Depressed if we have a Tory goverment.

[Dos_Box]

Also don't don't trust a bunch of eton boys to know anything about the real world.

 

Equally, neither does a union rep beyond their own ambition and sphere of influence. It is a shame we can't pass a law that forbids anyone enterign politics before they have spent 10 years in either employment or any other area apart from union activism, lobbying and any other task which involves getting 'tainted' by our current politcal system.

[Disease]

To all the Labour fanboys I say......... Winter of Discontent, what maggie ensured was that no union would ever bring the country to it's knees again. Go Maggie!

[broc]

Labour - LibDem coalition for me... preferably without Gordon Brown at the helm........ I think the LibDems could dilute New Labour conservative goals....

[AyatollahPies]

The Tories introduced 'right to buy' for council houses, & then prevented LAs from spending the money building new affordable social housing. New Labour continued where the Tories left off....

 

We could argue that every policy previous governments have had, is partly due to what the government before them did. The Labour party have been in power for 13 years now.

[creese]

I think the LibDems could dilute New Labour conservative goals....

 

That shouldn't make sense but it does.

[localzuk]

To all the Labour fanboys I say......... Winter of Discontent, what maggie ensured was that no union would ever bring the country to it's knees again. Go Maggie!

 

Not quite... Royal Mail's strikes didn't exactly help the country. Nor did the BA strikes...

[Dos_Box]

Not quite... Royal Mail's strikes didn't exactly help the country. Nor did the BA strikes...

 

Or the volcano. Damn the Fiery Mountain Party!

[Bezwick]

I do find it quite funny that anyone in Education would vote tory, as out of all the parties, they are the ones most likely to put you out of a job.

[cookie_monster]

I do find it quite funny that anyone in Education would vote tory, as out of all the parties, they are the ones most likely to put you out of a job.

 

 

You can't always think of yourself whenvoting for what is best for the country or the greater good.

[torledo]

Equally, neither does a union rep beyond their own ambition and sphere of influence.

 

now, now....that's no way to talk about the next leader of the labour party. ;0)

 

but seriously, the criticisms of past tory and labour govts. are valid.....i'm just not sure about all the love on here for vince cable.

 

regarding the cuts to come, i think a lot of it is long overdue. the level of wasteful spending and poor allocation of spending needs to be addressed. I know that doing more with the same or less money will result in redundancies and that too often it's indiscriminate, but there are too many people happy to jump on the gravy train for a free ride......sometimes it feels as if the bloated state exists to feed itself rather than provide value for money and deliver public service....and instead exists to humour people who believe they are owed a wage for doing very little [and how many of them really need the money]. i'm not under any illusions that it will be easy to solve, but just continuing to throw money at the whole edifice is not sustainable.

 

that's what i would fear from a labour govt.

[Bezwick]

You can't always think of yourself whenvoting for what is best for the country or the greater good.

I am thats why i am voting Lib-Dem as they seam to want to sting everyone equally, but as usual tories will sting the poor and labour will sting the rich. Trouble is most people vote for themselves not for the greater good.

[srochford]

It seems the Tories can't win whatever they do. If they keep council tax low then they're accused of cutting local services. If they increase council tax then they're slated for adding an extra tax burden.

 

You could put any party name in there and it would be true. What we ought to do is not just say "how much tax" but "what do residents get for it"

 

My local council (Hammersmith and Fulham; often used by Cameron as an example of a good council) has cut council tax for the past 3 years which sounds wonderful. What they've also done is put up the charges for everything else (on-street parking charges but they've gone up massively, for example) They've also claimed more money from central government (which is still tax I pay) and used up reserves. On top of that, their "efficiency savings" have put a good number of people out of work. Of course, those people don't matter - they were probably on short term contracts so they just vanish from the system; there are no compulsory redundancies.

 

On top of all that we now have a dreadful council funded newspaper (if it was the only thing you read about the borough you'd run screaming from the place thinking it was an absolute hell hole) which is putting other local papers out of business - they can't compete with a free council paper. (It wouldn't matter if the council paper was just council news but it tries to cover everything including local entertainment etc and takes advertising which means there are fewer advertisers to spend money with other papers)

[danrhodes]

I've had enough of the election too I agree with Dos_Box! But its blue for me as well!

[ZeroHour]

People seem to think that if tories were in power when the credit boom was around they would have done anything different. If anything according to Paxman when he grilled Cameron the tories at the time would have given the banks etc even less regulation!

