Well, I'm glad you're satisfied, that settles it.

I've viewed his tweets and a number of interviews and you'll have to try harder to convince me of he suddenly changed his views...until it was necessary to further his political career of course...a bit like his leader in fact.

Yes, you know and I know that Israel does not necessarily equal Jewish. But meanwhile in the real world of anti-Israel hatred and rhetoric, that's precisely what goes on. Not uncommon amongst student leaders and indeed the Labour party, as I'm sure you're well aware.

Yes. Why?

I believe that despite rubbishing Labours spending plans, he also said that Brexit was a financial disaster

If he's right on both, we ALL have a problem.

I think we've all acknowledged on here, possibly around 7,000 times, that Brexit would mean an economic hit, certainly short-term. I don't see much wrong with his article, thought the scale and duration of that economic hit is unknown.

And yes Labour's spending plans are quite rightly rubbished. They've been rubbished from pillar to post. If you have some irrational reason to disregard the views of the IFS, look elsewhere. The FT have done a good analysis for example.

BTW Paul Johnson's Twitter makes for fascinating reading.

lease define anti-semetic. I ask, because there's a huge difference between holacaust denial and calling out illegal. Iccupation in the west bank.
But I digress. Not debating is a sensible decision. There's every chance the 'tolerant' left in the room would spend their time heckling and booing, which obviously wouldn't look great.


Bull. Bojo led the debating society at eton.... Hes scared of facts, thats why hes run from the debate...... Factcheck that if you like

I don't really understand what you mean; being against Israel's illegal apartheid regime does not make one antisemitic - because Israel self-evidently isn't representative of all Jews.

I'm sure some people do conflate the two - in either direction - and say things that are unacceptable; but the vast majority of what is conveniently labelled antisemitism in the Labour party, is just criticism of Israel's crimes against the Palestinian people - and by the EHRC definition - that cannot be anti-Semitic.

Antisemitism is a vile and egregious smear that has devalued the genuine struggle of many Jews, and de-legitimised those Jews who also happen to be anti-Zionist, of which there are many.

I have no wish to trawl through his twitter feed and as you say, the size of the "hit" and it's longevity are unknown.
However, when the most ardent "leavers" are "happy" to now accept there will be a hit, it doesn't look great in the short and medium term and after that, who the hell knows -Trump and Boris may both become trigger happy in response to being "tested" by one of our many world enemies.
However, with stagnant growth and an agreed hit to come, it must all seem really worthwhile.
Chuck in a level of borrowing that the Tories have previously ridiculed the opposition over and we have all of the ingredients for something rather unpleasant and with legitimatised racism and xenophobia (from the top down), the UK (or what's left of it) should be a joy to live in.

The magic money tree that did not exist but found one billion pounds to pay off the DUP or the coalition of chaos with the same party.
They say that we would have to endure austerity so that they could write off the debt and return to surplus within four years but we would never lose our AAA rating how did those promises turn out.
It was Labour who suggested borrowing to fund various programmes whilst the rates were at record low levels. This was ridiculed by the Conservatives however surprise surprise it is now a good idea.

So You blame Thatcher for selling off the housing stock and not releasing funds for building new one and yet Labour were in power for 13 year 1997 to 2010 and their record was far worse. Here's a few facts for you to digest.....
Margaret Thatcher's government had built more council flats and houses in a single year than New Labour's managed in its entire period in office.
The official data shows that the Blair and Brown governments built 7,870 council houses (local authority tenure) over the course of 13 years. (If we don't include 2010 - the year when David Cameron became PM - this number drops to 6,510 contrast this figure with Thatcher's government, which never built fewer than 17,710 homes in a year and you can see the significant difference.
Between 1997 and 2010, of the 2.61 million homes constructed, only 0.3% were local authority tenure. Mrs Thatcher's government supervised the building of a similar number of houses (2.63 million), but 18.9% were LA or 'council' properties.
To look at it another way, New Labour built an average of 562 council houses per year. And Mrs Thatcher's Conservatives? 41,343. That said, it's also true that the number of council houses under construction declined steadily during Mrs Thatcher's era. In a nutshell, Corbyn and labour in power would be an absolute disaster for this country, of that I have absolutely no doubt. Their policies are economically insane, they would reduce this county to an economic wasteland within 3 years, destroying businesses and subsequently putting millions out of work.

