GENERAL ELECTION 8th June

[Arthur]

 

 

Let's challenge just two eh, which Northern European powers are meeting their 2% commitment to NATO on defence spending?

 

Er...that would be the UK then.

 

Let's spend more on our infrastructure and less on empty motorways in Southern Europe.

 

.

[Joseph_Pestell]

OK, I will say that I think TM is wrong to refuse a TV debate. Not tactically wrong, of course, but morally wrong. I think the electors should be allowed to hear all the party leaders answer the same set of questions at the same time. I do agree that it needs careful handling if it is to be worthwhile with some way of giving each uninterrupted time.

 

I also think that the "Question Time" format with members of the public asking questions does not work. They ask questions that are too specific to their own individual circumstances that no politician can answer properly and that is penalising to the incumbent (as I know having been mugged with this sort of question in 2005).

 

It would be wrong for only journalists to ask the questions. But they could read out a suitable selection of viewers' questions. Or even get each Party Leader to put a question to the others.

[hayfield]

John, though I'm saddened by the result of the referendum and find it hard if not impossible to accept, I've not gone around stamping and screaming but have tried to deploy calm reason. However I'll do my utmost to play my part in either nullifying the result or softening the stance that we as a country will take. Given that we live in a democracy if my favoured outcome eventually prevails it will be democratic, it can be nothing less as it will be our democratically elected representatives who negotiate and agree on our behalf. Campaigning for a change of heart is exactly what the leave camp were doing before the referendum and if that was democratic then campaigning for a change of heart after the referendum has also to be democratic.

 

We're not in a dictatorship or ruled by despots but some actions like trying to deny parliament a vote on whatever deal is negotiated weakens democracy.

 

 

Neil

 

I am with you on pushing on the best deal possible, as it benefits both camps. As I said most who were on the remain side whilst not liking the result accept they were in the minority, like anyone on the loosing side in any election just gets on with it. There is a subtle difference between getting a deal that you feel benefits both sides and being disruptive which benefits no one.

 

As for a parliamentary vote, we must be careful. Debating the issue is one thing, but we cannot show the bottom line in the agreements, as we may be able to negotiate a better deal. Its a time to show whilst the two sides differ we are unified in obtaining the best possible deal for all, and this must be the goal of all. Having said all this I think Europe will be a totally different place in a few years, as there seems a lot of unrest from the northern European countries constantly footing the bill

[Reorte]

Do agree that we should try and spread work through the regions, the south east is full up

What, make everywhere else busier too? That's just spreading the problem. Elsewhere needs the economic activity spreading out, but adding more people will just make them worse.

[Purley Oaks]

So not real power houses of financial strength ? in fact some who see a financial benefit of receiving not giving

 

40 years is hardly in for a quick buck, and with the world a totally different place now to then.  Trading partners (which is what we signed up for) yes, political bed fellows no

The first quote is about Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia, Kosovo & Bosnia and, yes, they are not financial powerhouses, although they may be in future. The EU has paid substantial sums of money to each country (a sort of Marshall Plan) to help them come to terms with the peace after the horrendous war and to rebuild institutions. If the EU had not existed it is unlikely that individual European countries would have paid lump sums to the warring countries.

 

The war was 25 years ago, but it is still bubbling under in some places - parts of Bosnia are known as Serpska Republika, even though technically Bosnia. The EU and USA have done a lot for the region, and once each country is a member of the EU they will start looking outwards and will see peace as normal. So trading partners, yes, but in this case, political bedfellows, yes.

 

It was Immanual Kant who wrote about perpetual peace; there is now such a thing as democratic peace - name any war in the 20th or 21st centuries which were between two genuinely democratic countries. That is one reason why the EU has been important - for maintaining and strengthening democratic institutions.

 

 

I see that ex-PM Dave Cameron has said that the Brexit vote has ended a poisoning of UK politics. Really? I thought it was just a tory crisis.

 

Mal

[Guest]

There are some folk on this thread putting their point across (again and again) with such conviction that they obviously believe themselves to be right and anyone that has an opposing view to be wrong. Nothing wrong with that, of course, everyone is entitled to their opinion. The thread makes for interesting reading. There does appear to be an awful lot more opinion than fact, so personally I'm taking everything with a very large pinch of salt. Time will tell.

 

In response to a previous question, I for one think TM and JC are correct to avoid trial by media. The televised "head to head" debates I've seen in the past have resembled a cross between a car crash and the very worst of reality TV. I think we're all better than that. The media just want sensation. Facts and useful information are not always top of their agenda.

[Fenman]

Tell you what, you start naming better run countries and I'll counter with a worse one and we'll see who runs out first.

