High Pay Attracts Wrong Type of MP
Alan Duncan has, we are told, been given a final “third strike and you are out” warning by Dave. Guido can’t see how the public can trust the Tories to be really sincere on reforming MPs’ expenses if Alan Duncan is negotiating for the Tories. His sense of self-entitlement clearly shows he is not well disposed to anything that is going to reduce his ability to pick the pockets of the taxpayers.
Tory backbenchers are lining up behind Duncan’s claim that parliament will not be able to attract candidates of the “right calibre”. Complete bullshit – this is a self-serving and fallacious argument. The army pays poorly and yet still attracts the best calibre people, well motivated and made of the right stuff. The finest priests are poor and honest.
Politics is a field that has always attracted the worst character types; the power hungry and the vain, egotistical blowhards with an an over-developed sense of self worth go into politics the world-over claiming they want to “make the world a better place”. Paying them high salaries and padding it all out with financial perks compounds the problem. It attracts people with all the usual character flaws of those attracted to politics and who are also plain greedy.
Politics should be about public service, it should be an honour, not a grubby profession pursued for personal enrichment straight out of Oxbridge.
Don’t go into politics to make money. Choose a different business career if you want to be wealthy. Better still make some money first and go into politics after you have gained a couple of decades of real world experience. John Prescott becoming a multi-millionaire at the taxpayers’ expense when he was supposed to be a servant of the people sends out the wrong signals.
Politicians who claim that the “right calibre” people are motivated by high financial rewards really mean they want those rewards. Guido wants politicians who are motivated not by the prospect of personal enrichment, but instead by the honour of being elected as public servants.
Pay them by results. Offer a modest salary and a potentially large bonus – for all MPs, not just the governing party – if they meet targets on employment, general happiness, prosperity etc.
They’d just rig those targets like they rig all the other ones. then pay themselves a bonus. Just like the FSA paid itself a bonus after presiding over Brown’s economic bust.
To keep the ‘right’ people.
For fucks sake.
Exactly right.
And Guido’s post: “Duncan’s claim that parliament will not be able to attract candidates of the “right calibre”. Complete bullshit – this is a self-serving and fallacious argument.” is also exactly right.
This attitude by the highly paid, in all walks of life, is often totally self serving. The reality is that there are plenty of people clamouring to replace them.
In fact many of the highly paid spend their time back stabbing competitors for their jobs, and undermining aspirants. It is a common joke that the rich, powerful and highly paid surround themselves with “yes men” precisely to shield themselves from competition.
If they had made decent money outside politics before becoming MPs, the pay, for a part time job – 4 day week and 20 week year is plenty.
If they can’t earn enough in the other 32 weeks of the year, then abut £60,000 is more than they are worth.
Ian – don’t forget that the scumbag McDoom and his cronies are actively seeking to prevent MP’s from using the “spare time” to earn any other income for purely party political reasons by stigmatising other earnings through a cynically manipulated disclosure regime.
They are deliberately seeking to prevent anyone who is capable of earning an honest living from being able to become an MP, thereby perpetuating the incompetent, dishonest, party-political collection of lickspittles that comprise the present sorry crowd at Westminster.
What a bunch of Wan–rs. How much more do the General public want to put up with. No wonder we are being bent up and taken from the rear. If Women hate Rape then this is the same to every decent hard working tax paying male. We are being raped and it hurts that much I wont be able to walk. Ah fuc- them I will just go on the dole see what they think about that.
Yeah, agree – really good points Guido. Alan Duncan in charge of expenses reform is like letting thieves look after banks.
Oops, they already do……
Unfortunately, the troughers will set their own targets and rewards and we all know that will result in MP’s having bigger bonuses than superstar bankers
The level of achievement would have to be certified by an organisation that was outside the UK and immune to Government influence. For instance, educational standards would be measured against achievements in other countries, not on the basis of numbers of GCSEs passed.
They would still find a way, they always do…
Look at EU Mandlebum for a recent example…
we need more Muslims in Parliament
Aye, d’ya think you could organise ‘em to park a plane in it?
Leave him alone, Hes a QPR fan. Theres not many of us left
One more QPR fan here.
The QPR supporters outing has been cancelled. The sidecar has got a flat tyer.
Yeh Right! Like Kieth Vaz Lord Desai Baroness Udin And The “Right Honourable Mr Malik One Can Only Imagin Can’t One ?
Keith (note spelling) Vaz, although an oleaginous dickhead, is not a Muslim. AFAIK he’s a Catholic of Goan descent (hence his Portuguese surname).
I thought vaz was a greek name like vase or ern
No, we need more decent human beings in parliament regardless of their religion. Anyone who wants to be an MP should leave their religious beliefs at the door – faith should be a personal thing, not a thing to be forced down the electorate’s collective throat.
The fact that you believe that we need more MPs of any particular religion suggests you are mentally unstable to my mind, and I’d feel exactly the same if you were a Christian/Hindu/Sikh/Jew/[insert your preference here] who was calling for more of your own team in parliament.
Keith Vaz is a Roman Catholic. London Muslim is a tw@t.
Oh, I see. Yep, easy to get confused!
Oi Ali you really are a raggedy arse twonk. What you are saying is that you only want agnostics or aetheists in Parliament. Up yours.
No Baiter’s Master, that’s not what I’m saying at all – I’m saying that people should leave their religion at home, as it’s got nothing to do with the running of a secular parliament.
Learn to read before you insult me you fucking moron,
I’ll quote my own comment to make it easier for your tiny brain to comprehend – “we need more decent human beings in parliament REGARDLESS OF THEIR RELIGION”.
Does that clarify it for you, or are you still having problems understanding the basics of the English language and what certain words mean?
I don’t believe the gorgon went in to politics for the money. Was it only power he wanted? He’s been useless anyway.
We need fewer in the parliament and in the country – dont presume a right to include yourself as ‘ we’ you are not British and not welcome.
I don’t think you are a London Muslim at all “London Muslim”! I think you are a BNP troll trying to get a rise out of people.
STILL awaiting moderation after three days? Ummm…. doesn’t that slightly defeat the object of moderation?
We need more Jedi’s with militant imaginery deities too.
We need more aphids and aganoids and less religionous politicians in human decision making. ffs. IMO. Look at Blair the angel of canon bullets.
Patron of patronisors. Duncan should be dunked like the witch that blair had on his beastywick.
(Where’s TT to slag me orf?)
And fewer Jocks.
Jim Magilton spolit for choice up front
We Need More Muslims In Football !
Like we need a hole in the head.
And we need more non Muslims in Mosques and Islamic States
and We need better problem solvers in political dire agnostics
enough Burkes in Parliament lets have more Burkhas
Like a hole in the head.
yeah take out all those expensive leather seats & throw down some
tatty old mats,have a little islamic sing-song before each session,
chuck all the wimmin mp’s up into the ‘purdah’ gallery,
kill all the gays (we all know there are no gay muslims),
& the speaker (imam) can ban all booze & pork from the
mosque (sorry,palace).
All those grubby Tories with pots of money should pay to be MPs – each according to his means.
Yet another tribalist, incapable of looking objectively at this matter, who has to turn all of these debates into an exercise in political point scoring.
Whilst this article is about Tory MPs, the wider debate is not about one side or the other – members of all parties are on the take. The fact that you refuse to see this of your own precious party does you no credit, which is proven by your convenient glossing over the fact that the Labour benches have their fair share of millionaires too.
Yes, tribalism should be shut in a box, and left there. In a secular society religion too. There should be many more independent MPs. The system that includes whips and puts pressure upon party members to vote this way or that is quite wrong. MPs should always represent their constituencies before their party loyalties.
Tony Blair entered Parliament with a £30,000 mortgage and left Parliament with a £10,000,000 property portfolio inc. flats in Bristol, London town house and Country home near Chequers. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.
This is a bad example, or an example of the wrong thing: Tony had a wife earning something like £1m a year during this period. Otherwise he has creamed the mortgage system to the same extent as “Dave” Cameron & most other MPs.
imho Tony is more an example of how MPs should be stopped from using their political careers to launch lucrative consultancies & directorships, in his case upon retiring as MP but in case of other public servants (thanks for reminding us of what they are Guido) while still in office! Most of the Tory frontbench falls into this category.
Until the 3 main parties move away from gesture politics & take real steps to regulate their porkiness and restore public confidence I will not vote for them
If it where you or I we would only have thru’pence left after tax on the engraved carriage clock and the bus fare home.
Michael,
Tony Blair had a wife who did very nicely out of laws passed by her husband the PM, laws which more often than not favour the criminal over the victim.
I have been banging on for years and years, that MPs ought not to be paid anything at all. If you pay them, you get career poiticians – like with single mothers: the latter can be considered rather more blameless too….at least they don’t buy duck houses or have their moats cleared, or gouge on their mortgages on all the empty properties that they own.
This suggests that “Governments” not only ought to have “targets” – a Stalinist notion redolent of “5-year plans” – but that they ought actually to be doing stuff too….a terrifying thought.
I should have thought we’d learned by now that if you start with the notion that governments can properly identify the best use of resources (they can’t – markets do that) and that governments can be trusted to act in the interests of individuals (they can’t – read history!) then you will get the kind of government that it itself increasingly forces you to pay for! Like this one.
No, sorry. Stop all MPs pay and expenses right away: you will then get the right kind “entering Parliament”. Like retired old ladies who run charity shops, and red-faced Colonels and successful businessmen (so that rules out Alan Sugar…) And, moreover, resptrict the Franchise to Free-Holders. then taxes will fall, and everyone wins both ways.
You mean deploy or select MP’s like we used to do Village elders before we got paid career politicians foisted upon us villagers who act and behave like alien village idiots who represent anything other than the interests of thy village that you and yours were born in? And they decided to gave the village idiots money too – paid for by the taxes of the village workers from afar in Westminster and Europe. Who turned the alms houses into african charity shops.
Why do you think there are so many villages in need of an idiot? Most of the idiots are in Westminster.
Bankers use the same excuse for their high earnings as politicians. They feel that if they are not paid very high salaries and bonuses they won’t be able to attract high quality employees/mps. That excuse is, of course, rubbish.
Yeah, if bankers were that clever they would lend their own money; leaving out the middle man or womb. Then ordinary folk could save their money for better things instead of giving it to the bankers to waste. Costing tax payers more who then have less of their wages to buy things with off manufacturing companies who they work for to get their wages before tax.
A banker or “stock broker” is someone who would like to invest your money for you….
…until it is all gone.
http://www.angelfire.com/realm3/accord/demreal.htm
The above link is an article about what democracy is and what it should be. I only know this because I had my crystal balls polished
I absolutely agree with you, Guido.
Politicians should be paid the minimum wage to deter the money-grubbers thereby making politics the reserve of the moneyed élite such as myself and keeping out those Labour and Lib Dem oiks.
After all, what do the lower classes need money for? They only spend it.
Qvite so
Ja ja bestimmt
Stupid class war bollocks. Grow up. What we need to do is stop the conveyor belt that takes people into parliament without ever having a job, as a self-contained career path. Doesn’t mean you need to pay minimum wage, but it is clear that MPs are getting rich by playing the expenses game (Darling) or by milking their contacts and influence (Mandelson). Far better to have people who have achieved something in life and know how to manage things – there are too few of these in any of the parties.
Quite right – better than what I said.
Augeas is right, and it was better than what you said.
83 Augeas has it right, in that professional politicians who have become insulated from life eventually begin to believe their own spin.
We also need to restrict the influence politicians have on everyone’s lives by placing a cap on the percentage of national wealth they are allowed to spend or borrow.
Politicians are no brighter than the rest of the population, so they should be encouraged to work within their limitations, rather than indulge their delusions of grandeur.
I’d be a politician for minimum wage, I hear the perks are great.
Also politicians should have some knowledge about the area they are working in. How can they be good at their job when they are being constantly moved from education, to environment, to justice, to health, to housing, to foreign diplomacy etc etc. This system makes for a fiasco, one that we’ve suffered for 12 years.
“John Prescott becoming a multi-millionaire at the taxpayers’ expense when he was supposed to be a servant of the people sends out the wrong signals.”
Correct. It’s just symptomatic of a wider malaise, though: celebrity culture. Far too many people – thanks to Nu Liebour’s Socialista culture – believe they can get rich and famous even though they possess neither talent nor flair nor good looks. Call it the Jade Goody syndrome if you like. It’s completely addled the brains of an entire generation who simply can’t see the purpose of meaningful work and valid academic study. The Nu Labour years will be seen in retrospect as a crucible for a flatulent, garbage-strewn society of dysfunctional, self-obsessed half-wits.
Nulabia years will be seen as more than that after the implications of the mass exodus of talented, hard working folks are apparent.
You’ve summed it up completely, Guido.
Unlike Merv the Perv who can’t count for toffee. Another £50 billion? No probs, how d’ya want it, in cash or in bonusses? They’re all as bad as each other – too clever by bloody half. At what point does it seem feasible to just print money rather than live within ones means – more qualifications than you can shake a large stick at and still proper retards.
Camoron is a weak man not fit for purpose Bring Back William Hague !
Yes Please, we rejected him once and we’ll do it again
He was too young and inexperienced then. He is a grown-up now, unlike Cameron.
Hague would be perfect if he headed up the new, new labour party. He would be better than Blair. The Tories are pointless and beyond their sell-out-by-date. We have two choices as I see for politicians; either pro fed europe or against and independence again. Until this question is settled everything else such as employment, whatever is academic IMO.
Hague has certainly grown in stature (metaphorically speaking) since he was Tory leader. He talks much sense. But so did Blair before he became the Anointed One. It just seems no sooner do they become PM than they sell their souls to the devil. You never know what you’re voting for with any of them. The only people who appear to have any sense of true purpose and honour are UKIP and the party we’re obliged to pretend doesn’t exist (the BΝP).
An altered front bench line with Hague as leader and includes Boris j, Dan Hannon & Douglas Carswell.
That wouldn’t get them into the office of a parish council. Vote UKIP for proper connected leadership.
If UKIP had any chance og winning an election their margin would be huge but they cannot win so I ,for one , will not waste my vote .Labour must be consigned to oblivion
I’m afraid people from the real world don’t get selected Guido!
This NHS thing has stirred it up a bit – complex for us. You see we ought to tell the truth but look what happens when we do! Hmmm….
By the way Anne Main is a joke that I for one no longer find amusing.
dear, dear eileen,
I am pleased to announce that you have won the ‘understatement of the year’ award.
your following entry stole the prize -
“This NHS thing has stirred it up a bit – complex for us. You see we ought to tell the truth but look what happens when we do! Hmmm….”
the tories are fucked now innit eileen.
oh and what exactly did you mean by telling the truth? hannan was right was he?
do tell.
this is fucking gold dust to a person like me who wants a hung parliament.
fucking gold dust.
I’d like to see a hung parliament, too, matey. But not in the same way you do.
naughty naughty string ‘em up!
Please outline your own cost benefit analysis of the NHS.
But hang on a minute, let me get out of this corset before you start.
my own cost benefit analysis is this: a healthy workforce is more productive and efficient than an unhealthy workforce.
simple innit eileen.
the fact that gordon brown spent too much public money too quickly and was therefore unable to monitor the spend is another subject which covers all government departments, not just Health.
correction:
apart from the military which has had its funding cut by gordon brown.
Mps are unqualified morons, But just clever enough to feather their own nests.
Ooo you’re a typical Aries!
Yes I suppose one benefit of privatisation would be that we could spend more money on fighting battles we can’t win.
And duck!
Don’t talk to me about Anne Main MP. If there is one person who I despise less than Cameroon it is her. St Albans had to be on the new Monoloopy Board Game so we can maintain flat investment. FLAT INVESTMENT. Imo. It is no good she led the demonstration against the proposed rail freight terminal which could have employed millions of local people like the Romans did before labour got in. I can’t wait to see her lose her job as tory mp and for flat investment in the local area.
LabCon have ruined the liberal Roman economy and I want independance from europe onece and for all.
Someone was telling me all about it – something about her daughter and lodgers.
Glad to hear Dave is sorting out this loose cannon.
Dave might also want to have a word with Daniel Hannan over his abolish the NHS comments.
The NHS may have its problems, but a private alternative will always cost the most needy more than they can afford and the private sector will make off with vasy amounts of tax payers money like they do in the US.
What did Daniel hannan hope to acheive with this outburst, it hardly endears the Tories to the voters and the PravdaBEEB will be all over this.
Any more of this and the Tories will erode their competance lead on Labour
Get it under control Dave, tell the talking heads to keep their mouths shut in the silly season and let labour damage themselves instead
Daniel Hannan should be sacked for this. By merely slapping Duncan’s wrist over his comments, it shows how Dave is losing control of his party. I doubt Hannan will get severely reprimanded either.
Dave – if you read this take note.
We’ve been conservative voters all our lives, but if you don’t start showing some backbone, we WILL vote UKIP at the next election!
