To traditional Labour voters and those that care about workers rights and the NHS who have voted Labour in the past and are planning to vote Conservative at the 2010 general election. I don’t think Labour’s done a particularly good job in many areas of government, but they do have their successes as well like […]
Continue Reading Why I’ll Never Vote Conservative at a General Election
I am not sure whether some comments are meant for me regarding my education etc, firstly i am in the film industry mostly as a writer, but not under this name, i have also written a lot of political articles, i have written documentaries for the bbc and magazines, there is even some pathe news of me on you tube, been on the radio both here and in the usa, have travelled to a lot of countries filming, have met far too many famous people to mention, and i can truthfully say most have the same views as me, yes i had a very good education not a good as one of my sons who went to cambridge and my other son was also at university , they have both made good of their lives, i have detailed my experiences of the socialist party elsewhere, and it just does not work, they ruined our film industry together with most of the things we fought for, yet they waste money on feathering their own nest, david does a good job here and should be thanked for giving us the opportunity to express our thoughts thats more than the government does, travel across america and see the stars and stripes hanging outside houses, we are not allowed to hang our national flag as it offends certain religions. travel to japan and see what it is like, old people can walk safely at 3 am in the morning, no mugging, old people respected, school uniforms, travel the subway and see what happens young people stand up and offer elderly people their seats, thats education, all we need here is pride in our country. sorry for writing again, i will still read the comments but will not be offering mine.
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I don’t understand why you think increased public spending is a good thing. Labour have indeed increased public spending in many key areas, but the majority of the money is wasted on admin, red tape or non-essential staff. I would be much happier spending less more efficiently.
The breaches in our civil liberties alone would prevent me from ever voting Labour. Once the state starts interfering with our every day lives then it will become an increasing problem, and with todays digital technologies no aspect of our lives will be safe.
The biggest single reason why nobody should vote Labour is Gordon Brown. He is a man who consistently stands by his financial record. He often forgets all the growth he is so proud of was started under the last Conservative government, the first 15 quarters in fact. He sold our gold of at the lowest ever price, just before a very sharp upturn in gold prices. He then encouraged people to borrow heavily because he promised their would be no recession, this borrowing helped to prop up an economy that was already struggling-the last period of growth was sustained by borrowing and spending not by people being able to afford it. That meant that come the recession, many people were already at the end of their credit and left with nowhere to go.
He appears to be saved by the low unemployment during this recession, but that is not due to any Labour policy, more that companies have learned from previous recessions so have cut wages and work hours rather than make people redundent, as this preserves the skill base for when the recession ends.
Tax credits is an unmitigated disaster that costs the country billions of pounds every year in overpayments, and also to immigrants who can abuse the system very easily due to incomplete record checks. This has also helped mask the downturn in work hours, many more people work part time now and are supported by benefits than previously, so while unemployment may be lower the total number of hours worked has not increased significantly.
Even with that recent figures have shown that nearly 25% of people of working age in the UK are not working, but only about 5% of these are classed as unemployed.
Schooling is failing in this country due to Labour interfering with teaching, setting ridiculous targets that schools work to rather than focus on the important matters. A similiar thing is happening in hospitals.
The civil service has grown massively, creating a further tax burden, but added to that Labour have politicised the civil service, effectively damaging our democracy.
Gordon Brown and Tony Blair have both been shown to be liars in the Iraq enquiry, and the de facto leader of our country is the right honourable Peter Mandelson, an oxymoron if ever I saw one.
I’ll finsh there, although I could go on. Labour have, as alwyas, been an unmitigated disaster, and only their mastery of propaganda and spin leave them with any hope of re-election.
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Ah, thank you. Exactly. Could we just have that comment up in ten-inch high letters and posted over every billboard in the country? Might get through eventually. Just leave out the ‘hope of re-election’ bit – makes me shudder.
We may have higher minimum wage but are taxed to death. I left the UK in October 2009 and if COMRADE Brown wins I will not be coming back (EVER). The country is a joke with stupid over paid jobs for university sheep that have no clue or common sense.
Kids run a muck as the Teachers have had all control removed and with more emphasis on targets than actual teaching. I know this from experience!!!!
We have created a society that pays first world prices and gets a third world service….
I have my Proxy vote ready and it will be a Conservative vote
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To Ray Coach……..awful shout on the University Graduates………..one of the only plus point of an awful 13 years of Labour in my opinion is the increase in Graduates. I graduated from University as a Quantity Surveyor/ Project Manager and am now contributing a significant amount of my earnings into the economy, so a wise investment by the government. Sheep we are not, as top firms snap up Graduates from all disciplines to become company assets. You need brains for a successful economy, not just manual labourers…the mines shut a long time ago pal, University graduates are the least of your worries!! The problem I have is how my taxes are spent, you can live comfortably on Government hand outs and do nothing for it. The abuse of Disability Benefit is a prime example of my frustration with Labour Government.
Roll on the Tory years, get ready to tighten your belts!!
