<shoots off at a tangent quite unexpectedly in search of God knows what>

Darling is much criticised from Labour and Tories alike for a lack lustre performance so far and there are calls to replace him as leader of the "Better Together" campaign. Labour has just realised that if the Scots go independent they would lose all their Scottish seats and with it any chance of forming a majority at Westminster. One good reason to vote Yes!

You are side stepping the issue. The discussion is not about borrowing it is about Osborne's much critcised recovery plan now clearly seen to be working which Labour said couldn't happen without spending (and borrowing even more)

If you want a separate discusion on why the borrowing is higher than expected then there are plenty of reason to explain this which I have already done. eg North Sea revenues down, Our World leading financial sector down, our main export market down. Three factors that were not apparent when this government came to power.

But back to the main debate. Are you a recovery denier? Are you pleased the country is on the road to recovery? Are you able to give credit when due?

Take 41 away from: 179 (1997); 167 (2001) and 66 (2005) and tell us how many GEs Labour would've lost

Nope, its part of the issue - the "austerity plan" is nothing of the sort, as a country we are borrowing more money now than we were three years ago whilst at the same time cutting public expenditure for whatever reason the PR merchants in Whitehall spoon feed us this week (usually by blaming someone else).

In truth Osborne could have done this three years ago, in truth this is fairly similar to what Labour had as their recovery plan, spending in certain sectors to assist home buyers and loosen the grip on personal credit is a proven way out of recession, it worked in the early 1990s and it worked again around 2000/2001 when in fact it saved us from recession, the problem for Osborne is that he didn't really want it to happen this way and he didn't really want to borrow this much to make it happen but with time running out on this parliament he had to release the grip sooner or later - as I've said before, it was bound to happen in a five year employment contract.




Not sure what a denier is, google references state that its a unit of measure for fibres so I'm not one of those. If you are asking me if I am happy that a recovery, albeit a small one (by government admissions), seems to be underway - the first quarter of 2014 will be the main pointer - then yes of course I am and I have never said otherwise, feel free to show where I have, also feel free to show where I have stated that I'm a Labour party supporter, you'll struggle.

Do I give Osborne credit for this ? I give him credit for finally realising that austerity doesn't work even if he won't publicly say it, I give him no credit for continuing with the cutting of expenditure in public services and the selling off of public assets despite election promises that those public assets were safe in his party's hands - whilst all the time increasing the country's debt.

Would those lies include cutting funding for [url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-25331644#TWEET982197mental health care[/url?

Any recovery is to be welcomed.

It'll be nice when the majority of the British people see it and not just a few. It'll be nice when unemployment falls and vacancies rise – and when underemployment falls too.

It'll be nice when ordinary people see their incomes grow rather than decline.

It'll be nice when food banks close their doors through lack of anyone needing them and then the Red Cross no longer need to hand out food parcels in the UK.

It'll be nice when this government stops telling lies about benefits claimants as well as those lies about its policies.

A significant reason for the reduction in real wages in recent years has been the fact that an increased proportion of the wage bills of employees and employers alike is going on national insurance and pensions. Labour aRe largely responsible for the former and as government tries to address the latter people moan about having to work longer.

It ain't over yet, not by a long way [urlhttp://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/12/12/george-osborne-welfare_n_4430917.html?utm_hp_ref=uk[/url.

In order to sell the idea of swingeing cuts to the benefits bill in the next term he is going to have to start telling some whoppers in order to get the Murdoch press reading public onside, which is basically all he has to do to get re-elected, stand by for some epic "scroungers" tales to come in the next 15 months so that white-van-man and you taxi cab drivers convince themselves that its the crippled and insane that are robbing tax from their wallets (when they pay any).

It's a sound strategy, as Rachel "tougher than the Tories" Reeves has decided. Still, no doubt in 2015 the "Big 2" will be cast into the wilderness by the voters aghast at these policies.

I genuinely wouldn't know who to vote for now. Maybe it's time for a new Guy Fawkes (a more successful one). Clear the lot out and start again. Mind you there are still plenty of public schoolboys with an over inflated sense of entitlement out there, we will never run out of those. The party they join depends on how wet or dry they are 1. had your lunch money stolen, know your place, bullied mercilessly, fagging for the big boys but still an arrogant little S4h!t with a superiority complex over the masses - LibDem: 2. cardigan, in a band, smoke a bit of weed, Daddy a bit of a leftie, not allowed into any secret societies, Labour: 3. stole lunch money, had a fag, regularly vomit on an underling after consuming too much champagne and fois gras, wear rediculous Voctorian era clothes, member of secret society, Tory.

