UK General ELection 7 May 2015

[Stavros]

Farage thoroughly burned UKIP's chances of getting any votes in Scotland with his comments about "too much of English taxpayers money heading over Hadrians Wall" in last nights live ITV debate.

So much for the "United Kingdom" in his party's name. He also needs a geography lesson, the border isn't at Hadrians Wall...

Indeed, I don't even know why they call themselves the United Kingdom Independence Party when they don't seem to have much of a presence outside England, and with such a focus on the depressed (and mostly depressing) coastal towns perhaps they should re-name themselves the English Coastal Party?
His other gaffe was to single out people who are HIV positive and according to him 'coming here' to get free treatment on the NHS. Making an example of a social group is never a good idea in public debates.

What intrigues me now is the fate of the Liberal Democrats,and whether they can hold on to enough seats to maintain their coalition with the Tories. Miliband and his team to my mind are still too close to the last Labour government, people can still remember them, and it hurts.

[Laphroaig]

The irony is that Farage was firmly in the No camp in the Scottish referendum. Typical hypocritical politician.
I missed his other gaffe, I could only stomach watching about an hour of the debate.

Nick Cleggs buzzword of the debate was "balance". He seemed to be suggesting that no matter which party ends up in power, a Lib Dem presence in parliament will be required to keep an eye on them and make sure their excesses are kept in check. If that's the best message he can come up with then they are in big trouble.

[broncofan]

I watched through the introductions and Johnny's question about the economy. I liked Nicola Sturgeon's answers the best, but of course I can understand why Labor has to pretend they are going to cut "wasteful" spending. There's nothing controversial about cutting wasteful spending as nobody could advocate for wasteful spending. It's tough to campaign by saying that you are not going to worry about deficits now, that it may be more important to grow the economy in the short term (which often means you are not ready to rein in spending) and then worry about national debt later on. You could be labeled as fiscally irresponsible, but I just get the sense that austerity does not work.

Nigel Farage is a bug-eyed smarmy clown. He doesn't seem to have any ideas.

[Stavros]

I missed his other gaffe, I could only stomach watching about an hour of the debate.

According to today's Telegraph it wasn't a gaffe, it was deliberate and aimed at UKIP core voters -they called it 'shock and awful' and initially had intended to single out people with TB:

Mr Farage discussed whether to deploy statistics showing that sixty per cent of newly-diagnosed HIV patients are foreigners at length with his aides before Thursday night’s television debate, and decided to go ahead after being reassured it would “motivate” the party’s base, the Telegraph understands.
The remarks, which were denounced as distasteful by Mr Farage’s political rivals, were not an attempt to “reach out” to floating voters but instead a “core vote message”, sources disclosed.
A Ukip source said Mr Farage had originally intended to warn of the comparatively high proportion of migrants with tuberculosis “but then we realised that HIV drugs are more expensive”.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/gene...-strategy.html


I dont doubt the figures which show a high proportion of foreign nationals seeking treatment for HIV, but it isn't clear why they are in the UK -they may be students, people on working visas, and so on. It also is not clear how many knew they were HIV positive before they came into the country, just as there is in fact a provision in Immigration law which means a border official can deny entry to someone who is HIV positive if they do not have the money to fund their treatment -but what the precise rules are on it are I don't know.

[Laphroaig]

What intrigues me now is the fate of the Liberal Democrats,and whether they can hold on to enough seats to maintain their coalition with the Tories. Miliband and his team to my mind are still too close to the last Labour government, people can still remember them, and it hurts.

The most recent yougov poll in Scotland suggests that the Liberal Democrats are facing political annihilation here, with their support dropping from 19% in 2010 to just 3% now. Appologies for lowering the tone and posting links to The Sun but the yougov site link which I've included isn't working for me at the moment.

http://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/scot...ATbspanor.html

http://may2015.com/featured/the-8-ke...od-for-labour/

http://www.snp.org/media-centre/news...g-poll-showing

[peejaye]

Stavros; I must correct you on one thing that you say. Milliband and his party are too close to the Labour party? Are you serious? Milliband and ALL of his party are far too close to the Tories! That's the problem with politics in this country. Ever since "The Monster" Blair destroyed the Labour party and everything it stood for by introducing his center-right "New" Labour, the working class in the UK haven't had anyone to vote for! New labour support big business and privatisation of this countries assets, what's left of them that is!
The only difference between Labour and Conservative nowadays is the latter are more evil. They are not known as the "Nasty party" without reason.
Most other points you make I am pleased to say; I agree with.

[Stavros]

Stavros; I must correct you on one thing that you say. Milliband and his party are too close to the Labour party? Are you serious? Milliband and ALL of his party are far too close to the Tories! That's the problem with politics in this country. Ever since "The Monster" Blair destroyed the Labour party and everything it stood for by introducing his center-right "New" Labour, the working class in the UK haven't had anyone to vote for! New labour support big business and privatisation of this countries assets, what's left of them that is!
The only difference between Labour and Conservative nowadays is the latter are more evil. They are not known as the "Nasty party" without reason.
Most other points you make I am pleased to say; I agree with.

But this is what I actually said, with emphasis added
Miliband and his team to my mind are still too close to the last Labour government, people can still remember them, and it hurts.

For some time there has been an argument that the only real difference between Labour and Conservative concerns which party can manage capitalism better than the other -it was part of the argument Ralph Miliband used in his book Parliamentary Socialism, although he later changed his view to decide that Labour was irredeemable. Other than that, I agree with your views on 'New Labour', and do not see how the current leadership can revitalise the party. I don't think David Miliband would have made a difference either.

[Stavros]

The most recent yougov poll in Scotland suggests that the Liberal Democrats are facing political annihilation here, with their support dropping from 19% in 2010 to just 3% now. Appologies for lowering the tone and posting links to The Sun but the yougov site link which I've included isn't working for me at the moment.

Unless the Liberal Democrats can compensate for losses in Scotland with wins in England, their potential to maintain the coalition with the Tories does not look good. As I said, intriguing if the SNP wins enough seats (not votes) to make a numerical majority with Labour possible, but as Labour is also poised to lose seats, and not just in Scotland, I now wonder if the Tories could achieve a numerical majority of seats in the Commons. WIth such a dearth of serious discussion of policy, the numbers are more interesting than the issues! It will be definitely be interesting to see how the Labour vote holds up in places like Rochdale, Rotherham and Blackburn.

[Laphroaig]

Of course, opinion polls don't always translate into votes and votes don't always translate into seats, but with the rise in popularity of the SNP (in Scotland) and UKIP (in England), hypothetically it's possible to see a future coalition government being propped up by by one or more "minority" parties.

Strange then that Labour have already ruled out a possible coalition with the SNP.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-31906463

I assume that they don't want to alienate Labour voters in England, but a u-turn on that point of view after the election wouldn't exactly come a surprise.

Even stranger is the news that the SNP secretly favour a Conservative government.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/poli...d-Cameron.html

I have nothing to back this up but the impression I got from Leanne Wood (Plaid Cymru) during the TV debate was that the Welsh voters were ready to desert Labour as well.

[peejaye]

I agree Laphroaig & well said Stavros. You are a wise man. I, wrongly assumed you were referring to the "traditional" Labour party.
Maybe David Milliband would of had the press closer to hand than Ed who seemingly as alienated them! David M just reminds me of Blair as do most of "new" Labour.
Doesn't it concern you when "tabloid filth" like the Daily Mail brand Ed as "Red Ed"? It's readers actually go for it, as do the media! Imagine what their opinion of "far right" would be! It's gone far to far for me. We are living amongst some "very sick" people!