The new middle
The Scottish Daily Mail has been working itself into a froth this week over the idea that the Scottish Government doesn’t intend to match George Osborne’s increase in the upper-rate income tax threshold from £42,000 to £45,000.
Central to the complaint is that rejecting the increase will hurt what the Mail calls “the squeezed middle” and “middle earners”, including “nurses, teachers and police”.
There are, of course, several ways of defining “middle”.
Below is a graph of UK earnings distribution, created by alert Wings contributor Alistair Davidson from this UK government data.
We’ve highlighted in red the group who’ll be affected. And sure enough, in one sense (because it truncates the X-axis of the graph) you can say they’re in the “middle”.
But alert readers will notice that there are a lot more people on the left-hand side of the graph than the right-hand side. In fact, the Mail itself admits that less than 15% of the population is in what it calls the “middle” group paying the higher rate of tax. This graphic is taken from today’s article in the paper:
That would mean that the Mail was defining “low, middle and high” earners like this:
That’s a pretty strange definition of “middle” to most people’s eyes. But in fact it’s even more bizarre than that. Because most of that definition of “middle” – which encompasses people earning up to £150,000 – will barely even notice the Scottish Government’s freeze. If you’re taking home £3000 a week you’re not going to be very hurt by not getting an £8 tax cut, and you’re certainly not in the “middle” of anything.
The people who will feel missing out on the cut the most are those on over £42K but under £45K – the ones on whose behalf the Mail is howling about being “dragged” into the upper bracket in Scotland while their counterparts in England escape it – make up just 2% of the population.
Which means that what the Mail is really talking about is this:
Nothing in the paper’s story is technically untrue. “Middle” is an extremely versatile word, as readers who remember being taught about the mean, mode and median in school will know. (Even if most of us no longer recall what those terms mean.)
Strictly speaking, the Mail hasn’t told any lies. It’s just presented the truth in a way that creates a massively false impression. And that, folks, is why you should never believe the headline.
“And that, folks, is why you should never believe the headline.”
Nor, in the Mail’s case, the date on the header.
Ach, the Daily Mail.
Young people must ask themselves ‘Why do we expose our parents to this hypocritical filth?’
The headline was no doubt created in a plush “no middle income” office to the piped music of The Dambusters Theme, Churchill’s “…we will fight them on the beaches…we will never surrender” speech, while sipping Gin & Tonic from a Toby Jug bearing the words “Bunga Hill Tea Estate 1936”
They bypassed frothing and went straight to foaming some time ago.
There is that phrase again ” not technically untrue”. What a licence to say anything you want in the way that suits you.
Technically my dogs could bite you. However having had them over 14 years with nothing but love and affection for everybody and everything they meet ,I think it is highly unlikely. Crikey,even rabbits walk beside them in the garden,and two cats belonging to neighbours share our nightly walk.
Technically,you never know though.
I have never understood why there are, never mind that people by ‘Scottish’ editions of lies from London.
Well, perhaps I do. They are stupid.
As ever, a superb exposure of MSM half-truths, or less.
BTW, ‘truncates’ looks wrong in line 10, would ‘bisects’ be betterer?
When I was a young apprentice and complained about the tax being taken off my meagre salary,my father, a miner who grew up through the depression of the 1930’s, chided me. Don’t complain about paying income tax. It means you’ve got a job and an income.
YouGov / Times Post budget and Voting Intention 180316
link to yougov.co.uk
Increasing the higher tax threshhold (the amount people can earn before paying the 40% rate of income tax) to £45,000 a year
Great Britain:
Good idea – 47
Wrong priority – 37
Don’t know – 17
Rest of South:
Good idea – 53
Wrong priority – 35
Don’t know – 13
Scotland:
Good idea – 37
Wrong priority – 52
Don’t know – 11
More analysis here…
link to lallandspeatworrier.blogspot.co.uk
Scotland at present pays the same tax as RUK but gets more services, I won’t rhyme them all off we know what they are
Why on earth would these affected earners want to go anywhere else for the sake of a few bob, and if they do they’ll find all the free stuff they get in Scotland as part of a civilised decent society starts to cost them quite a bit of dosh over the long term
Wait till their kids go to Uni, or them or their kids get sick, or Gran and Granda need help at home in the big Yoon Kingdom of low tax,… to name but a few that I wasn’t going to name but couldnae help masel
Wonder how many new projects Kezia will fund from the money ‘created’ by not doing the tax adjust?
This is why we have to get out of this corrupt and damaging union as soon as possible.
The reptilian UK media will never stop corroding Scotland until they have no reason to, or anything to gain from doing so. Only we can take that reason away from them.
Ask yourself this, do you really want your children to suffer and endure what we have to, day in day out.
No, me neither.
“Jokers to the left, jokers to the right…”
SNP x 2 + EU
The Daily Heil eh. Far right British attack propaganda or ogling little girls in their underpants. Who actually buys their garbage?
Yes indeed Dr Jim, a point I was discussing only yesterday with a couple of SNP friends.
Who would up sticks and venture South with their family to take on all these additional costs… it’s not for everyone!
Better in Scotland Why even Ben Nevis has grown a few inches since we have got the new powers!
PS: Hark the Herald:
“All that was needed to complete the picture was a Shepherd’s crook to drag Ms Dugdale away”. “Unfortunately for her, it never came”.
link to archive.is
You would think that even Unionists would know that average income is £27k not £40k and that average Council Tax band D in England is £335 higher than in Scotland.
Or that thanks to the Scottish government we have free tuition fees, free personal care, free prescriptions, free eye tests, wider free school meal provision and a far far better Health Service thanks to the SNP that all middle income Brits have benefited from.
You can’t put a price on a much better quality of life.
Well, yes but… It’s not just that small “middle” group that will fail to benefit from the cut in their tax bill but everyone earning more than £42,000. And the effect will not be lost on those aspiring to earn more than £42,000. Just saying…
I am fortunate enough to be one of the few people to be affected by the change in tax levels. I am glad that the Scottish government are able to maintain my tax a current levels in order to support government spending in Scotland.
While everyone could do with a few extra quid, I would not sleep at night knowing I was a couple of hundred pounds better off at the expense of the sick and disabled.
When I pick up a free prescription I immediately make a contribution to a food bank or other charity. That way I benefit from Scottish government policy and ensure that it is not at someone else’s expense. Free services are there as a safety net and I hope never to need them. Every day I a glad that they exist for those that do.
You have to give it to them, misrepresentation of facts is becoming a fine art!
Scots often refer to a daily printed publication as ‘a paper’. We have now reached a point where dropping the ‘news’ in the word newspaper is almost universally appropriate!
A ‘paper’ typically now presents advertising, sport, one sided opinion, and pro-Union propaganda … Impartial reporting of facts and events ie. news, just isn’t party of their agenda.
i think there is a point being missed here.
It is not just the band imaginatively entitled “the Middle” that will be affected…..
It is everyone in or above that bracket. Above being the rub…..
That is far more than the 2% mentioned.
It is effectively a hand out allowing everyone who earns above £45k to pay a lower rate of tax on three grand.
Of far more concern to me is his raid on limited company dividends.
He is penalising family run businesses far more than the self employed or high earning employees.
As one who is fortunate enough to be in the top 2% I am well able to afford this extra tax burden. However I am at a loss to understand it.
Haven’t surveys showed that Scottish people are in favour of better services and welfare through higher taxation? I don’t know one person of several in “the middle” who object to paying a higher tax which is in any event only on additional earnings once they’ve paid 20% on the rest of taxable income. I don’t know any Mail readrs, mind you
Whilst I am sure it is very boring and frustrating that the newspaper apparently takes an anti-SNP stance on almost every issue, to be fair, on the specific issue that The Rev has picked up on, there is lots of potential for “obfuscation”.
In general conversation, most of us in the general public know what we mean by “middle earners” – and teachers and policemen would probably fall into the category that we are imagining when we use that term. So, in that sense, the “squeezed middle”, and “middle earners”, are indeed not, going to benefit from a potential increase in personal allowances.
That is a call that the SG can now make – and it is up to them. With the power, comes the accountability, responsibility – and the politicking.
You now know, don’t you, regardless of the rights and wrongs of the situation, that come the next Holyrood elections – this will be an issue that the SNP will be harried on.
The other parties will lay the charge that the SNP don’t care about Teachers and Policemen’s earnings. They restrict their pay increases and then make them pay more tax, relatively, because their personal allowances haven’t gone up. In real terms, the SNP are reducing Teachers and Policeman’s pay compared to the rest of the UK.
I predict you will see lots of interviews now where the SNP rep’ will have to spend an enormous amount of time and energy explaining why the SNP government cares less about Teachers and Policeman’s real pay – than they do elsewhere in the UK.
Jimnarlene 11.41
thanks for that link.
recommended to others.
As long as Westminster controls personal tax allowance levels, they can feck with Holyrood’s tax income any time they want.
Daily Mail Middle Muddle Madness
Mail readers are self-centred, greedy, vile people.
You’re earning over £42k and you’re bitching and moaning about NOT being able to take money out of disabled people’s pockets.
If you really feel like that then why don’t you go and kick some poor bastard out of their wheelchair, so you can steal it and sell it on eBay? Because that’s the moral fucking equivalent, you scumbags.
I’m reminded of this lyric from The Levellers: on and on the river flow, we are the undertow.
To play devil’s advocate for a moment the lower graphic indicates that the small percentage of workers already pay more than half of all income tax. Also one should not conflate, as is often done, benefits not provided with money being “taken”. This implies that the money belongs either to the state or to the recipient. It doesn’t The state takes it FROM the earner, by force if necessary, and gives it away. That’s a perfectly logical statement (the only one maybe) of what happens in redistributive taxation
See that printed shit up there? That blatant, overt rightwing propaganda; that openly English upper-class racism; that fuck-off-you-Jocks-but-don’t-you-dare-try-to-be-independent-because-we-need-your-resources… against Scotland and Scots, mass-produced by non-dom, tax-dodging Britnat zealots? I mean, WTF?
Does the title having ‘Scottish’ in its name make it legal to promote this hatred in the self same country (Scotland) that it despises so much?
Yes, yes, freedom of the press and all that, but when does that freedom stop being ‘As we see it’ to becoming outright abuse, with a side-serving of lies and utter dishonesty?
Is Scotland unique within ‘countries that have/suppport press freedom’ to have 96(?)% of its own media rabidly hostile to it, its people and their governmental representatives? Maybe someone here can clarify, but after viewing the media in a fair number of countries that are, like Scotland (and the rUK), supposedly ‘free’, Scotland’s situation does indeed seem to be one-of-kind and truly remarkable.
