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.

2Miliband promises Scotland Home Rule Bill within 100 days of taking power


Comments on this joke from Daily Herald :-

Miliband has a few problems here. Big ones at that.
First…his idea of Home Rule, and our idea (most Scots) are two different things. Regards social security and general welfare, most of us demand full control over it, not those parts that London graciously deigns to give us, minus the funding, which makes the thing quite useless in fact.

Second. I have said previously, and it is also a recognized fact by ppl on a much higher paygrade, The Work Program is utterly worthless. It costs an absolute fortune to administer. Most of the roles done by the Work Program providers could so easy be getting done by DWP civil servants in jobcenters. Work Prog peeps get almost twice the pay and are in big expensive Downtown offices. The fact that the boss of one of these companies has paid herself over 8 million in a single year says it all. That was mostly taxpayers money. Notice the strange silence of the Taxpayers Alliance with that one! Her company doesn’t actually make any money of its own after all. It’s not like Apple or something. That’s all from the Government. All of it.

The failure rate of those who have had the misfortune to have been thrown into the Work Program is simply disgraceful. The entire project should’ve been abolished ages ago. That Miliband considers this anywhere near to being a route to help anyone who is out of work shows up his total lack of knowledge of reality.

Apart from that, the real means to create real employment as opposed to Work Program inspired Workfare and zero hours, can only come from central government reestablishing real industry. You know, like shipyards that build new oilrigs, and the steelmills that produce the steel, and so on. Instead of getting it all done in China. None of that is going to ever come from Westminster’s useless and overly costly Work Program.

As for Jimbo Murph being a game changer for Labour…..well yeah he is. But not in the way red Tory Ed thinks!!


For the avoidance of doubt will Ed Miliband please let us have his definition of Home Rule now.


What the hell is home rule? Who defines that? Someone, outwith the Scottish people, says that we will have home rule. This is contemptible. I am done. Vote SNP - from a 50 year old, lifelong Labour voter.


You've hit the nail on the head, Francis. This is more like colonial rule than home rule.



Mr Miliband knows we want Home Rule, so he is renaming what is on offer as "Home Rule".


"The party leader insisted Mr Murphy was, after just a month of being elected Scottish Labour leader, already leading the political agenda in Scotland."

That tells me he does.



Leading the political agenda? That tells me neither of them are in touch with reality. Of course, Jim Murphy is now supposed to pipe up and say that whatever Mr Miliband has planned, he doesn't necessarily have to go along with it if he doesn't feel like it because he's is own man. Or will they be coming as a double-act from now on?


You mean like
* his triumph on having the new womens' prison scrapped, when the reality was that the campaign was initiated about Women for Independence whose role has been carefully excised?
* Like how Jim and the rest of the Labour Party voted against a moratorium re fracking when the fact is that they abstained on that clause, and instead put forward a clause which allows fracking to go ahead subject to some administrative requirements for fracking companies - a clause so anodyne that the Tories accepted it without a vote?
* Then turned round and demanded the SG do something they chose not to do - just put a stop to fracking - when they knew that the clause proposing transferring responsibility for fracking to Holyrood had been lost at the House of Commons (in fairness they supported this).
*The policy of Scottish Labour to devolve powers away from Holyrood to local authorities was supposed to be like our other national drink, made in Scotland from girders, but is actually a parallel to the policy at Westminster to devolve powers from there to large city councils.
Another newspaper in the last few days, ran a story with the headline "Jimitation", which seems to me a pretty apt description of what Murphy is at with a fairly compliant Scottish media (otherwise Margaret Curran would have been laughed out of town for claiming on Twitter to have voted against fracking). Leading the political agenda? I dont think so. There is perception and then there is reality.
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Poor Miliband, he knoweth not his history. Before calling it the Scotland Home Rule Bill perhaps he should compare it to the "The Government of Ireland Bill 1920":

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/...

This was known as the third Home Rule Bill, the first having been thrown out by the House of Lords which had the power to do so at the time, and the second interrupted by the First World War. That's the (third) Ireland "Home Rule Bill" which was enacted (repealed in 1999 for NI), which means calling the proposed Labour one will invite inevitable comparison to the Irish 1920 one, ignoring of course its partitioning of Ireland which is not applicable to Scotland.

He might like to consider that bearing in mind in some respects, the current Scotland Act 2012 has some better provisions, nobody would accept reversals that the Government of Ireland Bill 1920 have, but WOULD expect the favourable provisions.

In essence, to deliver the Scotland Home Rule Bill, he would have to deliver close to Devo-Max, if not the full monty. In any case, more than Smith, and more than the current Command paper.

Thanks Ed. I look forward to it. Why not go the whole hog and call it the "Devo-Max Bill" - and deliver it? The SNP will be there in strength to help you!



