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General Election 2017

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Rudi Hedman Flag Caterham 21 Apr 17 10.44am Send a Private Message to Rudi Hedman Add Rudi Hedman as a friend

Under labour there were quangos, agencies here, there and everywhere. Sure parts of the country were a tip and are now much better, but it's an example of what pikester is referring to. The pen never stops filling out chequers, and that ends up hurting them in the long run.

 


COYP

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davenotamonkey Flag 21 Apr 17 10.46am Send a Private Message to davenotamonkey Add davenotamonkey as a friend

Originally posted by CambridgeEagle

Brexit hasn't happened yet. Jobs are, as we speak, being moved out of the UK, along with international agencies and companies.

The FTSE moves with negative correlation to the pound and the value of the pound reflects investors confidence in the future of the underlying economy. These things weren't predicted to happen 24th June, but over time post Brexit.

What has already happen, ironically, is billions of pounds worth of UK property has been sold from UK investors and pension funds to foreign investors, mainly from Asia, the biggest example is the Cheesegrater which was sold by British Land to a Chinese company for over £1bn. Just a fortnight ago a Chinese investor purchased the Nestle building and surrounding buildings in Croydon. This was brought about by UK investors being concerned about the future of the economy, particularly for office occupiers in London so pulling their money out, and the fall in the value of the pound, which made purchasing UK property using foreign currency much cheaper. Why is this ironic? Well the direct result of this is when British companies pay their rent each quarter a significantly larger proportion than pre-Brexit goes straight out of the country. Rather than going into a pension pot for UK citizens these rents now go to China or wherever else. This is basically like importing property. In a vote to stop letting people come here to work and contribute to society and the economy, the Brexit brigade has accelerated the removal of British assets owned by British interests and results in money flowing directly out of the economy.

The largest landowner in London is Qatar Holdings. The government of Qatar are the 51st biggest owner of London property. The government of Kuwait is the 16th. This has only got worse since 23rd June.

Just for clarity: have you seen any upsides since the Brexit vote from your little echo chamber? I'm guessing not. Inward investment is bad, right? Bilateral deals queued up, bad? Employment rate? Terrible! Fastest G7 growth - crap! Another upwards growth adjustment from the IMF - junk status! U-turns from nearly all "actors" seeking to scaremonger us into voting remain? Fake news!

Incidentally - the FTSE100 was sub 4000 in 2008 when the GBPUSD wasn't much higher than it is now, so there is not always an anti-correlation. Moreover, you Brexit Armaggedonists were wailing about market crashes if we voted to leave. The FTSE has never been higher. I'll take a hit on the overvalued GBP for that, and the 250 isn't looking too shabby at all either.

Anyway... I hope you, and whatever party you align to, keep banging this particular drum - the electorate are wise to it now.

 

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Yellow Card - User has been warned of conduct on the messageboards Hrolf The Ganger Flag 21 Apr 17 10.48am Send a Private Message to Hrolf The Ganger Add Hrolf The Ganger as a friend

The sad Remainers will try to turn this election into yet another attempt to subvert the Referendum.

They must be made to fail. Brexit means out of the single market and British control of immigration, nothing less.

Almost all of the geographical Britain voted leave except for London and Scotland and I think we all know why that is.

 

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CambridgeEagle Flag Sydenham 21 Apr 17 11.12am Send a Private Message to CambridgeEagle Add CambridgeEagle as a friend

Originally posted by Penge Eagle

I take it you will be voting for Corbyn's Labour, in June. Sell it to me!


I'm undecided. I like my local MP who is a Labour MP and she's not a Corbyn supporter. I think Corbyn is a liability. But in terms of why you shouldn't vote Tory that's easy. I've given lots of evidence already in this thread, most of which has come directly from OECD or ONS so is reliable. Their record on the economy and delivery of public services is appalling. Positive GDP growth and low official unemployment are such misleading indicators when considered in isolation. Productivity is low and inequality high. Public debt has increased massively, but more concerning is that private debt is getting back towards pre-GFC levels. The positive GDP numbers are driven by consumer spending and consumer debt, not investment or increases in productivity. The balance of payments is also a drain on the economy and selling off swathes of assets to foreign interest will only make this worse, something which started under New Labour but has increased apace since 2010 and increased massively since 23 June due to the falling value of the pound.

In my opinion one of the biggest structural issues for the economy is inequality, and the tax policies of this government have been so iniquitous that this is getting worse. If you want an interesting and compelling argument as to the problems associated with the kind of inequality prevalent in the UK today (which are predicted to get worse) read this: [Link]

Stiglitz is a world expert on this subject and has a Nobel Prize in economics and explains it far better than I could.

