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.

Cyners, yes, first come first serve service.

Must dash, just off to my local Trustle Food Bank, I hear they are giving out hot cross buns this evening.

Better hope Edwina isnt peeking in on me when I draw up in the Rover taxi.

Get a copy of today's Times if you can. Lots more details of the case against Farage. It looks like much more solid evidence from may whistleblowers. Farage expelled committee members who asked what was happening to substantial funds amounting to millions of pounds in donations.

This story will run and run. The Electoral Commission is now involved.

Hes innocent.

Just Tories want revenge for Miller.

It is looking like the original article is triggering further revelations from ex UKIP people. Today the Times has half the front page and all of page 6 devoted to Farage..

sticky - in that case you're truly pathetic! :-) .... surely flying is elitism in its own right anyway; after all, think of all those poor buggers who can't even afford a coach trip to scarborough

It is good to see that inflation is "going" down.

It is good to see wages going up compared with 4 years again and George is not crowing.


But wait a moment, perhaps I am wrong, part of the lower inflation is due to lower "fuel" costs.

Ah, is that due to good capitalist principles or over production, or lack of "need", depress production of goods, bit money sloshing around hand to hand.

But, in that the Ukraine is a large supplier of Europe of "fuel", what are the future prices of "fuels", especially for Germany and its economy?

Where does that lead to as far as production costs (inflation) or wages (devaluation)?


Ummh. I will go back to chess, at least I can see my problems then, even if I don't know what to do!

8-)

Think of the poor buggers who don't want to go to Scarbra or similar. By the way, where is it?

Yep where is it? he he LOL.

Dont be silly flying isnt elitism at all. Its cheaper to fly to Alicante and have 2 days in a hotel there than it is to go to Blackpool for the same thing. Chuck in a bull fight rather a ride on the donkeys too.

Yoooooooooooooooooooooooooou really are out of touch.

Update - Labour lead at 3
by YouGov in Politics
Wed April 16, 2014 6 a.m. BST

Latest YouGov / The Sun results 15th April - Con 34%, Lab 37%, LD 10%, UKIP 13%;

Old report that Hays, this just out 1 hour ago...............

electionista ‏@electionista 1hour
UK - YouGov/Sun poll:

CON 33%
LAB 39%
LDEM 9%
UKIP 11%

Tomorrow's Times

What happened to the £287,000 donated to Farage’s local branch?

Almost £300,000 in Ukip party donations were paid in to Nigel Farage’s local branch and withdrawn as unspecified “other costs”, raising further questions over the party’s funding.

Ukip insiders have repeatedly raised concerns over £287,734 spent by the party’s southeast branch in 2004 and 2005. The money was not used for campaigning, communications, property rental, utilities or auditing and was described only as “other” running costs, according to accounts filed with the Electoral Commission.,,...........

The Electoral Commission wasn't interested at the time the accounts were submited so why would they be now ?

They tend to respond to complaints rather than do much in an active way to check accounts.

sticky - so you support gross cruelty to animals then? .... are you backing the move for the return of cock fighting and bear baiting? :-)

btw, prob worth having a look at TW again

Watch out, David Cameron: my Tory friend is voting Ukip

We were out walking the dogs the other morning when my friend Deborah announced she was going to vote Ukip in the May local elections. I nearly fell over the poodle.

Deborah is the most 100 per cent cast-iron solid, loyal Conservative female voter since Margaret Hilda Thatcher. Why would she suddenly throw in her lot with Nigel Farage and his motley crew?

“If the Prime Minister thinks that people who hold views like mine are swivel-eyed loons, then I want to give him a bloody nose,” Deborah said sharply.

My guess is that she’s far from alone. Ukip posters are blooming in some unlikely windows. It’s no longer just alienated country folk; I’m told Fulham is now (ahem) a hotbed of Faragistes.

There is a sense that David Cameron has taken his traditional Tory voter base for granted. As Deborah said to me: “He has raped the nice ladies in hats and suits who turned up to do his flower arranging. On gay marriage, even his own mother was saying: 'I know, but he won’t listen.’”

Yikes. The truth is, Ukip is no longer just a protest vote for cranky Europhobes. People read about that comprehensive school in Leeds where all 314 pupils are being taught English as a foreign language and they see, with dreadful clarity, that politicians long ago lost the immigration plot.

Operation Trojan Horse, an investigation into an alleged plot by Islamic extremists, will focus on claims that religious hardliners tried to overthrow secular head teachers in Birmingham schools, and segregated boys and girls. While politicians and police bickered this week over whether a former counter-terrorism man should lead that inquiry, the rest of the population was simply slack-jawed with disbelief. How on earth had this been allowed to happen in our lovely, tolerant country?

Why was Santa Claus suddenly banned from handing out presents at Ladypool Primary School in Birmingham to delighted, mainly Muslim children? Last year, Vicky Hubble, the teacher behind the event, was told by the new head that Santa’s visit would be cancelled and there would be “no mention” of Jesus being the son of God.

