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.

RF ............FO then. Start a new thread.

You dont set the agenda here, and neither do I.

I work within the terms and conditions of the B/Board.

Your not dictating to me you ignorant little man what goes on, on this thread.

You can always filter me.

Now like I said put up or shut up.

Nope...

What do we think about the Oscars?

Gravity was very clever, but boring with poor acting. Best Director

Blue Jasmin was wonderful as are most Woody Alan films with great music, especially Sidney Bechet. Must get Best Actress.

12 Years a slave. Interesting, but only of the quality of a made for TV film. Will probably be Best Film and Actor.

Wolf of Wall Street was very funny and technically brilliant. Leonardo Di Caprio should win Best Actor but probably will not.

Not seen any.....would like to see Gravity and Wall Street...

10 appalling comments by Tory Politicians about Food Banks & people in Food Poverty.


There are now 1,080 Food Banks in the UK (full list here). 1 million people will access Food Banks in 2014. Despite this catastrophic level of poverty, Tory politicians remain totally oblivious to the suffering of the poor. Below are 10 comments uttered by Tory politicians that reveal just how out of touch they really are.

Michael Gove MP claimed Food Bank users were “Not able to manage their finances” (evidence)
A former Tory Minister claimed “the moment they [Food Bank users] have got a bit of spare cash they are off getting another ­tattoo” (evidence)
David Cameron PM said Food Banks are “Part of what I call the Big Society” (evidence)
One Tory MP claimed that Food Bank usage can “become a habit” (evidence)
Another Tory MP said people use Food Banks because of an “inability to manage money and to budget, addiction to alcohol or substance misuse..." (evidence)
Tory Minister, Lord Freud, suggested “food from a food bank is by definition a free good and there’s almost infinite demand” (evidence)
A senior Tory Councillor said Food Banks enabled poor budgeters to “have more money to spend on alcohol, cigarettes” (evidence)
A Tory MP jibed “how many folks can still find funds to pay for alcohol and cigarettes but not food” (evidence)
West Oxfordshire Conservative Future chairman “I have seen some ‘food bank users’ in the pubs of Witney... #priorities.” (evidence)
Iain Duncan Smith MP accused the Trussell Trust of “Scaremongering” (evidence)

Secretary of State John Kerry warned on Sunday that Russia risked eviction from the Group of 8 industrialized nations if the Kremlin did not reverse its military occupation of Crimea in Ukraine.

“He is not going to have a Sochi G-8,” Mr. Kerry said on the NBC program “Meet the Press,” referring to the meeting of the industrialized nations that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia is to host in June. “He may not even remain in the G-8 if this continues.”

“He may find himself with asset freezes on Russian business,” Mr. Kerry added. “American business may pull back. There may be a further tumble of the ruble. There’s a huge price to pay.”

rf
Easy to download them (not that would suggest it)

gf
Most of those comments are spot on. Well done.

The organization of the next world cup (soccer) is going down the pan....

2
MAR
2014
Thousands of young people forced to go without food after benefits wrongly stopped under ‘draconian’ new sanctions regime

The under-24s are bearing the brunt of a punitive new system that stops payments without warning

Thousands of young people have been forced to go without food or other essentials after their benefits were wrongly stopped under a “draconian” new sanctions regime, research suggests

Since the Coalition introduced more punitive benefit sanctions in October 2012, more than 45,000 young people have been hit with an incorrect penalty, according to IoS analysis of Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) figures.

A sanction can mean having welfare payments cut off entirely for a minimum of a month and as much as three years for “repeat offenders”. The hardline system, which means people can end up cast adrift for accidentally missing an appointment, is thought to be one of the reasons behind the vast numbers turning to food banks.

Experts say young people are being unfairly singled out by the strict new system of penalties. Despite making up only 27 per cent of Jobseeker’s Allowance claimants, 18- to 24-year-olds have accounted for 42 per cent of all sanctions handed out.

In total, 343,744 young people have had their benefits stopped because a job centre decided they have not abided by strict rules. About one in five cases results from someone failing to attend an interview with an employment adviser, though there have been examples of people being sanctioned for this despite never receiving an interview time.

YMCA England is publishing a report this week into the damaging impact of sanctions on the young people it works with. Denise Hatton, its chief executive, said: “The level of incorrect decisions being made by Jobcentre Plus is frankly scandalous. Benefits are supposed to be a lifeline and safety net for those most in need. When these benefits are taken away, it can be disastrous. When this is done without due cause, it is reprehensible.

“It is no surprise that the young people we support feel that the job centre is simply a place they have to go to be processed and punished.”

Of 79,924 young people who asked for their case to be reconsidered since the system changed on 22 October 2012, 38,969 had the decision overturned. A further 6,455 are recorded as successfully appealing a sanction, though the DWP says it is re-examining its own appeal statistics.

Sally Copley, head of UK campaigns at Oxfam, said that getting sanctions overturned is a “really painful” process that can drag on for months. Oxfam is pushing for more intensive one-to-one support for unemployed people as a more effective way of tackling poverty.

Shadow Employment minister, Stephen Timms, said: “David Cameron’s out-of-touch government is letting young people down, and the number of young people on Jobseeker’s Allowance for over a year has doubled since the election. The shambles at the Department for Work and Pensions, with a staggering 58 per cent of appeals against sanction decisions upheld, is distracting job centres from their real job of getting people back to work.”

The DWP has been dogged by claims that job-centre staff are given weekly or monthly targets for the number of benefits sanction decisions to take. The department strenuously denies this, describing the numbers as management information, not a target.

Nearly all YMCAs (94 per cent) responding to research out last week reported an increase in the number of young people they work with being sanctioned, with just under two-thirds indicating that the increase was significant.

More than four-fifths of the vulnerable young people who were sanctioned reported being forced to go without essential items. The most common areas where they were forced to cut back or go without were: food, 84 per cent; housing costs, 81 per cent; and toiletries, 75 per cent.

Citizens Advice has been inundated with requests to its bureaux for help with those facing sanctions since the changes came in 16 months ago. Citizens Advice chief executive, Gillian Guy, said: “Sanctions are meant to be a last resort but the experience of many of our clients is that job centres sanction first and ask questions later. In many cases the Government’s sanctions regime pushes people working hard to get a job further away from employment.

read the rest of this article by Emily Duggan in the Independent, 2nd March 2014, here: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/thousands-of-young-people-forced-to-go-without-food-after-benefits-wrongly-stopped-under-draconian-new-sanctions-regime-9162844.html

Are they seriously trying for regime change...on Russia?

Who next....China?

The main gas pipeline to Europe goes straight across the Ukraine. It increases the need for the UK to invest in tracking to secure energy supplies.

Well thank you Hays thats very kind of you.

A man after my own heart who likes politics and thinks war is futile.

sigh !...

Resistance is futile.....(I prefer the Borg)...

Yes I sigh about pathetic people like you RF, you hide behind your PC.

Are you going to war then?.

Or will it be young men from working class families who have to lay their lives on the line as per history.

Sir : I have this wonderful and devious, cunning plan .....

That says it all about you COWARD.

Yes youl be right behind the lads, 60 miles back behind the lads.

You'll need more than a cunning plan to take on Russia.