I agree, I hope this is not the start of a self destructive, talk yourself out of power trend.
Lay down firm, but fair policies we can afford on health, education, crime transport, immigration and we’ll follow.
Get preachy and follow ZaNuLbour executive dictatorship and we”ll vote UKIP or Jury
Why the heck should Hannan be sacked? He was telling the truth about a dysfunctional, inadequate, disgraceful system known as socialised “medicine”. It should not exist and we need more like Dan Hannan to help slaughter this most obese and diseased of all sacred cows!
Cameron needs a proper kicking for refusing to grasp the nettle and use this as an opportunity to begin the long overdue return of medical care to individuals’ responsibility.
Why, for goodness’ sake, would anyone want to be treated by a doctor who is a servant of the State, paid and forced to do the State’s bidding rather than to look after the best interests of his patient?
Your comment about the NHS makes me realise why you’re a down under.
Dan Hannon is the only real tory in the party…the NHS is not a sacred cow. It has many many faults. Much of which is caused by this meddling government. (doctors pay deals….lack of NHS dentists… to name but two)
Criticising the NHS has become the new racism. But we have every right to criticise it, after all, it’s our billions which are being thrown at it – and often wasted.
Yes – I agree with everything you’ve said, but we’re stuck with the NHS at the moment.
Dismantling it would bring a whole new set of problems at a time when jobs and livelihoods are being lost, and Hannan should have shut up about it – particularly on US TV.
Most of the staff in our hospitals are extremely hard-working and they need MP’s and MEP’s to have confidence in them, not run the system down to other countries.
The biggest issue with the NHS today is the constant governmental interference, target-setting and micromanagement. There is a huge army of box-tickers and statistics-gatherers that do nothing productive and detract from the role of treating patients effectively.
Give the NHS back to the doctors and nurses, let the patient be at the centre rather than the “system”
Oh, and why is private health insurance provided by companies taxed as a benefit-in-kind? We should surely be encouraging those who wish to opt out to do so, I would give tax relief to those who want to pay BUPA and friends rather than use the NHS!
The problem with the NHS – and it should be discussed – is not “the entire NHS”. Bits of it are good (you will be hard pushed to find better *emergency* treatment elsewhere).
Where it fails spectacularly is in its routine aspects. MRSA, incompetent/overworked doctors and nurses, untrained staff, no (medical) accountability for GPs, the GP system generally, dentists….etc
Focus on the real problems and let’s not throw the baby out with the bath water.
It’s not “new racism” to point out that in ‘96, when liebore were stealing the tory’s rejected policy clothes, they said they would reduce NHS administrators. Since 2000, the growth in administrator numbers has exceeded by far every other category of clinical staff. The outcome here, as elsewhere, is a mentality that “customers” for public services exist for the convenience of the providers of those services and their power hungry…. vain, egotistical… over-developed sense of self worth… who want to “make the world a better place” – not the other way around. Communitarianism is just another disabling, subverting, and ultimately perverting Ism.
Road works used to be run like that until Thatcher put a temporary stop to it by instituting tendering, which included time frames. Unfortunately we’re back to square one under zanu liebore, and there is only one reason – corruption. The contractors have organised themselves into local cartels, with their contacts in local government, and since the politicians are themselves corrupt, troughing, or simple idiot place(wo)men, they are in no position to point the finger.
Save us from the do-gooders. What’s wrong with being good?
24 NHS employee has a good point. We cannot go on assuming that the NHS can consume more and more of the national cake. It has the potential to bankrupt the nation and should be set strict cash limits.
Politicians are quite content to promise to spend more and more of somebody else’s money to get elected next time round.
All that happens is that we get another crisis every few years because the government cannot balance its books so they devalue the currency to escape from the consequences.
This the road to national ruin.
They’re all at it said “you would be hard pushed to find better emergenuy care”
I wish I believed this. I did a study of emergency care for acute cardiac syndrome (“suspected heart attack”) and it was clear that the NHS fell behind France, Germany, Spain or Italy (the other 4 of the Big 5 we looked at).
We had to add whole new categories of (slow) response time for the UK leg of the study, and the UK was way behind in e.g. delivery of effective intravenous antithrombolytic drugs in the ambulance if the in-ambulance ECG confirmed signs of MI. The whole level of expectation is higher elsewhere. Perhaps the UK has caught up a bit since then, but the general point is true: the NHS lags significantly behind other major EU countries in many areas.
Sad to see two Tories stepping out of line in as many days.
Alan Duncan is just a stupid cυnt who is summed up perfectly by Guido’s comments. Dave should have got rid of him immediately as it’s not the first time he’s made comments alog these lines (HIGNFY a few months back springs to mind), yet his job as Shadow Leader of the House involves negotiating to sort out the MPs allowances mess.
Dan Hannan needs to be told that he can’t say one thing for European audiences and another for American ones – his monologue at Broon rightly brought him praise and his book “The Plan” has great vision about how we can get out of the mess.
His desire to make a name for himself on these very Republican US talk shows needs to be reined in, they are extremist by any European standards and the fact of the matter is that heathcare on both sides of the Atlantic is broken and in desparate need of reform.
Well put Steve.
I understand your worries Steve. That Dan Hannan’s speeches will be used to scare the bedwetters at home. But it is precisely because the Tories were cowed into idiot policies like pledging to match Labour’s insane spending plans that they cannot now broadcast from the rooftops.
We told you so. We told you this was reckless borrowing and squandering. We told you this ‘boom’ was just a massive government spending splurge and low interest rates. We told you it would all go to shit.
Same with the NHS. Of those million bedwetters and bastards recruited since 2001 probably half a million are getting under the feet of doctors and nurses in the NHS. Working 9-5 Mon-Fri with their 35K ‘managers’ salary and corner office and parking space. ‘Facilitating’ diversity meetings for one another and such bullshit.
It needs to be shouted from the rooftops. The P45 Gods are coming and they’re coming for you, you worthless fuckers. And, with the money we save we’ll pay off some of Brown’s monumental debt.
On election Cameron should slash income tax by (say) 10% and implement a Brown tax of (say) 20% being the amount necessary to pay off Brown’s monumental debt.
Wow some discussion on Order Order. Guido will be annoyed. Even Eileen Critchley has made a come back!
I know its o/t but my threepennies worth is that its unfortunate if the truth cannot be told. BBPravda have not bothered to spell out what exactly Dan’s criticisms of the NHS were for his American audience and I guess that is the possible problem but we do not want another government of spinning liars a la Nuliebor.
Back on topic, Guido you are so right about “right calibre” of politicians. Prezza is one example, Jack Straw another. Jumped up student politico to Barbara Castle’s arsewipe to bag carrier for Bliar and now the ditherer. All the while making a “career” for himself. On reflection Pressa did work before fixing his snout to the trough while Straw doesn’t have a clue what goes on in the real world.
Lefties used to want their union leaders to get the same pay as the average “working man (now person)” got. Of course the greedy troughers who saw a union post or working man’s representative as a “career” would have none of that.
jgm2, you are completely right about the spending levels – Cameron’s biggest mistake has been to commit to NHS spending, as a huge sythe could be taken through the middle with little effect on the services provided – in fact getting rid of the ‘diversity monitoring facilitator’ types would make the whole place better for everyone.
I like the “Brown Tax” idea, would show everyone where the problems lie. Something radical like changing the 40% tax band to 50% or VAT to 20% for one year only would also work – as long as they did undo them after the year!
Non-job of the day, I came across this when looking for IT jobs, realised it was nothing of the sort but couldn’t work out what it actually is…
http://jobs.guardian.co.uk/job/891884/networks-manager/
Networks Manager
Salary; starting from £37,451 (including London Weighting)
The FTN runs a series of networks (currently nine) to enable participation by our members at executive and board level in national policy making, professional development and learning through sharing good practice. Currently the networks are professional groupings, as well as special meetings for Chairs and Chief Executives and a group for Mental Health members. In future they may well extend to other specialist groups of members. We are seeking an experienced manager to support the networks, to manage our events programme and to develop more diverse strategies for member engagement.
starting from £37,451
Steve: If you haven’t got at least a Masters’ Degree in “Creating Diverse Strategies for Member Engagement”, you wouldn’t get past the first interview, mate ;-)
I suspect you may also have to be a member of a currently-favoured disadvantaged minority grouping of one sort or another to even get a look-in…
Indeed, and there was me thinking that a neworks manager did nothing more than keep the computers talking to each other ;-)
Obama’s enemies will be delighted with Hannan’s ‘endorsement’ of the ‘dreadful’ NHS. Hannan’s scooping up so much money in Europe that he’ll never have to worry about paying for his own private healthcare.
Dave take note – I and many other Conservatives have already left the party for UKIP. The more bollocks you talk about ‘global warming’ and not rescinding labour’s class war taxes the more others will follow. If you lose well tough fucking luck I am sick of hearing the arguement that voting UIKP will split the Tory vote and let Labour back in. I vote for what I believe in and I don’t believe in green bullshit, high taxes or the EU.
Same goes here too, Dave. There ain’t no Conservative Party any more and you’re just a Blair clone in waiting. No votes going your way in this household. Right wing fringe here we come.
I voted UKIP and will do so again; because I agree with them and when asked I can be proud of wishing to live in the UK run by UK people, democratically. The NHS and any other issue can only be sorted out by ourselves not EU traitors. Listen up, Hannan. Join us or join them foreigners.
Doctors in the NHS are paid high salaries, but the service is worse. Our surgery is now closed on a Saturday. Access to a doctor is more and more difficult, and takes longer. It is impossible to get a NHS dentist since newlabour came in.
Unfortunately, Hannan is right. The NHS is a bottomless pit. Just look at the obese human wreckage infesting Britain: these are all people who take no responsibility for their own health. Why should they when the taxpayer (e.g. me) promises to do it for them?
My experiences of the NHS have all been negative, and if I could opt out and get my money back I’d do it in a flash. It’s inefficient, often incompetent, over-managed, and of course a gigantic political football that can be kicked around at will.
It will never be dismantled, of course, because it has now become a sacred cow. Critics of whatever stripe are immediately dismissed as foaming Nazis or simply mad, even though they speak no more than the truth.
Imagine if in 1945 the socialists had not only nationalised medicine but food, clothing, and heating, which are arguably just as important to one’s wellbeing. We’d all be naked, cold and starving today, and anyone who complained would be dismissed as above.
If anything is ever to improve, people must be free to speak out within the party system, and if the Tories won’t take a lead on free speech, who will?
My experiences of the NHS have, without exception, been negative, too. Its primary objective is self-perpetuation.
On the other hand my experiences of the NHS have been very positive as have those of my close family. It is important to remember that there are good and bad employees in every organisation, even dare I say the Tory party.
Anon: just because you happen to have had what you think are good experiences, does not answer the point.
The NHS exists to perpetuate itself, not to serve the best interests of patients. In this, it is just like any other arm of the State. It is a fundamentally flawed concept: it may happen to employ plenty of perfectly competent and hard working doctors, nurses and other staff but that does not make it right as a matter of principle.
I’m with Sceptic on this one the more right wing the better bollock to socialism
But it is still stupid of him to pitch in with the Republicans. The US healthcare system is cripplingly expensive – it has taken out their motor industry by imposing massive overheads on them – and leaves 50 million people without access to medical care. It’s probably the worst value for money of any healthcare system anywhere in the world, so it needs radical change, yet Dan has lined up with the dinosaurs and the vested interests.
Spot on!
Both systems are fucked but they are extremes, the best solution has to lie somewhere in the middle. I think somewhere like Canada is a good place to look.
Dan Han makes a big mistake to lavish praise on a system which consumes more public money than the NHS per capita, yet fails to provide for millions; while every night the TV is full of adverts for prescription drugs and medical-negligence lawyers – the same TV that is against reforms…
Agreed, I lived for ten years in the US. It has got a lot of good points but its health care system aint one of them. To all the fucking whingers about the NHS take it from me you don’t want to get sick in the good ol’ USof A. You can soon burn through your insurance money and then you will get a nice bill for every single aspect of your ‘care from the medicine to the pillowcase on your bed.
It will never change though as the unholy alliance of Doctors, Attorneys and the insurance companies have it all sown up.
Agreed.Most of us think that the NHS needs serious reform and that if we were starting it today from scratch,it would probably look very different.But it is here,a child of its time(government control of the commanding heights of the economy)much loved notwithstanding the moans and the public demands that it works.Cameron understands this.He must despair of Hannon.This spat is so unnecessary and so hard to defend.
The bulk of those 50m it leaves without access to medical care are those least worth the cost and effort anyway. Something the yanks are ahead of us on. If you want to continue pissing into the gene pool, funding the NHS the way it is is the right way to go about it.
hannan should have said the NHS desparately needs reforming to make it more efficient and cut waste.
But it is mad to say it should be abolished.
No it isn’t. To say the NHS should be abolished is a perfectly rational and reasonable stance to take in support of individual freedom and responsibility (and economic efficiency).
Please give one good reason why it is “mad” to say the NHS should be abolished. Please do so without raising the usual straw man that “we would all be dying in the streets like in the USA” (one, it isn’t true, two, there are many other forms of healthcare systems in the world beyond the UK and the USA).
you are an idiot.
if you are going to involve yourself in arguing for the destruction of the NHS then get your facts straight -
“Imagine if in 1945 the socialists had not only nationalised medicine ”
medicine was not and has nevere been nationalised and hannan’s analysis is entirely incorrect.
the pharmaceutical industry should have been nationalised at the same time as the NHS.
the reason people are dying due to a ration policy of medicine by NICE is because the pharmaceutical companies are profiteering from death.
nazis.
TaT is right for once! Cut out the rot save the flesh and sort out health tourism thieves with their free hospital parking from dodgy disabled badges. Oh yes, – we’ve all seen you at it and you know who you are but you won’t be reading this I bet. There’s nothing wrong with the NhS so long as its for intended purpose and not common purpose.
If we had nationalised Fizons, and Wellcome and whoever else we had at the time, I am sure we would have no substantial domestic industry (Glaxo, AZ, lots of research centres of non-uk companies), and would be buying all our drugs from the non-UK multinationals. Ni
Mamory Man I can blow your augment out of the vacume you are living in. How is it that non-NHS prescription drugs are cheaper abroad, like when you need to go to a private medic center to get an inhaler or whatever? Such as Spain or Italics
Has Mr. Hannan been paid by a lobby group in USA? His statement endorses the anti Obama faction there. The health insurance groups have a lot to lose if Obama gets his way.
The last time I had any with the NHS, I found it had been incompetent, didn’t follow its own procedures, and had staff who lied to cover their own backsides. Oh and between starting the complaint and getting it resolved one relative had cancer diagnosed and then died from that cancer, so speed was not one of its positives either.
But Hannan is perfectly right.
Governments have absolutely no business pretending to provide “free” “health care”. It’s not free, and the buggers who run it don’t care.
And yes the Beeb will scrag him, but thne what did you expect…
The whole damn spat, and the whole #welovethenhs nonsense is just cynical political opportunism by Labour.
Its their first opportunity for months to score points over the Tories, and they’re all over it, with their shiny new internet attack teams pounding Twitter, Facebook and Blogger 24×7.
And the public are lapping it up. A 5 point narrowing of the gap in the polls by the time this has blown over.
Is Hannan just saying what other Tories believe? Let’s hope you don’t need some “bugger” to turn up in an ambulance to treat you.
I didn’t realise Lord Mandlescum travelled around in an ambulance!
The only people the NHS is free to are those who have never paid any tax!
That’ll be Labour’s core vote block then (when they aren’t defecting to the Bee und Pee, anyway).
There are two bad healthcare systems: the UK system, in which patients and medics sink under the weight of a massive, entrenched bureaucracy and the American system that lets down 20% of the population and is ridiculously wasteful. There are also some very good systems, in countries such as Canada, Australia, France and Germany. They provide universal healthcare, free at the point of delivery without absurd expense or deadly central control. The obstacles to reform are overcoming vested interests and the Not Invented Here syndrome. It’s very hard to admit that the foreigners have got it right while we/the Americans have got it wrong.
It has to be run by medics – I guess we could all agree on that but then…. A local GP of mine earned over £330k last year which I don’t begrudge without further info but it’s just another client state vehicle at the moment. What incentive is there for a GP to question some lazy gimp who says they’ve got depression and then, Bob’s your uncle, incapacity benefit, social housing, never pay for a bloody thing again in their life all on the slate?
Oh, and completely forgot about health tourism – the only valid basis for ID cards.
Right on, Sir Willi. Italy has unemployed qualified doctors, yet in the UK when a brilliant surgeon suggest to the Powers that Be that they make a second operating theatre available for him, so that he could move straight from one patient to another, they ignored him until he went away. This just smacks of the old trade union cynicism which deprecated workers suggesting improvements to how things are done, because it just assisted the regime, that intolerable “exploitation” of workers by the bosses.