I recommend all to watch BBC iPlayer - Jeremy Paxman Interviews: David Cameron at least. It also goes on about how the tories plan to deal with the bank issue was a complete joke and the opposite of what every other country etc was going to do. I am just glad Cameron was NOT in power to screw us up more.

[torledo]

Labour - LibDem coalition for me... preferably without Gordon Brown at the helm........ I think the LibDems could dilute New Labour conservative goals....

 

have you seen libdems in local govt. in a 'supporting' role ?

 

if you had you probably wouldn't identify them as a diluter of conservative goals. If anything, they are to the right of labour and more likely to have a conservative influence on the labour party as far as issues such as deficit reduction.

Edited May 5, 2010 by torledo

[torledo]

People seem to think that if tories were in power when the credit boom was around they would have done anything different. If anything according to Paxman when he grilled Cameron the tories at the time would have given the banks etc even less regulation!

I recommend all to watch BBC iPlayer - Jeremy Paxman Interviews: David Cameron at least. It also goes on about how the tories plan to deal with the bank issue was a complete joke and the opposite of what every other country etc was going to do. I am just glad Cameron was NOT in power to screw us up more.

 

maybe the tories weren't wrong, maybe there were other options beyond nationalisation.....it would have involved no less in the way of moral hazard than the nationalisation/pseudo-nationalisation route....just an alternative method of dealing with bank failures. it's just that now that brown 'saved the world' every other alternative is automatically wrong. which i don't buy into personally.

[teejay]

http://www.libdemvoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/doyouhate.jpg

From this, I hate foxes.

[Guest salan]

Well as the country is NOT run by the government anway...

'Yes minister' comes to mind.

I am not sure who to vote for.

To me Labour have been in power too long (like the tories before them).

They all say they will do this that and the other and then nothing.

Locally the conservatives are in and Chshire is in a right mess!

But guess what! the number of 'new' jobs with high salaries is vast!!

At our local offices (Wyvern house), the councilors think that they are gods!

They actually expect for everyone to 'move out of the way' and you actually feel that you areinferior to them.

Personally I think that it should be the other way around.

So who will I vote for?

Dunno. Not lab not Tories but after that? who knows

Alan

[danrhodes]

http://www.libdemvoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/doyouhate.jpg

From this, I hate foxes.

 

According to this im a Lib Dem man then!

[tmcd35]

have you seen libdems in local govt. in a 'supporting' role ?

No but I have seen both Labour and Tory in national government in a 'leading' role !

 

Can I ask a related question - Why do we need Trident at all?

[Andrew_C]

How about the rise of the surveillance society under Labour? (I've been arrested and detained twice for "anti-terrorism" reasons just because I like to take photos of buildings). The farce of ID cards? The thousands of jobs lost at BAE? The Gulf War? Afghanistan? And now sabre rattling at Iran?

Do you HONESTLY think the Tories would have done ANY of that differently? Well, other than leading us into war, rather than following the USA.

 

If the Tories win, I'm moving to Mars!

[ICT_GUY]

So why support a new Trident with out reviewing. To me it seems silly that Trident is not part of the strategic defence reviews. As a country we must have wasted a fortune on Nuclear weapons.

 

Its a waste if it didn't do its job. Its a deterrent, the whole point is that if its effective we never have to use it. Therefore it can be argued that it has been worth every penny.

[teejay]

As a deterrent, keep our seat on the UN Security Council etc.

One thing you should realise, LibDem don't plan to renew Trident, but they DO want a nuclear deterrent. The problem is, we would have to develop our own system which would cost far more than Trident and would also breach nuclear testing bans.

[teejay]

Do you HONESTLY think the Tories would have done ANY of that differently? Well, other than leading us into war, rather than following the USA.

 

If the Tories win, I'm moving to Mars!

 

Errm, yes I do, so would the LibDems and almost any other party except Labour.

[tmcd35]

Its a waste if it didn't do its job. Its a deterrent, the whole point is that if its effective we never have to use it. Therefore it can be argued that it has been worth every penny.

 

A deterrent to what? Under what circumstances would you actually consider firing it? I bet we wouldn't even if were being invaded. I wonder if a better deterrent, especially in this day and age, would be to better equip our armed forces and plough some extra dough into intellegence gavering and anti-terrorism units.

 

Spennding millions on something you're not going to use under any circumstances and justifying it as a 'deterent' is just loonacy! (IMHO).