 

Let me save myself time ... anywhere in Central and South America ...

 

I take it you know nothing about Costa Rica or Uruguay then?

 

Paul

[Fenman]

...

Education standards are dire. ...

 

We have a 'unwritten' constitution ...

 

Do I really need to go on?

Nope. I think you've proved your point.

 

Paul

[brianusa]

This sentence from Poggy, says it all.

 

" Our house prices are absurd due to sustained failure to build enough for our ever-growing population. It is impossible to obtain any sort of secure tenancy"

 

Not only in the UK but in the US and while this is a UK oriented discussion, what happens there is not an isolated case and I have my UK passport still which is the reason for my interest in these discussions; otherwise the only real info comes from the BBC and Question Time!  Our 'cute'  little harbour town which we moved to about twenty years ago was a picture postcard example of a place to retire.  Since then, a new bridge has been built, traffic increased, forests cut down and housing estates in their place, strip malls and congestion.  Meanwhile property values increase but it doesn't deter buyers who mortgage their life away.  Already we have tripled our homes value and luckily we are in a small cul de sac surrounded by huge firs that provide our privacy.

 

So I've been able to learn a lot from this lengthy discussion which has been commendably free from excessive argument.

 

Brian.

[Neil]

Troubling piece in today's Guardian about a Dutch pensioners struggle to apply for residency. She's lived in the UK for 50 years, married here, brought up a child here, worked here and now widowed here. It's hard to tell if the fiendish residency application process is an unintended or intended result of the referendum process, but stories like this bring home that it's not abstract concepts in play here but matters of real and fundamental importance. I'm ashamed that my country can be so cruel whether intentional or by accident. It's not as though this is an isolated incident, there's more in similar vein here and here. It's not hard to find further examples.

[Mike Storey]

Let's challenge just two eh, which Northern European powers are meeting their 2% commitment to NATO on defence spending?

 

Er...that would be the UK then.

 

Let's spend more on our infrastructure and less on empty motorways in Southern Europe.

 

.

 

Cods - try looking at France which has a carrier on active service (we don't), more nuclear warheads available and more independent than we will ever have, and an infrastructure (along with that of Norway, for anti-submarine detection) on which we have to rely for the defence of own shores, let alone anyone else's. It's army is active in seven different theatres currently (UK only five) and it has developed its own defence industry (which has successfully beaten us with export orders) to support its own defence. Sweden has done much the same on a smaller scale. Look also at Germany's defence industry, which could outstrip ours in a nanosecond, once constitutional changes are made, on which the UK has always held a reservation.

 

Tell me also how much the USA has paid for the use of domestic bases in the UK, Norway, Germany, Spain, Italy, Greece and Turkey? Don't know? The answer is nothing. Tell me how much these bases have been used for actual defensive activity for Europe (such as sending up aircraft to intercept or detect hostile flights, ships or submarines)? The answer, as you do not seem to have been briefed very well, is none. Their only useful role has been one of deterrence, not operational cost. All these bases have only ever been used for the projection of US power into regions in which NATO has not been involved, with the sole exception of the Balkans humanitarian mission. You have swallowed the Trump argument hook, line and sinker, which even he has now admitted is not sustainable. You need to keep up.

 

Why is the UK going to be dependent on US F35's for its defence, along with Euro Typhoons, when no other European nation has to?

 

And the empty motorways in Southern Europe, as with almost all in northern Europe, bar the UK, are privately funded and paid for by tolls, something the UK has resisted for decades, but which makes total sense. Why should I pay, through my substantial UK income tax, for a motorway from godnoswere to wherethehellisthat that I will never use, but rail passengers have to pay (at least 75% of) the cost of any improvement anywhere? Do you have the answer to that, or does it not meet your only objective of rubbishing the EU (and the rest of NATO it would seem)?

 

Any more complete untruths you are prepared to use in support of highly questionable conclusions? I am sorry I this does not meet the "polite" intercourse we have adopted on this thread, but I am getting a little tired of the complete falsifications being used to promote a particular point of view. MODs - please delete if you see fit.

[rockershovel]

Troubling piece in today's Guardian about a Dutch pensioners struggle to apply for residency. She's lived in the UK for 50 years, married here, brought up a child here, worked here and now widowed here. It's hard to tell if the fiendish residency application process is an unintended or intended result of the referendum process, but stories like this bring home that it's not abstract concepts in play here but matters of real and fundamental importance. I'm ashamed that my country can be so cruel whether intentional or by accident. It's not as though this is an isolated incident, there's more in similar vein here and here. It's not hard to find further examples.