Their policies are economically insane, they would reduce this county to an economic wasteland within 3 years, destroying businesses and subsequently putting millions out of work.'"

Quote ="wrencat1873"I have no wish to trawl through his twitter feed'" You should, it's not politically biased, it picks everyone apart, and beyond the GE stuff there are some interesting stats. I know the left don't really care about balancing the numbers, but still... https://twitter.com/pjtheeconomist?lang=en Quote and as you say, the size of the "hit" and it's longevity are unknown. However, when the most ardent "leavers" are "happy" to now accept there will be a hit, it doesn't look great in the short and medium term and after that, who the hell knows -Trump and Boris may both become trigger happy in response to being "tested" by one of our many world enemies. However, with stagnant growth and an agreed hit to come, it must all seem really worthwhile. Chuck in a level of borrowing that the Tories have previously ridiculed the opposition over and we have all of the ingredients for something rather unpleasant and with legitimatised racism and xenophobia (from the top down), the UK (or what's left of it) should be a joy to live in.'" Yep, for the squillionth time, it's all about the long term. Extricating ourselves from the federalist long-term goals and ideology of the EU will pay off in the long term. We were supposed to be in economic armageddon simply for voting out. Didn't happen. I won't deny there is a rollercoaster ahead but it will pass.

Quote ="wrencat1873"I have no wish to trawl through his twitter feed'" You should, it's not politically biased, it picks everyone apart, and beyond the GE stuff there are some interesting stats. I know the left don't really care about balancing the numbers, but still... https://twitter.com/pjtheeconomist?lang=en Quote and as you say, the size of the "hit" and it's longevity are unknown. However, when the most ardent "leavers" are "happy" to now accept there will be a hit, it doesn't look great in the short and medium term and after that, who the hell knows -Trump and Boris may both become trigger happy in response to being "tested" by one of our many world enemies. However, with stagnant growth and an agreed hit to come, it must all seem really worthwhile. Chuck in a level of borrowing that the Tories have previously ridiculed the opposition over and we have all of the ingredients for something rather unpleasant and with legitimatised racism and xenophobia (from the top down), the UK (or what's left of it) should be a joy to live in.'" Yep, for the squillionth time, it's all about the long term. Extricating ourselves from the federalist long-term goals and ideology of the EU will pay off in the long term. We were supposed to be in economic armageddon simply for voting out. Didn't happen. I won't deny there is a rollercoaster ahead but it will pass.

Quote ="Seventies red"So You blame Thatcher for selling off the housing stock and not releasing funds for building new one and yet Labour were in power for 13 year 1997 to 2010 and their record was far worse. Here's a few facts for you to digest..... Margaret Thatcher's government had built more council flats and houses in a single year than New Labour's managed in its entire period in office. The official data shows that the Blair and Brown governments built 7,870 council houses (local authority tenure) over the course of 13 years. (If we don't include 2010 - the year when David Cameron became PM - this number drops to 6,510 contrast this figure with Thatcher's government, which never built fewer than 17,710 homes in a year and you can see the significant difference. Between 1997 and 2010, of the 2.61 million homes constructed, only 0.3% were local authority tenure. Mrs Thatcher's government supervised the building of a similar number of houses (2.63 million), but 18.9% were LA or 'council' properties. To look at it another way, New Labour built an average of 562 council houses per year. And Mrs Thatcher's Conservatives? 41,343. That said, it's also true that the number of council houses under construction declined steadily during Mrs Thatcher's era..'" Jesus Christ you're about as hard to outwit as IR35. If you'd included a full link with context I suppose it wouldn't have helped your "case" though - here's the accompanying graph - notice when it declines and flatlines: And the link, which concludes, "Between 1997 and 2010, some 350,000 housing association dwellings were built. If we look at both housing association homes and council houses, Labour built more affordable properties in 2009 than the Conservatives did in each year between 1987 and 1990." https://fullfact.org/economy/who-built- ... ew-labour/