We have heard Labours empty promises before, Browns VOW and Miliband as one of the three Amigos. The comand paper was supposed to detail these promises but turned out be only about 30% of the way there and will probably be watered down further by the time it becomes a bill.. Once again Westminster politicians have shown their lack of integrity and will promise anything to gain control of Westminster. The only way Scotland is going to get the promises honoured is to have as many SNP MPs as possible.
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Miliband just lurches from one disaster to another.

It's what he does best, and long may it continue.
2517

Murray just won and is into the Australian Open final.

Just been watching Haystack. He's got his mojo back at last! I thought it was silly of him to make the comments he did on the eve of the referendum, but heyho all is forgiven I hope. He is going to need his A game in the final.

Well done, Murray!

Peter Rolfe---26 kids by 15 women, what a fine specimen he is, benefits of £46k a year. If ever a reason were needed to clamp down on benefits this surely is it.
2517

2517

What do you suggest in the case you described.

Castrate the bastard.

Paul and Sandra Dunham are due to receive their sentences today.

See HERE

What isn't made clear, is that when an accusation is made against you in the USA, you are first of all presumed guilty until you actually prove your innocence.

Additionally, everything is so stacked against you by way of not actually being able to defend yourself adequately well enough to be able to 100% guarantee this will happen even if you are innnocent of the charges.

Primarily, this is because of the absolute fortune it costs in lawyers fees.

The accused then looks at the statistics and finds that with 'white collar crimes' the plea bargain rate is 97% and so just because of this, is pressured into doing such a 'Plea Bargain'.

A sample selection of accusations is then chosen by the prosectuing lawyer and the accused then agrees to accept a 'Guilty' plea on these in return for the absolute guarantee of a lighter sentence from the judge. ie. Do a plea bargain.

Having agreed to this:

It is likely that Sandra Dunham will get 60 days in jail.

As to what Paul Dunham will get as a sentence is as yet unknown but we are about to find out.

IMHO, I do think, as lots of others do, that he and his wife are actually totally innocent of everything they have been accused of.

At one time, Paul Dunham enjoyed the right to entertain Pace's clients by taking them by helicopter to watch the Formula 1 Grand Prix at Silverstone. This is a measure of his total remuneration package worth to the company at that time and his powers within the company.

Just imagine what he would have wanted to remove his home from the UK to the USA to run Pace in the USA and then in turn remove house once again from one USA location to another.

From what I've read about his position, it looks to me like he has cleverly and maliciously been totally stitched up by the son of the USA owner of Pace, that owner now long dead and unable to verify the situation and help Paul.

The whole thing seems now so complicated and so expensive, I think both Paul and his wife, Sandra have had to totally capitulate. He has had heart problems and isn't actually well enough to fight. He has also been extradited out of the UK to the USA under the most appalling USA/UK extradition agreement, which latter was designed to be used only with terrorists - but has never, ever been used for that reason.

God help- anyone, including USA citizens too, if they are innocent and ever happen to come up and be on the receiving end of American legal shit - because that is just what it really is.

American legalities are for lawyers to get rich from. They are not about justice and keeping or breaking the law. If you are guilty, you need a lawyer. If you are innocent, you need a lawyer. If you ever need an American lawyer, then God help you!

Fred, a classic case of an irresponsible irk who could not afford to look after his offspring himself, he should have after warnings, been given a vasectomy. His benefits should be cut back to the £26k limit immediately.

CC great idea.
2517

2517,

I empathise with your position, but:

Are you going to hold this individual down?

To do so legally what law are you going to introduce and what limits are that law?

Who will do the the operation and what price will you pay for it being done?

If you limit the payments, who suffers, the parents or the children?

Does the state confiscate the children and what is the cost of their maintenance in institution?

It is a bit of a b.

Apparently, there is some snow around. It is nice and dry and fairly warm here in London.

If you limit the payments, who suffers, the parents or the children?
in this sort of case, you'ld probably find that the parents spend much of the allowances on themselves

i know you're just playing devil's advocate, but i think as i suspect much of the electorate does, that open purse benefits is as unacceptable as open door immigration

Typical barrack room lawyer.
2517

George 2517 and what about the other end of the scale you know the Tax dodgers, what are you going to do with them ?

Who would swap the woman terrorist for the kidnapees?

George lets face it, the deficit could be wiped clean overnight if we caught these people robbing the country of tax while a benefit cap of £23 grand per annum is just a pin prick on the deficit.

Do you think you are morally right with your stance on benefits?.

It is very doubtful if stopping tax dodgers would generate much money. That is without thinking of the manpower needed. The lefties always exaggerate the scale of these things.

that doesn't mean they shouldn't be stopped, but of course sticky and some of his pals seem to be unable to differentiate between avoidance with evasion

do some of the currently legit loopholes need to be tightened or stopped?
Yes