O/T DDay for Brexit..well sort of...

[Scum-Triumphant]

What tremendously dull lives you must lead to give a flying feck about what someone else thinks about brexit.

All that matters is what you think. Not a millionaire that you’re unlikely to ever meet.

[great_fire]

I have met him, before he got "woke".

[Scum-Triumphant]

He speaks about it all the time.

[sawmiller]

He speaks about it all the time.

A cursory glance at this site will quickly tell you he’s not alone in that case lol

[great_fire]

He was pretty normal before he went to work for the BBC, can probably say that about a few people though

[millmoormagic]

I don't see how this data can say what they are saying and yet you can still leap to that conclusion?

I think i can, he's thick

[millmoormagic]

Ah, the 1970's, when you could afford to buy a house, have an annual holiday, your mrs could stay at home and look after the kids if she wished, work 5 days, have two days on the lash and still put a bit away, and not be burdened with massive amounts of debt.....yep, terrible terrible decade.

[KerrAvon]

It's not my job to negotiate the details of an alignment plan - as you're well aware. I'm just giving my thoughts on where I would prefer the negotiations to turn towards if there was a change of negotiation strategy. Maybe the only strategy that would have a hope in hell of getting through the commons and avoid a no deal or 2nd referendum. Of course, this would involve delaying the withdrawal date. Slim chance but have you got any other ideas that might work? What do you want to happen?

Oh, the data was provided by the Office of National Statistics - I linked to it in my post on the Labour v Tory record on economics. Why are you suddenly so reluctant to track down a post when you spend ages doing this to others? I think I know....

I appreciate that it’s not your job to negotiate a deal (we would be in real trouble if it was), but you said that your preferred option was one that ‘aligns with’ the Single Market and Customs Union and I am interested in what you mean.

You must have thought this through to want such a deal. So where would you align and in what respects would you diverge? And how would you deal with technical issues and governance within the aligned relationship?

Whilst I’m personally interested in your ideas, I am also thinking about you when I ask, as I fear that some posters will look at your unwillingness to explain what you believe in and will says’ blimey, that raging is simply regurgitating meaningless Labour soundbites without understanding a single word of what he’s writing’. I wouldn’t like that. Our relationship is based on a mutual respect and I don’t like the idea of people thinking that, on this issue, you are reduced to the level of the nodding dog on the Churchill advert going ‘Oh yees’ whenever a member of the shadow cabinet says something.

[KerrAvon]

For Kerr (everyone else excuse long post).

As you're a lazy dawg, here are the main points from the report (based on ONS data, sheet of this was attached to the original post, you can find it online if you wish). These points are pretty much all comaring Labour v Tory rocord on economic indicators from 56 - 97:

Public spending

• Within the UK, since 1972/3 (the start of the dataset) the highest three years for Total Managed Expenditure (TME) as a share of GDP were from 1974/5 to 1976/7. However, Mrs Thatcher’s early governments oversaw the highest sustained 5 year period of public spending as a share of GDP, with public spending that was 46% or more for a record 5 consecutive years, from 1980/81 to 1984/5.

etc.

I’m not sure where you think you are going with this. You told me that you had a document that showed no difference between Labour and Tory governments and I speculated how the figures would look if you took the non-Labour governments of 1997 to 2010 out of the data. In response, you assured me that it would make no difference, which, of course, caused me to believe that you’d sat and worked through the raw data to be so confident. When I asked you for your workings out, you’ve posted a load of stuff that includes the non-Labour governments of 1997 to 2010. Did you mean to post something else?

The significance of the Blair/Brown non-Labour government data being included is that it will skew the figures quite markedly as you are talking 13 years of government compared with only 11 years of actual Labour government within the period of the data set. You will recall that when he came to power in 1997, Blair kept to his manifesto promise (those were the days!) and followed the spending plans of the outgoing Tory administration. That resulted in him running significant budget surplus for several years.

As gm hints, isn’t the issue here that – if we accept your assertion that the data shows no difference between the outurns of the two brands of government – you have to look at the inputs in tax takes. In other words, given that the Tories tend to be tax cutters, isn’t the position that you are setting out that you pay less under the Tories to get the same results?

[KerrAvon]

Now you're getting the hang of things
If that's true
But don't be too concerned as I'm sure there'll be a clause to cover pension rights transfers
It's what happens in such organisations particularly Government

So you are saying that Labour has gone back on its manifesto and is now supporting a further referendum because they've got their snouts in the trough?