Quote ="Seventies red"So You blame Thatcher for selling off the housing stock and not releasing funds for building new one and yet Labour were in power for 13 year 1997 to 2010 and their record was far worse. Here's a few facts for you to digest..... Margaret Thatcher's government had built more council flats and houses in a single year than New Labour's managed in its entire period in office. The official data shows that the Blair and Brown governments built 7,870 council houses (local authority tenure) over the course of 13 years. (If we don't include 2010 - the year when David Cameron became PM - this number drops to 6,510 contrast this figure with Thatcher's government, which never built fewer than 17,710 homes in a year and you can see the significant difference. Between 1997 and 2010, of the 2.61 million homes constructed, only 0.3% were local authority tenure. Mrs Thatcher's government supervised the building of a similar number of houses (2.63 million), but 18.9% were LA or 'council' properties. To look at it another way, New Labour built an average of 562 council houses per year. And Mrs Thatcher's Conservatives? 41,343. That said, it's also true that the number of council houses under construction declined steadily during Mrs Thatcher's era..'" Jesus Christ you're about as hard to outwit as IR35. If you'd included a full link with context I suppose it wouldn't have helped your "case" though - here's the accompanying graph - notice when it declines and flatlines: And the link, which concludes, "Between 1997 and 2010, some 350,000 housing association dwellings were built. If we look at both housing association homes and council houses, Labour built more affordable properties in 2009 than the Conservatives did in each year between 1987 and 1990." https://fullfact.org/economy/who-built- ... ew-labour/

How many billions has it cost in propping up the economy to avoid us going into a recession? The £70bn programme of quantitative easing was key. Money well spent to mitigate us having just shot ourselves in the face, but we still dropped from the top to the bottom of the international economic growth charts - at a time the world was booming, we were disembowelling the things which, for better or worse, had become fundamentals in our economy.

Isn't it fortunate we're not under the control of the European Central Bank, and can manage our fiscal and monetary policy effectively?

Anyway, the FT reckons consumer spending is what made the most impact: "there is no doubt the resilience of consumers is the biggest reason for the UK economy exceeding expectations", not QE, which of course helped alongside interest rates cuts.

I'm well aware of and have always expected economic risk with Brexi...oh I can't be arrised, I've repeated it so many times.

Do you think that the UK ecconomy is "exceeding expectations" 1.4% over the last 12 months and although there is a loose BoE target of 2-4% for next year, this looks massively optimistic.
The current "buoyancy" in the ecconomy is all due to desperately low interest rates, ironically, something which isn't usually compatible with a strong ecconomy.
Most sensible people take risk from a position of strength when "you can afford to lose" or from a position of desperation when you have" nothing to lose". I wonder which one of these best describes the position of the UK when taking such a risky venture.

Is your point here that the ECB isn’t effective or that it is ‘them’ rather than ‘us’?

If the latter, I think this is where a lot of the disagreement and mutual incomprehension comes from. People define themselves, and by extension ‘us’ in all sorts of different ways. Culture, language, geography, ethnicity, beliefs, preferences, shared interests. To me, the EU is less alien and other than, for example and setting the bar very low, Johnson, Javid, Gove, Raab, Patel, Truss and Rees-Mogg.

Now, you might say that ‘we’ could at least vote them out. But none of my ‘us’ are voting for them in the first place anyway. We’re outnumbered, and that is how democracy works, so fair enough. But it isn’t fortunate for my ‘us’, it is in fact a e state of affairs.

