever thought that one up! :-)

Hays,

I really thought you were working class.

I imagine you with a cloth hat and holes in your trousers, tied below the knees with string.

Must be something you said.

Are you really sure you are not?

DB$,

I liked you joke.

LOL

Had a bad day!!!!

I do come from that environment. My grandfather punched a cart round the city of London with milk churns on it to deliver the milk to businesses. He worked for a dairy in Leadenhall Market. My father was brought up to wait for my grandfather outside the Lamb pub there (still there). When his wife died in childbirth, he married the barmaid from the other pub in the market so as to have someone to look after the kids. My father did not like his stepmother and left hone in Hackney when he was 14 and got a job. At 16 he was on the boats to and from Australia.

LOL he certainly has.

Hes still smarting from the I D Smith paradody comment but would have avoided if hed taken the time to read the thread rather than single posts.

Mind he is a B lister a second rater so I expect no more of him.

Funnily enough I couldn't care what you rate me as gf. I think you are an utter tosser, but I don't suppose for one minute that makes any difference to your life.:-)

.............................................................

Dave Camoron‏@EtonOldBoys24m

Lets just put something in context, Royal Mail is valued at £3.3bn..... Bankers share £7bn in bonuses, just rejoice at that news

fred - I don't need any political view to determine whether or not I like smoking in a restaurant any more than I do to know whether or not I like to eat fish

goldfinger - 10 Oct 2013 22:31 - 13221 of 13221

O/Topic.........

doodlebug4 - 10 Oct 2013 20:30 - 13212 of 13220

gf, you are one of these people who will argue black is white. Just how do you figure out that despite the CR thread has most posts it is not the most popular? I see a little green-eyed monster in there who will not admit to the evidence of statistics........ENDS

Statistics today taken from 7.05 am to 10pm

1. Cockneys Den

7.05am........155955

10.00pm..........156064

109 posts in total.

2. TOP Traders Thread

7.05am........327355

10.00pm......327939

584 posts in total.

= 435.7% overall gain over Cockneys Den thread.

YET AGAIN DOODLES you have been found wanting.
2nd rater.

Do you like smoked salmon.

I agree with the sentiment and avoid smoking areas and I am delighted for the few times I go into a pub that they are now smoke free.

But, "Political" has a multitude of definitions such as:-

"Belonging to or taking the side of an individual, organization, etc.; supporting particular ideas, principles"

However, as much as you dispute it, I see you as part of the con party faithful.

-------

Hays,

With your background I would have expected more empathy and insight, but, perhaps, it a reaction to the past.

Read the comments:



Can this Immigration Bill succeed where its predecessors failed?


By Philip Johnston Politics Last updated: October 10th, 2013

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/philipjohnston/100240804/can-this-immigration-bill-succeed-where-its-predecessors-failed/


We have had at least half a dozen major pieces of legislation controlling immigration and as many minor measures since 1997. So isn't it astonishing that it is still possible for someone to obtain a driving licence despite having no legal right to be in the country? Furthermore, how is an illegal immigrant able to open a bank account or access routine health treatment? Most countries require proof of residence, social security or NI numbers before either are possible.

The latest Immigration Bill aims to close these loopholes, but we are entitled to be sceptical – and most of us are. A YouGov survey shows that a majority believes the problem lies not with the system itself, but with the poor enforcement of existing rules by immigration officers. The poll found that 60 per cent of people believed immigration rules were not properly applied, allowing too many illegal migrants to remain in Britain.

Theresa May says she wants to "create a really hostile environment for illegal migrants" but the same was said by her Labour predecessors. When we still have not yet managed to put effective e-border controls in place, as this week’s report from John Vine the inspector of the Borders Agency revealed, it is hard to see this measure being any more effective than its predecessors.

Some lawyers are already saying that in order for the checks to be made appropriately and fairly, we will have to revisit the whole agonising debate over ID cards. The Bill’s central aim is to stop migrants using public services to which they are not entitled, thereby reducing the pull factors encouraging people to come to the UK. But the principal difficulty that besets immigration policy is its conflicting aims. On the one hand we want to maintain an open economy, attracting the best and brightest to our shores; on the other we don’t want immigrants placing pressure on our public services or living off benefits.

We don’t have even a rough idea of the number of illegal immigrants. The only officially commissioned estimate, published in 2005, estimated the size of the illegally resident population at 430,000, based on census data from 2001. The London School of Economics, put the number higher at around 600,000, mostly living in the capital. Migration Watch UK estimate the illegal population at 1.1 million.

Since 1997, government policy on illegal migration has ranged from tougher visa regimes to attempts to manage identity either at the borders or internally with the ill-fated ID Card; or through employer compliance. Companies who employ unauthorized workers can be fined, but few are. There are also already some restrictions on access to public services, such as non-emergency health care and schooling.

So what difference will the new Bill make? It promises that patients registering with a GP will be asked to prove that they are legally entitled to live in the UK and to access free NHS treatment. Councils will be ordered to stop giving social housing to those with no connection to their area. Private landlords will have to run background checks to ensure tenants are residing legally in this country – and are understandably unhappy with the idea of internally policing borders that have already been breached.

Employers who hire illegal employees could face a fine of £20,000 for each worker; and foreigners who are refused permission to stay in the UK – including criminals – will be made to leave immediately. We have heard much of this tough talk before – not least from the Labour Party which now has the temerity to attack this measure as failing to "address some of the biggest problems" in the immigration area. But public scepticism can only grow if the Government has to return to Parliament for yet more new laws if these don't work.