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.

re; €uropa and the nu lab about face.


All points to the fix is in.

SNP have said that they will be campaigning heavily for the UK to stay in the EU. There was never much chance of us leaving the EU. Now the chances are even less. The public will vote to stay in out of fear of leaving as did the Scots with their referendum. That will settle the position for at least a generation.

Why did Tristram Hunt drop out of the leadership race?


He seemed to have all the NuLab qualities.

ie, he is rich, privately educated, a toff, and can string a sentence together.


Would have thought he would be a shoo-in.

Haystacks doing morse code .

Tristram Hunt could not get the number of MPs to support his nomination. It is 35 that is necessary.

Irvine Welsh: 'Labour is finished in Scotland'
Trainspotting author Irvine Welsh says there is 'no way back' for Labour after 2015 election wipeout
By Martin Chilton, Culture Editor online7:15PM BST 23 May 2015 Comments158 Comments
Irvine Welsh, the Edinburgh-born playwright and author of Trainspotting, said he believes the Labour Party "is finished" in Scotland as a political force.
In the May general election, Labour lost 40 seats in Scotland and now has just one MP north of the border, compared to 56 out of 59 for the Scottish National Party.
Welsh told the Hay Festival that he thought the political sea change was so great that Labour would not recover. Welsh said: "I think the Labour Party is finished in Scotland. There is no way back. I just don't think there is any way back for Labour in a unitary state. Their strength was being a regional party and building a coalition around inner-London and the de-industrialised areas of the Midlands and the north of England but that coalition building has fragmented and it won't happen in Scotland."
Even the leader of the Scottish Labour Party, Jim Murphy, lost his East Renfrewshire seat in the election wipeout.
• Hay Festival 2015 in pictures
Welsh, whose latest novel A Decent Ride was shortlisted for the 2015 Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse prize for comic fiction, said that he thought Scottish nationalists had become "more pragmatic" over time and this was a contributory factor behind the success of Nicola Sturgeon's party.
The 56-year-old, who divides his time between Chicago, Miami and LA, said: "When I went to London at the age of 18, Scotland was very nationalistic, in the sense that they didn't like England, but in quite an adolescent way. It was almost as if England was to blame for everything that was wrong in Scotland.
"The after the 1979 Scottish devolution referendum [which did not get enough votes to create a devolved legislature] I was living in Leith, near Edinburgh, and knew a lot of actors and would-be poets and artists and they were very angry and shifted the focus to it being Scotland's fault. But I thought that was too victim-orientated and with too much self-flagellation.

"Then after more than a decade of living outside Scotland, with five in Ireland and six in the United States, whenever I returned I thought that the Scots had grown up with a different mindset, that it doesn't matter whose fault it is but they had to be more pragmatic and sort it out. The blaming culture had gone. It was a lot more positive."
Welsh believes that one beneficial effect of the SNP surge has been its effect on the arts in Scotland. "There has been a cultural renaissance along with the independence movement," Welsh said. "There are so many people who are getting the chance to express themselves."

comments
What goes around, comes around Welsh.

In the mean time carry on living that champagne socialist lifestyle in America, that bastion of social equality, you two faced hypocritical w@nker.
I suspect that Labour is also finished in England.
We're sick of the "Benefits Street" types that Labour espoused.
Sick of being threatened with severe taxes just for working hard and providing for our families.
Time for Labour to disband and give people a new party, with sensible policies.

rvine Welsh, I suspect is right. Labour is finished in Scotland and is also in the intensive care ward in England and Wales. You only have to look at the safety first, timid soundings of the leadership candidates to see that they are terrified to say anything that will be contentious for fear of ruining their career prospects.


Agreed. Maybe Labour was just a product of 20th Century class warfare and have gone from representing working people and fighting for their rights to a bunch of middle class whiny bleeding heart liberals that working class people just don't get anymore. Although I think the Conservatives did deserve to win this time round we do need an effective opposition to provide a viable alternative, but its difficult at the moment to see Labour or anyone else providing it.

He probably realises at this moment in time he has not got the all the requisites and experience for the management job, which will be a hornets nest for the individual who takes it on.

Far wiser for him to wait and see for the next few years in order to mature.

Like the 50+ year old port I have.

It is the Hypocrit Party once again

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/labour/11627101/Andy-Burnham-claims-17000-a-year-on-expenses-for-London-flat.html

Andy Burnham claims £17,000 a year on expenses for London flat

Labour leader candidate charges taxpayer to cover rent despite owning a property in walking distance to Westminster

Andy Burnham is claiming £17,000 a year in expenses to rent a flat in London despite owning a property in the capital.

The favourite to win the Labour leadership has been receiving £1,449.98 each month for a flat in Kennington, southeast London since July 2012.

Mr Burnham, the shadow health secretary, also gains an income from renting a nearby two-bedroom flat in Kilner House, near and Kennington.

even such a slow developer as taylor's '63 will not benefit from further cellaring
the next memorable earlier vintage was '55 and i'm quite sure fred won't have any of that, though no doubt the ob clubs, guilds and oxbridge colleges almost certainly will

I am glad your are that sure.

I played with a tennis partner who was a Taylor's rep back in 60s, but also provided me with Crofts and Cockburn's advice and access.

Long departed, like some of his port!

Fred you got a girl in every Port , or a Port in every girl , Hello Sailor .

My mum told me that I shouldn't talk to girls.

Sometimes, I wish I had listened to her.

absolutely sure .... i still have some croft's '63 and also other ports/vintages '66, '67, '70, '85

far far too much indeed, but it's out of fashion so shall not sell in auction
drink a little myself and also sell some at a very fair price to the golf club on sor basis

Give it up Dave, you have no chance!




Germany and France agree closer eurozone ties without treaty change

Proposals to be presented at EU summit in June will come as a blow to David Cameron who will table British pre-referendum demands at same meeting


Ian Traynor in Brussels and Frances Perraudin in London

Monday 25 May 2015 18.55 BST



Angela Merkel and François Hollande shake hands in Berlin. Photograph: Imago/Barcroft Media


Ian Traynor in Brussels and Frances Perraudin in London

Monday 25 May 2015 18.55 BST Last modified on Monday 25 May 2015 19.35 BST



Germany and France have forged a pact to integrate the eurozone without reopening the EU’s treaties, in a blow to David Cameron’s referendum campaign.

Sidestepping Britain’s demands to renegotiate the Lisbon treaty and Britain’s place in the EU, the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, and the French president, François Hollande, have sealed an agreement aimed at fashioning a tighter political union among the single-currency countries while operating within the confines of the existing treaty.






The Franco-German policy proposal, said Le Monde, “shows that French and German leaders do not have much in common with David Cameron”



more: http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/may/25/germany-france-eurozone-integration-no-lisbon-treaty-change-david-cameron

lets have the vote and get us out of the stinking rotten corrupt eu
it is no benefit to the working classes it has destroyed wages destroyed the services
and made the rich richer .
the only thing it as done is fcuk up hospitals schools filled the prisons
get the scum out of the uk Poland released all their prisoners if they left the country
and if they did not would be sent back to prison . facts

American and eu companies pay hardly any taxes in the uk they fiddle al their profits
its time to act and tell them pay your taxes or leave .
uk companies are now protesting to gov over a level playing field .
teco
mrw
sbry
m/s
waitrose
johnlewis
and many more are being hit because foreign companies pay very little taxes

the directors of all foreign companies pay no taxes in the uk
and most of their managers pay no taxes
close them down or pay your taxes