Show me an admininstrator with vision, and I’ll show you someone in the wrong job.
This is why the Republican side of the American debate is concentrating on the NHS in Britain. Out of all the “NHSs” in the developed world to hold up as a model, they chose the most broken one to scare people with. Obvious, innit.
But Dave hasn’t. Anne Main is flat untouchable
In the top three percent of pay and they still feel hard done by! I’ve noticed that the doctors of my acquaintance have all become much greedier and less vocational since NuLab has doubled their pay for doing less work – same with the MPs, the more they are paid the greedier they will become.
And where are the MPs of high calibre exactly? Margaret Moran perhaps Certainly not the oleaginous Duncan! Oh, I know they must mean Jacqui porn-queen Smith and Hazel squirreling-away Blears.
I have been a cast-iron voter for the Tories, but now if I bother to vote it will simply be to get rid of NuScab.
Mo Mowlam was an MP with sound principles. It’s a great pity we haven’t got more like her.
doctors get paid little compared to the price of getting a house near the hospitals in London.l
they also complete 10 to 15 years training. I do not see any MPs doing this.
You could spend years training a cat to play the trombone but it’d have as much chance of mastering the instrument as the NHS tools I’ve suffered have of doing the jobs they’re paid for.
There are a couple: Frank Field (God Bless Him), Kate Hooey and David Davies but that’s about it.
three is a crowd
James Whale got it bang on when he said that politicians shouldn’t be paid anything. It should be a priviledge, not a right, to get elected.
They should be allowed to earn money (as long as it’s declared properly and diligently) outside parliament. This would attract the people who genuinely want to serve their country and constituents, and not the power-hungry and greedy individuals we have at the present time.
I think they should be paid by their local party members and only them, they should be paid what those members think is sufficient.
What a daft argument. You want to turn the clock back to the days when only people with lots of money could become MPs. How can you do the job of an MP properly and “serve” the country and constituents, if you are doing another job outside Parliament? Only rich Tories need apply!
Not true.
There are plenty of ordinary people out there who have their own businesses, and have made their money through sheer hard work.
We need people like that. People who have been where we are and know what it’s like. The politicians we have now have no idea, since they have rarely been out of work, poor, in debt, or had their homes repossessed.
The idiots we have now are so far removed from the ordinary people of this country, they’re not even on the same planet.
So all Tories that are rich must be corrupt? There should be name for that prejudice. How about richism.
sounds good to me!.
The argument about vocational calling and other professions vs wages has ben a well run argument in medicine and nursing. Before wages were raised, the argument was that nurses did it only for vocational reasons and therefore any increase in pay would attract the wrong type. Equally, how should you exclude those who were not the right unless mummy or daddy could afford to sub them? Politicians and the public need to get real.
In the old days, Parliament was populated by folk who had private means. Their middle and upper class outrage led to the Factory Acts amongst others as they were not Gradgrinds, but did have independent means and could speak their minds without fear.
Today, the arm twisting in the central party structure means that MP’s are on the whole whip’s prisoners, and lobby fodder, which has led to a complete lack of respect for them and their acitivities. If the MP doesnt fall into line then career over and deseclection.
The pathetic argument that second jobs means little attention to Parliament and the whinging of the left on this topic has meant fewer MP’s of calibre. Dave’s gang and some Labour MP’s of the old school could survive with no MP salary, and we get public service form people who have a sense of duty and not with an eye on the main chance of salary in preferred safe seat.
All this about pay falls neatly into Grubby Brown’s pocket of preferment and socialist hatred.
is that what we want?
Auntie – a very thoughtful and set out post, if I may say. Sums up the point I tried to make (some what less temperately!) further up in these posts.
Thank you!
“perfectly set out” – I meant…! Grrr.
well said Guido, I agree completely on this.
If they care about the money they are the wrong kind of person to be an MP
1000% Right Guido > These People Are Low Life Tax Fiddling Scum Bags “The Right Calibre Of People” Are One’s Who Want To Make A Difference To Peoples Lives And Not Line Their Own Pockets I. E. Expences, Extra Jobs ,Taking Bungs To Ask Questions Etc THE Game Has Changed From What It Was In Years Gone Bye When The Ex Shop steward Or The Wealthy Lawyer Went Into It To Give Something Back .Now It Is Career Politicians Who Know Nothing Of Life Except ,Get That Degree And Make More Cash Than You Can Imagine ! IT ALL NEEDS TO CHANGE ! Less Of Them, Pay Capped, NO Expenses What So Ever, NO Second Jobs, Or Second Homes And A Set Of Rules That Are Stricter Than The Laws That Govern Us !
Hat-tip to Dirty Harry for the name!
I thank you…!
Excellent piece, Mr. Fawkes. It’s about time the received wisdom that you can only get the best “people” by paying high (compared to the rest of us) salaries was treated with the disrespect it deserves. The only reason someone wants to be an MP is that they realise they have no abilities whatsoever. This, coupled with greed and the general character of being a “little shit”, means that politics is their only option. Bastards, the lot of them!
Agreed. I think you have to pay MPs a salary so they can have NO outside business interests at all. Far too many of the fuckers taking bungs from large corporate interests for the influence they’re able to wield (Lord Mandy for example). This rubbish about ’smart’ electric meters is a prime example of the way we all get shafted when an MP caves in to corporate brown envelopes. WE end up paying for all those back-handers these craven cυnts are constantly trousering.
MPs only get remunerative directorships because they can obtain insider knowledge and because they have important connexions in the HOC. They also know their way around when it comes to lobbying. If they were not in this favoured position they wouldn’t be given the time of day!
Nicely argued.
Pay them the average wage (an incentive to improve the lot of the population), establish a network of public housing for them to stay in while in London (suitable for singles, families, couples etc) and pay subsistence expenses in line with average civil service rates.
In this way, everything about their pay and living conditions tells them they are public servants and not the public’s masters.
One only has to look at the rows of fat, unhealthy, morons on the Labour back and front benches at PMQ’s to realize that the electorate in seats they represent don’t know any better or just don’t vote.
I know we live in a democracy, but if Ainsworth gets promoted to the level of Defence Minister then it illustrates how awful other Labour MPs with lesser abilities must be.
How many times have we seen John Prescott falling asleep on the front bench at PMQ’s.
That was how interested he was in the job.
Two jags. A man who could hardly string a sentence together, stuffing himself on pies, brawling with hecklers, shafting his secretary, what a fine example of meritocracy.
Don’t forget the bulimia…….!
All those stories about Prescott’s bulimia makes me sick.
I’ll get my coat.
Plenty of fat unhealthy morons (you forgot “tattooed”) in ther electorate, not that most of them can be arsed to get off the sofa and vote.
Moderate? You’ve just pre-judged millions of Britons by their skin colour!
Spot on Guido.
If you ever choose to write a biography on Blair, the third paragraph would make a fantastic introduction!
Seeing that grinning creep and his loathsome wife on Larry Ellison’s $150M yacht, kissing and hugging their hosts like “old friends”, on the same day that eight fallen soldiers were returned to UK, turned my stomach!
Incidentally, does anyone know how many hundreds of millions of pounds Ellison’s company (Oracle) has made from the NHS since the deal signed in January 2004?
Or how about Oracle’s senior vice president of homeland security solutions, now serving as chief operating officer for the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq. Does anyone know how much Ellison’s company has made from that dirty war?
One thing’s for sure – Blair does!
The bastard!
I see he’s been told off by the animal rights people for taking a ride on a elephant.
But he saved all the ickle foxes. He did ban fox-hunting. Oh, that was just class war politics again wasn’t it.
and saved the fluffy wuffy tb spreading badgers. Ahhh, so cute.
Funny that. Since the “ban” came into force, there are more people out fox hunting in this neck of the woods than ever before. The League Against Cruel Sports and their ilk (of whom Herr Hitler, the anti-hunting vegetarian would have been most proud) have done more to promote participation in field sports than anyone.
Well done chaps, thanks for your help…
Tally ho…!
I don’t think it was so much a class thing, but an unmistakably British thing. They’re very keen on dismantling existing symbols of our nationhood and replacing them with others more in keeping with international Marxism, equality, homosexuality and Africa.
So is this disastrous NHS database system being produced on Oracle? I didn’t realise, it explains even more about Bliar!
Shame Dave’s gonna have to pay Ellison a hefty penalty with our money for scrapping the crap.
I’m sure Bliar will get his cut of that payment as well, Ossie.
That would explain Cameroon’s lot making noises about giving NHS health records to Sergei and Brin (Google) or Bill (Microsoft) – my enemy’s enemy is my friend, as in IT, so in politics.
Then world + dog can snoop on everyone else’s medical history – which will of course be garbage, as they only pay peanuts for data entry and there’s no oversight to speak of.
Morons, morons, morons.
Yes, he certainly is!
I believe Mr. Duncan was trying to address the issue of MPs having second jobs (difficult to be sure- He’s obviously a spectacularly bad spokesman).
If an MP can’t find thirty or so hours for a second job then they certainly can’t find enough time to be a minister, let alone a Prime Minister.
If an MP receives remuneration as good as he got outside politics he will be reluctant to lose it. After a couple of terms specialising as MP his value outside politics will decline, making him even more desperate to keep his seat. With de-selection now a possibility this makes him the slave of the Party leader- whereas the job calls for either independent people or MPs who are slaves to the people. The fact that the only advancement open to an MP depends on the Party leader’s favour makes things worse.
Nicely put. If MPs want more money, they should do something else. If they can’t get loadsa money elsewhere, perhaps they aren’t worth it. By clinging on to their safe seats and whinging about their pay, they simply demonstrate they couldn’t get that sort of money anywhere else.
MP’s pay should be determined at constituency level with annual appraisals based on surgery performance, House attendance, Committee representation with a separate category for ethics. Why should they be any different from the real world? They gave us performance targets and statistics up the Ying-Yang so they should abide by the same. Furthermore, de-selection should be a much more transparent results-based process, rather than relying on emotional appeals to grassroots members aka Anna Main.
Hear, hear. good idea.
And they should be made to fill out a whole load of forms in the process so they get a feel for what their legislative programmes have created in terms of bureaucracy for others.
I never thought I’d see the day that Guido became an anti-capitalist. Pretty soon he will be a useful idiot for the Left. I see nothing wrong with the idea that people should be paid what the market decides. If anything MPs are underpaid and that is including their expense fiddles. MPs pay has always been depressed because of the general backlash against MPs. I don’t see why that when higher wages work for the captains of industry that it shouldn’t also be applied to MPs. If anything low wages only seems to attract deluded do gooder, socialist statists from the Left.
The only way to get more experienced MPs is to raise the age of entry into Parliament.
Wrong. Older MPs can be unworldly too. We need MPs with real life experience. Not someone who has been working for the public sector or on a local council all their lives.
Someone with real life experience. Now, that could be a difficult one.
I’m trying to think of an MP who hasn’t got a property portfolio, and who doesn’t live in a sprawling country mansion. Not easy.
Ummm….the trouble is that you are describing Bob Ainsworth.
Doug, you have to decide whether the MP is serving his constituency or working for the voters.
If an MP wants to justify their salary by bleating on about what they could make in the private sector, they’re not suitable to be an MP. The fact that you use the tired old argument that Guido will soon be a useful idiot for the left whenever he says anything against the tories suggests to me you have a vested interest in MPs salaries.
MPs underpaid? Their salary is two and a half times the national average, but no doubt you’re another one of those people who believes that us proles don’t really matter much aside from during an election.
you miss the point doug.
public service is not a market you whore, it is a vocation.
you fool.
Knob. Ever worked as a dustman?
If that was true about the level of pay how is it that many countries pay less than the UK yet fare no worse ?
MPs are always on the bloody television or radio giving their thoughts rather than facts.
MPs just seem to exist to keep journalists and broadcasters in work, rather than working for the country.
Their party duties probably take up half of their time – the taxpayer should only fund proper public duties not time spent on party matters and all media fees should be collected by Parliament and not the individual MP.
Most of them get paid to appear on TV. Do they actually do HIGNFY for nothing, or do they donate the fee to a local charity? Discuss.
I doubt if many of them would do HIGNFY for nothing. They come across as far too mean to do that.
MPs long since refused to operate in the real world. Above inflation pension rises, while robbing the rest of us and reducing what was the best pension industry in the world to tatters. Thanks for that, Gordon. Awarding themselves massive pay rises, perks, expenses.
The culture of troughing is endemic, and over the last ten years it has got worse. Real conviction politics has long gone, to be replaced with marxist elitism, while the proles are treated with utter contempt.
There needs to be a huge clear out, but it will never happen. The Heir to Blair doesn’t want to rock the boat and has about as much spine as a limp wall flower.
Well said Guido. I am old enough to have met many people who gave their time free as local councillors, all for the good of the community. Over the years that has changed. Now, most councillors are paid agents of whichever party pulls their strings.
The same applies to MPs but with knobs on. I am amazed that people like Blair and Mandelson ever represented constituencies like Sedgefield and Hartlepool, where there is real social deprivation, but they now live the lives of millionaire playboys. What do the voters in those constituencies think? Do they think that they were used as a stepping stone? Do they realise that they were just a means to an end? Do they think ‘Was he working for me or was he using me to advance his own career?’
If things go wrong for MP’s they just change the Rules to accommodate them again.
That’s where it all went wrong. If a totally independent, outside body were to set their wages and expenses, they wouldn’t be able to cream so much money out of the system.
No surprise there, they are merely re-enacting the great communist dream; downtrodden proles kept poor, living in grey, uniform flats, rationed, monitored, punished for any dissent, while the political elite swan about in Zills, live in luxury villas and take long holidays in their dachas.
The voters in those contrituencies would vote for a monkey wearing a red rosette. They have always voted Labour, their fathers always voted Labour, their grandfathers always voted Labour etc ad infinitum.
Very little can be said that will change their mind, especially as ever more of them are now employed unproductively by the State, and see an incoming Tory government as a threat to their non-jobs.
They don’t aspire to anything. They just want everything to remain the same.
We did well under the Tories in the 70’s/80’s. It wasn’t easy but we did have the choice. At least we could work plenty of overtime without it being taxed.
Plenty of overtime was the reason I emigrated.
Massive fiscal drag over the past 12 years meant that that overtime was taxed at 40% rather than 22% – so why bother doing it…
And Heath sailed us into the maw of the European Union, swearing blind it was only a Common Market.
As far as the elecorate of Sedgefield is concerned for their support of wannabee multi-millionaire Blair,to use the classic line,”if God had not meant them to be shorn,he would not have made them sheep.”
Does Dave have the guts to go through with this one? Would be a big step but useful for public opinion and when dealing wih public sector job cuts.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/aug/13/david-cameron-conservative-ministers-pay
David Cameron is planning to make his ministers take significant salary cuts if he forms the next government, senior sources have told the Guardian.
The Conservative party high command have calculated that if they are to push through cuts in public services, their politicians have to show they are prepared to “take a financial hit”.
A pay cut would also help the party as it attempts to renegotiate public sector pay deals. One senior Tory said a cut as high as 25% was being discussed, which would cost figures such as William Hague and George Osborne nearly £20,000 a year.
nah, it’s a load of bollocks.
you are such a gullible tramp steve, you’ll believe anything for a couple of rocks of crack you crackhead c’unt.
dave is a useless fucking pothead.
face reality steve please stop living in your crackfuelled fantasy land.
choose life steve.
tat,
All that projection. R U a recovering addict? Well done if you are. Its not easy.
Everyday you post complete crap about Steve Expat and I am growing rather bored of it. You will reply to my post with a load of vitriol of your own (guaranteed) and you will go away none the wiser about how little your contribution is to this blog. I may be wrong, of course. It is possible, though unlikely, that Steve Expat is bi-polar and that you are his alter ego, in which case, you should both stop.
you must be new here stalker. thick as thieves is a most popular hero. he is rather like marmite though, you either love him or hate him. and I must thankyou so much for telling me that you fall into the latter group because it is always a great pleasure to know that I am getting up the nose of c’unts like you. thankyou. sincerely.
oh, and last thing: fuck off if you don’t like it here stalker….hold on, you hang around a place that you do not like hmm…. I’ve got it! you are alan duncan the ungrateful ponce and I claim my democracy back from untrustworthy c’unts like you.
anonospaz 1.35,
we all know that’s you anticitzen you wanker.
pathetic, totally pathetic.
SH, thanks for the support – no I’m not a bipolar tat, in fact I would rather Guido blocked his IP address like he obviously has with the Liebour cut’n'paste trolls.
there is more chance of you being banned than I you fucking tramp.