John McDonaldish, 11:56
Yes of course you are correct but you destroy your own argument by throwing the grenade at the end, so I will pick it up and through it right back at you
Aspiring, ok let’s go there. John your proposition is you need the upper rate tax rate to remain as one day in the future if you work really, really hard, your boss may call you into his office and say good job boy, here is a rise just for you! (I say you for effect, I don’t care what you earn)
Do you know to what I “Aspire” more from the tax system than the few extra bawbees, I want my country to be fair, to respect the working man and treat everyone with the dignity they deserve. I want an NHS free at the point of need, I want social inclusion and the commonweal of my nation to be given every advantage to Aspire. That means a world class education system, from the early years and continuing as long as there is a need , of good affordable housing, of a justice system and police force, well resourced and competent, of a excellent fire service that will rush to my aid, and yours John. For street cleaners and home helps, traffic wardens and environmental inspectors competent and professional. I want good roads and fantastic trains, water clean in my tap, and flushed away when needed. A government of the people for the people and subservient to the will of the people, that’s what I Aspire.
The gap between the richest in society and the poorest has grown to a socially unacceptable level, its long past time people wherever they sit on the tax system realise that.
John I have said what I aspire to, ambition not the wanton greed displayed by the Mail, so John can I now ask will you be joining me in that shared Aspiration?
If you do then trust me you will be on the side of the angels :-
I predict you will see lots of interviews now where the SNP rep’ will have to spend an enormous amount of time and energy explaining why the SNP government cares less about Teachers and Policeman’s real pay – than they do elsewhere in the UK.
Scotland is fully aware that the UK runs Scotland’s economy sensibledave.
This is our neighbour’s cunning plan, do as much to harm and hold down Scotland economically, while monstering SNP Scots.gov for not hiking taxes to pay for it all.
Or sensibledave, what’s your swivel eyed toryboy take on Osborne’s now endless austerity UKOK disaster?
And you cant creep away with BBC/Daily Heil style “its a world wide slump so dont blame the toryboys” sensible.
Philip Dixon says:
18 March, 2016 at 12:01 pm
Philip 5% of £3000 is £150 not £1500
Philip Dixon,
5% of £3,000 = £150 (not 1,500)
Which is £12.50 a month = less than 2 prescription items in England and a drop in the ocean re tuition fees.
@Phillip Dixon
” Everyone earning above £45,000 will surely pay 5% more than their English counterparts on £3,000 (£45k -£42k), so £1500 each per year”
I don’t think that is right. If the threshold delta is £3000 as suggested then instead of paying £1200 tax on it (40% tax) folk in the higher tax band would be now only be paying £600 on it i.e a difference of £600 not £1500.
However, although I haven’t checked, the old threshold, allowance plus earnings for last year was about £42K not the £45k quoted so have my doubts whether the delta is actually as is claimed in the media anyway.
I suppose my pension rights put me in the middle bracket of taxation. However I would not mind at all paying more because I know it is for worthy causes.
I already have a few standing order donations to charities, and of course the Rev, having had the benefit of free prescriptions, university education etc etc.
I already pay through choice ,so a little extra in taxation is not going to kill me given that my fuel bills have tumbled this year alone saving me hundreds of pounds.. I do not know many (at least of my acquaintance) who object to paying a further sum in taxation if required.
And it’s £43,000 anyway, isn’t it?
sensibledave @12.09
Have a look at the EIS and Police Scotland pay scales and see what type of teacher or rank of Polis you have to be before hitting 40% tax.
Remember you only pay 40% on the balance above allowance + salary on which you pay 20%. Not a lot of people are going to be £100 per month less well off than English equivalents!!! and you won’t have a student loan to pay back plus other benefits as stated by others above.
I’m nowhere near as sharp as most on this site and even I can see through the pish the Mail are punting.
Hi Roughian
… I wasn’t having a pop at the policy or the rights and wrongs thereof, I was commenting upon where this will probably go – come the hustings.
Weird BBC Politics show half listening to debate just there with Ligger Neil and another Murdoch henchman of the Sun.
Murdoch henchman of The Sun appointed another Murdoch henchman for Press Complaints thing and then that Murdoch henchman then appointed the Murdock henchman of The Sun, for a job as press complaints commission head of etc Apparently Murdoch can decide what the BBC thinks, shock.
Also, Ligger Neil has a really lovely new hair dye colour, for Spring hopefully, or its a just a new wig. Its lovely though, takes years off him.
Another outstanding piece of journalism Stu.
BTW, to all those here throwing numbers around. I’d have sold my granny for a wage of £42G. Half that even.
galamcennalath @ 12:01 pm
See:
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_journalism
@ heedtracker: regarding your last point – now I see how you get your name
Not quite OT
Im not in the 40% band but all this personal allowance is just another smoke screen. Next financial year my personal allowance will now be 11k……… but of coarse I have a company car and the tax liabilities rose in accordance to cancel out any benefit from the PA rise.
Im no worse off than last year, but I wont have a WM Tory telling me they have made me better off!! I can imagine the middle earners in this little story will be getting stung some other way.
Since 2011 there have been 513 new taxes introduced. Aye the Tories, the party of low taxes, just if your in the right club !!
At least Roden has nailed his colours to the mast. His tax cut comes before disabled people.
I believe he palms himself off as New Labour so refer to Kezia for explanation
sensibledave says:
18 March, 2016 at 1:04 pm
Hi Roughian
… I wasn’t having a pop at the policy or the rights and wrongs thereof, I was commenting upon where this will probably go – come the hustings.
Come come sensible, you’re always on here strutting your rule Britnania garbage and demanding answers, now its your turn.
1.Has austerity UKOK Osborne toryboy style failed sensible?
2. As a hard core yoon blue toryboy sensible, justify for us vile seps why slashing disability benefits and giving the dosh to “middle” earners is good UKOK government?
I wont even try to get you to explain the staggering moral corruption displayed by our imperial masters sesnsibledave, as its Friday and the tory stench oozing out of toryboy world No.11 does make at least some people want to vomit.
Some good news for people where we are:
—————————————————————–
Infections also occurred on a huge scale in the rest of the UK, but Scotland is the only part of the UK to hold an inquiry.
Eleanor Bradford:
link to archive.is
Ruglonian says:
18 March, 2016 at 1:13 pm
@ heedtracker: regarding your last point – now I see how you get your name
I’m a psychologist Ruglonian, by day. By night, space assassin.
The Ligger looks simply stunning in his spring colour choices too, on BBC expenses, because your worth it Andrew. Personally i dont know how any of the Ligger’s Daily Politics guest’s can keep a straight face.
RÉCITAL PRÉFÉRENCE
LONG-LASTING, HIGH SHINE COLOUR. FIGHT THE FADE!
Glamourous, fade-defiant colour with up to 8 weeks of lustre and 6 weeks of shine.
link to loreal-paris.co.uk
“Because most of that definition of “middle” will be entirely unaffected by the Scottish Government’s freeze. Those who will actually lose out on a tax cut make up just 2% of the population.”
Sorry Rev, this is wrong, the entire 15% and also the few additional rate taxpayers will lose out on an up to £400 cut in tax.
Nice to know nurses, teachers and police are earning £42,000 or more, it must be true the Mail told me.
Just took a wee look at wages. Pounds
Teacher after probationer year 26895 to 35049
Chartered Teacher 35964 to 43845
Policeman 23493 to 36885
Police Sergeant 36885 to 41451
Nurse Bit more complex but you need to be at Band 8A to get
42612. I happen to know Band 8A is managerial levels.
So what does this tell us?
It takes years for these essential workers to get to the current limits and then you need to be promoted.
Teachers, nurses and police officers are not being penalised. In fact I bet they wish they earned that kind of cash. I’m sure they’d take the punishment!
Can I be a journalist now too please?
heedtracker says:
18 March, 2016 at 1:06 pm
Also, Ligger Neil has a really lovely new hair dye colour, for Spring hopefully, or its a just a new wig. Its lovely though, takes years off him.
Nah, he had a few dirty pots to scour.
Daily Mail owned by a tax evading Non Dom wants to keep tax evading. Greedy Pigs just can’t get enough. The Daily nonsense. The voters will decide not a criminal.
The shocking thing is that so many earn so little in the great old fashioned UKok.
Not all the better offs want to pay even a penny more in tax btw. Just because folks earn enough to have a comfortable lifestyle, and have a few quid in their savings accounts, while passing the homeless and foodbanks and not batting an eyelid, does not mean that they are philanthropic angels.
How many of the very well off and even millionaires, who are handed the warm home payments, hand that straight to a foodbank or other cause? Some do, but I bet most just have a more expensive lunch or buy a bottle of champagne.
No matter what the Scot.gov do, those south of the border, and the die hard yoons here, will still believe that Scotland is subsidised, when in reality, Scotland is their cash cow. It’s just that their government of choice, are fckg things up so badly, that their taxes are going down the pan. That means that they pay twice for services, through taxes, and then at the point of use and need. Wake up england.
The daily heil need someone to blame and something to distract from the utter shambles of tory policy, if we can even call them policies.
If you’re on 42 grand a year, partner at least 10 grand and are complaining about being poor or ‘squeezed’ then you seriously have to sit down and look at your expenses and address that. It beggars belief that a family cannot live on nie on £3500 a month and need that extra £50. No tax band rise is going to address the problem of overspending and the howls of being squeezed will continue.
Have I got this right
a couple of weeks ago Ruthie & her yoonie pals wanted to pay more tax and to pay for prescriptions.
So in practice when they have to pay more tax they they still scream
ArtyHetty says:
18 March, 2016 at 1:39 pm
The shocking thing is that so many earn so little in the great old fashioned UKok.
It may shock but its UK.gov policy, red and blue tory, Gordon Brown in particular. Low wage economies tend to have low inflation which is vital to those who own much of the UK’s wealth. Inflation eats into great wealth making the wealthy a lot less wealthy, which is not a good thing.
So aswell as illegal and catastrophic wars in Iraq, New Labour’s other great legacy is a slave wage UKOK economy but with that wealth preserving low inflation.
It could go so low, lenders may well start paying borrowers to borrow. Also, keeping the UK workforce low paid is primarily why Blair and Brown opened up the UK to workers from the former eastern bloc and all former British colonies.
Low skilled but relatively high employment rate, very low wages, regressive taxation, rule red and blue tory Britannia.