Austerity has been a disaster. If you want to understand why austerity is both theoretically and empirically the wrong thing to do, especially in a downturn then read "End this depression now" by Paul Krugman, another Nobel Laureate.

QE is another massive Elephant in the room. It's been totally misused by the Tories and they will not countenance using it properly as it would be against their "austerity at all costs" ideology. Richard Murphy has written more words about tax theory and policy than anyone else so I'd recommend just sticking his name and QE into google to read about his thoughts, however a couple of quotes here:

"QE will pump money into the economy, but the reality is that the vast majority that will go into speculative activity, will support financial trading, will boost bankers’ bonuses, and will preserve the integrity of bank balance sheets, which is, however, an objective that could be much better achieved by the government taking direct stakes in their share capital instead using the same money. To put it another way, QE is an extremely blunt instrument to achieve a goal that has very little direct benefit to most in the UK."

Labour have a policy to launch a national investment bank. Here was Richard Murphy back in July last year: "In this alternative form of QE the money created by the Bank of England is provided to a National Investment Bank to inject into the real economy. In other words, it funds new investment. In the short term that could be infrastructure repairs. It could also be investment support to businesses. That investment in business can either be in equity capital or by way of loans. In this way the risk that the money will be used to fund speculation and not to promote real economic activities is avoided: the banks as middlemen are cut out.

This is precisely what our economy needs now. In the aftermath of the referendum vote, with all the uncertainty that is faced, the British economy needs a direct injection of cash to ensure that it has the capital it needs to continue to create the jobs that the people of this country deserve to make the goods and services that we require and which we must export to continue to provide a solid foundation for our future. At this time only the government can provide this, and QE provides the mechanism to do so."

I could go on.

 

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CambridgeEagle Flag Sydenham 21 Apr 17 11.21am Send a Private Message to CambridgeEagle Add CambridgeEagle as a friend

Originally posted by Rudi Hedman

Pikester has a point. I've heard of someone, through a trusted contact, who phoned up the DSS under either Blair or Brown because it was a roundabout 2007, to claim dole. He was encouraged to go on incapacity benefit. He could work, but now didn't have to. Within Cameron's coalition he was back working.

The motorbility provision is very expensive. The cars are given back within 2 or 3 years. There's something wrong going on there.

I have no doubt that Labour's policies are workable, and probably affordable. Most had it pretty good in the noughties. The problem is that there will always be an economic cycle and that is when things get turned upside down. You tell me a time when it hasn't. That is unless we adopt Scandinavian income tax rates and that won't ever happen in the uk unless there's another world war or catastrophe or civil war.

If this Nobel Laureate is so spot on, why is it not known, popular, being practiced now, everywhere. What did Blackadder tell Baldrick when explaining the British teaming up with France and Rusdia and the Germans teaming up with Austria Hungria to prevent war?

''There's one fatal flaw with their plan.''

'''What's that?''

''It's bollox.''


It is known. It's not practised in some places as it would require stopping austerity, which the Tories and other right wing parties aren't keen on for ideological reasons.

The evidence is widely available that austerity doesn't work.

 

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Yellow Card - User has been warned of conduct on the messageboards Hrolf The Ganger Flag 21 Apr 17 11.25am Send a Private Message to Hrolf The Ganger Add Hrolf The Ganger as a friend

Originally posted by CambridgeEagle


It is known. It's not practised in some places as it would require stopping austerity, which the Tories and other right wing parties aren't keen on for ideological reasons.

The evidence is widely available that austerity doesn't work.

What does that mean?
I can see that all parties try not to offend their traditional support but are you suggesting that the Tories like to keep 'poor' people poor for other reasons?

 

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steeleye20 Flag Croydon 21 Apr 17 11.25am Send a Private Message to steeleye20 Add steeleye20 as a friend

Originally posted by Hrolf The Ganger

Because she is winning by a country mile. Ain't no need.

Your political insight is very naive at times.

Six weeks is far too long for an election look what 3 weeks did to Ted Heath all his fault it was too long poor man!

Harold Wilson would beat Mrs May building up support and taking it on the line he would identify where the votes were and adapt as necessary to win.

I think he won 5 thats amazing he was also caught out by Ted Heath after calling a snap election.

So it can go wrong Mrs May.

 

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Rudi Hedman Flag Caterham 21 Apr 17 11.27am Send a Private Message to Rudi Hedman Add Rudi Hedman as a friend

I agree on the QE and the infrastructure issues.