Thick As Thieves is an anti-hero who has confused fantasy with reality. We need to show him what reality is so that he can understand that what he perceives as reality is actually all made up. We need to help him to understand that he is ill before we can cure him. And this is available on the NHS as well.
yes, I am an anti-hero as far as you are concerned you fucking cripple.
a nemesis type figure, hmm, yes, I like the sound of that, thankyou.
note to doctor: the stalker patient has no insight whatsoever and we believe she has severe learning difficulties and is also suffering from schizophrenic delusions of grandeur. she is certainly a danger to herself if not others. ECT advised.
begin treatment immediately.
@Stalker hunter [354] I’m pretty sure I know steve expat from another forum, and he’s as sound as a bell.
tat, I did choose life. Life away from this stinking hole of a country.
I’ll be back when there’s a new government that cares more about the people than lining their own pockets. DC’s plan to cut ministerial pay has to be a step in the right direction surely?
cut and run, eh steve?
Yep!
Thought that I may as well get some international experience on the CV when still young and this place is in the shit. I’m certainly not the only one!
thought so steve. cut and run like a cowardly tramp, eh?
shut your fucking gobby mouth then tramp.
you are full of shit steve, you waffle on and on with your shit and you don’t even pay taxes in this country…hold on, you don’t pay tax, you live abroad and wish to stick your oar into British politics, hmmm.. I know who you are, you are ashcroft the tax evader and I claim the tax money that you have evaded paying to the exchequer.
see how ridiculous your position is hobo?
in or out steve.
you are out my old mucker.
Thick as Thieves, shall I call you Thick, or Thicky? It may help to break down the barriers between us. In order for you to get better, you must want to let us help you. Your condition may have gone untreated for too long and as such you may be a threat to yourself as much as you are to others. We should begin with your childhood. Were you disturbed as a child? Did you have nightmares, or perhaps a tendency to self harm?
oh shut up you silly old tart. you are making a right arse of yourself love.
Our office hours are 08:30 to 16:30 Monday to Friday. Should you need a repeat prescription, please enter your PIN number. Thank you.
TaT isn’t your typical Telegraph reader other wise he may have learnt to be courtious to other contributors instead of talking like a jailtime latrine janitor.
JLJ
you can’t even spell courteous you dopey fuck.
you can’t even fuck dopey you courteous spell!
A “socialist” buffoon like Prescott becoming a multi-millionaire says it all really.
Well, he’s got to keep Pauline in hairspray and eye-liner.
He’s got to keep ‘er indoors in hairspray and eyeliner.
Is that how he makes up to her for fucking his secretary?
Well – it’s a start…..
and put everything twice on expenses: two jags, two shags
Anyway why would the big fox(dave) sack the other fox(alan) for eating the chickens…its what they do stupid.
The parasite Mps and civil servants/councils on golden pensions and pay/bonus should pay for their fu*k ups when the governments are sued,why should the taxpayers always end up paying out instead of these bastards.
I agree entirely with Guido’s sentiment but, “The finest priests are poor and honest” and many of them are in the job for reasons other than saving souls I would suggest. I never did the join the other choir boys instead preferring to play cricket. Thank God I diod when the Godly were carted off to jail.
To say that the finest priests are poor and honest is correct. There are of course not-so-fine priests, as there are not-so-fine people in any other walk of life…
make your point or fuck off steve the tramp.
thankyou….
My point is that there are good and bad people in every role.
For example there are people here who add to the debate and there are people here who make personal insults
you are simply not keeping up with events steve.
it is the party system that has corrupted our democracy.
until you face that fact you will continue to stumble around in a crackhaze not really knowing who you are or what the fuck you are doing.
I am trying to help you steve but you seem to have insufficient intellectual capacity to appreciate my efforts.
the independent movement will have to get by without a crackhead tramp like you steve.
I think we’ll manage, eh?
Duncan should have got the push after the last HIGNFY debacle. He came across as mentally unbalanced and more than a bit scary.
And very, very irritating.
Severe weather warnings posted for Cumbria.
Must be the influence of Jonah Brown.
Time to batten down the hatches, then.
When is he back here? I’ll diarise it!
Great post Guido. If you want money it’s simple – you go into a business and earn it.
Should the £60-£136K salary range for should be slashed drastically, I think paradoxically the quality of people entering politics will probably rise.
It is my perception that in order to be in a really high money earning bracket, without actually owning your own business, you’ve got to be a bit of an arsehole.
Also maybe it’s just the way society is wired at the moment; if you can knock a guy out in less than 10 seconds, become famous on a reality TV show, score lots of goals in football matches, or are ugly and can sing a bit then society will pay you lots of money for it.
If you are a brave soldier, or dedicated nurse/teacher/parent, or whatever then the world won’t pay you for it. Time to redress the balance.
Oh no. We should emphatically not be paying people to become parents. That’s what we do at the moment which is why we have the highest rate of teenage pregnancies in the western world.
Whole constituencies (Labour-voting natch) with generations of single parents pushing their bastards to the Post Office in 20 quid pushchairs from Argos to buy forty quids worth of cigarettes. ‘Cos they’re ‘entitled’ to it. It’s my rights innit.
On that score where’s the incentive/reward for those of us who’ve chosen not to burden the state with children? I’d like the option of a sabbatical (unpaid would be fine) for not inconveniencing everyone else/draining the coffers by taking maternity leave. And why am I funding child benefit for those who don’t need it?
Fuck off twat. My kids will be paying your pension via their taxes.
No they won’t. I’ve paid NI for 40 years, and I’ll be getting a company pension of 20K a year (and my wife will get one of 17K).
All these lowlife windowlickers breeding like flies on a shitpile are dragging the country down the shitter. We don’t NEED cannon fodder any more, for fuck’s sake.
That’s the f*cking least they should do, anon. If they get a job of course. Otherwise I guess I’ll continue supporting them.
The single biggest change to save money on welware would be to scrap the entitlement to a house for unemployed single mothers and replace it with basic sheltered accomodation – think of a student hall of residence style building.
Make living there subject to curfews and provide a nurse, a social worker, child care, employment advisor – everything they need to be supported but no luxuries. Give them a bus pass and food vouchers but NO CASH BENEFITS, cigarettes or alcohol. If they don’t work they can eat but no more.
The aspirations of teenage girls to becoming parents is what needs to change.
Succinctly put Stu – I’ve been saying this for years now, and I’m sure we’re not alone. Such a shame that the Westminster thieves won’t do it because either:
1. They don’t want to lose their core vote.
2. They don’t have the balls because they’re scared of the political capital that those who fall into the previous category will attempt to make from such a plan.
Add something to make the teenage boys take responsibility too please. The girls don’t do it on their own.
Totally agree stu. I unfortuately live in sarf east london. On my street I’d say roughly 30% of the houses are still council/property association owned which are occupied by single mothers and their spawn. The streets a complete nightmare, the kids are feral and the mothers inbetween boyfriends fight amongst themselves ‘in the street mainly’. They have no value for nothing as everything is provided for them.
What do we do about those lowlife scumbag slags who have seven kids by seven different fathers and live off the state?
They’s have been sent to a gulag for parasitism under the Soviets.
They could be re-educated into paying prostitution?
Ok, shoulda left out parenting but you get my drift… I would include engineers instead.
By good parents I meant those not continually sponging off the state, expecting others to pay for their alcohol, fags, drugs, hair-dos, ipods, bling, pets, junk food, etc bloody etc.
While I’m on my soapbox I would like to see bogus disability allowance payments smashed as well.
My mothers neighbour gets a car every three years, and only needs to ensure he puts on a good performance once he has left the front door: not forget the walking stick and put on a suitably pained expression with slight limp. He has this charade down to a tee. There is fuck all wrong with him. Once out the back where he thinks no one can see him he moves and shakes with the best of them.
What’s more he is an annoying bastard. If he pisses my mother off once too she will shop him.
I gave up a well-paid career to be a teacher (no regrets – maybe because it’s still an option once I’ve had my fill of the education mess we’re in). Although I’m on less than half the wage I was I still reckon my pay is fine – no complaints on that score. The ‘holidays’ aren’t the bonus that most think they are as I still have to work though half of them – not all teachers do, I’ll admit – and work a 55-60 hour week in term time. So overall I get about what/less time off that many do. Plus six hours in a classroom is more stressful/draining than twice that time I’d spend in previous jobs. What does piss me off is the very Newlab increasingly top-heavy levels of incompetent Blair-speak management who earn 2/3 times what I do for doing f*ck all apart from making my job more difficult. Get rid of them and halve the education budget and we’d all be better off.
Well said – it’s not just in education either though, it’s in every state-run business, the NHS and defence…
Billions there to be saved, and would make the lives of those of the front line much more productive as a result.
DB, good on you for taking a pay cut to teach, we need more people with real experience in teaching as we do in politics
I got bored of working to swell the coffers of the already very wealthy!
Everybody with half an ounce of common sense will agree with you Guido. You summarise the issue very well and you make your comments easy to read and understand. It is certain that the way we are governed and that the people needed to change the status quo are at the heart of all our problems.
So, who has the answers and the strength character to sort it out?
Brown? No, his time has long past, he has turned Gt. Britain into Gordon’s Ghetto.
Mandleson? No, God help us and save us from this lady boy Svengali.
Clegg? No, Nice chap & articulate but leading a featherweight party.
Dave? He’s running a party of greedy has beens and must sort them out now. If he can’t do it before an election it will not happen afterwards. The country is watching Dave. Action this day or its UKIP or The Party With No Name.
Never has the country expected so much from one man BUT…………
Are you referring to Dave? I expect f*ck all, and I’m sure I won’t be disappointed.
I have this dream where Dave wins the election with a big majority and sets about implementing a whole raft of swingeing policies that weren’t in the manifesto, like cutting the civil service to the bone, chucking out all the deadwood middle managers in the NHS, forcing the workshy millions to get a fucking job (they can pick up the litter where I live, for a start) and generally SORTING THINGS OUT. Anyone with half a brain can see that things need to be done. Oh, and abolishing the benefits culture, as well.
And introducing gnss road pricing and payg pedestrian insurance and gps mobility scooter charging, toll roads and workplace parking charges.
Congratulations for this Guido. Your voice counts in this new political world where everything is up for grabs, everything but money, that is; I mean a new political landscape, where the existing politicians grasp nostalgically at what is being swept away.
Would you stand for election yourself?
Guido, can you PLEASE stand in Rutland against that cυnt Duncan.
He’s in a safe seat that would never vote Lab or Lib, it’s crying out for a well known independent to stand on an anti-troughing platform. Most of the constituents (including my parents) hate the incumbent with a passion, especially after the last couple of days, but they need someone to vote for…
Wouldn’t it be lovely to see that arrogant smile wiped off Duncan’s face if he loses his seat.
I really would pay to see that.
I know that constiuents are already writing en masse to the local Tory party Chairman, to suggest that they will lose lots of votes if they don’t deselect Mr Duncan.
If he survives that then a good indy is the best chance of wiping the smug grim from his face. Come on Guido, you know you want to…
never mind telling Guido what to do you cheeky c’unt, why don’t you stand?
oh, hold on, you’re a crackhead tramp who smells of piss, so that won’t work will it?
I think Guido might stand a better chance of being elected than I
ofcourse he has a better chance than you you silly tramp.
you are a crackhead, so you have no chance whatsoever.
you are one of life’s losers steve, I thought we had already established that?
keep up hobo!
you don’t like your own medicine, do you steve?
Talk in coherent sentences Mr. TwAT, and I may try and understand your point…
you are a tory steve.
I a merely dishing out your own propaganda to you.
and it seems to be upsetting you.
now you know how it feels, not very nice is it?
I am growing bored of you now steve, you are rather dim.
but don’t worry, I will still give you a clout from time to time.
worst retards,
thick as thieves
well said guido pay them all min wage and build a set of dorms and if they dont like they can go fuck
The army pays poorly and yet still attracts the best calibre people, well motivated and made of the right stuff
Well said that man!!!
Whats wrong with paying them for the time they (MP’s) are in the HOC, not just for turning up? (as in the EU shambles).
Where possible, fixed time for debates etc. They must turn up for “work” at the HOC for a minimum number of hours a month, No 80+ day holiday in the summer.
Do away with party whips. Their (MP’s) vote decision put on a HOC website, pref. with an explanation.
Any other time, expenses must be justified by an external non political audit.
MP’s would be fined, as we are by the IR for attempting to make false claims.
Expenses taxed as benifits in kind, That is, the same tax rules that applies to the rest of us. All perks, such as cheap booze and food in the HOC stopped.
Serious breaches of rules, corruption, fiddling, will be punishable by instant dismisal from being a member for the duration of parliament, or for life and loss of pension.
Just then we might get a greater number of honest MP’s.
I WOULD VOTE FOR A PARTY,LEADER, THAT WOULD IMPLEMENT THOSE SORT OF RULINGS.
I don’t want them doing any work. I’d be happy to pay them 64K a year to sit at home shagging their secretaries. Because then they’d only be fucking their secretary instead of the entire country.
Seriously 64K x 644 = 41 Million. Fuck all compared to the 200bn deficit their idiot policies have landed us with this year. And next year. And the year after.
We’re all fucked. So far this is the ‘phony’ recession. The presses are rolling, printing 175bn quid. And Labour wants us to believe this is all over? This hasn’t even got out of the fucking traps yet.
We had ten years of this imbecile government borrowing 30bn or 3% of GDP to ‘achieve’ a GDP ‘growth’ of 2%. Ie we’ve been in recession for the past ten years absent government borrowing. And now, even with borrowing at 13% of GDP, we’re still in recession? We are soooo fucked.
This is a monumentally fucked up situation and Labour is using every trick in the book to stave off the inevitable outcome and dump it in the Tories laps. And in doing so making the eventual outcome even worse. Pure, evil bastards.
They should hang.
This is a monumentally fucked up situation and Labour is using every trick in the book to stave off the inevitable outcome and dump it in the Tories laps. And in doing so making the eventual outcome even worse. Pure, evil bastards.
You are so right – but per my post below – does Cameron have the balls to take the necessary steps?
I fear not.
You are right, lieboure know they are fucked. They are just shitting in the sanpit now before the Tories come to play in it.
Well said TOO FAR but not FAR ENOUGH.
Make the new rules retrospective and punish all those that
have committed offences of dishonesty.
Absolutely spot on my son!
we don’t need any of them!!!!!!!!!!!!!
they are all away ,feathering their nests,cosying up to oligarchs and whoever else they think will give them a leg up ( or leg over)……
yet the country hasn’t ground to a halt.
people are still going to work,shopping or visiting the beach.
they think they are so clever and indispensible………that is totally UNTRUE!!!!!
if brown ,mandy,badger or any of the other traitors were to drop dead then NOTHING WOULD CHANGE.(except that i would organise a massive parrrty)!!!!!
spineless leeches,one and all,imposing themselves on us in the name of fucks knows what-killing our soldiers,exporting our jobs,behaving like the Stasi-whilst stealing OUR money………
wake up people.thay all need to be sacked……………and the proceeds of their crimes clawed back …the houses,moats etc…………
this country is a shithole
Agree with everything you say Guido.
The problem as I see it is “Why would any ‘normal’ person want to go into politics as it is currently structured?”
Brown is a thug, Mandelson is a liar, and Cameron is a girl’s blouse. The LibDems have no national policies, come election time they will preach one thing in constituency A and the opposite in constituency B. UKIP are a one trick pony.
Where are the men of principle with the balls to make the argument even if the message isn’t popular? Politics should be more than spin and PR – they insult all of us every time they open their taxpayer funded gobs and spout the ‘party line’ which never answers the question and is invariably bollox.
They are a bunch of self serving money grabbing nincompoops and we deserve better.
Rant over.
Please someone add backbone to girl’s blouse.
Have to disagree with you about UKIP It’s all Balls. They have policies on so much more than just their desire to take us out of Europe. I’d also say that after having heard Nigel Farage interviewed on numerous radio shows, I feel far more confident in him than any of the Liblabcons. Their website has information on their policies.
P.S. As much as my comment about their website could make it look like I’m part of their PR team, I assure you I’m not. I’m not even a member, nor am I of any other party.
I agree he is a good speaker, but those that lead parties with no chance of being in power seem to enjoy the freedom to speak their mind; to tell it as it is.
Would he be as open and direct if he had a sniff of power and had to win over the rump of the middle ground?
Or would he be like the others – all party line and spin?
You may be right, but we’ll never know until he gets the opportunity to prove it one way or the other – in the current mess we find ourselves, one could argue that no track record is a better option than either of those displayed by Brown, Mandy or Cameron.
As is often said, the big problem is that only the worst kind of people get into politics in the first place – just once I’d like there to be a party with members that are the exception that proves the rule.
MPs should live on basic rate Job Seekers/Incapacity Benefit. They will then be able to see the world from a very different position from the one they corruptly see it at present.
Guido’s view of the ideal politician is very romantic – in which democratic country in the world in recorded history has there ever been such a body of selfless, poorly-paid, honourable public servants who think only of the greater good and never of themselves and their own families?