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The problem with your article is that all the lovely wages went up because TB and GB BORROWED the money. As you know if you borrow money it ultimately has to be paid back. And who is going to do that?
Dear David, I am stunned that given this country’s current predicament, of 13 years of total mismanagement, promises upon broken promises and the HIGHEST ever tax burden on the individual your rant of achievement beggars believe.
To all on this blog who believe the Labour government has done a great job look at the facts!
Debt from £6 billion in 1997 to £168 billion now, Liam Byrne’s reason for this being good is interest rates are low therefore its manageable, this is incompetent at best and dangerous at worst! Interest rates will rise fact! Work out the numbers for yourself, bankrupts go bust because they borrow too much and cannot payback when times get tough, bankrupts happen even when the individual is in work. Greece is bust yet our debt rate is the same as theirs GB response is to forget cutting spending but keep borrowing! Raise NI contributions on everyone and keep emploting in the civil service 100’s of thousands of people who generate not one penny of profit for the country but take money from the country and we in profit making private companies are tax to hell and back! INCOMPETANCE!
I could list failure upon failure of this Government but it would be boring.
However, the most poisoned action was to fail in delivering PR to national elections as promised in 97, to allow a creation of imbalance with Scotland and Wales and EU election leaving English constituents feeling disenfranchised!
In 2005 the Tories won 50k more votes in English seats yet the Labour party won 92 more Englisg seats than the Tories, clearly the Labour party has no mandate for the English part of the Great Britain.
Role on May 6th and rollover Gordon, Jeremy Clarkson was right in his Aussie assessment! Scottish, one eyed and an idiot!
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the question is will we all be finacially better off than with the current goverment or will we have to wait till the tories get there arses into second gear
hi here are some questions for you all to awnser?
why was our gold reserves sold,did the goverment not forecast that metals would increase in value and would be an asset for the country.
why has so much money been taken out of the pension funds,which will make it necassary for people to work to an older age.
why am i paying lots more tax and and have nothing to show for it.only the country in debt to the sum of 166 or so billion.looks like this was missmanaged
why has this goverment thrown money at all the goverment departments and various agencies who have let individuals down and ended with children dying.
why is there so many foriegn people in this country with hardly any skills and so many of our school leavers and people on the dole who want to work.
why is it that a lot of people i talk to think this country has gone backwards.
why is there so many skilled people leaving this country for places that have better and fuller lives.
why do i not believe my children have a future in great britain.
why under the conservatives did we have miras etc and now we have tax credits which a lot of people don t claim because they don t know they are entitled to any money,,,nobody tells them as this government has made it too complicated to find out.
why is it that all the parties feel that the old laws of the land make it that they are above the law.
why is it they only tell us what they think we should know.
why is it that with the modern technological age they feel that they need to travel around the country to canvas for our votes.
can anybody tell me what are all the good things that every party are going to do and what are all the bad things also!
why was it that the banks were allowed to loan so much money to so many people who could not pay it back and like the government end up with so much debt that it will take two generations to pay it back.
why is it with all this debt that the european union is forcing us into a 48 hour working week,when wges have been kept low for the last 20 years,inflation and the cost of living has gone up and wage increases have not gone up to compensate.i have not had a wage increase for 3 years.
why is there so many questions and so little time for the parties to awnser them truthfully and why do they all make me feel that i and my family are getting the raw end of the deal!!!!???????
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I agree with David’s comments but Andrew, do I need to remind you of the likes of John Major? Do I need to remind you of day when the markets crashed big time? Yes, the UK is in a much bigger debt than when the tories left downing street but long term, the country is in a much healthier position investment wise, lessons have been learnt from the Blair years especially with the Iraqi conflict.
With all the bickering about the jobs tax, everyone should really be focusing UK’s exporting business. Somethings should be re-nationalised eg Coral Steel – which should be called British steel and get competitive in the market. The costs of building the 2012 olympics village would be so much cheaper if we used our own steel. The costs of building houses would be so much cheaper.
The UK were the first to invent railways and steam trains – The UK should look into manufacturing “green” trains where we can sell into Europe. We should invest more into wind farms and have a national electric company where everyone pays the same rate – in other words, when the wind farm have earn’t its money, the funds will help to reduce the debt. If we have enough power, UK could export power to european countries.
These are only a few examples which the UK could do. Whoever wins the election needs to have the guts to make these changes and make britain powerful again.
Finally I would like to see some positive plans from the party leaders in terms what they would liked to have achieved in 5 years time before making my vote.
Paul
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Renationalise Steel. Not sure how old you were but when British Steel was Nationalised it lost so much money every day that it would have been cheaper to lay everyone off and pay them dole money. Heaven help us if there are still people out there that think Government can run things better than private enterprise. Maybe they would like to live in Cuba or North Korea.
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The Labour party, over its time in office did bring in a number of good reforms for the country. It would be very poor if they hadn’t over 13 years.