As above - If there was an election tomorrow, I would not vote, simple as, and that would be for the first time in the 26 years I've been eligible to do so.

The Tories are rotten to the core, always have been, always will be.... The Lib Dems are just useless chancers - They know they are a pointless minority, an irritant on the political landscape, yet are constantly looking for a way to wheedle themselves into some sort of power, even being prepared to sell all their principles so as to being able to cosy up with whoever is in power..... As for Labour - For a party that should be the voice of those in the most peril from such an uncaring government, they are totally inept... Ed Milliband is hopeless. The majority of his shadow cabinet are equally awful - I don't know a single one of them who appeals in the slightest to me.

We all know that Tony Blair wasn't the messiah that many of his initial worshippers hoped he would be, but UK politics desperately needs somebody of his charisma to bring some vision and hope back to the political scene.... Democracy is slowly dying in this country, simply because the public don't care any more about charisma-free monotones offering nothing fresh or nothing that offers any hope to the vast majority.

The last thing I want to see, after Camoron and Blair is someone with "charisma", I'd far rather see some policies that will help address the growing inequality in this country. Both Cameron and Blair hads charisma, what they both lacked was an ability to resist the neoliberalism that now blights the developed world, where the market is seen as everything and service is a dirty word. It's high time neoliberalism was shown up for what it is: an expectation to privatise profits, knowing full well that the state will cover any losses. The banks are but the prime example.

So stuff charisma, give me substance

I agree with what you say with regards to needing politicians with substance, but there can be no denying that Blair, in the run up to his election and in the initial honeymoon period as PM, really seemed to offer something fresh, a refreshing vision to the awful stink that the Tories had become in their final years under Major.

Presently, we have zilch, absolutely nothing, from any of the major parties - Its little wonder that minority, crackpot parties like UKIP are managing to garner support in areas where they should be laughed out of town.

Of course, we want substance and not false promises, but I think firstly we need somebody, or something to wake up a disinterested public, otherwise democracy may as well be done away with, because having elections, where only a third of those eligible to vote are doing so, just become an embarrassing sham and give little authority to those who somehow find themselves in ultimate power.

What really grinds is when its nigh on impossible to vote for the party that used to be important and meant something to you growing up.
I haven't been able to vote for my party, the Labour Party, for many many years.

And now a Tory think tank has come up with the idea of only paying benefits for the first two children. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/12 ... ref=topbar This coming from the same guy who claimed on expenses to heat his stables. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/11 ... 50907.html

And now a Tory think tank has come up with the idea of only paying benefits for the first two children. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/12 ... ref=topbar This coming from the same guy who claimed on expenses to heat his stables. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/11 ... 50907.html

Quote ="dr_feelgood"And now a Tory think tank has come up with the idea of only paying benefits for the first two children. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/12 ... ref=topbar This coming from the same guy who claimed on expenses to heat his stables. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/11 ... 50907.html'" This bloke is another nasty, snout-in-the-trough piece of work. I'm curious as to what he would 'think' a family should do if, for argument's sake, they have triplets while not claiming benefits and then later need to claim benefits.

Quote ="dr_feelgood"And now a Tory think tank has come up with the idea of only paying benefits for the first two children. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/12 ... ref=topbar This coming from the same guy who claimed on expenses to heat his stables. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/11 ... 50907.html'" This bloke is another nasty, snout-in-the-trough piece of work. I'm curious as to what he would 'think' a family should do if, for argument's sake, they have triplets while not claiming benefits and then later need to claim benefits.

We need to find a way to reverse the stigmatisation of accepting the benefits of a welfare state, especially as the vast majority of the population are indeed recipients of that state.

I was born four years after the creation of the welfare state. Born in a dedicated maternity hospital with all the available care in reach if required, instead of born in my mother's bed iwth the only "experienced" care coming "Betty down the street" because my mam & dad couldn't afford to pay a doctor's and/or midwife's bill.

I benefited from free (at the point of delivery), healthcare and schooling. My mother never received any family allowance for me because it was only paid for second and subsequent children. I left school at sixteen and from the following April paid income tax and NI without grumble or complaint because I knew that the state would use my contributions to look after me in my dotage. Unfortunately now I'm reaching pensionable age, I find that the state has reneged on that promise, I'll need to keep on working just to simply subsist. All my contributions to basic NI, SERPS, various company and private schemes will amount to around 4/5ths of buggerall.

The only thing austerity has brought is more misery for the less well-off in order to create ever more wealth for those who didn't need the money anyway. A determined, as opposed to the half-a[ir[/ised window dressing, exercise in tackling tax avoidance and evasion would result in no need for austerity. Concentrating on tackling "benefit fraud" while basically ignoring tax evasion and avoidance is peverse but just about sums up what the tories are, always have been and always will be about.