The key is that the job, in a true democracy, is transient. The difference between the priesthood, the army and politics is that, in the first two, the job is (usually) for life or for as long as you choose, whereas in politics you may be voted out at the next election through no fault of your own, such as a national swing etc.
If you do not pay MPs well, then you will attract only people with private incomes, outside interests or sponsorship by unions and other outside organisations. I would not be averse to that (that is how it used to be, of course) but many people these days want MPs to work only for their constituents and have no outside interests.
So by all means keep them on low wages, but let them have other jobs (with full transparency, of course). It would be good for them, broaden their minds and might keep them away from the Commons and discourage them from passing reams of useless legislation which only benefits the lawyers.
Please don’t rain on our romantic parade. I can hear the death rattle of faith – all that’s left is hope.
You’ve got that the wrong way around. The death of hope comes first, as you can have reasons for being hopeful – which you find out were wrong or mistaken. There can be no reasons for having faith – you either have it or you don’t.
It’s why postmodern tribal-loving rationalism always attacks faith first – reasons (facts) it can subvert with the MSM, the BBC, the internet any time, and so manage people’s hopes and expectations (qv Santa Obama).
It’s why Blair so desparately wants (and hopes) to be saved by Catholicism. For Blair, everything can be spun, thus no fact is secure, and so there is no hope in mere hopefulness. His faith however is pathetic, in all senses of the word. It would be almost touchingly naive, were it not that he is a dangerous war criminal still at large.
it’s ironic that Blair will rot in hell for all eternity if his Catholic beliefs are correct.
I no longer have faith in democracy. I hope I’m wrong.
twenty years forging a succesfull career to fund themselves before being elected. Net result no labour government.
Yeah, but given the way they bring the country to its knees everytime they get in, that wouldn’t neccessarily be a bad thing. It’s not like they ever actually help the people they claim to be interested in giving a better deal to.
I’m not saying the Tories are much better (although I’d argue they are with the purse strings), but I do believe that we’d be in a far better position to weather the current economic downturn if we hadn’t had Blair and Brown creating a false economic boom financed by borrowing and keeping nothing aside for the inevitable rainy day we’re now experiencing.
I don’t mind MPs making a lot of money if (a) they work full-time (b) they do something useful instead of just trooping through the lobbies (c) they are more focussed on achievement than process and (d) there are no fiddles. Your MP should be a bit of a nob (not a knob). I don’t want an MP who can’t get him/herself off the council estate – what use is somebody like that?
Well argued, Guido, but bollox nonetheless.
If you take the money and status out of being an MP you will end up with
- nastly little c u n t s like Hayden Prowse, the jerk who entrapped Alan Duncan by filming a private conversation, or
- others like him who have abandoned the letter T, or
- the idle rich
The only answer is to pay them well AND let them keep their day jobs. Heaven forbid, it might even attract some normal people.
So Hayden Prowse is a nasty little c**t because he caught someone out?
I disagree – yours is the same mentality as that of a criminal who blames their imprisonment on the prosecution witnesses, rather than the fact that they broke the law.
Both things can hold true. Prowse is a slippery little c**t. He did catch out the vainglorious chancer Duncan who was a fool to have any dealings with him after the garden stunt. C**ts both of them.
Dangerous Dave delivers REBUKE to Hunky Dunky.What next? Crush a grape?
Oooooooh I could crush a grape!
I could wave a chicken in the air
I could rip a tissue.
I am Hooper, crushing the plastic cup on the Orca.
I could stick a deckchair up my nose
Oooooooooooooh I could shag Maggie Philbin
I agree, but need to add Trade Union leaders who have received pay increases of up to 20 % despite their members being made redundant or having their wages frozen or cut.
Yeah. That really is appalling.
These people are shameless traitors and should be shown as such, but they are
protected in the msm owing to the liberal, pro status quo agenda they pursue.
Even Arthur Scargill never gave up his generous pay and conditions during the strike. I know I saw his wife in M&S stocking up on treats as miners suffered on handouts.
Scargill was a useless prat who was set up as a “aunt sally” by Thatcher. He let the miners down. But still the stupid sods followed him… T
Pay peanuts get monkeys.
If the pay is peanuts doesn’t that mean that the present lot are monkeys?
Its the monkeys who gather the peanuts to pass on to the Lizards – with interest.
But we’ve paid much more than peanuts and we’ve still got monkeys.
Controlled by lizards
If I was Dave I would have given Alan a good spanking.
If I was Alan, I would have wanted something a bit rougher than just a spanking – that got boring whilst we were all still at school.
What would Thatcher have done with Duncan? I think we all know. The Tories are wets…
We need an end to Political Party’s.
The main three are a cartel of crooks all working to cover each others backs & maintain the status quo at all costs – & of course stop any real democratic opposition emerging. Pravda BBC are an enormous help to the main three & the status quo – they have a vested interest in the three way power split in Great Britain.
When they have done fleecing us here off they go to the EU to fleece us some more.
I agree entirely. Political parties, and their control over MP’s futures, have brought us to the current situation.
Alan Duncan’s complaint about MP’s conditions of service indicates the true feeling at Westminster; “go away little people, we decide our pay, not you.”
Political parties that control MPs and professional politicians need to be outlawed. Political parties can be banned simply by using current “terrorist legislation” ( think Iceland here). Professional politicians can be reduced by limiting them to two terms only.
We do not need professional politicians. We need MPs who put the good of the public before their own interests.
None of the existing parties fits that bill.
Perhaps it is time to initiate a Royal Commission into the Governance of Great Britain and the Role of Political Parties in Parliament including the EU.
The Royal Commission on the Defence of the United Kingdom in 1859 could be used as a yardstick!
It is significant that Queen Victoria supported this Commission and that it forced the resignation of William Gladstone, then Chancellor of the Exchequer.
This all leaves me Un comfortably numb!
The whole argument is a canard; parliament is increasingly powerless and subservient to the eu, whilst we conjecture the number of angels that would fit on a pin head – the real business is done in Brussels and Strasbourg by unelected federalists who are bleeding us at a rate that makes our own mps look like amateurs.
For example, If a company were to ‘outsource’ its functions to a third party the remaining employees could reasonably expect redundancy, part time employment, and a loss of status and pay commensurate with the dimunition in responsibility. This is what is happening with the relationship betweeen the eu and Westminster and is an argument worth raising Guido?
I was just going to throw up my arms in despair when I decided I couldn’t be arsed.
Not sure this argument particularly works in Alan Duncan’s case, Guido? The man’s worth a fortune and took a massive cut in pay to become an MP, so I’m not sure you can justifiably accuse him of troughig when he’s made himself poorer in becoming an MP.
Also, couldn’t this, “do it for the inate reward of the work, not for the pay” be applied to doctors and nurses too? Why pay them at all?
He’s in it for his ego, then, not his wallet. Every time he opens his mouth tells you that – if he doesn’t need the money he still thinks he deserves it. The preening bellend.
I do not believe for one minute that AD has “made himself poorer”. He (allegedly) made his millions from oil, and from being a lawyer.
If he could make more money in the private sector, why would this man have become an MP? Look at his clothes, shoes, etc. He always has a tan. This is not a man who buys his outfits off-the-peg, and flies out on holiday economy class with the rest of us. He is extremely high-maintenance.
If he is constantly going on about how his high-flying lawyer and banker friends make more than he does, can he please fuck off and go back to being one of them?
My sentiments exactly.
Of course, the other side of the coin could be that his high-flying lawyer and banker friends couldn’t wait to get rid of the snivelling little shite.
Please call his bluff and see if he can re-enter the banking/legal market?
But, he most probably wants to be an MP for the holidays, and it is after all only a part time job for most of them.
Nurses especially are not paid £64k, plus tax-free allowances! If they were, I’d agree, but they’re not.
We’re witnessing many more doctors become less interest in patients than the money that they earn. Look at the ever increasing number of doctors who now do their GP training compared with before the salary-hike and reduced hours…
Doctors are catching up to where MPs currently are…
All things considered, 36 barrels still seems to be the most sensible and effective option.
Boom….er……shanka!
Churchill had to write books topay his way in life as his salary wasnt enough.
Was he the right kind of politician?
Margaret Thatcher (for all her faults) never claimed her salary in all the time she was PM.
That tells me she was in the job because she really wanted to be and not because of the monetary trappings which go with it. I have a great deal of respect for her because of that. Pity Gordon doesn’t do the same.
That is a matter for conjecture. I offered him peace and there needn’t have been total war – but he insisted.
Peace in exchange for what? The slaughter of anyone who didn’t fit in with Hitler’s view of “the master race”. Bravo, take a bow for being this weeks most ignorant piece of shit. Not related to Goebbels by any chance are you, because with propagandist bullshit like that, it wouldn’t surprise me.
Even if meant tongue in cheek your comment is disgusting – you obviously don’t know anyone who had ancestors that either died fighting in the war, or in one of the concentration camps intended for….well anyone who the nazis took a dislike to really.
Get a sense of humour the comment was tongue in cheek. If it upsets you why not go back to Labourlist with all the other losers. Now fuck off.
I’m not a labour supporter you fucking prick – I’ve never voted for those scumbags in my life, but I am someone who had great aunts and uncles (on one side of my family) murdered by the nazi regime, and other relations (on the other side) who died serving their country and I personally don’t think it’s particularly funny. What the fuck have you ever done for anyone?
If I were a labourlist lover, do you really think I’d be adding the (pre EU of course) comment, given how much those idiots over there love the EU. Use your fucking brain you utterly ignorant and thick moron!
Now YOU fuck off and get your facts right before you start throwing around insults.
AH, you’re always upsetting the rest of Europe! I wonder if ‘the rest of Europe’ feels as hot under the collar regarding comrade Stalin.
Absolutely I do – probably more so given that Stalin killed far more people than Hitler did. The pair of ‘em were both murderous scum.
You seem to be labouring (pun fully intended) under the misconception that I’m a steaming lefty – trust me nothing could be further from the truth.
I thought you Labour people loved benign Uncle Joe and his fully managed economy and state. Whats a few Gulags between friends?
You really are a fucking prick aren’t you Nick – I’ve already said I loathe the Labour party, I’ve never voted for them, and I’ve never supported them. You are just an ignorant little gobshite, incapable of even reading what other people actually say.
The fact that you accuse someone of being a leftist just because they object to a childish comment made makes you as much of a piece of shit as all those fucking pricks in the Labour party who accuse any one who questions them of being prejudiced in some way. You have the cheek to accuse me of being a lover of Stalin, when your accusations clearly prove that you’re far more of a fan of dictators and the lies they spread about those that disagree with them than I could ever be. You’re a waste of fucking organs.
Learn to read you fucking simpleton, and learn that just because someone doesn’t think all of your bullshit is funny, doesn’t automatically make them whatever your diseased little brain thinks they are.
having thought about it , 2o grand is the avrage wage , so pay em 20 grand , a hostal for mps nearby and no 2nd homes for minsters ( they do get grace and faver homes right )
I think the senior Cabinet Ministers get Grace-and-Favour accommodation, but some have sub-let theirs and pocketed the money.
This isn’t right. If they do not want to live in the property themselves, it should be let by the country and the proceeds put into the country’s coffers.
something just poped in my head , with all the new technolagy we have ,do they all need to be in london ?
No. I don’t believe they do have to be in London as much. They could certainly work remotely for some of the time.
Going to London must be a good earner. You get to sit in the HoC, for which you must sign for attendance; a good, and very subsidised lunch (with wine if required) at the Commons Bar, and after that the world is their oyster.
Nice life.
164 – “do they need to be in london?”
I think much of the problem is that most of the Hoons aren’t – how busy is the HoC not during PMQs? If they are, they’re probably out shopping and claiming it on expenses.
or in comittes covering up the goverments mistakes
Absolutely correct Guido!
There are many in public services working quietly on very low pay, some volunteer their services with NO PAY at all (or expenses).
Are MP’s saying people such as these are worthless because they are not highly paid?
MP’s in the majority have proved themselves not fit for purpose, overpaid self-important and 60% redundant.
The taxpayer can no longer afford them its time for a clear out!
Low pay will do it very effectively.
I don’t think they are saying people are worthless because they are not highly paid.
I think AD was saying that MP’s are grossly underpaid for what they do, and are worth much more. He didn’t say exactly how much more, though, did he.
Can someone remind me of exactly what they DO do and, more to the point, exactly what they DO pay for out of their own pockets?
I know that dustbinmen earn about £14K and what they do is hard work unloved, not respected and absolutely essential. An argument for them to receive better pay and conditions would be acceptable and be a good comparator of value for society. Their work is not and cannot be outsourced to Brussels. Give them a swap with mps and let them see what work and pay really is.
Eamonn Holmes was a dustman for a short time on one of the many reality TV shows. He always sings their praises on Sky, telling us how hard they work.
As (I believe) most of the wheelie bins are emptied by contractors now, their jobs fall into the private sector, so they’re treated like most of us on here.
I, for one, would love to see an MP (like Alan Duncan) empty a couple of thousand bins for a time.
Watching gmtv recently I overheard Andrew Castle and Fiona Phillips sympathising with a dustbinman for some reson I can’t remember. What caught my attention was the unblinking compasson they poured out for this poor man as he he only had £900 per week to live on. It was not a slip of the tongue as I incredulously watched them repeat the error before moving solemnly on to the next item. His actual salary was of course £900 per month.
$900 a week eh? Probably chicken-feed to Fiona and Andrew.
Hi “as little as possible methinks”
Some good points, but I do agree with Duncan to a certain degree: why would anyone high calibre want to work for £64k? That’s a quite a drop to me, and I’m only a middle ranking corporate whore. I want my politicians to be top quality individuals; and they aren’t going to work for £64k, and not even whatever a Cabinet Minister gets.
Where I do agree with you is that politics attracts self-serving egotists; it always has done and always will. If we raised the salary for MP’s we’d just get a higher grade of tosser representing us. I think the only type of people who I’d really want to represent me are people who have done well in business, made their money and want to give something back – fingers crossed they wouldn’t be money grabbing, power hungry egotists because they don’t need the money. However experience tells us that that hasn’t always been the case (duck houses and moats spring to mind) and it’s hardly representative of the electorate as a whole. It is preferable, in my opinion, to careerist politicians with zero real world experience – look at that brainless twat Tom Miller’s selection as PPC and his childish arguments on Labourlist for a great example.
It depends on what you mean by high-calibre.
I had a reasonably high-powered job, but without high-powered pay. I started at the bottom of the scale and worked my way up. It took me 17 years.
I would have gladly worked for £64k. I could have retired after 10 years.
You have a narrow definition of high calibre. What about the overwhelming majority of perfectly intelligent reasonale taxpayers who would find £64K a big increase. Someone from their ranks to represent them, like for like, would be better than some glory hunter who has happened to make money. I am reminded of a definition of business, and therefore successful businesmen must be exemplars. Business – the ability to extract the most amount of money out of something or one without resorting to violence.
I AM one of those reasonable taxpayers who would have found £64k a big increase.
My salary was nowhere near that for the hours I put in.
I have a friend who works in a small Collage in mid Devon, he is an ICT tech on 15K. and has a first class degree. His manager has no IT qualifications and has been there allot longer and as he says is self taught, and on double the salary, he recently talked the Head and governor’s into spending £1500 on some new equipment he said was essential when £500 was all that was really needed, but as my friend said the manager wanted the new toy. Paying double has not got value for money for that collage, and it is replicated time and time again.
Longshanks and shelling-out are nearer to correct on this one than Hedley Lamarr. There are a great many people of intelligence, long training and experience doing vital, complex jobs throughout society for a great deal less than £64,000 per annum (I speak from personal experience). If you have a better-paid doddle of a job, good luck to you; but count your blessings, you are truly fortunate – and don’t ram it down other people’s throats, because – believe me – they will not respect you for it. I would also advise that you do not regard it as a job for life – if it is in the private sector, the recession could bite your employer at any time, and high-paid contributors of little are the most likely of cost savings. If in the public sector – well, after the next election you had better be sure that your contribution to public benefit is substantial. The public purse is empty.
I take onboard the points made by Longshanks and shelling-out; I work in the City and I suppose it’s a bit of a micro-climate compared to the real world outside the square mile. On the downside I could be out on my ear tomorrow if things get any worse; or they figure out how to shift my job to India. And I’ll probably die of a heart attack by the time I’m 50.
A report on R4 the other day made me laugh, the editors put in a piece to try and make us feel sorry for our poor victimised mps. Apparently some of them are being shunned in the street and one was subject verbal abuse whilst competing in a charity fun run. Fellow joggers passed by and asked if he was running to make sure he could get home in time to fill in his expenses.
Oh, excellent. The poor dear. I’ll bet he was a bit traumatised……:-)
Fellow joggers passed by and asked if he was running to make sure he could get home in time to fill in his expenses.
…and that’s a problem for what reason?? I think Mrs Blears now knows what the public think of MPs, a lot more of them will find out at the election
A few more re-designing of MP’s cars is called for I think…..