Low paid, high skilled, highly educated and highly motivated, all welcome to teamGB. Its for our own good but try betting on Brexit or not.
Now then, let’s get a bit of reality going in here. “nurses, teachers and police”.
link to scotland.police.uk
To get £42,000 or more, you need to be an Inspector or above. The highest paid Sergeant gets £41,451.
For nurses (click the tab for Scotland), it’s Band 8 or above, the highest Band 7 nurse gets ££41,373.
link to rcn.org.uk
What was the other? Ah yes teachers. Nobody on the main grade scale gets above £35,763, some “Chartered” get just above the £42,000, so basically you have to be a principal teacher or a Depute Headteacher or Headteacher.
link to snct.org.uk
But are there teachers, nurses and police included in that 2%? I suppose if at least two nurses in Scotland actually earn between £40-45k, it would be true…
Scottish Gov will bring in minimum pricing and not pay £4Billion repayment for money it doesn’t borrow or spend and cut Trident/illegal wars. Once 220,000 people waken up. Taxes could go down not up. Get Westminster politicians away from Scottish resources and stop mucking up the Scottish economy.
The other way of looking at this whole higher rate thing of course is that there are so many schemes now for ISAs and other tax dodge credits for higher earners, anyone on £42,000 or above can already be in one, so they can just stay in one, if the threshold stays at £42,000.
Persoanlly I’d like to see it cut to say £35,000 to reflect the lwoer average salary in Scotland compared to London and the South-East. That would bring in probably getting on for an extra £1 billion.
New ISA are for those under 40 to save for home or pay off student loans. Save – the UK Gov match it. 4 to 1?
Thankfully (at the moment) I am not one of those that will be affected.
In the Observer:
—————————————————————
Downing Street has insisted it “remains committed” to cutting disability benefits by £4.4bn this parliament, despite the prospect of a Commons defeat over the proposed changes.
David Cameron’s official spokeswoman said the task of explaining the changes was ongoing and the government would engage with MPs and disability groups to ensure the money for disability benefits was “targeted at those who need it most”.
link to archive.is
SNP x 2 on 5th May.
slightly of topic,
If any young ones on here are looking at this wondering what they can do, to earn enough to even get to pay tax, even if they are not academically minded then honestly try to get a trade, I know plumbers brickies and joiners who won’t get out of bed for less than £300 per day.
link to thisismoney.co.uk
Just perusing social media and various sites and comment threads the yoons have been extremely quiet post budget. Says it all really.
I’m affected by this. However, I won’t be moving to England or Wales. People don’t live places simply because of the tax rate, or we’d all be living in Jersey or Monaco. I don’t actually mind paying a bit extra to help the poorer folks get a chance. I’d probably prefer if everyone’s wages were a bit higher but that’s by the by.
I do, however mind paying my taxes so that the super rich and arrogant of the SE can dodge their responsibilities. So, forgive me Daily Mail for not following your pattern of an enterprising young professional on a good salary, but I choose Swinney over Osborne every time.
I’m one of the 2% that would be affected and John Swinney is more than welcome to keep the £10 or so per month I calculated that the Tory tax cut would bring me. In fact, I wish they just pass all of my tax onto John as I trust him to spend it a hell of a lot more wisely than George.
Stocks and share ISA’s can go down as well as up. Usually down every time there is a muck up. People are left with less than they put in. The Hedge funds win, thanks to George. The brother in law, best man et al all cash in, thanks to George. Nice Wee cash bonus for Georgie porkies and the new best pals. Greedy pig faced suckers. Just another racket of fleecing the public.
Well said Martin and Ravelin. My thoughts too.
This is a very dangerous situation for the SNP.
The problem isn’t the percentage of workers who would be affected but the fact that it will be constantly used as a political weapon to benefit the Tories. Even many of those who aren’t affected will think they are due to the influence of the unionist media.
If the SNP don’t match the bands, then all we will hear for months to come is that Scotland is the most highly taxed part of Britain.
Over and over and over again.
People might not move south because of a few hundred pounds, but it would have a negative effect on new jobs and investment coming to Scotland.
And it is also linked to the fiscal framework which has been postponed for 5 years. How does having higher tax than England help to show underlying population growth is the reason if our economy falls behind ? Higher taxes and negative sentiment will get the blame instead.
I would like the see the SNP match the rates, saying although they disagree with them, it just isn’t the right time to have higher taxes than England, and use it as an argument for more powers than income tax which is too much of a blunt tool.
If income tax IS going to be different in Scotland, then politically it isn’t wise to have it directly comparable with just one band changed.
Add an extra 30% tax band or do something to stop the “highest taxed part of Britain” comparison. Slightly lower taxes for lower or low-to middle earners to compensate perhaps.
heedtracker 1:26 pm
You wrote: “Come come sensible, you’re always on here strutting your rule Britnania (sic) garbage and demanding answers, now its your turn.
No Heedy – I never have! You want to believe I have, you even maybe think I have – but I haven’t! Because you are so simple and lacking in brain power, you believe, because you are an idiot, that everyone that isn’t an SNP supporter – is a Unionist. And that my simple friend – is your problem.
You then project further by assuming that everyone that might have voted Tory is a supporter of all Tory policy. I have told you enough times, I don’t, but hey, you know better eh!
You see Heedy, and try and understand this, I don’t know anyone who might have voted Tory, that would refer to the leader of the Tory party as “David”.
Can you imagine the response on here if I did?!?!? Down here, we are not that sycophantic. We don’t hold our politicians in that high regard. Whoever we vote for, we probably do it because we think they are, at best, the best of a bad lot!
They are all, pretty much, careerist, nest featherers full of there own self importance and hypocrisy..
Its just a question of which one you think is the least worse Heedy.
But what happens on here, so often, is that every criticism of any SG policy, is deemed, and treated like, an attack on “the cause”. Then, there is a “dog whistle” response where virtually all the comments (although there are some “questioning” comments above”) take the position that everyone is out to get them and that their attackers are “yoons” or imperialists and therefore any criticism can be dismissed!
Take a look at other political blogs – and see what support the ever fragrant “George” has got for his policy to reduce disabled benefits. Not very much Heedy – and he will almost certainly have to change it – and quite right too.
Could you imagine yourself writing something similar about one of “Nicola’s” policies?
^what Martin and Ravelin said above. In spades.
Unionists very quiet on these proposals?? Of course they are quiet.
It’s been a good day’s work from the SNP and a good day for Scotland.
Thank you John Swinney.
Stocks and share ISA’s can go down as well as up. Usually down every time there is a muck up
The stock market is owned by giant pension funds, who also own the biggest hedge funds, that feed off any market dips and spikes. Biggest pension funds in the world are not UK. Crucialy for Osborne and UK.gov, there is not an actual UK state pension fund, which is why our neo fascist chums in the south a. go after the worst off and b. try to get UK work force building our own.
link to en.wikipedia.org
BT’s got the biggest pension fund.
So if you’re wondering why your broadband stinks and there’s no fibre on the horizon either, BT pension funds hitting £50bn, fifty thousand million quid:D
This is an excellent analysis of where we are and where we might be heading …
link to businessforscotland.co.uk
“Better Together’s broken promises open the door to independence …. Did someone say Game On?”
Coming soon to your local food bank
courtesy of Gideon.
Soylent Green?
Could you imagine yourself writing something similar about one of “Nicola’s” policies?
More tory waffle. I leave criticising “Nicola’s” policies to our BBC led chums in the UKOK media, because they’re so balanced n shit and ofcourse the assorted army of red and blue tory gits out there, all raging away at “Nicola’s” policies.
They really dont need my help, do you dear toryboy? Sorry, that’s British! toryboy.
there were a queue of folk trying to archive this one pertinent to the Revs post above
(: link to archive.is
galamcennalath, yup, agree with you there. Excellent article very much to the point.
link to businessforscotland.co.uk
heedtracker
You wrote: “I leave criticising “Nicola’s” policies to our BBC led chums in the UKOK media”
… why is that Heedy, would it be treason if you did? Would yo be drummed out of the brownies if you did.
This is how you do it Heedy: I think George Osbourne is a t**t that is sometimes either very stupid or doesn’t think things out beyond the next 5 minutes. Disabled Benefits cuts? Maybe he thought he would receive overwhelming support for such a move (in which case he is a t**t) – or maybe he really thinks they are really undeserving of the benefits (in which case he is a t**t). Either way, on this subject, he is being a t**t.
You see Heedy, all you have to do is write what you think – and not worry whether it is on, or off, your favoured party “message”.
I don’t care Heedy, I am not, and never have been, a member of any political party. I owe political loyalty to no one.
You should try it some time.
jimnarlene at 11:22 am says..
“And that, folks, is why you should never believe the headline.”
Jim I totally agree with you about never believing the headlines – especially Andrex-toilet-alternatives such as the Daily Mail.
But here’s the thing….
Headlines like the one above keep 5% to 10% of the floating yes/no voters in the no camp.
All the while that the msm manage to do this with these ridiculous headlines we will fail to reach the 60% yes polls needed to proceed with IndyRef2.
Stuart and WoS contributors are doing a genius job of fact checking and debunking the Daily Heil et al. Sadly my friends, that is not enough for us to get to Independence and rid ourselves of the lethal Tories – who by the way, kill disabled people: http://www.calumslist.org
I’ve two no voting friends that I have gently been nudging towards yes, and when progress to yes is made, up pops another Daily Mail lie. All very well that we keep debunking it, but I wager there is enough poison still left in msm to kill off IndyRef 2 for years to come.
It is all about the 5% swing yes/no voters.
While msm are allowed to peddle these lies we are sunk, and forever under the subjugation of Tory rule over Scotland.
Anyone have any answers on how to combat the anti-Scottish msm? Thank goodness for Wings Over Scotland, The National, Bella Caledonia, but we are going to have to turbo boost the msm cr@p-removal work if Scotland is to govern itself one day.
Giddy has just realized that there are tories voters with disabilities too and is about to get a crutch rammed up his jacksy. Scroungers, benefit junkies, disabled, all the same to him.
How out of touch is this man?