The personal debt and the country's growth built around consumer spending we were supposed to have learned from in 2008. Shame.

How long is the Psul Krugman piece? The problem is that when add Balls was lecturing us all on raising govt spending there was no global demand. The timing has to be right. The IS increased their's. Hasn't it been/isn't it showing to be a short term gain overshadowed by a longer term bigger loss?

 


COYP

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steeleye20 Flag Croydon 21 Apr 17 11.35am Send a Private Message to steeleye20 Add steeleye20 as a friend

Originally posted by Hrolf The Ganger

What does that mean?
I can see that all parties try not to offend their traditional support but are you suggesting that the Tories like to keep 'poor' people poor for other reasons?

Yes they are cruel where there is no economic benefit it does not work so what reason do they have for continuing austerity?

 

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Yellow Card - User has been warned of conduct on the messageboards Hrolf The Ganger Flag 21 Apr 17 11.37am Send a Private Message to Hrolf The Ganger Add Hrolf The Ganger as a friend

Originally posted by steeleye20

Yes they are cruel where there is no economic benefit it does not work so what reason do they have for continuing austerity?

What nonsense.

 

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CambridgeEagle Flag Sydenham 21 Apr 17 11.43am Send a Private Message to CambridgeEagle Add CambridgeEagle as a friend

Originally posted by davenotamonkey

Just for clarity: have you seen any upsides since the Brexit vote from your little echo chamber? I'm guessing not. Inward investment is bad, right? Bilateral deals queued up, bad? Employment rate? Terrible! Fastest G7 growth - crap! Another upwards growth adjustment from the IMF - junk status! U-turns from nearly all "actors" seeking to scaremonger us into voting remain? Fake news!

Incidentally - the FTSE100 was sub 4000 in 2008 when the GBPUSD wasn't much higher than it is now, so there is not always an anti-correlation. Moreover, you Brexit Armaggedonists were wailing about market crashes if we voted to leave. The FTSE has never been higher. I'll take a hit on the overvalued GBP for that, and the 250 isn't looking too shabby at all either.

Anyway... I hope you, and whatever party you align to, keep banging this particular drum - the electorate are wise to it now.

Buying property isn't inward investment! It's just turning a UK income producing asset into cash, which has no income return. The income producing asset then sends all its income abroad.

The cash is then used to pay down debt by and large to reduce leverage on wider portfolios to reduce risk due to heightened economic risks brought about by Brexit.

Quote from today's Property Weekly: Chinese property giant Country Garden has set its sights on building tens of thousands of homes in London as it looks to take advantage of the “golden opportunity” political uncertainty provides for overseas capital, Property Week can reveal. Second top story is South Korea buying a Sainsbury's distributions centre in the Midlands for £100m. 4th story is Saudis buying an office in Maidenhead for £35m.

So rather than build homes ourself we buy them from China. We need the homes that's true enough, but Brexit has directly impacted our own ability to deliver them and instead we have to pay profits to the Chinese to do it!

On IMF forecasts: “The 0.9 percentage point upward revision to the 2017 forecast and the 0.2 percentage point downward revision to the 2018 forecast reflect the stronger-than-expected performance of the UK economy since the June Brexit vote, which points to a more gradual materialisation than previously anticipated of the negative effects of the United Kingdom’s decision to leave the European Union,” the IMF said. “Though highly uncertain, medium-term growth prospects have also diminished in the aftermath of the Brexit vote because of the expected increase in barriers to trade and migration, as well as a potential downsizing of the financial services sector amid possible barriers to cross-border financial activity.”

I've already pointed out how misleading annual GDP growth and unemployment figures are.

 

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serial thriller Flag The Promised Land 21 Apr 17 11.50am Send a Private Message to serial thriller Add serial thriller as a friend

Originally posted by Rudi Hedman

I agree on the QE and the infrastructure issues.

The personal debt and the country's growth built around consumer spending we were supposed to have learned from in 2008. Shame.

How long is the Psul Krugman piece? The problem is that when add Balls was lecturing us all on raising govt spending there was no global demand. The timing has to be right. The IS increased their's. Hasn't it been/isn't it showing to be a short term gain overshadowed by a longer term bigger loss?

The last time we focused largescale investment in to a debt-heavy economy was under Labour post-war. It saw two decades of economic prosperity follow. A similar stimulation is needed now, because with productivity so low but employment levels relatively high, it's tough to see how else the economy will start to grow.

 


If punk ever happened I'd be preaching the law, instead of listenin to Lydon lecture BBC4

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