They should set an example and use those little electric cars Mandy promoted. I can just see Brown being shoe-horned into one of them with his security staff, secretary, etc.
MP’s are forgetting that they are responsible to THEIR electorate NOT the Party line. I enjoyed the Totnes candidate that was put forward by the electorate in Totnes, no matter which side of the political track they came from. Hence the backbenchers are keeping the higher political elite on their toes. This is when the Whips come in and use their bully boy tactics to enforce the party line. This enforces the thugs higher up the political food chain and deminishes the electorate who put the MP in Parliament.
Get rid of this thuggery and we will start to get the right power in politics. Get rid of the connections to lobbying groups who also side step the electorate and PAY for ownership in politics.
Dave’s start in Totnes is that, a start, to get politics back on track for the electorate.
Jest or not, remarks about living on rations are not acceptable when our elderly are living on less than the free food that they claim for.
Agree. Our MP has a voting record over 10 years of always voting with the party line.
Often in defiance of the wishes of his constituency. To me this means he is not an MP,
just a party stooge doing what he is told. Thankfully the spineless whimp is standing down at the GE.
ok lads look at it this way we get just over 150 grand a year on ecb contracts , after the new tax comes in that will just a bit more than a mp gets without expenses , we spend half the year going from hotel to hotel playing crciket , is a mp worth 64 grand a year ? do they spend half the year away from there families ? no , so why am i paying more tax than a mp ? when you think minsters get 140 grand a year ( just under the 50% rate ) and have fucked up the country , fucked up our troops , is this rewared for failure ? i know one thing , its not cricket
freddie, you forgot about all the sponsorship and endorsements adding quite a bit to your income, and of course the Indian money you’ll be taking from next year.
Outside football and F1 you’re the best paid sportman in the country!
i was just going on basics salary ie i didnt include mps expenses ( which if i am right ) they dont pay tax on , i will get taxed on all my earnings and i havent fucked up the country
and another thing people will pay to see me play , who would pay to go and watch gordon , dave or nick week in week out and follow them round the world ?
I’ll pay good money if you can hep stuff the criminals next weekend ;-)
and steve the ipl money was auction ie what the market wants to pay
Too true Guido, too true.
Spot the Conservative Party radical amongst this group of people, who wants to revolutionise how politics works:
http://www.parliament.uk/about_commons/house_of_commons_commission_/members.cfm
No I couldn’t either.
Douglas Carswell for Leader of the House
Ah, but Freddie – I don’t believe expenses are taxed. Nice little loophole, that one.
Guido. You’re getting hot. That is one of the finest political introductions for a blog debate I have ever read. I’m sure it would be just as good if not better if you delieved it in person at a Party Conference event. I’d pay good money to hear you speak.
The typical MP is a lazy, talentless,hypocrical,corrupt,mandacious,self-serving and otherwise unemployable. Most of them should be behind bars. Either that or estate agents.
…or used car salesmen.
well said
Or lawyers.
ambulance chasers
Career politicians, especially the sort who started off as shouty, lefty union reps, are best avoided. They try to apply the principles of trade union managment to parliament (fleece the workers, live the high life)
AKA Eric Pickles?
Two-jags and Gorbals spring to mind.
The best bloke to be in the commons is Daniel Hannon – see his interview on FOX tv on youtube. Cameron you are an absolute twit and me thinks you rather threatened by Hannon as he speaks the truth.
He’s not in the commons, that is why he is allowed to blow off like a sixthformer all the time . If he was in the commons he would tow the party line to keep his snout in the trough.
MEP’s have a much larger “trough” from which to feed. Look at Michael Cashman. His “expenses” run into hundreds of thousands of pounds.
He’s an MEP (Hannon, I mean).
Any relation to Hannan?
Arlene Phillips to be Government ‘dance tsar’
what sort of fuckwittery comes up with the idea of a “Dance Tsar”????
stress is one of the major factors in weight gain, tax causes stress
Brown should fuck off and go and work in some Hamburg fetish bar where he can play out is fantasy lifestyle
not his biggest fan ?
Totally agree. The Government has got us into an unbelieveable financial mess for which the next generation will also suffer yet seems more preoccupied about trivialities like dancing and writing on Twitter. “Give the masses bread and circuses” whilst they fiddle is now the policy. Cameron is no answer to our massive problems given his decision on Alan Duncan, showing he can no longer be trusted to keep his word. 65% of conservative activists believe Duncan should be sacked.
Oi, Hamburg doesn’t want the fat creep.
I don’t think there are 646 decent people left in Britain who could be trusted to run the country. What you pay them is irrelevant.
sorry , i disagree , our parliment is shit and our mps and lords , but our country is great and has many millions of decent people in it
Well how come its going down the shitter and the millions of decent people are doing sweet FA?
its the culture , bad parents , bad state , benifits depenedecy , no motivation to better themselves , its down to the parents
Freedie @ 232 you seem to be contradicting Freddie @ 227??
what i am saying we think the shit parliment means we have a shit country , its not true , the reasons why we have 4-5 million out of work is the hardcore , have only known that way which comes lack of motivation , which comes from bad parents
OK Freddie, if you are right, what are the other millions doing? Keeping their heads down, pretending it doesn’t exist? I’m starting to think its terminal.
most of the counrty dont give a hoot what the goverment says , so will have no effect on the country only by holding them more to acount without the spin , lies and smears will the people listen , then we might get things going in the right direction
Unfortunately, Freedie, its not the millions of sheep that count but the few self-selected arseholes who have sold out Britain. The thing that really puzzles me (and I’ve worked at the highest levels of Govt and in the private sector, and seen enough) is I truly don’t understand why?
its the end of a cylce ala 96/97
There are thousands of decent people left, Pensioner.
Trouble is, we didn’t go to the right schools, and we didn’t have the right parentage.
There are probably many of us out here who could do a parliamentary job much better, but we’ll never be given the chance.
The moral lesson the populace have seen for the last 50 years is that greed,corruption and deceit is the route to the top in politics,MSM and corporate business. Is it any wonder that so many people behave in a similar fashion?
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again…
People who want to become MPs are exactly the type of person who should never become and MP – egotistical, power-hungry…etc
People who would never want to become and MP are the ones you would probably want – uncorrupted…etc
i could be minster for culture lad
i appear to be typing “and” instead of “an”… too much beer… or not enough… I forget which.
you could be eduction minster with that lol
‘Guido wants politicians who are motivated not by the prospect of personal enrichment, but instead by the honour of being elected as public servants.’
And what honour would that be? Politicians as a group are routinely ridiculed by commentators such as, well, you. So, it is a bit rich to claim that some status accrues from public service when you spend most of your time attacking politicians in general. You clearly do not think that it does an individual any credit to get involved in politics and you don’t think that they should have much money either. If your views were widely held then it could not but have an effect on the type of people who go into politics and it would crazy to pretend otherwise.
There is no doubt that the recent expenses scandal has shown the appalling behaviour of some MPs and there is also no doubt that some MPs have not understood just how angry people are. The crooks should certainly be driven from office, but someone is going to replace them and that person will be making critical decisions that affect all of our lives. Let us try to ensure he or she is not a clown, eh?
Excellent post .
I would also say that misrepresenting your own beliefs to follow popular opinion is more damaging to politicians than any dodgy expense claim (in my view anyway) . It undermines everything our system is based upon and makes voting little more than a lottery for the non-tribal amongst us .
Douglas Adams had a good take on the current Westminster inhabitants:
- One of the many major problems with governing people is that of whom you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them: It is a well known fact, that those people who most want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it. Anyone who is capable of getting themselves into a position of power should on no account be allowed to do the job. Another problem with governing people is people.
That is all very wise and paradoxical but in practice somebody has to do the job and we have made some progress since the days when it was left to some inbred egotistical lunatic in an ermine robe…..wait a minute, that could be Mandy…..but we need some practical suggestions, not just “it’s all terribly difficult”. Guido’s solution is to keep MPs poor, so that it will attract honest and dedicated people. I fear that would attract too many who were either just power-mad or wanted to exploit their connections to make money on the side. (Ferdinand Marcos was on a very low salary).
Unfortunately, Imelda wasn’t!
The actual job of running the country is not particularly difficult, the civil service has managed it reasonably well for decades.
What is difficult is selection of peoples’ representatives, their conduct and terms of office. We get the politicians we deserve. If we choose to believe the lies that candidates spout, we should not be surprised if the lies continue when they are elected.
If we swallow the fallacy that politics is difficult to understand and should be left to “professional politicians” we should not complain when they do things which we disagree with.
A whole industry of of support from special advisers to lobbyists has grown to ensure the status quo remains. During the time people felt quite comfortable, no-one could be bothered to protest or object to Westminster. Times have changed, people are taking notice, but existing practices are so well entrenched that they will prove difficult to move.
the real reason why we have shit mps , is that they a squeky clean for most of there life , i would like to see people who have gone of the rails ( even if it means they have been in prison ) i mean they keep saying we should give people a 2nd chance but if you wont let say a ex drug addict to stand for a mp to offer his expertise on how to help drug addicits then maybe we might just get better laws ?
I couldn’t understand why the guy (his name escapes me) who hacked into the american government computer system wasn’t offered a job by them.
It seems to me that it would be far better to have someone, with his obvious acumen working for you, rather than not.
thats what i mean , get real people who have been though the health/ justice/ prison system who have real experiance with the systems and dont have to rely on briefings , but this wont happen anyone with a crimanl record ( if i am right ) cant stand for mp or wont be allowed to stand
MPs/the Elite, no criminal records? My, you are a sheltered man.
Those who make it to the top almost certainly have serious blackmail material. Think of Operation Ore, D’blane etc.
Psychopaths like Blair, Bush, Brown… will be controlled by their ‘indulgences’. Ranging from the minor, Bush’s skipping Vietnam service, going AWOL from fighter pilot duty, through family pull, through to serious shit with kids.
The last thing the elite wants is a righteous guy with his own mind. Wake the fuck up.
Gary McKinnon is his name. If he were American he would undoubtedly now be working for them – but because he is a forigner they feel the need to throw the book at him, and our supine government feel the need to maintain that relationship with the US to be more important than the protection of one of its own citizens.
By the way, what he did was look for blank passwords or passwords of “password”, “default”, “admin” etc. He is an embarrasment to the people who set up the US military IT system, which is why they want to make an example of him.
Thanks for that, Steve. I wasn’t quite sure of what he actually did.
#wehatethefactthattheeconomyisinruins
#wehateunelectedlordsrunningthecountry
#wehatefightingwarsonthecheap
#wehatetheunemploymentfigures
#wehaterisingcrime
#wehateferalyouthsrunningrampage
#wehateourpisspoorPM
#wehatetheunelectedcabinet
#wehatefallingbehindthefrenchandthegermans
#wehatenulabourspin
Maybe the problem is the electorate rather than its representatives.
How about the Heinlein solution: no vote until you’ve served a full term in the armed forces?
Why the armed forces? What about all the other positive contributions to society?
Who else is prepared to come home in a body-bag for the sake of the country?
Why disenfranchise those of us unable to serve in armed forces, but able to contribute to society in other ways?
It’s a simplistic, rough-and-ready, fix and would have the Commission for Equality & Human Rights foaming at its collective troughing mouth; and Mrs. Pankhurst turning into Whirligig Emily, alright.
But, the way we’re going, we’re more likely to need a new Cromwell and a Newer Model Army to rid us of the New World Order.
Off topic, but the search facility on my Internet Explorer seems to be as two-bob as our Parliament when looking for posts by name under Guido’s unique system here.
Anybody using IE8 yet without totally cocking up their computer?
I assume your posts are intended to be tongue-in-cheek, but they do come across as rather arrogant and sarcastic.
The armed forces cannot operate without equipment and rations. Are the people who design and construct the equipment, and those who grow the food, lesser people? Are the people who keep society supplied with the day-to-day necessities, who build businesses and provide jobs, who care for others when they need it, lesser people? Do you seriously believe that people in other walks of life do not risk their lives for others on occasion? Why should they be disenfrachised?
Shelling-out, below, mentions National Service. I believe Heinlein’s novel revolved around such a limited period of service, subject to extension in emergencies, being the minimal requirement for full citizenship. There’s no mileage in extrapolating on what was not included in the original work of fiction but the armed forces need all the ancillary expertise which you describe.
Heinlein’s theme was that, when push comes to shove, everybody who votes fights.
You could always choose to turn on, tune in and drop out instead.
Do you mean National Service?
Guido, I notice you have not changed your “Quote of the Day” for quite some while. I cannot blame you as, in the current circumstances it surely must be one of the most fuckwitted utterances that anyone, at anytime in History has ever made with Jam on it. It deserves to be on display for generations to come.
i wonder does guido keep a archive of his quotes of the day ? and what would be the top ten ?
The real problem seems to be the idea that the expenses were USED for personal enrichment through abuses – a problem we wouldn’t have if MPs were paid properly. I can’t imagine it would be too easy running two homes and all the other additional expenses that go with being an MP without the additional cash provided by the allowances. Why not simpyl pay MPs a straight £100k and do away with all the allowances, except staff and office costs?
Bugger paying them £100k. Far too much.
Why not have the country buy the constituency homes and the elected MP gets to live in it whilst he is in office.
That way, they can never make a profit because the house belongs to the country, rather than the MP.
If properties are left in the sort of state that Mr Parnell’s flat was, then it is the tenants responsibility to clear it up and leave it ready for the next elected MP.
Simples.
why not pay them £64 income support and tell them to fuck off
Oooooh. I wish…..
What’s with this obsession with ‘paying them properly’. What they get at present is adequate and you know it is.
Re-read Guido’s piece.
If all or most of our elected representatives and their assorted hangers-on were to drop dead today, life would go on pretty much as it always has, albeit at a far reduced cost.
I have just received this e-mail from a G. Brown – is this part of the progressive New Labour fiscal policy.
“I have deposited your Visa Card with our local FedEx Delivery
Services offices. I’ve paid the insurance and delivery charges, but a safe
keeping fee of US $198.00 is required before the package can be delivered to
you. You must pay this fee to authenticate your delivery address.
Mr. King does not know the contents of the package;
for security I’ve identified the contents as African magazines.
The Visa Card has been loaded with US $800,000.00 from the Bank of
Scotland and its PIN is 8876. Once you receive the card, you can use it at
any ATM to withdraw up to US $20,000.00 per day.”
this is a joke right ?
I went to a an American public hospital once. It was very clean.
Why are the BBC running this Hannan thing as the main headline on every news channel? Why are a list of Labour Mnisters coming out of hiding (nowhere to be seen for the last 3 months) and on hand to give them interviews?
Why are the BBC allowing all of them to claim this is secret Conservative policy with no challenge
This is a total non-story, as much of a relevance as Hannans address to Brown in the EU parliament – how come the BBC did not run that 24/7
Yesterday we had the Duncan non story, why has Pravda moved into election mode exactly?
Andy fucking Burnham ‘Camerons nightmare’ repeated 16 times in a 5 minute exchange, fuck off.
The BBC is labour’s PR arm. No point in complaining…they are pravda, plain and simple. If The Boy Dave had any balls he would make sorting them out one of his first priorities. But he won’t..he’ll be seduced by the showbiz luvvies and things will carry on as normal.
Not necessarily – he might just be Henry IV Part 1 waiting to become Henry V.
If I were “The Boy Dave”, why would I want to gloat about sorting the BBC before I’d sorted it? Not even hoodies are that thick.
The other night when the lead story on BBC News at 10 was the rise in unemployment – not one Labour MP appeared on screen to defend their policies or pass comment.
The next item was the Duncan (non) story which they reported with barely disguised glee.
Now today we have this.
‘The BBC…this is what we do’
You have more chance of being killed by NHS treatment than passive smoking
You have more chance of being killed by a police officer than chain smoking.
True. My father went into hospital for acute colitis. Not life-threatening, but he died 3 months later from a secondary infection, which we think was MRSA, but it wasn’t on his death certificate.
Getting him any form of treatment was a nightmare. Consultants were never available, and Doctors and other medical staff took an age to get to see us.
Getting his morphine dose increased took hours, even though my father was in severe pain.
In the hospital’s defence, the staff were very stretched at that time. I even helped nurses to make beds as patients were coming in constantly.
From my experience, and I don’t know what it’s like in the rest of the country, my hospital was/is in dire need of more staff. Some days, I don’t know how they coped, but they were always cheerful and worked very long hours.
Places like this are run on the goodwill of the staff – nothing to do with government at all!
Go to the NHS website where you can now rate and comment on your local hospital…have a look at some of the comments about cleanliness, staff attitudes, shortages of beds etc….there are huge problems in the NHS and most of them are caused by NuLabour diktats and mismanagment.
Thanks Rat. Will do.