The Guardian is fond of this sort of story. Just because the Guardian doesn't understand residency law, doesn't make it true. Length of time in country doesn't automatically confer right of residency, just as it doesn't in most other European countries. A while ago, it was a man who was clearly a German national by passport. Just because the residency laws are, generally speaking, not enforced doesn't mean they don't exist.

 

The relevant departments are as grossly understaffed as most other government departments, and like all government departments under pressure to deal with applicants, if they receive a question they tend to send stock answers, and the easiest stock answer is "no".

[jjb1970]

Cods - try looking at France which has a carrier on active service (we don't), more nuclear warheads available and more independent than we will ever have, and an infrastructure (along with that of Norway, for anti-submarine detection) on which we have to rely for the defence of own shores, let alone anyone else's. It's army is active in seven different theatres currently (UK only five) and it has developed its own defence industry (which has successfully beaten us with export orders) to support its own defence. Sweden has done much the same on a smaller scale. Look also at Germany's defence industry, which could outstrip ours in a nanosecond, once constitutional changes are made, on which the UK has always held a reservation.

 

 

Why is the UK going to be dependent on US F35's for its defence, along with Euro Typhoons, when no other European nation has to?

 

 

 

I agree with you on a lot of things, but France only has one active carrier (unless you count helicopter carriers in which case they have more than two) with PA2 having been abandoned. In terms of the F35, a lot of NATO countries are buying the F35 along with the UK. The French military has chronic budget issues of its own and it is a fair point that Europe under spends on defence because they shelter within NATO knowing that NATO is only really credible because of the US commitment to NATO.

[jjb1970]

This thread seems to be about Europe, so I'd like to ask a question. This thread (and many others) provides numerous reasons to consider politicians and government to be pretty inept at governing us. And this is not just a UK phenomenon, I travel a lot and to be honest I haven't been particularly impressed with governments anywhere. And I say that as one who seems to hold our politicians in higher regard than most. For what it's worth I consider most MPs to be intelligent, hard working and well meaning types at an individual level. Given that, why do so many people see the government and state intervention as the answer to all problems? After many years of pondering this I've concluded that the world needs the minimum government possible to provide a framework for society and that on the whole less is more when it comes to government interference (I'm a bit of a libertarian, a friend of mine described me as an anarcho-capitalist whatever one of them is). 

[Bernard Lamb]

Troubling piece in today's Guardian about a Dutch pensioners struggle to apply for residency. She's lived in the UK for 50 years, married here, brought up a child here, worked here and now widowed here. It's hard to tell if the fiendish residency application process is an unintended or intended result of the referendum process, but stories like this bring home that it's not abstract concepts in play here but matters of real and fundamental importance. I'm ashamed that my country can be so cruel whether intentional or by accident. It's not as though this is an isolated incident, there's more in similar vein here and here. It's not hard to find further examples.

I could give you quite a few more examples.

We have a group of German women locally who meet up for coffee each month. All are now 60 plus, many much older.

At a recent meeting about half, eight or so, had remained as German passport holders and none had ever applied for residency.

Until the referendum it was not thought to be of any concern.

Unless you were a German from outside of the BRD there was never any need for paperwork.

Now some are concerned.

It is not as though the various government departments have been unaware of the situation.

Bernard

[Mike Storey]

I agree with you on a lot of things, but France only has one active carrier (unless you count helicopter carriers in which case they have more than two) with PA2 having been abandoned. In terms of the F35, a lot of NATO countries are buying the F35 along with the UK. The French military has chronic budget issues of its own and it is a fair point that Europe under spends on defence because they shelter within NATO knowing that NATO is only really credible because of the US commitment to NATO.

 

Agreed (I had counted helo carriers) and corrected on French stats, but the other F35 requisitions are exclusively from those countries already relying on F16 replacements, something the UK did not need to do. In at least one case, an alternative supplier is taking the state to court for allegedly using falsified date to justify its decision. You, above many on here, will know the sorry history of F35 development, costs and effectiveness.

 

On French military funding, the crisis concerns diversion of funds to anti-terrorist and cyber activity (much the same as the UK, but from a higher base in real terms), the case for which Trump argued NATO was not fit for purpose, until he was finally "educated" that such funding was not counted in NATO expenditure against the nominal 2% of GDP target. It is a fair point to show that the ex-Soviet states do not come even close to spending 2% on NATO-allowed defence spending, but then, when their economies are, with one or two exceptions, virtual basket cases, did we (as in the UK) encourage them to join both NATO and the EU? Because it was in our (and the USA's) strategic interests, that's why.