It will be 'worse' under Labour. www.theguardian.com/politics/201 ... es-welfare The welfare state has ballooned to a ridiculous size over the last decade. It's much harder to shrink it than expand it. Thankfully all major parties recognised that it needs to be smaller.

It will be 'worse' under Labour. www.theguardian.com/politics/201 ... es-welfare The welfare state has ballooned to a ridiculous size over the last decade. It's much harder to shrink it than expand it. Thankfully all major parties recognised that it needs to be smaller.

Maybe it's a result of Cameron's recent visit to China and he was so impressed with China's "one child policy"?

Interesting to note that MPs are allowed to claim up to [url=http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/regulation/bedroom-tax-mps-claim-child-housing-subsidy/6528260.article£2,425 per dependent child simply for visiting.[/url

[url=http://www.theyworkforyou.com/mp/24822/nadhim_zahawi/stratford-on-avon#registerZahawi's They Work for You page[/url

You mean apart from the tax agreement thing with Switzerland that the coalition started in January this year? Still, it never quite brought in the £3bn projected, just less than £1bn I think the figures show. Which is still £1bn more than anyone thought would be recouped. Perhaps those on benefits are squirreling away their hard earned in Geneva.

The Lichrenstein Disclosure Facility has generated several times the £1 billion originally forecast. To be fair to the coalition they have done more to counter tax evasion than Labour did.

This is true but the new IT system that identifies irregularities in tax payments and/or earnings declared is based on a "best guess" and throws up some nightmare stories - my brother for instance has had the bailiffs calling at his house on several occasions chasing an imaginary tax boll of £2000, yes HMRC have sold a debt of £2000 to a private collection agency who get given short shrift each time they call because he does not owe the money at all, but HMRC's new software had guestimated that he perhaps does.

In August after two years of protracted phone calls and chasing nameless faceless individuals around the country to try and get an answer he presented himself at our local tax office at a pre-arranged appointment to sort it all out, after twenty minutes discussion he was told that his appointment was concluded, not that they had concluded the matter, just that they were only allowed to discuss individuals matters for twenty minutes - he refused to leave until they had reached an agreement.

Eventually after a manager got involved they finally got to the bottom of the £2000 tax bill - they thought he was still a company director even though they had been informed five years ago that he wasn't and had been filling in the correct employee (company car) assessments ever since - his total tax liability to them was £56.

I don't know how he kept his temper in there but he insisted that they got the payments section on the phone there and then and he paid the £56 on a debit card and bade them a good day - I have no doubt whatsoever that there are probably tens of thousands like him that owe nothing like the amounts that their fabulous new computer software guestimates - if they feed it shoite then thats what it spits out.

Lets be fair here UK GDP grew at 2.4% in the first year following the recession (Q3 2009 till Q3 2010) which was the year in the run up to the Coalition taking office.

It does amuse me how you get Tories now desperate to talk up these figures accusing Labour and left wing commentators of being unhappy that the economy has returned to growth and talking down the economy etc....can you remember the rhetoric we had from the Tories in the run up to the election when the economy was growing at what is more or less a normal long term trend rate.

The only reason this slow return to growth looks good is because the economy stagnated for the first 2.5 years under the Coalition so it is a recovery compared to that but not compared to the last year under Labour.

The reason Gordon Brown's line in the election campaign was "don't let the Tories threaten the recovery" was exactly because the UK economy was recovering. It went in to stagnation after the Coalition took over they just made sure they blamed Labour for it....

Quote ="dr_feelgood"And now a Tory think tank has come up with the idea of only paying benefits for the first two children. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/12 ... ref=topbar This coming from the same guy who claimed on expenses to heat his stables. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/11 ... 50907.html'" Tbh i dont know why he doesn't just come out and say we'll kill every child born after the first two

Quote ="dr_feelgood"And now a Tory think tank has come up with the idea of only paying benefits for the first two children. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/12 ... ref=topbar This coming from the same guy who claimed on expenses to heat his stables. www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/11 ... 50907.html'" Tbh i dont know why he doesn't just come out and say we'll kill every child born after the first two

To be fair, if you can't afford to keep three or more kids, then why should the welfare state be expected to do it for you??

I'd love a Ferrari, but I can't afford it, so I don't buy myself one - The same thing should apply to having children.

Of course, there should be safeguards for people having triplets, or twins during a second pregnancy, but for people who insist on having children despite already struggling with what they already have, then there has to be some sort of deterrent put in place.