The Prime Minister should stop showing his white, hairless legs in Lanzarote, put some trousers on and get back to deliver a stirring Easter message to the Deborahs, before they give him a bloody nose.



http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/mother-tongue/10770366/A-12-year-old-mother-is-a-case-not-for-the-midwife-but-the-police.html

What a silky story!

So I’ll leave you with the words of someone who is far more popular: Eddie Izzard, writing in (again) the Mirror:

“A million food parcels. How did our Britain get to be so hungry? Our country, where even after the Second World War, we still had the ambition to feed our poorest people and build a better country.

“This government said it wanted to reform the British welfare system. Instead, it has broken it. The proof is here in the desperate families who have had to turn to their GP, not for medicine, but for vouchers to be able to eat.

“Instead of supporting the most vulnerable people in Britain during the recession this government has hit them with a wave of cruel cuts and punishments – sanctions, Bedroom Tax, welfare cuts.

“The zero hours economy it champions is not enough to put food on tables. It’s done nothing to tackle food and fuel costs.

“No wonder that today, 600 faith leaders, dozens of charities and 40 bishops are telling David Cameron he is failing the country’s poorest people.”

Perhaps you are not affected, like all those new millionaires on whom the Tories are relying. Do you think that makes it all right for this to be happening here?

You can use your vote to share your opinion.

Silly story Haystack...it would be hilarious if it wasn't the truth.

This is under Call Me Dave's watch.



A 12-year-old mother is a case not for the midwife but the police

The story of Britain's youngest mother and father shows us how parenting in this country has gone seriously wrong



http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/mother-tongue/10770366/A-12-year-old-mother-is-a-case-not-for-the-midwife-but-the-police.html

Britain’s starvation crisis won’t bother our new millionaires at all
16
Wednesday
Apr 2014
Posted by Mike Sivier in Children, Cost of living,

Britain’s shame: The front page of yesterday’s Daily Mirror.

So the United Kingdom now houses more millionaires than ever before – but at the huge cost of forcing hundreds of thousands of people to seek help from food banks or starve.

This is David Cameron’s gamble: That enough people will profit from the misery of the huge underclass he has created to vote him back into office in 2015, to continue his attack on anybody who takes home less than £100,000 pay per year.

Are you really that selfish?

Do you think this is any way for a civilised, First-World society to order itself?

No – it’s more like the description of the Third World that became prevalent towards the end of the 1960s: A country with low economic development, low life expectancy, high rates of poverty, and rampant disease. They are also countries where a wealthy ruling class is free to exploit the population at large who, without money or force of arms, are powerless to stop them.

Let’s see now… The UK definitely has low economic development. Neoliberal governments since 1979 have decimated our industrial base and the so-called recovery we are currently enjoying has yet to show any worthwhile results, despite the dubious rises in employment and wages that are making headlines this week.

Low life expectancy? Yes, we have that. People in lower-class residential areas are expected to live only a few years into their retirement, if they make it that far, while those in rich areas may continue into their late eighties. Sharp readers will recognise that, although we all pay the same amount into the state pension, the rich get more from it as they live long enough to receive larger amounts.

High rates of poverty? According to the Trussell Trust, the number of food parcels it handed out per year tripled from 346,992 in 2012 to 913,138 last year, with 330,205 going to children. Another 182,000 were provided by 45 independent food banks. The government says poverty is falling but bases its figures on a proportion of the median wage, which has been dropping for the last six years. This means government claims that worker wages are rising must also be lies.

Rampant disease? Perhaps we should not go as far as to suggest this is happening – but the British Isles have witnessed the return of diseases long-thought banished from these shores, like Rickets and Scarlet Fever, along with an increase in Tuberculosis. These are all poverty-related, as they are caused by malnourishment. You can thank your Tory government for forcing so many people out of work and diverting so much NHS funding into privatisation.

As for a wealthy working class exploiting the population – the evidence is all around us.

Look at the reasons people are being driven to food banks, according to the Daily Mirror article from which I quoted the food bank figures: “Benefits cuts and delays, the rising cost of living and pay freezes are forcing more and more people into food banks, experts have long warned.” All of these are the result of Tory government policy.

The government is, of course, unrepentant. I had the misfortune to see Treasury minister David Gauke – who found infamy when he signed off on huge “sweetheart deals” letting multinational firms off paying billions of pounds of income tax they owed us – saying he was not ashamed of the huge food bank uptake. He said they were doing a valuable job and he was glad that the government was signposting people to them. Nobody seemed to want to ask him: In the country with the world’s sixth-largest economy, why are food banks needed at all?

Of course, I’m not likely to persuade anyone to change their political allegiance over this. You all know where I stand and, besides, this blog is simply not big enough to make a difference.

Whilst not denying the unfortunate need for food parcels in Britain today, I feel sure that many of the 'claimants' are in for a free ride, there is always a route in for the not-so-needy but greedy brigade.
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