The NHS has huge numbers of staff, but most of them are sitting behind desks or in meetings, if they’re not taking their annual 9.5 days of sick leave or going off on a jolly.
Even on the wards there seem to be a lot of staff, but little evidence of any organisation. They all seem to chase about like mad getting nowhere.
You have NO chance of dying from passive smoking.
You have NO chance of dying from passive smoking. It’s a WHO scare tactic used to enforce the smoking ban.
You have more chance being knocked down by a London bus than being killed by a terrorist. (I exclude our own state’s terrorism).
I am sure Mandelson is in politics for the right reason. Paying off any mortgage he has; seems to be his main aim. I understand he has cleared the 3/4M morgage of his M+ home.
Well we wouldn’t want him falling behind with his payments, now, would we.
BBC Pravda have really opened up on the Conservatives today.
Seems like a concerted effort co-ordinated from the bunker to discredit & stigmatise.
Why the Tories do not go on the offensive I will never know. They are cowtowing to the BBC daily now & allowing themselves to be forced into “un-Conservative” positions.
I don’t really care – I am not voting Tory anymore.
I hope the BBC tears the Labour Lite “Heir to Blair” Cameron regime to bits.
The Boy Dave is making the biggest, and most basic mistake in politics: he wants to be liked by everyone.
Meanwhile, Pravda will carry on being anti-tory and pro labour…while Dave frets about his Guardian chums and sucks up to Polly.
Maybe Cameron let Danny loose to say what he wants,any PR is good ,it’s keeping Cameron in the public eye and will help the polls especially when the Liebour attack dogs go after him and our unbiased Pravda does it’s usual unbiased reporting.
Fucking Hell Prescotts on now, he been doin a respons on Yoootoob
Luckily i’ve got a wide screen tv.
When presscott inevitably gets a heart condition and is told to loose weight before he gets treated will he hit the salad bar or go private?
He’ll have to have a reinforced bed.
Prescott tossing the salad? The unspeakable in pursuit of the inedible.
What would be interesting would be a public enquiry into how our politicians become so wealthy in office – historically ‘the left’ seem to have had a great deal of luck. That leftwing blowhard Aneurin Bevan ended up with a farm, as did Sunny Jim Callaghan. The Kinnocks and the Blairs we know about. Mandelson, of course, can be read like a particulrly muky little book.
tit
Actually, that’s quite a good point. I think delving into Lord Voldermort’s financial past would be extremely enlightening.
Years ago he used to write a column for The Daily Mirror, that wasn’t very enlightening, most of it was rubbish.
One of your best posts, Guido. Well argued, and most thoughtful people would entirely agree with what you say.
Quality of comments and debate this morning very high, too.
Is not Sir Christopher Kelly compiling his report into MPs pay and expenses? If so, might I add my thoughts, for what they are worth?
MPs remuneration should be above the average wage, but not stratospherically so. The ideal level is one which gives a reasonable standard of living to those coming to politics from another high-paid background; if they wish to maintain a high-rolling lifestyle, they may do so by falling back on their accumulated wealth from their previous career. It should also offer a reasonable salary to those coming to politics from a more lowly background, so that they can maintain a decent standard of living.
I believe that the current salary of £64,000 is about right. A family can enjoy a fair standard of living, without outrageous luxury at public expense, and without undue worry at how to pay basic bills. People would not, hopefully, see this level of remuneration as an attractive career choice, but as reasonable recompense for public service. Higher salaries, say £100,000 or more, would become a target for the plain greedy careerists. If they want that sort of money, go and earn it elsewhere.
It will be interesting to see what the Kelly report recommends.
i thought the idea is to be able to serve your country not line ones pocket
Exactly. The remuneration should be such that those without personal wealth can still afford to give service as an MP, and those with personal wealth receive some recompense for earnings they may have made otherwise. The current salary is, therefore, about right. It opens up the chance to serve to the majority of the population, not just those with private resources or sponsorship by other organisations.
Over 1000 pounds a week without getting your hands dirty, where do I sign up.
Me too.
There may not be actual dirt on your hands, but politics is a dirty business – just look at Mandelson and Balls.
However, blood on your hands (like Blair and Brown) never washes off
199 of our finest are now dead, last night another 3 soldiers……
…………..whilst McStalin & his cabinet of war criminals are on holiday.
Not one of them has made any public comment on these latest sacrifices to the vanity of McStalin & New Labour – let alone stood on the tarmac & paid their respects to these fine young men.
That’s the problem.
An MP said that if they were to send a representative to a funeral, there may be incidents.
I know what he meant, but what a cowardly thing to say when our soldiers are giving their lives.
shelling-out, any idea which MP said that?
I’m sure they can be shown the error of their ways by their constituents, as happened with Mrs Blears ast week…
I can’t remember if it was on Question Time, the one on BBC2, or the Daily Politics.
Sorry – can’t remember the name of the bloke either. He was reasonably young though (30/45).
politicians are so full of their own importance, were in reality they are only there to express the views and concerns of their constituents. the government takes advise from the highly paid brains in the civil service on how best to slice the cake so £64000 is far to much to pay for what is basically a messenger.
If you think you can do better, put yourself forward as a candidate, either with the party of your choice, or as an independent. The independents have their best chance in decades in the next GE.
Personally, I won’t. I don’t much like politics or politicians, I just accept then as a necessary evil; the least worst of political systems. Besides, I don’t like London. So, I’m left with voting for somebody else to represent me.
at this time anyone that is honest and put the good of the country first would not last five minutes. the system is totally corrupt. a way of bringing these thieves into line must be found.
Man goes to the doctors because he can not get his wife pregnant. A week later he is seen in a local pub dressed in a brand new white suit, new shoes and a new shirt. A friend asks for the reason for his new look, he replies ” if the doctor says I am impotent, I am going to look impotent!”
Very old Black Country Joke
Fat, very drunk businessman picks up a hooker in a grim West Midlands town. They repair to a hotel room, where, despite deploying her full repertoire of erotic titillations, she fails to get so much as a twitch from his flaccid todger. Exasperated, she cries: “Whassamarrer wit yow? Is yow impotent?” “Course I’m impotant, I’m the Mayor of Dudley!” came the indignant reponse.
brown tracked down near Keswick…who ate all the pies?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1206463/At-little-plain-sailing-Gordon-Brown–goes-boating-holiday.html
Caption contest guido?
some good shots of mcsporan-brown looking casual and relaxed.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1206463/At-little-plain-sailing-Gordon-Brown–goes-boating-holiday.html
I believe that particular pleasure craft is the Cleveland Steamer
How much do you think it would cost us if we asked the good people of Keswick to keep him there?
I wouldn’t inflict him on the people of Keswick, they’re decent people in the main. How about Rockall?
Is that Gordon’s Zimmer?
Sell Barbour shares!!
One has deep sympathy for Derwent Water. It deserves better.
At least there is very little ice at this time of year on Derwent Water, so much safer for everyone that I get a little practice in here!
She has half-inched poor old Footy’s duffle coat!
Any chance of a Dogging Tsar?
Another position for the Dark Baron!
It was offered. I however, am Lord High Cowing Tsar.
but let us not become obsessed purely with MPs wages and expenses.
it is not that our MPs are being underpaid, it is the rest of the civil service and public servants generally are being overpaid.
the wage of the PM must be the highest wage paid to any public servant and the wage structure of every public servant must be dragged down to that level.
oh, and I also believe we will need to introduce a 90% tax on all bonuses paid to employees of publicly funded organisations and bodies in order to stabilise the public finances.
that tax should continue for atleast three years with a view to being extended for another two years. we can then take a view on whether to continue or abolish the tax.
it is the only way.
I wouldn’t want to give Gordon another penny piece.
He’s ruined our economy so why we should give him more money is beyond me.
He isn’t worth it.
fuck gordon ‘afghanistan’ brown he is a war criminal.
I have no respect for that idiot. but I do have respect for the office he holds.
and I think a British Prime Minister should be paid atleast 250K a year.
nobody should be paid more than that and all other salaries must be downgraded accordingly.
’tis time to cut the useless fat of excessive top end salaries and expenses and bonuses.
the savings created could initially be used to pay of the states debts and then to improve front line services.
that is how you run a successful budget.
it will be tough for a couple of years but then we will be stable.
and another saving can be made by declaring a moratorium on all fines to be paid to the EU. we cannot afford to make such luxury and untenable payments to a corrupt organisation like the EU.
that would save Britain over 5 Billion Pounds over the next five years.
such savings here and there will accelerate this country’s path out of the recession.
There are all sorts of problems with that.
You may be able to downgrade public sector pay to a point, but public sector workers will not take kindly to that. Remember, we are talking about Governance Officers, Clinicians, Doctors, Nurses, Council workers, and Executives alike. You think things are bad on the railways now? If there was another General Strike, things cold get even worse than they are at the moment.
You would not be able to dictate salary bands to the private sector at all. That’s why government have had no luck with the bank bonuses. They can ask, but at the end of the day it is up to the employers to decide. If this was forced there would be cries of discrimination – which could well apply to the above paragraph as well.
The money you saved would be spent in Court as people were paid compensation for loss of earnings, which would probably amount to far more than £5bn if you take into account the legal fees (and extra Court time) for each of those people.
I’m afraid we’re all just going to have to bite the bullet. It’s not going to be pleasant, but there is no other way out.
public sector workers are retiring all the time. never mind this reform bollocks politicians are always wittering on about, natural working rhythms can allow a clear out and renegotiation of salaries.
I am not talking about low wage frontline services; this policy would be started from the top, so you overstate the complications. the unions would see the logic and benefit of such a policy. indeed it may well be possible through this approach to honour the wage claims the unions are demanding for lower paid workers.
any problems can be overcome. high level members of the civil service are on very thin ice(war crime collaborators).
but any issues regarding the implementation of such a radical programme will not achieved by the current corrupt mob of politicians sitting in parliament. we will have to wait until after the next general election before any progress can be made. and that progress may well be made by independent candidates untainted by corrupt party thievery and bribery.
the only reason we are waiting for progress is because gordon brown is a selfish c’unt who wishes to cling on to power until the very last minute.
not for the benefit of the country but for the benefit of gordon brown(war criminal/torture facilitator).
that is the bottom line. labour must kill brown and quickly.
note to labour party: kill brown now.
there is no other way.
I’m not overstating the complications, Thick.
Most of these high-powered executive you speak of have Contracts. If any company, private or public, were to break their contracts, there would be hell to pay. Look at the debacle over Sir Fred Godwin’s pension.
To say the Unions would see the benefits poses another problem. Most of their top men are on huge amounts of money. Look at what Arthur Scargill was earning during the miners strike. They won’t buy it – and at what level do you start cutting salaries? This could affect thousands of people.
If high-level civil servants are allegedly war criminals, then there has to be hard evidence to back this up.
It’s a good idea in principle, but it really isn’t as easy to implement as you think.
contracts need to be honoured by both sides.
I would say that many companies supplying services and goods to national and local government are not honouring their end of the bargain and a good lawyer could unpick many of these bad deals for the taxpayer.
which brings us to the issue of PFI contracts. I suggest a good judge would come to the conclusion that PFI contracts are nonsensical documents which cannot be understood due to their intentionally complex formula.
as they are not understandable they therefore cannot be enforced because it is impossible to establish at any time whether the contracts are being fulfulled.
I think we have stumbled upon a very large saving here shelling out.
the termination of bad value contracts will save the taxpayer billions.
excellent work.
well done.
contracts need to be honoured by both sides.
I would say that many companies supplying services and goods to national and local government are not honouring their end of the bargain and a good lawyer could unpick many of these bad deals for the taxpayer.
which brings us to the issue of PFI contracts. I suggest a good judge would come to the conclusion that PFI contracts are nonsensical documents which cannot be understood due to their intentionally complex formula.
as they are not understandable they therefore cannot be enforced because it is impossible to establish at any time whether the contracts are being fulfulled.
I think we have stumbled upon a very large saving here shelling out.
the termination of bad value contracts will save the taxpayer billions.
excellent work.
well done.
Contracts for supply of services are one thing. Employment Contracts are quite another.
I do agree that more savings could be made within the supply side, for instance; we hear of electricians changing light bulbs in hospitals and charging £400 to do it. These sort of things should be stopped immediately.
Once a Contract has been signed, and the “department” is tied to that company for however long the Contract states, they (the department) would have to prove that the company in question had not met its Contractual Obligations, and back it up with evidence. If the company had changed the lightbulb, they would have met their obligations. It’s up to the accountants/lawyers to thrash out the costs and the fine details well before the Contract is signed. Otherwise the whole thing is a farce.
I wonder how many of these companies have some sort of affiliation with government departments – and exactly how those departments choose the companies they employ.
I suspect there are many PFI Contracts. Getting out of them will be difficult, even in a Court of Law. Remember – these people in government are top lawyers/accountants who get paid very well. They will have dotted all the i’s and crossed all the t’s. They will have to prove that the Contract is bad value, if the laws they have created allow them to.
There is never any shortage of applicants even for unwinnable seats, their work requires no special training or aptitude and in fact we would all be better off if there were fewer of them passing fewer damn silly laws. The cheeky sods not only want to boss me about but to be paid handsomely by me for the privilege.
Well said, Guido.
Daniel Hannan should tell the chinless toff to fuck off. If that middle-class metropolitan liberal thinks we are being served well by those superannuated self-serving plodders in the NHS he’s nuts.
Lord Snooty should have the balls to take on the argument with the bone brained British public and “educate” them on the true cost of public sector inefficiency & ineffectiveness. Wet fart.
Bang on.
Hannan is being targeted for two reasons by Pravda BBC:
* He humiliated McMental
* He has spoken the truth about big Government – once Government has the reason to increase its size, its power & its influence over every facet of our lives they never vote to reduce that influence & power & size.
Reagan knew this 20 years ago.
Hannah as Tory leader may tempt me back to being a Tory voter – but whilst we have this Blue Labour “Heir To Blair” sad caracature of a Tory in Cameron I won’t.
With all the incompetence, sleaze & utter fiscal insanity of Labour it begs the question why is the opposition on the backfoot?
mad para sir,
I agree with you wholeheartedly on many matters but on this issue you are allowing your hatred of brown and the BBC, which I share, to cloud your view on hannan’s position. hannan is correct on the EU but on everything else he is a fucking loon.
and regardless of your view of the NHS daniel hannan has single handedly and in one sentence torpedoed the conservatives chances of a large majority after the next general election.
that means a hung parliament which I believe would be the best way forward for the country.
with the greatest respect you have simply got this hannon thing totally wrong. if he was anti EU he would refuse to take his seat.
he wishes to take his shilling and piss in the tent. no principles, that is his problem.
bit like dave really.
I entirely agree with you, Guido. Politics should not be a field one enters in order to make money.
“”The army pays poorly and yet still attracts the best calibre people, well motivated and made of the right stuff”".
That used to be the case Guido.
A look into who is leaving the Army today & why will tell you a different story.
And the numbers are startling, inspite of the young unemployed being tempted into the Forces now because of the recession.
Once the trust between the Government & the squaddie / professional soldier in the frontline is gone, & it is gone completely now, the dis-integration of Britains standing army of professional soldiers is upon us.
Maybe this was Labours plan all along – to remove the professional British soldier & destroy the moral & fabric so that there is no opposition when it is incorporated into the EU Rapid Reaction Force.
Labour have thrown our lads lives away in – is it 6 or 7 wars since 1997? – all of them un-necessary & not one of them for the primary purpose of the British Army – defence of the realm.
199 and counting… says it all really
It’s not just 199 though is it. It’s their wives, children, fathers and mothers, friends, and colleagues. That must run into thousands.
All those people whose lives have been destroyed. This government has a hell of a lot to answer for.
It’s also the countless thousands that come home injured and unable to work again – the ones this sick government was in court against last week trying to reduce their payouts. Disgraceful.
With career politicians, especially highly paid career politicians all you will get for your money is lobby fodder. And a lot of them. Highly paid robots who just repeat and support the party line. How could you expect anything else?
Well said, Guido. Duncan’s had his chances, his bloated sense of self entitlement and loose cannon mouth risk damaging years of work by Cameron. Duncan should have been sacked.
I am in need of a shit, does anybody know which government department I need to contact and/or do I have have to fill in any forms?
Process through the usual channels.
Can I help?
**BBC Have Your Say Alert**
Labour are manufacturing an anti-Conservative backlash around the NHS on BBC Have Your Say, disgracefully claiming Labour have cherished the NHS whereas Conservatives want to dismantle it.
it is all hannan’s fault the gobby c’unt.
he only went and just lost the conservatives the next election.
innit.
hung parliament, here we come!
excellent.
well done hannan.
good cripple.
It’s not that bad, but it needs Cameron and the Conservatives on the case – now!
I’m in BUPA because I am afraid of the NHS
dear, naive auntie flo,
oh yes it is that fucking bad love.
yours etc
tat
ahung parliament would be an excellent outcome….but this lot will do some grubby deals to leave Con or Lab back in. A Clegg/Broon administration?…god help us.