But they are a tired government and that is plain for all to see. The NI fiasco is a perfect example. Brown didn’t take the advice he was given (bad ideia) and then handled the issue badly.
Throughout the last decades we have had the two main parties with their different ideologies, taking their turn at government, which has produced a sense of balance to our democracy, particularly relevant as we don’t have proportional representation.
Time for a change
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After the general election the country is going to have to be taxed more to deal with the deficit, that’s a fact.
If we don’t raise National Insurance which tax would you suggest we raise instead?
Income tax: Labour and Conservatives tend to stay away from that tax as it’s a direct tax even though there’s no real difference in raising National Insurance relative to raising Income Tax (same people pay the money).
Increasing NI or Income Tax across the board is a fair way to raise more money. Those who can afford more, pay more.
VAT: Historically the go to tax for the Tories, this has a damaging effect on the poorest in society, no matter who you are you pay more for gas, electricity, food, entertainment… meaning those with least money can spend less on non essentials that drives many parts of the economy.
I don’t have an issue with the poorest in society contributing as well to our problems, but it’s counter productive to take too much money from them as those with no disposable income as such spend all their money anyway. Do we want more of a poor families money going direct to government in the form of VAT or have it being spent on goods and services that drives the economy (people spending money is what drives the economy)?
IMO increasing VAT would be more damaging to the economy than raising NI contributions (both are damaging, but more money needs to be raised to cut government debt).
Efficiency savings are a joke, yes government is VERY wasteful, but in case you haven’t noticed despite the government saying they aren’t cutting services they have been since the credit crunch hit (they had no choice).
Councils who allocate funds on the ground have less money, they have had to cut services in one way or another. In my area East Lindsey District Council stopped collecting green bins over the winter period (November to April) to save money.
I heard on the news earlier that Labour planned to cut 35 billion in efficiency saving between 2007-2010 and so far they have saved only 11 billion. Government is already trying to save money through efficiency savings, but no matter who is in government they tend to do a bad job.
After the general election if the Conservatives win they’ll cut money to public services and say it was efficiency savings when it’s mostly a spending cut.
David
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Another way to save money and blood shed for that matter is to pull our troops from Afghanistan but seeing as that’s not going to happen any time soon the governments only option is to raise National Insurance it could be thing to break the economy or to get us back to recovery. It’s a risk we have to take besides the conservatives still haven’t told us where the money for their policies are coming from at least labour are being straight about one thing and that’s where they plan to get the money to put this economy back into recovery. Either way we are the ones that have to pay for the damages.
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Pulling our troops out of Afghanistan isn’t the only way to save money, but from a money saving perspective sooner we are out of that war zone the better. As a responsible country we can’t just pull out over night, I bet we wouldn’t have gone to war had the credit crunch been under way at the time!
I’d rather see government promoting more business generation than concentrating on public sector cuts only. Yes trim the fat from government spending (a LOT of money is wasted on stupid stuff), but don’t hurt services that we need.
The great news is we are one of the top countries for “Ease of Doing Business” despite what the doomsayers within the Conservative party would have us beleive!
http://www.doingbusiness.org/en/rankings?tercile=top
When you look at countries with a large population we are ranked number 2 over all for “Ease of Doing Business” with only the USA above us.
Even if you look at all countries including the small ones they have ranked http://www.doingbusiness.org/en/rankings
We are still number 5 with other European countries like Germany (25) way down the list.
When I watch the news the impression I get is the UK is an awful place to do business and a place like Germany is awesome. I run a business (I’ve run two businesses over the last 10 years) and I find it very easy to do business in this country, I’ve not had a single problem from government. Everything I’ve wanted to do, I’ve been able to do easily.
Our worst ranking in the tables above is for Employing Workers (I guess it’s because our workers have a lot of protection) at 35 http://www.doingbusiness.org/en/rankings?direction=Asc&sort=4. Personally I see that as a good thing for the British people, we want good working conditions, but even then 35th isn’t that high when a Germany is ranked 158! USA is ranked joint 1 along with Australia and Singapore where I understand workers rights are not a high priority!
We are ranked joint 2 for Getting Credit, so businesses generally can get credit here easily.
A report like this sends out a completely different picture of doing business in the UK relative to the way the UK is perceived in the media!
The sort of negativity we see in the media and from the Conservatives is sending out the wrong picture to potential foreign investors who we need right now to generate more jobs.
I always believed Labour was good on workers rights, but absolutely rubbish on supporting business and the opposite for the Conservative. The facts point to Labour being really good for British business and good for British workers as well.
When you think about it a happy, well paid worker is going to work harder and smarter for a business than a poorly paid unhappy employee.
David
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David
You are right that who ever wins will have to make cuts. It is a disgrace that none of the parties are spelling this out. The hole the GB has got us into means that we have to shrink the public sector which is currently 49% of GDP. It was under 40% when Labour took office.
We should not be expecting more tax rises but more cuts and if that means cuts in our beloved NHS, then so be it. We are over taxed as it is.
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