 

The Thatcherite view of strategic defence being equivalent to a grocer's shop account book (even though she had to rely on US accommodation, at Ascension despite their public reluctance to support her actions, to re-take the Falklands), or even the Dickensian satire on the absurdity of self-sufficiency, when applied to global defence, has gained ground to suit a particular agenda. We must not allow that to become the accepted truth. It is far from it - such massively increased, defence expenditure did not save Belgium in WW2, let alone South Vietnam later. Some on here are trying to convince us (or is it themselves) that such logic has sense, in order to denigrate the whole European ideal (the four freedoms, not the mythical single state) when all evidence is to the contrary. Such is the level at which they desire the debate to be conducted.

 

Compare and contrast these anti-EU arguments to those which accuse the EU of trying to set up an EU army and Border Force, requiring considerable additional expenditure, estimated to be considerably more than the 2% NATO requirement, but at the same time attacking the EU for failing to protect its borders. How did they get away with arguing that the EU is an ineffective organisation, whilst at the same time, arguing that they already had too much power as an entity? Somehow, they did get away with it (and won a referendum), and are likely to get away with the domestic argument in the GE, that the party whose record is most divisive, unstable and inexplicable, is the party most likely to deliver a stable and best outcome negotiation. Post 2015. I no longer have faith that the British electorate has the will, let alone the capacity, to see through the absurd, and genuinely reflect.

[Trog]

 

It was Immanual Kant who wrote about perpetual peace; there is now such a thing as democratic peace - name any war in the 20th or 21st centuries which were between two genuinely democratic countries.

 

Second Boer War.

[Mike Storey]

The Guardian is fond of this sort of story. Just because the Guardian doesn't understand residency law, doesn't make it true. Length of time in country doesn't automatically confer right of residency, just as it doesn't in most other European countries. A while ago, it was a man who was clearly a German national by passport. Just because the residency laws are, generally speaking, not enforced doesn't mean they don't exist.

 

The relevant departments are as grossly understaffed as most other government departments, and like all government departments under pressure to deal with applicants, if they receive a question they tend to send stock answers, and the easiest stock answer is "no".

 

Oh, so that's the reason then? Not a lack of clear directive from our ex-Home Office Sec of State, or even the existing one, who is by any measure, truly well out of her depth. Bodes well for the future ahead - glad to see that you can excuse the UK civil service from appalling dereliction of duty, but that the much smaller EU civil service, the EU Commission (the ones you call the dictators)  are guilty of almost all the ills pertaining to the British people. Nice. Everyone else, please take note. This is likely to be a recurring apology/excuse, again with absolutely no foundation in truth whatsoever.

 

Such decisions in EU countries, also as bad in some cases I fully admit, due to local ineptitude or bigotry in some cases, are immediately subject to appeal through an independent Tribunal, for which there is no charge. 90% of such appeals, in France, have been successful since 2015. I await an understanding of how such appeals work in the UK - I believe the most publicised ones have involved, not inconsiderable, legal expenses, primarily because the party currently in charge of the UK has completely demolished Legal Aid for people who might actually need it, unless you have robbed a bank or worse. Working for the JAM's? No, only the Jammy.

[Mike Storey]

At last there is a quotable slogan against the first quotable slogan "Strong leadership against chaotic coalition". And Corbyn did not fluff it in delivery! Maybe things are about to change.....

 

For those at the back "Strong against the Weak, but Weak against the Strong". Nice - they must be employing an even more literate Australian? But it also has some bottom .

[Trog]

 

The Thatcherite view of strategic defence being equivalent to a grocer's shop account book (even though she had to rely on US accommodation, at Ascension despite their public reluctance to support her actions, to re-take the Falklands).....

 

 

Wideawake Airfield is that one of those free US bases that are never used to defend other NATO members?

[Mike Storey]

Wideawake Airfield is that one of those free US bases that are never used to defend other NATO members?

 

No, but it is no longer a USAF base anyway, since 1982. The USAF have used Spain for staging since Franco died.

[Stanley Melrose]

I have a Canadian neighbour, employed and earning a high salary.  After 5 years here, it was made clear to her that she should apply for leave to remain or go away.  To get permission to stay involves a test of knowledge of "British" aspects of life.  She invited several of us (native born Brits) to go through a couple of the sample test papers.  We are all university graduates and collectively we just about passed but it would have been a close call had we had to take the test individually.