None of which would mean anything if people weren't spending. We've had very low interest rates since 2008 while the economy has been on quite a rollercoaster (one might question the impact they actually have, although I was grateful for REALLY low mortgage payments) and yes of course QE helped. Meanwhile, spending has increased year on year despite the forecasts of doom. And the position, as you know, was "get out of the EU".

Is it performing ahead of expectations? Depends what your expectations are. I'm honest in that I don't expect much around Brexit and we'll most likely see a dip, but I also expect long-term growth to recover and continue, much as it did following the 2008 recession.

Consumer Spending in the UK (millions)

Nice graph but 1.4% actual growth over the last 12 months really is no great shakes and over the last 6 months, just 0.1%, with a "hit" to come.
The economy is gasping for air, absolutely no doubt and ironically, without the influx of people from outside the UK, we would already have an economy in reverse.
I'll lend you my crystal ball if you like ?

"only the immigrants can save us"



Please, spare me.

You scoff but, if you take out the spend of those "millions" of immigrants, we would be under the line.
My point being, not so much the effect on the economy of immigrants but, more to do with the extremely fragile growth that we have and having just about climbed out of the deepest recession since the war, "some" people think it's a good idea to have another try



It's economic lunacy and looking behind the donors for the leave campaign, getting out of The EU , for them, has more to do with the tightening of some of the rules about "hiding" cash, which will become somewhat more difficult under the new EU rules, something that the UK should be applauding and following, rather than helping some less scrupulous businessmen.

You're over-complicating a simple point, which is very simply that our fiscal and monetary destiny is our own to control - we can decide quickly and effectively what we need to do to balance out the good and bad times.

But your last 2 paragraphs do show a difference in our mindsets. Just because 'right now' your preferred political people stand less chance of getting into power, you prefer to align yourself permanently to the EU - whose aim is to weaken the power of the nation state and gradually bring us all to closer union and centralised political, fiscal and military power. I'd rather take the bold plunge of extricating ourselves from the web while it's still possible, with all the risks that holds.

FWIW I certainly don't see Europe and 'them' and 'us'. Very simply, I don't want to be ruled by the EU, and want no part of their long-term goals.

153,000 immigrants work for the nhs

Despite this the nhs has a staffing crisis with 100,000 vacancies

Without them that figure would be 253,000

Hang on, you pro-mass immigration remainers keep telling us it's all relative; that more immigrants means more tax revenues, means public service expansion, means a bigger economy, etc, etc. Are you saying the reverse doesn't work? That if mass immigration had never happened then yes we might have a slightly smaller economy and slightly less spending - but the benchmarks would shift accordingly. It's all relative, remember. You can't have it both ways.

Yes I'm aware the some groups of immigrants [iTEND [/ito contribute (slightly) more - it's not a like-for-like comparison but there we go. But in reality that contribution is quite small, and some groups actually take more than they contribute. They are certainly not propping the economy up.

And? Is any reasonable person saying they should leave? I'm certainly not.

Which is a legitimate POV. I worry about this EU takeover, maybe to the same extent to you worry about the short to medium consequences of withdrawal. There’s a degree of risk, but nobody is sure of the extent and on balance, I think it’d be no big deal.

I’m not a huge fan of the EU, but it is well down my list of priority problems.

Ultimately some issues are best managed locally, some regionally, some nationally and some internationally. Maybe coming out of the ECB is for the best, i don’t know. I doubt it’ll be good news for the UK’s poorer regions. And anyway, our interest rates are set by the BoE and our taxes are determined by Westminster. This new monetary and fiscal freedom won’t be perceptible to most.

Coming out of EMA might be more consequential. I really ought to know what the plan is there. I do hope we have one... I shall check...

It looks like MHRA will step up. Be interesting to see if it is beefed up to cope or just piggy backs on EMA and/or FDA decisions.