Anyway,given our financial state at the moment,can we actually afford to run an NHS on the scale we do? The answer’s no because Labour are already planning ‘efficiencies’ so this is a non-event.
Good luck to Hannan. I would rather we had political parties where people are allowed a personal view point ,rather than parroting party messages blindly a la new Stalinists
BBC has lost a lot of its touch in current affairs since zanu liebore told it to self-flagellate in repentance for Gilligan. It’s forgotten that to catchee monkey you have to go slowly slowly. It has become agenda-driven – to the extent that I listen to Toady and all I hear is agenda after agenda grinding away, with the real bits of news slipped in between, like “throw-away” adverts between the programmes. Its “packages” are built on stereotypes of people and positions, which is small wonder when science is reported on by history graduates. More and more people are noticing this game the BBC is playing, even if they can’t put a label on it (simulation).
Polls will tell whether all this BBC crying Wolf over the old bogeyman is likely to make a difference to voting intentions. I doubt it. People will ask “who’s Hannan?” “Oh, some tory MEP the american right have taken a shine to because he talks like they would like to shoot”.
David Cameron is weak.
He surrounds himself with men who have never done an “honest” days work outside politics.
He is unable to deal positively with his lying and thieving MP’s.
He is unable to deal with Duncan.
The front bench is made up of shallow, self serving, impressionable, weak, not very intelligent people.
The only ray of light is Hague. Behind him are the likes of Davis and Redwood.
The Conservatives as we see them are a pathetic group without a single coherent Policy. Not one. Time they moved over for the real Tories to gave a go at getting these morons away from ruining our country further.
God help us all. I’m a Tory voting UKIP. I don’t see anyone else credible.
Why not just vote for another 14 years of the Labour dictatorship? That’s what a wasted vote for UKIP effectively is.
What is the difference between the current Stassi occupation and an “administration” run by Cameron?
I read, see, hear not a single PROPOSAL. Not one from Cameron and his hopeless, useless crew.
None whatsoever!
You can put your x wherever you like and nothing changes.
When is all this nonsense over MP’s expenses over:
You cannot be THAT dumb. Are you mad?
Dave my old hoody hugging friend.
Please listen to all of the opinions being directed to
you about your apparent weakness .Show some strength
immediatly boot out of the cabinet Dunkin Doughnut DUNCAN
and others that have shown contempt and dishonesty.
You are losing thousands of potential voters each and every
day you display further weaknesses. You had it all sewn up
and now the stitches are all coming undone.
Don’t you want to be Prime Minister for Fucks Sake?
Actually the Army are quite well paid. An MP gets the equivelant of a Lt Col salary, which sounds about right to me.
http://www.armedforces.co.uk/armypayscales.htm
How can you compare an Army Officer with an MP?
The Officer has been selected through a very tough procedure and is a leader of men. He will be morally upright too. He is required to have a minimum level of intelligence. He is obliged to do what he is told by his Senior CO. He will be told to live in many different Countries/locations and to move his family with him at short notice. He lives in sub standard housing which he can never purchase. He may be required to give his life in the Service of his Country.
An Army Officer at Lt Col or Higher Rank will never “make” the sort of money a typical MP can trough.
You ought to be ashamed of yourself for making the comaprison. Liars and thieves are not permitted in Her Majesty’s Service.
Most of the army aren’t Colonels or above and they do not get paid well. Mps should be considered the equivilant rank as a Corporal and paid accordingly.
I am not comparing MPs with Army Officers in terms of their moral values, but Guido stated that the Army is poorly paid. I am just taking issue with that.
As for sub standard housing that he can never purchase, again that is not true. Annington Homes, the company that owns all the UK military housing stock has been selling army quarters at knock down prices to army families since about 1997.
As for whether an Army Officer at Lt Col or Higher Rank will ever ‘make the sort of money a typical MP can trough, that too is bollocks. A two star general is on well over 6 figures in salary alone, never mind the staff car, driver, possible a cook, certainly a batman as well as an Aide de Camp and most likely a substantial house for which he pays a peppercorn rent. He will also take advantage, no doubt, of the Boarding School Allowance that pays up to two thirds of school fees of your choice, regardless of the total amount.
I do not begrude the Army any of this, but it is important to get the facts right. It is also important to remember that soldiers do what they do because they enjoy it, and for the money.
I am not comparing them in Moral terms, but just pointing out that the army is not poorly paid.
Why should he have to ‘deal’ with Duncan, Duncan may be a soggy arsed self serving venal twat, but in that regard he is no different to the majority of MPs, he was caught saying something on a secret camera, follow anyone, especially MPs around with a secret camera and I am sure it would make for very uncomfortable viewing (Mark Oaten especially)
To listen to Mandelsson, who i believe once spent a years average salary on flowers for his office, pontificate about ‘rations’ and ‘hardships’ opened up an obvious line of attack?
Why not attack him?
Duncan was NOT followed around, he mouthed off to a bloke he had invited to meet him. I expect better than from a someone in his position.
As I’ve said before, Duncan is not a very good judge of character. How can he be a good MP?
It was Duncan’s own fault. He deserves to go for such an astonishing lack of judgement. Of all the people to say that to he had to pick a campaigner highlighting MP’s corruption. How can we trust him to run a serious department if he can’t handle a simple thing like this. Is this the sort of thing somebody of “high calibre” does?
Duncan has done enormous damage to Cameron who no one can believe now he’s let him off the hook ,betraying all his angst and fury over the expenses issue. Who can ever accept that Cameron is telling the truth now?
I can’t see how Mr Cameron can be seen as having the integrity required to be an honest, fair, Prime Minister as he supports Mr Duncan and his personal albeit public views on expenses and salary. DC You have blown it and will continue to emit gas from your unsealed exhaust system. You can’t get thicker than a thick thief twitter.
Yes I agree. Cameron continues to `blow it` by his continued irrational support for the obnoxious Julie Kirkbride MP. Duncan is yet another example.
I agree with all of Guido’s words!
Your all mad if you vote for Cameron after his slap down of Hannan.
Hannan is starting to seem a bit of a nutter and Cameron was right to slap him down. Pandering to the crazy anti-NHS mob in America has lowered my opinion of him.
Pravda have just been itching to get Hannan since he humiliated the Primne Mentalist – & them.
I remember BBC Pravda very reluctantly covered the YouTube sensation when Hannan bitch slapped McMental.
There is nothing nutty about stating the facts – small Governments & low taxes are what make wealth – not over arching neo socialism / marxism as espoused by Red Labour & Blue Labour
Cameron is too camp to slap anyone!
Bet Duncan enjoyed his slap down yesterday.
I hugely admire both Cameron and Hannan. However, I baulk at Hannan’s ultra right views which are unelectable here. He gets a bit carried away with the heady Republican ethos when he’s in the US and starts bashing the NHS and other UK holy cows, he needs to recognise that some of his views do not match those of the majority of his partry or the electorate – he needs to cool it.
Having said that, Dan Hannan did a bl**dy brilliant job on Brown, you almost forgive him anything for that. Just please cool it a bit, Dan.
He did do a good job. But he’s spoiled all that by his outburst on american TV. He really should learn when to keep his gob shut.
Maybe Mr Hannan is getting ideas way above his station?
On Fox News they said they hoped he would be Prime Minister one day. Frankly there’s a better chance of Hattie Harman taking over. If Hannan thinks America is so great and Britain is so bad why doesn’t he emigrate there.
Rubbish. He’s simply gets a bit carried away, as anyone would, while basking in the heated adulation of millions of Republicans who are begging him to be their next President. The GOP love Dan’s eloquence, his patriotism and his stunning Brown basher of a speech as much as we do. He simply needs to cool it on the ultra right stuff.
Cameron is going after the pro-europe vote now that Labour have lost it.
A Labour bloke stating that Hannan is un-patriotic – there are squaddies overseas right now who must be laughing at the bitter irony of it all.
Burnham – what a tosser. Has he been mentored by Balls by any chance?
He’s a first class twat he makes me baulk everytime I see him around town, I swear he wears mascara as well.
Frightful chap really.
It is bloody outrageous for Labour to suddenly . The thought of five more years of this ‘patriotisim’ is enough to make me wanna emigrate. However Labour is right, Hannan shouldn’t be mad-mouthing Britain for the gratification of a bunch of crazy Yanks. Hannon is being unpatriotic – but Labour is taking the piss if they think that they ARE.
Anon:
Brown’s having a breakdown in Kirkaldy, or where ever
His minions need a smokescreen
Duncan and Hannan have carelessly set themselves alight
What’s needed is a nulab fire of equal intensity – preferably at Brown’s bunker.
HEAR FUCKING HEAR
In the U.S. Mayor Richard Daley the First of Chicago used to say that in politics you could have power, or you could have money, but not both.
He had power, but relatively little money when he died. The clerk of Cook County, where Chicago is located, died with hundreds of thousands of dollars stuffed into safety deposit boxes, but had no power at all.
This lot seems to want to have both. What we need are honest politicians who want to be paid an honest wage for doing an honest day’s work. No more, no less. Let’s have politicians with power, but no snouts in the trough.
Well said, Guido. I agree with every word of your post.
BTW, Dave hasn’t really been very tough on him, has he? So much for a zero tolerance attitude to tory MPs who are only in it for what they can get.
Oh Fuck is Hannan another dickhead
Dear All
Guido says;
“High Pay Attracts Wrong Type of MP”.
With ‘low’ pay we get Gove, Osborne and Brown!
How much worse can it get?
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
How much worse can it get?
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
Well you could stand for office you utter tosser.
WTF do you think you are anyways, asswipe?
Best regards
Dear Mad fred 2 para
Thank you for say I should stand for public office.
It has been said before don’t you know.
As to your question WTF do I think I am?
I am a humble Glaswegian pottering about the place with a world famous blog, the Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University.
Read it and weep biatch.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
the EU will slit your throat george. you think the brits are bad.
keep talking your self to the gallows.
you idiot.
Dear All
Speaking of mental, here is a funny story from the provinces.
Desperate Scottish Tories have decided to try the Chloe Smith approach to see if it will work in Scotland.
Ruth Davidson is a first time contender who has been a party member for less than a year; she is their fresh newbie candidate in Glasgow North East.
So, it looks like it is being billed as a battle of the Beeb by the press but less everyone forgets in Glasgow East, the Tory Candidate, Davena Rankin pulled 1,639 votes, only 6.3% of the votes cast.
And that was with parts of Glasgow East being affluent areas.
In Glasgow North East, there isn’t the same situation for Ruth Davidson to work with, it’s hard core Labour all the way.
Ms Davidson has been endorsed by Tory leader David Cameron; he also endorsed Davena Rankin and she got wiped out, could it be he is a jinx?
Cameron said;
“It is great that she has pledged to fight a clean and honest campaign. Politics is about winning arguments, not smears and fears”.
Given reports elsewhere about Ms. Davidson’s background; she doesn’t have an option but I am sure that others will cover this in great detail.
Annabel Goldie, Tory leader in Scotland said;
“I look forward to this by-election. There are no no-go areas for the Scottish Conservatives in Scotland”.
Or votes, or support or like Annabel.
So, what are the Tories doing here?
Well in the bigger picture; they will be trying to get more votes that the Lib Dems and be angling for third place. If the Tories poll fourth or worse than that it would be a disaster for them.
Of Ms Davidson background she says;
“I’m from Glasgow, my mum and dad are from Maryhill and Merrylee, and I’ve worked in Glasgow most of my life”.
Not much of a bio but I am sure she will fill in the blanks in due course.
Then to show she has a sense of humour she added;
“So, being from Glasgow, why am I Tory?”
In Scotland I am sure that only God knows and that will run like wildfire through people’s minds.
“Well because I like what David Cameron has to offer and I think the Labour Party has taken this great city for granted for too long and has nothing new to offer”.
The Tories haven’t anything to offer Scotland!
“Every hour of every working day 70 Scots lose their jobs. It’s the Conservatives who have the new ideas. We secured the reduction in local rates for 150,000 small businesses”.
Actually, the SNP brought forward Small Business Bonus Scheme which was one of the key SNP Government Policies.
On the law and order front she says;
“We are pushing for prisoners to serve the sentences they are given”.
What if it is a miscarriage of justice?
“We want a drugs strategy based on abstinence, and a presumption of prison for people who carry a knife”.
In others words, not very realistic on drugs and the SNP have already said that there should be a presumption of prison for knife carriers but the sentence should be determined by a judge.
On her education policy she is completely unaware and out of touch; the Conservatives will never have control of local education as it is a devolved matter to Holyrood.
She wants to campaign on a devolved issue in a Westminister Campaign?
Is it because she knows she cannot do anything about it?
Where’s the logic in that, where’s the new politics?
If she is fighting for third place; she will have to do considerably better than this.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
So what you’re essentially telling us is that the chance of a Tory win in Glasgow is approximately zero percent.
Thanks for that George – not sure if we’d have worked that out without your riveting commentary on the subject.
What do you do for an encore, tell us there’s no chance of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad receiving an invitation to one of Benjamin Netanyahu’s grandkids’ barmitzvahs when the time comes?
Dear Anon
Statswise it isn’t zero percent but it is very low.
And she has a bad haircut as well, potential vote loser there!
Finally; you Tories are so ungrateful.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
Ah, good ol’ Georgie boy – anyone who questions him must be a Tory, and probably eats babies in their spare time right?
Do you really expect anyone to read a post so ridiculously long? Are you for real or are you just some kind of parody? – I thought at first your name was Lard.
Dear Anon
“Do you really expect anyone to read a post so ridiculously long?”
No; I understand that a certain section of the public can handle a few sentences.
I hope this is short enough for you.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
The above comment is available at all good book stalls.
Dear Chronic
It is and also on the world famous Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University website.
Plus music to listen too.
I have commented on a paedo story today.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
Hannan is an unpatriotic prick with a smooth line in self promotion and a fucking, great European expense account.
Line him up with Duncan and pull the trigger.
Daisy’s let the country down by limpdicking around on this.
hear hear.
Nonsense! Hannan for Tory Leader!
Dear TAT
“the EU will slit your throat george. you think the brits are bad.
keep talking your self to the gallows.
you idiot”.
What a horrible person you are.
Ever thought of joining the Tory ranks, they about to take charge of the Westminister trough?
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
grow up george.
a good and mutually beneficial settlement with the rest of the union will serve scotland better than being fucked up the arse by the EU, no vaseline. they will take everything you have george. you better start nailing stuff down now.
try and be less party political and concentrate on the national interest innit.
oh, and I am independent of any political parties and as I think david cameron is a totally useless pothead c’unt the chances of me joining the tories are significantly less than you joining the wankers.
I hope that clears things up for you george.
Hey Tat,
why you always talking about doing people up the deaf and dumb?
Is there a story we should be told?
Spot on Guido. Duncan outpouring and Dave’s reaction just re-enforces the view that most MPs are two faced greedy so and sos.
Salary, IMHO, is about right but, as an example when they are going to cut everything else, their salary should be reduced by at least 10%. Expenses, allowances and any other remuneration should be cut right back to a level at which a poorly paid individual who wished to become an MP would be just about able to do so without incurring significant financial problems. This should be paid universally as the sole allowance and be variable depending solely on the relationship between the constituency and Westminster. Then we might see real conviction politicians with fire in their bellies and some experience trying to run the country.
It seems to me that the more we remunerate our politicians the worse and more useless they are.
Sorry Guido, you are wrong on this. Halve the number of MP’s, pay them a good wage to attract the very best, and have a recall vote to hold them to account, and ban second jobs to remove undue influence. The current salary will not attract the best candidates.
Alan Duncan! Its a question of judgement. To invite this guy for drinks on the terrace shows a singular lack of jufgement – not for the first time – showing he is not fit to be an MP let alone a key Cameron aide. It also refelcts bad judgement from Cameron.
Guido, if I may say so: one of your best pieces yet. Politics should be a vocation.
Yes I agree. And a commitment. Commitment politics wouls eliminate most of the careerists.
[...] Grove takes Timothy Kirkhope MEP to task.4. Party Lines has been eating out at the Gay Hussar.5. Guido says high pay attracts the wrong kind of MP.6. English Parliament Online on a national day for [...]
Great post Guido – you’ve nailed it.
We should have MPs motivated by public service who have already made their way in the world and are therefore in a position to lead by experience.
Totally agree. Guido’s hit the nail right on the head.
Alan Duncan says MPs are “treated like s***”. If my wish were granted he would be…literally! The sooner we flush Tory turds like him out of our parliamentary system, the sooner the stink of corruption, hypocrisy and greed would leave the corridors of Westminster Palace.
http://rhubarbandgrumble.blogspot.com/
[...] of all, Guido is right. A political career as an MP should be considered an honour and a privilege. To serve in such a [...]