 

Anyway she duly took the test (successfully), supplied details of every trip she had made out of the country in the entire time she has lived in the UK, given up her Canadian passport for some "process" (she does not intend to apply for UK citizenship) and has been told that she can remain in the UK.  One of the conditions of the "process" requires that her passport is retained until someone in the relevant agency gets around to whatever they have to do - presumably put some stamp in it.  She was advised that it can be moved up the queue if she pays £500 but better still, if she pays £10,500 someone will call at her house and complete the "process" there and then.

 

Oh, I should say that the tone of many of the questions in the sample test papers was decidedly racist, in my view.  Who was Home Secretary when this "process" was designed and implemented?  Yes, Mrs Strong and Stable" herself. . . .

 

Stan

[Nearholmer]

JJB

 

It seems to me that it is exceedingly difficult to pin-down exactly what your "... minimum government necessary to provide a framework for society ...." might, or might not, encompass.

 

If "government" means 'all the things governed by laws', then what you are seeking is the minimum span of legal control practicable, which I guess is why your friend labelled labelled you "anarcho".

 

Looked at historically, the span of legal control has expanded as society has become more and more tightly-coupled, to use systems-engineering terminology, and as people have sought to move "up the hierarchy of needs". So, one might expect that a very interconnected, interdependent society, and one within which people have fair expectation of more than the basics of existence, will have "a lot of law" ......... it might be that society has reached a point where it would be quicker to answer the question "what shouldn't be subject to laws?", than the question "what should be subject to laws?".

 

Really interesting topic!

 

Kevin

[rockershovel]

Re various comments above, there is no doubt whatsoever that the actual "British Citizenship Test" is absurd and unrealistic. It focuses on things which the British indigenous population know little or nothing of (partly due to the dumbing down if the education system, partly because they are things which it is quite possible to live here for long periods, in complete ignorance of.)

 

Periodically, the government ties itself in various knots over "British values" which it appears unable, or unwilling to define. I've travelled quite widely and really don't see this as a difficult question; a constitutional monarchy, delegating power to an elected House of Commons, overseen by a partly hereditary, partly appointed second House (Lords) which is only nominally subject to the party system. Said country is nominally Christian in character, although religious observances are little followed by the general population. with an accumulated body of secular law upholding the equality of all before the law, without regard to religious or ethnic affiliation. It guarantees freedom of conscience, to hold any religious or political view, or none at all, provided only that the Royal Peace is maintained.

 

Rule of secular law is paramount, with particularly strong laws of contract and property ownership. These mean that a defining feature of British life, ownership of housing, is widespread under a central system of registry of ownership and a privately run system of long-term indebtedness which finances it. The British are communitarian in habit, being great joiners of societies including a mutual funding system which has made a msjor contribution to house ownership. This also relates to their publicly funded system of health care, sometimes described as "the nearest thing they have, to a religion" which also derives from a sometimes opaque, but strongly held idea of "fairness" which doesn't always follow the ideological concepts propounded by the liberal left.

 

There are widespread, tribal allegiances of varying strength to sport in particular, and they will "gamble habitually and drink as much beer as their wages will allow" and see no reason why they shouldn't. Broadly speaking, the Common Law of the land holds that any given thing is legal unless shown to be otherwise, usually on the grounds that some specific harm has resulted to some specific person or group. Their political system derives from this, with one faction being effectively controlled by the Trades Unions (which no longer represent a social class of industrial workers who have largely disappeared).

 

Their political beliefs are sometimes obscure or contradictory, but very real. Some years ago, the government of the day embarked upon a reform of the archaic system of local taxation. This came to be perceived as "a tax on the vote" or Poll Tax, and the results were chaotic. Very large numbers of people refused to pay it, and huge sums remain uncollected to this day, whilst rioting in London and elsewhere resulted eventually in the ousting of the then-PM. They believe that this vote should be exercised in person, freely and secretly, except when it isn't. From time to time they can be roused to displays of public enthusiasm, by a charismatic female PM or an expensively-dressed society clotheshorse married to the Royal house, although they tend to end up discarding such enthusiasms.

 

The problem with this, is that it doesn't correlate with the Left-wing internationalism prevalent among the upper-middle-class and lower-upper-class, who principally comprise the political elite. "Patriots of the world alone, friends of every country but their own", it's no real contradiction that the nominal Labour Party be effectively controlled by the wealthy niece of a belted Earl (regarded in his time by the popular press, as a figure of political mockery and absurd barbering) who is a remote cousin by marriage to a recent erstwhile PM of expensive, if somewhat misjudged, Eton and Oxbridge background.

[Neil]

Here's a thought provoking view that was aired on Newsnight last night. It proposes an evening out of the funding of political parties by limiting the size of individual donations; no more windfalls from wealthy individuals, companies or for that matter trade unions.