I’ll tell you what else is free in Scotland apart from all the other stuff I listed earlier
You get free courtesy from your Scottish Government team if you want to talk to them and they listen with patience to your ramblings and if your ramblings are any good they use them and take them forward
I know coz I’m one of the ones who did it
And if you meet any Minister they look you in the eye when you talk to them from the First Minister on
I met the FM walking up Kirkintilloch high street with her husband and Chief Excec Peter Murrell no dark suited armed guards no hordes of police protection and there were a lot of folk there for a Hub opening and nobody crowded or swamped the FM she mingled freely Let’s see Cameron walking down Main street London with the Mrs, they have to have an armed cordon with snipers on the roofs round hotels just to have a conference
That’s the difference between Scotland and Westminster in the big better together England Parliament of Great Britain and the Commonwealth we don’t need an opposition to hold our Government accountable WE The people hold them accountable by withdrawing our vote if they treat us badly, just exactly the way we did to the Labour Conservative and Unionist red and blue Parties
Why would anybody want to move to a country over a couple of bob they can easily deal with and leave all our good manners behind to a country where if you approach the prime minister you might get shot
I’ll take a selfie with our guys any day of the week (not literally, more for the youngsters)
The Troll suggested perhaps we shouldn’t be calling our Government by their first names, or words to that effect
Why not? we know who they are and where they live and they work for us, and you know what’s nice, they know it too
And I for one appreciate it (especially the manners thing)
Goes a long way I think “Aye yer right therr Jessie” “Naw yer definitely right”
Almannysbunnet says:
“Giddy …. How out of touch is this man?”
Like so many other posh boy Tories, he was born to be out of touch.
Silver spoon, private education, Oxford, Bullingdon, Conservative Party. He stood no chance of every being in touch.
Almannysbunnet @ 4.13
“Giddy has just realised that there are Tory voters with disabilities too and is about to get a crutch rammed up his jacksy.”
Haha – can’t imagine a more deserving crotch!!!
yesindyref2 @ 1.47
You forgot train drivers. A trainee driver starts his 1 year training on a salary just shy of £25,000 After slightly more than a year if they pass the various tests they enter their probationary period which I think is also a year but might be longer. When they have successfully completed their probationary period their salary rises to £43,200 or so. Then there is overtime etc.
That is for Scotrail drivers.
Hi jimanarlene,
I agree it’s sometimes hard to see how we counter the blatant distortions, but the fight has not started yet.
We need high profile, co-ordinated leadership and I think Nicola will provide it.
Let’s see what the summer initiative is as the first stage. I know the 50% ( bugger if you bought a 45% tee-shirt!) will get behind it.
Then it’s two things. Firstly advice from Harold McMillan -“events, dear boy”, and secondly and terrifyingly, timing.
I’m getting on, might not see it (shite!), but it’s coming.
The daily mail is steering on a dangerous course. They must realize that Scotland will soon be independent, and they have alienated a huge section of an independent neighbouring county. Likewise the bbc has lost most of its credibility by lying so blatantly and now is hardly watched by most computer literate people. It’s a dangerous path they are following with no regard to the future. They have just committed media suicide.
#Martin @3:01pm
Your taxes help Scotland to provide ‘better public services not available in England.’
link to lallandspeatworrier.blogspot.co.uk
Legerwood
YesIndyRef2 didn’t miss out train drivers. He was using the examples used in the article to drum up anger towards SNP/Scotgov i.e. Teachers, nurses & police officers.
With regard to Scottish independence and increasingly other things the BritMSM are now almost on the same propaganda footing as the the pre War Nazi press and the Cold War Pravda.
Recent example on QT was 10min+ on English schools, nowt to do with Scotland Tasmin got about 15 sec at the end of that debate to say Not our issue. Then when Tasmin tried to extend the later debate on sugar tax to free nutritious school meals like we have in Scotland Dimbleby immediately cut her off saying Scottish matters were not for discussing.
It is a kind of collective mental illness, isn’t it?
The Daily Hate Mail must be between a rock and a hard place. They cannot endorse Labour at the Holyrood election as their tax plans would be even worse for their ‘middle Scotland’ readers. I can hear the gnashing of teeth from here and I have a hearing problem. Bless them.
I can’t be bothered trying to figure all this out. It looks to me as the Yoonsters are once again making a big fuss over nothing.
What does cutting taxes mean? Reduction in taxes = cuts to services.
Tax cuts for nurses & policemen = reduction of number of nurses & policemen.
What is the point of cutting taxes is it to make Osborne look like a nice guy?
@Al-Stuart at 4:11 pm
“While msm are allowed to peddle these lies we are sunk, and forever under the subjugation of Tory rule over Scotland.
Anyone have any answers on how to combat the anti-Scottish msm?”
Sorry Al, no answers from me, unfortunately. The Unionist anti-Scottish MSM is, for many of us, *the* biggest impediment to Scottish independence. They were the propaganda mouthpieces for the Better Together blitzkrieg of lies and fear which stole independence from Scotland in 2014. And they are still dutifully enacting this role as we speak in March, 2016.
Imagine if we had a media that was pro-Scottish independence and anti-Union… Well, we would now be independent, or as near as damn it, with our very own Independence Day coming up soon.
But no, we are where we are, where every day is a battle to contain the substantial forces of a media working as an agent of the British state, where nothing is off the table to stop Scotland from ridding itself of the shackles of Westminster and being allowed to go free into a better future for itself and its people.
Following is an article from a blog by Ross Dawson called “Launch of newspaper extinction timeline for every country in the world”. He gives his reasons, whys and wherefores.
NB It was written in 2010, so it is six years out of date, if you will, yet it is still ‘on point’ as none of his predicted dates have as yet been reached.
Of course, predicting future events is always going to be full of uncertainties, and putting precise dates for their happening is always going to be sheer guesswork. But, whatever…
He predicts the first to go is the USA in 2017. Following, is the UK [sic] and Iceland in 2019.
link to rossdawsonblog.com
Pure speculation, of course, but the demise of the print media, especially in Scotland, can’t come quick enough!
But, if it *were* to be the case and we were rid of Scotland’s biggest impediment to independence by 2019… what say yee for our rightful independence by 2020 or 2021?! Not soon enough for the likes of us all here, of course, but still – that would do nicely!
Superb piece by Macart on WGD.
Anyone have any answers on how to combat the anti-Scottish msm?”
Ruby replies
Not take it seriously! Just have a laugh at their antics.
Are you perhaps wondering how you can stop the gullible from being manipulated by the media?
I can’t help feeling that the MSM are doing such a bad job that eventually even the gullible will smell a rat.
Lollysum @ 5.04
Perhaps I should have said ‘yesindyref2 you could add train drivers to the list’
Would that suit you better?
When drawing up a list of occupations with salaries over £40k then train drivers might not seem an obvious choice to most people.
Dr Jim
You wrote “incredibly sensibledave suggested perhaps we shouldn’t be calling our Government by their first names, or words to that effect. Why not?
I did no such thing doc! I merely pointed out the different relationship that voters appear to have with their politicians down here. You would, quite rightly, think I was a t*t if I referred to Cameron as “David”. It suggests a relationship, a warmth, an admiration, an affection – that frankly doesn’t exist between politicians and voters down here I am afraid.
I know that doesn’t quite “sit” with the UKOK, Yoon, Toryboy narrative that people like Heedy believes exists in the south – but that is one of the reasons he is almost always wrong on everything.
@Al-Stuart at 4:11 pm
“While msm are allowed to peddle these lies we are sunk, and forever under the subjugation of Tory rule over Scotland.
Ruby replies
The problem is not that the msm peddle lies it is that people believe the lies and I think that could well be due to people not having enough time to give any thought to what they are being told.
As soon as you become aware of the lies/manipulation there is no going back.
It could well be the more blatant lies the MSM peddle the more people will become aware!
The whole anti-Scottish thing actually helps to waken people up!
I reckon the Unionist parties in Scotland are finished and that is down to them being seen as anti-Scottish.
The printed Colonial Media may decline over time but the State Sponsored Broadcaster, even if not a single person in Scotland paid their propaganda license, would still be funded by the Colonoal Government in WM.
The only way, IMV, to beat the influence of the Corporate Colonial Media is to buy them out of existence. By that I mean buying ad space in their rags and promoting online Indy sites or simply placing an ad which debunks Yoony lies and provides real information for people to go and check for themselves.
Imagine such an ad in the Daily Redcoat that had the strapline: 10 Westminster Lies About Scotland (followed by a list of their lies). Or: How Your Scottish Taxes Fund the UK. Imagine the effect that information would have over time on soft NOs. (Remember – if indy is at 50% at the moment, we don’t need much to get the desired majority of 60%).
Of course, it’ll be horses for courses. You don’t place a big complicated ad in the Redcoat – their readership most likely wouldn’t get past the pictures. But a simple soundbite ad such as those Indy Poster Boy creates could work a treat in those rags.
It’s the only way I can see this being done but it will take a BIG crowd-fundraiser to do it. I know also that this has been spoken of before with ads being placed on street billboards but, as far as I can see, nothing has yet been placed. I think, though, we need to target Redcoat readers and that means newspaper ads rather than billboards. Just my twopenceworth.
Chic McGregor 5.05
Wrong I am afraid Chic.
Dimbleby redirected “Tasmin” to address the question asked by the audience member i.e. regarding the Sugar Tax – and not to divert off and give a speech about free school meals in Scotland. The conversation had developed into a discussion about the potentially regressive nature of the Sugar Tax – and “Tasmin” was in favour of it – I think.
Which reminds me …. Did you all watch Question Time last night from Chelmsford in England – in a constituency where the Tories carried over 50% of the vote in the last GE?
Did you see the government rep’ get an “armchair ride” with the rest of the panel nodding supportively as she calmly explained government policy. Did you note how an enormous proportion of the audience were clearly government, bused-in, supporters and how the audience asked questions and made points based upon their sycophantic partisanship?
Er …. No you didn’t!
Actually, the government rep’, Nicky Morgan, is someone who is particularly useless on QT. Why she goes on the programme I don’t know. Why would you go on – if your only plan was to wriggle, obfuscate, confuse, annoy everyone – and basically say nothing of any note for an hour?
However, back to the point. Can I assume that Wings supporters will be writing to the BBC to complain about how the government rep’ was harangued by all of the other panellists, as well as David Dimbleby, and the appalling, disproportionate, unrepresentative audience in the Chelmsford Tory constituency?
I like what you ‘do’ Heed, it just shows him up, so all can see him as he is.
Just watched FMQ’s… Dear O’ Dear!!!
Seems like both Labour and the Tory’s should have went to Specsavers… not for their eyesight, but for hearing tests.
All these newspapers are printing stories about what Unionist politicians say about Scotland and what they say is
Scotland is shite!
Scotland is broke!
Scotland is hopeless!
