Election Year or Fear!

[MadAmster]

It appears that Labour is now lauding Maggie T as a shining light to follow... having said that, the "quotes" they used from Labour politicians were on a Scots Nat page. Blue Tory = Red Tory?

[MadAmster]

Sums up my thoughts...

[Trickytreesreds]

Sums up my thoughts...

correct

Heres one from the publics mouth. Brave woman, doing that publicly

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9aS...=MahyarTousiTV

[swaledale]

GB News feels increasingly like a space to present uninterrupted Party-Political Broadcasts. That’s despite UK broadcast rules, supposedly enforced by Ofcom, which state that broadcasters – including GB News – must ensure ‘adequate and appropriate levels of due impartiality in its presentation of matters of political controversy and current public policy.’ In December 2023, GB News breached the Ofcom code for the fifth time, and 12 further Ofcom investigations are currently open into the channel.

Yes this feels like a "foil" to other media such as BBC ITV SKY Channel 4, especially as a considerable amount of its output can be shown to be either completely false or at best a rather narrow and distorted version of the facts.

Of course if your one of those people whose bubble is so restricted that you can think the BBC is biased or say that it does not reflect the world you live in then a narrow partisan media might just be up your street!!


HINT - guess what your interpretation of the world might just be your bubble and the real world might possibly be different to what you think it is.

[Geoff Parkstone]

Swale: "HINT - guess what your interpretation of the world might just be your bubble and the real world might possibly be different to what you think it is."

If ever there was a more "physician heal thyself" post than this, I've yet to see it 😄

[Geoff Parkstone]

By way of trying to achieve closure on this difference of view, I think TTR is correct in identifying economy/health/immigration are the three biggest issues at the next election.

Whether these represent any one individual's specific issues is a different matter. rA clearly doesn't think immigration is a key, TTR does. Based on the think-tank observations young labour voters align with rA, older conservative/brexiteer voters align with TTR. Is it ever thus.

No one is right or wrong. In any election different interest groups will back different policies. Non smokers will back increased tax on fags, smokers don't. Pacifists will not back increased defence spending; environmentalists have their priorities etc etc

Everyone has their own personal perspective on these issues. Thus all are important and potentially vote impacting. A real key issue would be one that made a "young labour" voter and an "old Tory" voter come together, or switch to a new stance. It's just like the majority of constituency outcomes. The pig in a blue scarf will win in Reigate, a pig in a red scarf will win in Hackney. Policies by and large don't matter in these "rotten boroughs".

Look at your marginals to see which issue matters, not across the country. If you want to see if boater immigration is a big issue, ask the people in Kent, Sus*** etc who are on the front line, not the electorate in say Liverpool or Melton Mowbray where the impact is less felt. It's easy to say "I don't care" if it doesn't impact your life

Closures of pits didn't effect me as an accountant in the south, but had devastating impacts on those (largely) northern communities involved.

Pretending that issues that clearly influence a lot of people simply don't exist, just because you cannot align with them is foolhardy. Leaving them to fester is even more so.

[ramAnag]

By way of trying to achieve closure on this difference of view, I think TTR is correct in identifying economy/health/immigration are the three biggest issues at the next election.

Whether these represent any one individual's specific issues is a different matter. rA clearly doesn't think immigration is a key, TTR does. Based on the think-tank observations young labour voters align with rA, older conservative/brexiteer voters align with TTR. Is it ever thus.

No one is right or wrong. In any election different interest groups will back different policies. Non smokers will back increased tax on fags, smokers don't. Pacifists will not back increased defence spending; environmentalists have their priorities etc etc

Everyone has their own personal perspective on these issues. Thus all are important and potentially vote impacting. A real key issue would be one that made a "young labour" voter and an "old Tory" voter come together, or switch to a new stance. It's just like the majority of constituency outcomes. The pig in a blue scarf will win in Reigate, a pig in a red scarf will win in Hackney. Policies by and large don't matter in these "rotten boroughs".

Look at your marginals to see which issue matters, not across the country. If you want to see if boater immigration is a big issue, ask the people in Kent, Sus*** etc who are on the front line, not the electorate in say Liverpool or Melton Mowbray where the impact is less felt. It's easy to say "I don't care" if it doesn't impact your life

Closures of pits didn't effect me as an accountant in the south, but had devastating impacts on those (largely) northern communities involved.

Pretending that issues that clearly influence a lot of people simply don't exist, just because you cannot align with them is foolhardy. Leaving them to fester is even more so.

Not really about what I ‘think’, GP. It just seemed interesting and relevant that an essentially Right wing collection of statisticians had concluded that the ‘small boat’ issue isn’t as significant as some would like to make out.

I guess the rest of your post is really, quite correctly, drawing attention to the failings of our democracy and the polarised nature of our electorate which won’t change until we move away from an ethos of ‘I’m alright Jack’ and looking after number one…for instance all voters should be concerned about the availability of affordable housing for our youngsters but simultaneously about the availability of proper care facilities for the elderly.

[Trickytreesreds]

Here's another topic that election time will throw up again, education fees.
We have universitys sucking in foreign students, who would never even qualify for University had they been born here
Meanwhile, UK born students continue to get strangled by more and more debt?
It's a vicious circle. Home born cannot afford it, so the Universitys take in sub standard students, of which 40% never go home.

One here must have set a new record though, how do you get £231k in student debt?

https://news.sky.com/story/truly-eye...ealed-13099826

Something needs to change, our brightest and best need more than this.

[Ramshank72]

Maddy, that's tosh. 90 000 were admitted for health care work last year. Doesn't exactly explain the rest does it?
When you are allowing students(who actually don't meet the rquirements of entry for a lot of them) to come here AND bring their families, why? Student Migration to the UK

Migration Observatory
https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk › briefings › stud...
24 Jan 2024 — In the 2021/22 academic year, approximately 680,000 international students were enrolled in UK higher education, making up 24% of all entries?

Immigration is supposed to be managed. It isn't.
Every immigrant, for whatever reason- brings pressure on housing/NHS/education/services/transport , as well as social problems and stifling wages .

We need immigration! But only what we need


But we are supposed to be managing it, like most countries in the world do.
Australia is very strict on immigration, yet needs workers when it suits. But even theirs was less than ours and thats after issuing 0.5 million temp visas for food picking.
London now has a population density of between 10 000 -15000 /km2 and rising. Sydney 2037 people per square kilometre,

This is why immigration is an issue to most folks. No disrespect to RA, but he lives in rural Derbyshire. He is hardly likely to feel the pains of poorer people living in these areas.

That doesn't mean he doesn't appreciate their struggles. The things that are top of his list are things that will help those people more than immigration stats.
We know you forest fans love history, what happened 10 years ago today?

[ramAnag]

Latest opinion poll results from Survation suggest that the Tories are predicted to end up with less than 100 seats after the forthcoming General Election and that Sunak’s own seat is now in serious danger. Can we just get it over with and start again?