People in Scotland are Nazi sympathisers.
People in Scotland are anti-English racists.
Scottish Government is BAD BAD BAD
Scotland was extinguished in 1707 and became Lesser England.
Which is all great for the SNP and really bad news for the Branch Office parties.
The secret to not getting annoyed by ET is not to read his posts.
Perhaps those who do respond to ET could put a header on their posts ie
FAO ET!
Don’t forget the bold.
That way everyone who isn’t interested in ET’s trolling can just SQP.
Andrew Mclean says:
18 March, 2016 at 2:50
“I know plumbers brickies and joiners who won’t get out of bed for less than £300 per day.”
Could you tell me, where they are working? I’m a brickie, and I don’t make that kind of money.
Ruby@5.42
I think you are right Ruby, but it is also a case of people feeling disempowered, and just giving up and not making the time to get the facts and info they need to make decisions based on what they think is right, not what the corp media tell them to think is right.
It’s what the establishment rely on. Thing is in Scotland they are only fooling some of the people, and it’s not enough to keep Scotland shackled for too much longer, they know that, hence the ratcheting up of #2 project fear.
Al-Stuart says:
18 March, 2016 at 4:11 pm
jimnarlene at 11:22 am says..
“And that, folks….”
I was quoting the Rev’s article.
“I know plumbers brickies and joiners who won’t get out of bed for less than £300 per day.”
Ruby replies
Is that because they are now in the House of Lords?
@Al-Stuart says:
..All the while that the msm manage to do this with these ridiculous headlines we will fail to reach the 60% yes polls needed to proceed with IndyRef2.
———–
We started at 30% in the polls last time and ended up at 45%.
We could have won if it wasn’t for the last minute promises of home rule.
So there is no way that 60% is needed for a trigger for the next referendum. Setting unrealistic levels is just a rod for our back. It will happen when it is judged winnable.
If Nicola actually came out and put 60% on the record, it will be used against us constantly like the “once in a generation” quotes.
Its extremely unlikely we would ever get 60% indy support before a referendum campaign with the unionist media against us. YES support rose last time because everyone was talking about the referendum, and the media were partly sidelined.
An eventual 51% win would do me just fine given that huge obstacle we face. Support will rise afterwards.
O/T
Macart nails the Unionist’s ‘cunning plan’ for the shite that it is:
link to weegingerdug.wordpress.com
‘Ordinary workers dragged into top tax rate.’
Were these ordinary workers not in the top tax rate before Ozballs made the reduction in top tax rate?
Have edited the piece in respect of the issue raised by a couple of commenters.
While we’re on about the media, does anybody remember ever seeing the SNP symbol on the BBC? I mean like a big full screen one?
BBC news this pm had a big red screen with the SLab logo on it, cant remember what the exact topic was. Product placement!
It made me think I cant remember any prominence ever being given to the SNP logo.
Ruby says:
“Which is all great for the SNP and really bad news for the Branch Office parties.”
Yes, I agree it will damage ‘besieged Unionist politicians’ and help the SNP and therefore, hopefully, the Indy cause.
However, I can’t help feel deep sadness that so many Unionist and Imperialists feel the need to foster bad feeling and animosity with their lies.
They really should sit down and ask themselves, is their Union so important that their actions are morally justifiable? I cannot see how anyone would conclude they are.
The tone was set with Project Fear, deceit and false promises pre IndyRef. It continues unabated.
They will destroy their own Union with their excesses, but at what unnecessary cost?
#sensibledave @ 5:52 pm
It’s not England’s Question Time
The Chancellor linked his new tax on sugary drinks with childhood obesity and funding of school sports in England.
He said..
“And here’s another truth we all know.
One of the biggest contributors to childhood obesity is sugary drinks.”
Scotland, Wales and N. Ireland will receive their share of the new tax and can decide what to do with the money.
David Dimbleby had no right to interrupt her and then prevent her from making her point since the SNP could decide to use the proceeds of the new tax to fund more healthy free school meals in Scotland.
@Sensibledave
Feeding primary school children gives them an opportunity to learn about dietary intake, when you provide them with healthy nutritious options .
That is pretty basic stuff and Tasmina was merely highlighting that education on diet is already beginning in Scotland with kids from an early age.
If you think that is nothing to do with sugary drinks then heaven help you. I think youare argumentative either for attention or you are definitely stupid. I think I know which.
The britnat media continues to self-destruct in its desperation to save the so-called united kingdom – a bit like the Labour party in Scotland.
I would have thought that Question Time would be an ideal opportunity to share ideas of best practise – seems to me England could well learn from the way we do things here, limited as our way of doing so is.
Cybernat @5.48
Would it be possible just to print out several copies of these issues and slip them into the DR or other papers when you’re in the newsagents ?
No need to put SNP or other pro – indie title on it …just the facts .
EBC MISREPORTING JOCKLAND.
Can somebody explain to me what point was the report on the EU payments to farmers and the number of different nationalities employed on the setting up of this system?
Has someone been doing something wrong? Has money been stolen? Has someone been murdered?
Was a lot of nod nod wink wink, insinuation and not much else. One or was it two guys very unhappy about the situation. Still don’t really understand what it was all about! Think some unlawful shannanigans by the SG being hinted at by the PQ investigation branch, without any evidence.
So it’s just busyness as usual. Or should I say bullshit as usual.
I understand that the system is struggling as all government computer systems do. However I believe Westminster makes the biggest and bestest and most expensive cock ups in history, they are in a league of their own. Doesn’t excuse SG.
I can hear the squeals of the Naw Bag Yoons loudly. I hear the protests that the poor buggers wont be able to afford to be members of Gleneagles and Dalmahoy both. I can hear the howls that they wont be able to send their little darlings to Fettes! It is only 8 firkin Brit Pesos but from the squeals you would think it was the end of their world.
Oh and that extra half of a percent on the Insurance Premium Tax will mean the Hoose Insurance is probably going up again and on a miserly £62 a week Carers Allowance the view from this one is GIRUY Naw Voting Middle Scotland. £8 is nothing to the Naw Bag voters of Middle Scotland but to a carer on £62 it would be a huge difference. Bleat and squeal away Middle Scotland as this 24/7 carer has no sympathy for them.
Following on from the Question Time discussions, did anyone see the disgraceful treatment of Hannah Bardell, by Brillo, on his very own ‘This Week’ programme?
He used precisely the same scripting as when he attacked Nicola on Conference day – “£15billion black hole, grateful to England for keeping you afloat” etc etc.
Brillo is an oaf!
@Papadox,
When computer programmes are required for the Government they are usually selected by three adjudicate from the tenders submitted. They are selected from several categories by a panel of usually three.
The tenders are usually crammed with information of previous work and contain very specific references re suitability for the work being applied for.
Every aspect is measured and the preference listed and compared by the three panellists. There is also usually a face to face presentation from the applicants.
Sadly,things can go wrong even in the best companies.
Can I assume that Wings supporters will be writing to the BBC to complain about how the government rep’ was harangued by all of the other panellists, as well as David Dimbleby, and the appalling, disproportionate, unrepresentative audience in the Chelmsford Tory constituency?
Probably not sensibledave you berk. Complaints about whatever it was BBC Question Time twits thought they were doing in Dundee, were all about
1. The yoonster bias of the actual panel.
2. The yoonster bias of the actual audience.
3. Almost no Dundonians were to be seen, despite it being in Dundee.
4. Dundee voted YES, not one YES Dundonian was heard, just a very odd collection of angry yoons from across teamGB, the biggest English bit.
BBC PQ twits may aswell have held it in Chelmsford sensibledave.
Got it now dear sensibledave.
Are you this stoopid offline sensible?
Or is it just UKOK toryboy zealotree what makes you like this?
Dumblefud was rude to Tasmina, and his behaviour would have been deemed rude to anyone, not because she is SNP.
Nicky Morgan sits there looking like an unblinking ventriloquist’s dummy, and then she opens her gob, to prove she is worked from the hand up her jacksy.
Tory scum ripping the piss out of everyone, expecting us to believe this tripe, that hammering the disabled, was only being put out there in Giddys speech, as ‘consultation’.
@Sassenach,
Yes, I saw that dig at Hannah Bardell. Our politicians have a basic problem with this in that they cannot outright call GERS or the Westminster Government liars the way we can.
For public presentation they need proof that GERS are manipulated. Suspicions and unevidenced accusations don’t work.
Therefore they have no option but to state Scotland has a strong economy as a defence.
Neil and the others know this basic fact and therefore feel safe to attack,knowing they cannot be refuted with direct evidence,but only circumstantial.
heedtracker says:
18 March, 2016 at 7:43 pm
Can I assume that Wings supporters will be writing to the BBC to complain about how the government rep’ was harangued by all of the other panellists, as well as David Dimbleby, and the appalling, disproportionate, unrepresentative audience in the Chelmsford Tory constituency?
Oh and sensible, Dimbelby himself, the chair, neutral, unbiased also piled in toryboy yoon style with this
link to wingsoverscotland.com
Dimbelby, as the chair explained in full that Scotland knew full well there would be a Brexit referendum, in 2014, so what’s the problem vile seps?
Was that just another mega whopper from a very expensive British outfit that tells out right lies hour by hour, day by day, sensible?
Ruby @ 6.07
Ruby wrote: “The secret to not getting annoyed by ET is not to read his posts.”
… Or, to paraphrase, “The secret to not having to think for yourself, is to not to have anyone present an alternative point of view”
We have seen your point of view on things Dave. You are welcome to have them but I for one am not interested in them now
I would like to give the Mail, the ‘middle’ finger.
Well blow me. IDS has resigned because he thinks government cuts to benefits have gone too far.
What a mad Tory world we have been forced to live in.
O/T
IDS resigns from the cabinet
link to twitter.com
Well I’m one of the fortunate ones who’ll be gaining from Gideon raising the bar but I’ll be emailing my Tory MP tomorrow to say I don’t want to be better off if it means people far worse off than me are going to lose out. I think Nicola’s done the decent thing, well done to her.
Well I had IDS down as the villain of the Cabinet but perhaps it is Osborne that is the piece of work.
@Graeme/Nana –
I reckon it was Moodie tipped him over the edge – being a wanker is one thing, but being a wanking organ-grinder’s monkey is quite another dontchaknow…beyond the pale old bean.
Cheerio!
Well, I never! Even IDS apparently now thinks that Gideon’s sado-masochist Tory economic policy has made a cut too far for the wrong people. Who would have believed it…?
O/T
Having just watched FMQs.
A wee question, What does Dipity Duggers have for breakfast?
Answer.
Waffles
Of course his resignation has nothing to do with losing his court case to keep all the universal credit papers secret?
It also couldn’t possibly be to help excuse Gideon’s forthcoming U-turn?
Harry and Paul do Question Time
link to m.youtube.com
The resignation letter:
link to twitter.com
Looks like the towel folder will be looking for a new job!
Osborne being on the receiving end of IDS saying he’s a hard-hearted bastard fair makes the eyes water.
Happy to pay more tax than my English counterpart, as someone said above, tuition fees, prescriptions, etc, quite frankly our country is more than worth it.
It’s just money, putting a price on social responsibility, caring for the elderly, the weak, the less fortunate, disabled, well, what good is cash in the bank if it’s all falling to fiuck around you. (Apologies for language, but sometimes it helps to reinforce the point).
SNP X 2
IDS has a little bit of a heart and a conscience too.. who knew!
I see Sturgeon has tweeted.
link to twitter.com
In the news where we are:
The Bairns win! 3-2 Rather a good game.
Ids resigns, the Tories continue to fight like a sack of ferrets. Lol.
I don’t believe for a second that he’s resigned because of anything his party is doing, he’s been the chief fucking architect of some of the most regressive social policies that we’ve ever encountered in the past 20/30 years. This resignation on those stated grounds is nothing but smoke and mirrors, recall how he wouldn’t leave when Cameron tried to get rid of him in that cabinet reshuffle?
Naw, they’ve bribed him and as some have mentioned above it will be to cover up some other more nefarious stuff and will be utilised to uturn on the disability cuts…shower of conniving bastards the lot of them.
Remember don’t believe a word they print. Someone had something bigger on him than he had on them, this is an establishment job…he’s just providing the obligatory ‘resignation’ on the grounds of what? Having just discovered a fucking conscience?
Age right!
@Yesindyref2
Heh, it appears folk need to generate some distance rapidly from a suddenly more toxic than usual Osborne.
When IDS has developed itchy feet and a nervous tick you know you’ve gone too far.
yesindyref2 @ 9.29
Agree. He’s fair put the knife into Osborne. Long may it continue.
SNP x 2 and EU in.
More likely IDS sees a post in Boris’s cabinet as a wee reward in the event of Brexit. This man does not give a damn about the disabled. He’s been gleefully slashing benefits for too long to suddenly have developed a conscience.
Don’t believe the headlines, every fibre in body screams ‘bollox’!
K1 is right, or on the right track. Prob a brexit undermining trick with a promised post down the line.
Nadine Dorries just tweeted that when she was going to vote against cuts to ESA, Ian Duncan Smith sought her out and begged her not to. He’s an unscrupulous, evil little man, there’s no way he resigned because he objected to any cuts.
IDS resigns? Smoke and mirrors – must be to get us distracted from something else! Oh look a squirrel!! Stay alert folks!!
The Yoons are full of smoke and mirrors. There is only one answer, and you know what it is. Life is far too short. Do not leave it to others.
Fair play all. Decades of Excel have rotted my capacity for mental arithmetic.
Plentae ah fuckin boardit-up hooses in Easterhoose, fur yoan erse. Wae ah fine band ah Cooncull Tax, fur thurr unemployed.
Stop press,
I D Smith has had enough of it and has resigned
K1 and ClanDonald.
Spot on with your assessment of IDS resignation. He doesn’t care about anyone but himself. Something more sinister behind this which will be unraveled over the coming months and year.
Here’s the info about IDS losing his legal case to prevent publication of Universal Credit documents remaining secret: As mumsyhugs says keep alert, things are never what they seem wi Tories. Ever.
link to politics.co.uk
Tory’s fight like ferrets in a sack. It’s all about Britexit don’t be fooled.
Will the IDS be on the brew?
Will his kids go without food, relying on the good humanity of his neighbours to drop in some food – no – but my family did in the dark old Thatcher days.
Fiuck IDS and the southern English Tories. The rest of the UK outside of London will soldier on. We, in Scotland, need to wake the f up!!
I just don’t trust the Tories… IDS may have resigned, but Friday night is the traditional time to sneak through bad news or changes. Why on Friday night?
Aye Foonurt ‘Eastehouse Epiphany’ is whit he hud, look how he then set about destroying the life’s of the poorest and most vulnerable after that ‘transformation’…the guys a Tory spiv promoted far above his amoeba like abilities…
(No insult intended toward single cell organisms in the construction of that sentence)
WOO HOO!
The BASTARD has resigned!
He still doesn’t get it though. He’ proud of welfare reforms HE has carried out but the latest changes brought by wee Ozzy the Towel Folder are a step too far!
Oh and as another wee snippet.
Just in case anyone thought TTIP was a balanced agreement … think again!
link to rt.com
The pig funker’s gang are now circling the wagons….Step up Bo Jo.
Anarchy For The Yookay
Coming Sometime Maybe
Chaos then ensued.
May I dare suggest a title for the IDS upcoming article.
“The attack of a hidden conscience”
Sarcasm, obviously !!
..
Seems IDS is trying to ‘finger’ gideon for the welfare attacks on the sick and disabled under investigation by the UN…stinks of a legal defence of “look, im actually not that bad a guy….”.
Gideon’s position under pressure now surely ?
Sky Papers at half ten will be interesting. Might even bring myself to watch it.
Haha, oh jeez folks, it’s all about timing, there are good times for political casualties, good times for bad news, good times for economic outcomes (good or bad) and yes…..good times for those ‘terrorist incidents’….some people choose to believe…..some people choose not to.
Your choice.
Nadine Dories on twitter let the cat out the bag.She claims IDS begged her to support the cuts days ago.
This is about Brexit and the next leader of the Tories.!!!! Nothing to do with compassion at all.
link to twitter.com
Bet these UKOK neo fascist delights are hashing up their IDS walks to walk headline.
“Cripples and beggars bring brilliant IDS career to tragic end!”
Here’s a link to the full resignation as listed by ITV. Make of it what you will.
link to archive.is
Just having a wee thinking session outside the box here.
Could the *ahem* resignation, or was he pushed but allowed to resign, an attempt for him to avoid this?
link to politics.co.uk
Friday night resignation,to late for the rags to front page the story?
I wonder if Priti Patel will get the job,or will she suddenly acquire a conscience and tell Osborne/Cameron to do one,
Osborne/yoon/hack media should have listened to Nicola in how to lower deficit,not by punishing the vulnerable but everyone `who can` give a little more, over a longer time.
According to the bbc the government have dropped their plans to rob the poor to benefit the rich.
Paul Mason on IDS & Brexit
link to medium.com
IDS resigns / jumped / was pushed?
Smoke and mirrors folks.
This has everything to do with the EU vote and nothing to do with conscience.
There will be more cloak and dagger to come in the name of the EU vote.
Almannysbunnet says:
18 March, 2016 at 4:13 pm
Giddy has just realized that there are tories voters with disabilities too and is about to get a crutch rammed up his jacksy.
Must admit I didn’t foresee that IDS would be doing the ramming
This is the man who jumped up and down like a football hooligan, cheering in parliament at the first round of benefit cuts after the election. Now he’s against them? Something deeply cynical about this. As usual I suspect he is looking to his own future. One heartless bastard stabs another in the rump. Par for the course with the tories.
Sink Osborne and you sink Cameron. A boost for Brexit?
His letter of resignation is actually a ‘fuck you’ to Cameron.
This confirms he’s being pushed out, that little comment at the end of the letter reveals where the arrow is aimed when he uses Cameron’s ‘we are all in this together’, against him in this way. That is a friend turned enemy right there.
Put it this way, IDS had no problem with his welfare reforms over the past 5/6 years and suddenly he’s citing Cameron’s gone too far…nah…he’s been dumped and he’s bitter.
If Priti (if ever there was a phonetic misnomer it’s her name attached to her ideology)…becomes the replacement, we are in for even worse ahead…if you thought IDS wis bad, meet the mother of all bad…Patel the Destroyer (fuck it’s like some Klingon takeover…).
Looks like England is continuing its decent down the toilet..
Rottweiler resigns. Savages bull mastiff.
I rather suspect he would be more accurately called IBS as he is a bit of a shit
What fun.
No downside for Scotland.
That’s the Labour Party and the Tories all fighting like rats in a sack.
@K1
Priti is Hindi for Love !
SNP SNP EU
link to bbc.co.uk
Tory propaganda unit all over the shop tonight. What’s UKOK BBC speak for back peddling til your wheels off?
Pitbull, I meant pitbull, not bull mastiff.
Karmanaut,
“Mail readers are self-centred, greedy, vile people.”
By my estimation, 90% of the selfish middle class voted No.
The Mail would be the mode of the papers they read.
They will never vote Yes.
Ignore them completely as far as the independence campaign is concerned.
Unless IDS comes to my door personally and tells me he has resigned I will not believe it.
If the yoony media came into my house just now and told me I was at my computer, I would not believe them.
Crocodile tears from IDS??, he is a fuc*ing Tory and always will be, he is simply playing to the cameras, the Red and Blue Torries are so far removed from reality, that they will say/do anything to get a vote.
“NEVER TRUST THEM”.
SNPx2
We need to leave this failed state as soon as possible.
Oooo, just saw the letter.
Trouble at mill in tory central.
Yes, more and more obviously the EUref is no more than a proxy struggle for which faction controls the Tory party. Nothing whatever to do with ordinary folk (not even in England). It’s been a long time coming, but the Tories are increasingly self-destructing over Europe.
Tank Commander Ruthie must be spitting bullets (or whatever) over the unfortunate timing…
Crocodile tears from IDS??, he is a fuc*ing Tory and always will be
He’s probably preparing his bid for PM. If its Brexit, Bojo’s too barking mental tory outside the M25, Osborne’s clearly not got the stones to fight for it, cometh the toryboy hour cometh the IDS, and look middle England, yes IDS clearly has a moral core/compass, moral, tough on scroungers, tough on John Foreigner, proud Brit, just like you, Daily Heil reader.
IDS PM July, Teresa May stalking horse, Mike Gove comic relief, lick spittle groveller.
I know Robert, I was trying (failing) to make a humorous comment about the ‘sound’ of her first name (pretty) juxtapositioned with her Tory ideology. As I said, clearly I missed the mark
Fireproofjim on Tory and Labour in-fighting
I am trying not to get too excited, while they self-destructive the SNP should prosper as an able bodied, coherent and respectable governing party.
Should we get our hopes up?? The thought of losing indyref2 would be too much to bare, NS needs to play our cards well in the coming months. I have every faith in her and the party.
SNP X 2
Robert j Sutherland
Of course the Scottish media will never ask her.
For some reason they encourage the distance between Ruth Davidson and the Tory policies.
For some reason, it’s Ruth Davidson for Holyrood not Ruth Davidson leader of the Scottish Tory Party,representative of every single Osbourne and IDS policy
We are going to win it might take some time or it might happen sooner than you think, but Scottish independence is inevitable and the yoons are going to have to adjust. Freedom is looming and that is a fact of life. We are prevailing.
I wrote above (before IDS went)
“Take a look at other political blogs – and see what support the ever fragrant “George” has got for his policy to reduce disabled benefits. Not very much Heedy – and he will almost certainly have to change it – and quite right too.”
And also. …
“This is how you do it Heedy: I think George Osbourne is a t**t that is sometimes either very stupid or doesn’t think things out beyond the next 5 minutes. Disabled Benefits cuts? Maybe he thought he would receive overwhelming support for such a move (in which case he is a t**t) – or maybe he really thinks they are really undeserving of the benefits (in which case he is a t**t). Either way, on this subject, he is being a t**t.
… I surprise myself sometimes with just how clever and farsighted I am!
Willie Black Predicted IDS would go ages ago. And even told him to his Face. Here is the proof. link to youtube.com
Is he trying to set himself in team Boris? A wee cushy number in that cabinet, he is for an EU leave. England votes oot, Cambo resigns, Gidy left oot in the wind, IDS back in the game.
Not 100% sure but I think Priti is for coming out of EU,
although promised the Minister`s job she might change sides,
seen her at the dispatch box a few times and she is one cold unfeeling person,
don`t think she has much time for the poor and vulnerable and would not be squeamish dealing out Osborne`s austerity.
On IDS. Why is there a collective amnesia from the BBC and MSM over the fact that the vast majority of Labour MPs, including Ian Murray, abstained on the crucial vote on 20th July 2015, when some Tory MPs rebelled, rather than vote against Tory welfare cuts which meant 67,000 disabled people in Scotland would lose up to £1500 a year under the Tory benefit caps. So much for principled opposition.
Ah sible, yer ego has no bounds.
I was wondering when you would manifest after the IDS revelation.
Iain Drunken Spliff resigning tonight is a simple vain attempt by the Tories to distract everyone from watching or listening to the wee phone box tete a tete.
In case no one has figured that out I mean of course the conference for the wee branch office!
Michael, thanks for that youtube link. It gave me a right laugh, followed by a cheer. Now that’s politics in action for you!
Charlie Flynn wins at Biffo
… I surprise myself sometimes with just how clever and farsighted I am!
You really are a very clever boy sensible. Just watched BBC 2 Newsnight pack of toryboy’s back peddle on Osborne too, all very light hearted and cheery, nothing to worrying about in toryboy teamGB, is there sensible.
Why attacking disability benefits is suddenly a red line for your average toryboy reprobate/economic fcukwit, we’ll find out tomorrow, when the neo fascists at the Daily Heil produce something of the usual creep out UKOK horror.
Cameron replies to IDS
link to twitter.com
I think our resident pet troll is trying to distance itself from backing IDS and Austerity,it wont be the only one,all those hacks and yoons that were saying Austerity was for the best,
and now they find the major perpetrator of Austerity finds them repugnant and immoral,
Nicola told them Austerity was wrong,
Labour before election wanted to be even harder on the vulnerable than Conservatives and people, who should be ashamed, still voted for Labour,
if you voted for Labour at Election with their promise of being `tougher on the vulnerable than the Conservatives` you have nothing tonight to be smug about.
The times cartoon. Reminds me of the carry on film and Kenneth Williams
link to twitter.com
Thanks Nana
Its like a polite letter from Adolf to one of his henchmen.
“Your still going down for war crimes pally. Your up to your eyes in it along with the rest of us, but I’m going to get you first”
sensibledave says:
18 March, 2016 at 11:13 pm
… I surprise myself sometimes with just how clever and farsighted I am!
Aye and like most unionists you keep it well hidden.
link to twitter.com
I say! Daily Heil always tweet tomorrows front page monstering of anything Sturgeon today, like “OSBORNE SLASHES TAX FOR FAMILIES CANCELLED BY SNP” yesterday was it?
Oh well, maybe they’re all too be busy leching little girls in their underpants for a grand ol UKOK lech on a Saturday, sorry, BRITISH lech on a Saturday.
Is it Dail Heil, Daily Express lecher or Daily Heil, Daily Express letcher?
Where’s sensibledave when you need him?
Aye Fran, I can picture Cameron in his gestapo pjs penning that letter & going by twitter bbc papers review read the letter out.
Nana
hahaha, thanks for that image, I wont sleep tonight.
So, if I have this right we currently have around 20 Tory back benchers, now 21
, saying they are against the benefit cuts put through by wee Ozzy the Towel Folder.
Nicola Sturgeon is AGAINST the benefit cuts put forward by wee Georgie Porgie and the Scottish Daily Mail goes on an all out attack on the SNP and taxes for the *ahem* middle class in Scotland.
Now that Iain Drunken Spliff has come out so *cough* vehemently against wee Georgie Porgie’s benefit cuts, alongside his now 20 new best mates it looks like Georgie Porgie will have to back track on his plans.
Will we see, any time soon, the Scottish Daly Mail back tracking on their anti SNP high taxes headlines?
Hope folks don’t mind if I do not hold breath waiting for this to happen.
When the IFS,the Institute of Fascist Studies went for Gideon over his budget I did sort of wonder who would fall on the proverbial first amongst the Tories as the rats deserted the sinking ship and jockeyed for the next Tory leadership election.
IDS going, well it would be funny if it wasn’t for the fact we have to suffer another 4 years of those barstewards and probably longer thanks to the Naw bags. The damage they could still do to us is incalculable though.
This is a Brit Nat Govt that is falling apart before our eyes, imagine the economic chaos and destruction that it will cause. The Naws bags left us at the mercy of that, thanks fro nothing yah canutes!
It just adds to the fact we need our own currency and no more tying us in the next Indy Referendum to the Brit Pound as the English Chancellor will clearly be an idiot at best.
Fuck off you twat, you voted for them knowing full well what that prick was…an utter spiv. Didn’t see you on here gloating when he oversaw the entire social security system destroyed and people’s life’s ruined by his ‘masterplan’ to attack the poorest in our society as a form of achieving your Tory heaven of ‘reducing the deficit’?
Wanker.
IDS jacks it in with a really odd letter of jacking it in. £3500 cut in disability benefits to pay for a tax cut for the UKOK wealthy becomes, “latest changes in benefits to the disabled” are a “compromise too far.”
What exactly a “compromise too far” means and who or what’s had to be compromise “too far,” we probably wont be told by our noble and honest tory creep show public broadcaster.
IDS for torybooy PM, 2016!
Maybe its that life for the disabled people in the UK really is a hoot and half and yes, they are willing to IDS style “compromise” and help out Osborne with his ongoing tax breaks for wealthy tories, but it £3500 is just too compromising for them. Rather selfish really.
Convenient timing for that thug IDS, to put the boot into Giddy, not an attack of conscience. IDS lives for inflicting pain.
This is all about IDS working for Bojo and Brexit, simply sorting out the team’s.
Cameron pissed because he has been grooming Giddy as the heir, and now his pet Muppet is being painted as a meanie.
Schoolboy bollox from Bullingdon, as they choose sides.
Wee time-out folks…
Please have a quick gander at this old WOS post, from exactly two years ago.
Doesn’t sound that long, eh?
Well, put it this way – can you guess, before clicking the link, what the post was about?
Did you contribute to it?
Can you remember reading it at the time?
Do you recognise names which are, for whatever reason, no longer with us?
It was ONLY two years ago.
And yet we have bawbags trying to sell us this or that ‘promise’ about what will happen in the course of the NEXT two years or more?
It’s a wee jaunt down Memory Lane, aye, but it also shows us how deceptive ‘time’ can be.
Aside from all that, it’s (imo) one of the best-ever Rev Stu posts, and a cracking thread –
link to wingsoverscotland.com
Are the great abstainers capable of smelling blood here, or will they carry on as usual? Impotent.
ESB Scotlandshire will be plugging wee tankie even more, now that HQ has defectors and mutiny.
Well regardless of the EU Referendum result this Tory Govt is now a lame duck Govt and they will get away with it because of the great abstainers in the Red Tories, what an effin UKOK mess!
I am even betting bottle of whisky with a mate that even in the event of a UKOK/ English Stay In vote that the Tories will be running another EU Referendum following the next Brit GE in 2020 this time with a Leave PM. The full force of the British State will be brought to bear on leaving the EU. We wont be hearing anything about a once in a generation tosh from them then!
A Bad Week for Unionists: link to wp.me
For those who can’t, won’t, or otherwise have no particular reason to recall IDS when he was a real ‘player’.
Heedtracker will surely love this – it’s a frenzy of UKOK toads in a gigantic sperm-bubble.
(Not sure who the reporter is – Michael Crick, perhaps? but a nice bit of faint praise at the end: ‘It wasn’t an historic speech, but it was his best yet.’)
link to youtube.com
Just so that no one goes to bed tonight and is unable to sleep because they are seriously concerned about Iain Drunken Spliff’s replacement.
link to twitter.com
IDS isn’t unhappy with the announced cuts for the disabled. He’s unhappy that it was announced alongside the tax cut for the wealthy. Too obvious, not sneaky enough. He went along with it and would have been quite happy, as Works and Pensions secretary, to take the credit and announce it. His department came up with the idea FFS.
It was announced by Giddy as a budgetary issue, i.e. as a cost cutting exercise rather than sold as “for the good of disabled people”. He’s pissed off because his policies have been outed for what they are, a grubby money saving exercise at the expense of those least able to protect themselves.
This wee Portillo-favouring clip includes IDS’s classic ‘quiet man’ warning. Woooooo!
(Check out Oliver Letwin’s coupon in the dying frames: ‘I am witnessing the death of a legend’. Aye, okay Oliver…)
FRO, the whole lot of ye’s, the sooner the better!
That’s what I say!
link to youtube.com
Hey Ian that’s not 2 years ago, that’s a completely different universe.
Unbelievably we’re further on in those 2 years
Well O/T here, sorry folks.
I think it is time this petition started getting signatories folks!
link to change.org …
I think it is time to give Turkey a wake up call over their behaviour towards the civilian Kurds currently being killed every day by Turkey.
0 retweets 0 likes
Ok a wee early morning quiz, who just said;
“I want Nicola Sturgeon’s desk, I want her chair, I want the possibility of power she has at her fingertips”.
To help, here is a clue, she said “everyone in Scotland will be guaranteed a GP appointment within 48 hours if the party wins the Holyrood election.”
Now she didn’t make it clear whether you had to be ill first.
Ok final clue, she has a whiny voice.
Goodnight
Ian B @ 12.32
Thanks for the link Ian , Jeeeeezo how things have changed too.
In respect of posters past & present.
Many like me will find much of what they would say/ post is already on the thread by the time we get home from work etc By the time we read the whole thread half the night can be gone.
How many have changed their avatar , I note that Doug Daniels posts all have his new picture instead of the old BW one , sorry DD I Prefferred the original.
So how many “ahem” have changed their “handle” ?
Wings is an addiction I personally struggle with , can’t miss a post.
FFS av even got a cough now !
Thanks to you all.
From Twittersphere:
link to buzzfeed.com
IDS out-eviled by Osborne!
Aye right.
What’s really going on? More to this than just saving his own skin? Interesting times.
@Almannaysbunnet
Since no one answered I will. It was Kezia the Dippitydug. I thought her words summed her up in one sentence. ‘I want to grab the FM chair and desk and have my fingertips on the power’ or words to that effect. Not a word about Scotland all….me me me!
Thoan IDS basturt, wiz relentless in robbin folk ah thurr well erntt pensions. Wummin thit should huv retired ett sixtae, awe ah sudden, git tellt it wiz sixtae-six. Pruchin basturts.
Bit appairently, thoan disnae apply tae some ithurr EU member countries.
Another one hits the dust. Roll on Holyrood election when more of them will be gone.
It appears the Oil tax has been cut 20% to 40%. The UK is still importing more Oil & Gas, coal, and fracked Gas. When production in the North Sea has fallen because of Osbornes’s policy of mucking up the Scottish economy,
Onshore wind turbine have been banned in England, coal/steel production has been stopped by Westminster. Investment in solar has been cut. Where are the electric cars 4times cheaper to run.
HS2 (£70Billion x double) and Hinkley Point (£25Billion x double) is a total waste of publc money. A disaster waiting to happen. Putting up the debt. £95Billion – The deficit. There are much cheaper, safer alternatives. HS2 will make journey’s in Britain take longer and be more expensive. Putting more traffic on the roads in the congested south (cheaper) and more flights in the North (dearer).
Trident £170Billion is a total waste of public money. The nuclear waste is being shipped around the world. Dangerously expensive. A disaster waiting to happen. Nuclear weapons should be cut.
ISA’s are a fraud. Just another way of transferring money to the wealthy. Every,time the Stock Markets are crashed by the Hedge Funds. Thry skim off the cash and Investors are left with less than was put in.
Some people had a Building (bank) Society account and put in any cash to cover any unexpected bills or expense. One day a cashier announced it would be better in an ISA account. The person who was in a hurray reluctantly agreed, but asked if it would be the same conditions. That was agreed and the pay in book was left, the consent document was signed. An ISA certificate was posted out. The new ISA account could only be added to in multiples of £500, not what the customer had wanted at all.
The stock market fell. The sum left in the account was less than what had been put in. The customer complained to the Ombusman and got no where at all. Another financial racket, introduced by Westminster crooks. Many self employed people put money into ISA for a pension and lost out. Some then put it into property and lost out. Every time the markets fall. Low growth and illegal wars.
More little blue books are needed. For Holyrood and EU elections. Some folk can’t tell the difference.
ET WRITES:
“The secret to not having to think for yourself, is to not to have anyone present an alternative point of view”
Does this arrogant ET arse really think that here in Scotland we are not presented with an alternative point of view. The entire media presents us with an alternative point of view from an English perspective why does he think that we need his point of view it’s not like he’s well informed or interesting. He’s a boring English Troll and I think everyone knows that.
Have your fun winding up the boring ET by all means but please please could you put a header on your posts stating
FOA ET so that everyone who isn’t interested in ET’s trolling can SQP. SQP incase you don’t know means scroll quickly past.
I’m off to find out what’s going on with IDS. I quickly scanned what he said in the Herald and I got an off the scale reading on my ICD.
oops typo should be FAO ET I suppose you could put FOA ET if you want give him a diffent message. I’m sure you can guess what FOA stands for.
I’m off to read all the papers totally FOC and free of ads on Newsquest & press reader.
@Ken500
Ken I have correspondence dating back to 2004 alerting the government; a Mr Richard Cook from the Treasury, and Ruth Kelly, Financial Secretary to the Treasury; detailing the lamentable and borderline criminal performance of the Financial Ombudsman Service as then Regulator of the Banks, and demanding their intervention and an investigation. To say they weren’t interest is an understatement, my comments were swept aside and my stringent demand for an investigation or enquiry was ignored. This was four years before the 2008 Credit Crunch which was more or less put down to a failure of regulation.
My frustration with MP’s who don’t do their jobs properly is built upon substantial foundations which run deep. It is very often the most awkward of questions which are the ones which need answered most. That grievance I hold is apolitical, but based on direct accountability for well articulated grievance following an incontrovertible failure, and sadly, our elected representatives are universally weak with “negotiable” principles when it comes to such issues. They wriggle, they duck out, they misrepresent, they ignore, they turn a blind eye; and it isn’t just for their TV audience.
You suggest I have a vendetta against the SNP, but the simple truth is I was raised “old school”, and matters of principle are rigid and absolute. Once upon a time people with principles were respected for having them. This is no longer the case I am sorry to say, especially it seems within the ranks of our elected officials, but it remains the way I raised.
Arbroath1320 says:
18 March, 2016 at 10:25 pm
Just having a wee thinking session outside the box here.
Could the *ahem* resignation, or was he pushed but allowed to resign, an attempt for him to avoid this? ?
link to politics.co.uk
Ruby replies
Interesting article.
‘The department also claimed that publication of the documents could allow a hostile press to pick and choose sections of the information to cause the most damage to the department, without providing a full picture.’
They seem to be aware what the press do however they seem happy to use this hostile press for thier own gains!
I’ve read all the papers now but I’m none the wiser. They all seem to have the same IDS story on their front page except ‘The Scotsman’ who have the story about the Paris attack suspect.
… Very disappointed in the responses aimed at me. I go out of my way to educate and inform and these are the thanks I get! Through my comments yesterday, I made it absolutely clear that the budget changes on Disability Allowances were a disaster, unwarranted and grossly unfair. I told you that the policy would have to change because Tory voters would not accept it.
Whether IDS had any other reasons to resign, I don’t know, but politicians with half a brain should have seen that going after disability benefit was not going to be accepted by Tory voters – so he has aligned himself with the voters. Maybe looking for a senior post in Boris’s government?
Ian Duncan Smith IDS or are these the initials of those he wants to Eradicate? Invalids, Disabled, and the Sick.
As a Primary School pupil, I recall our wonderful teacher telling us how a mark of a civilization was how it treated the the poor and infirm within its society.
We had Bible readings regularly, and although I seldom attend a church, I think it does give you some morals and standards to live by, that should prevent us from becoming savages.
Obviously IDS and his pals worship the £ and nothing else matters
We see basic funds taken from the disabled to further enrich those who earn £Thousands every week, those who have spare £Thousands for savings accounts, and those with money for a private pension.
The Red and Blue Tories are inhuman, and any church that has no comment to to make on those who demonise the disabled have no credibility with me.
I’d like to see one of those Archbishops stop the likes of these at the church door as they fake sympathy for our fallen soldiers.
Anyone forget that some disabled claimants were Falklands veterans, etc? Remember how they tried to hide them on parades?
They seem confident that it is easier for their Camel Hair coat to pass through the eye of a needle than enter the Kingdom of heaven.
Do you know that Cameron himself, who regularly claims to human
through his love of a lost disabled son, chose not to use his £30 Million Pounds for private medical treatment and who claimed for every benefit he could get his hands on.
I presume he seen how preposterous it was for a Millionaire to be able to claim benefits and decided to end them not that he can’t use them himself.
I also wonder if IDS who has wasted £Billions on new welfare computer systems that don’t work can see that he was facing the boot for incompetence, and decided to jump over to support the Boris Brexit Brigade in hope of a future cabinet position?
ET WRITES:
“The secret to not having to think for yourself, is to not to have anyone present an alternative point of view”
Does this arrogant ET arse really think that here in Scotland we are not presented with an alternative point of view. The entire media presents us with an alternative point of view from an English perspective why does he think that we need his point of view it’s not like he’s well informed or interesting. He’s a boring English Troll and I think everyone knows that.
Have your fun winding up the boring ET by all means but please please could you put a header on your posts stating
FAO ET so that everyone who isn’t interested in ET’s trolling can SQP. SQP incase you don’t know means scroll quickly past.
Disappeintit wae raesponseez. Ye wurr cawin folk numpties, eejits, in ithurr shitey comments. Whit dae ye expect in reply?
Why on earth will it only affect those paid between £42k and £45k ? It will affect all those paid over £42k.
If someone earns £60k then it affects them as they will pay 40% on £15k rather that £18k . Please explain why you think only those earning berween £42k and £45k are affected.
Foonurt says:
19 March, 2016 at 9:19 am
Disappeintit wae raesponseez. Ye wurr cawin folk numpties, eejits, in ithurr shitey comments. Whit dae ye expect in reply?
Ruby replies
I think these arrogant ET tossers expect people to go down and their knees and thank them for their generosity. If you don’t do that then they’ll accuse you of being anti-English.
I’ve said it before but I will repeat I think ET would be better off posting on the Scotsman where he will find lots of subservient clowns who will be happy to get on their knees.
Arajag says:
19 March, 2016 at 9:28 am
Why on earth will it only affect those paid between £42k and £45k ? It will affect all those paid over £42k.
If someone earns £60k then it affects them as they will pay 40% on £15k rather that £18k . Please explain why you think only those earning berween £42k and £45k are affected.
Ruby replies
I’m confused by your question!
What will affect everyone earning over £60K
Arajag: I have a question for you! If you answer mine I promise I will try to answer yours.
Why is it we need to have all these cuts?
What has happened to cause the UK to be in such dire straits and why is Scotland such an economic basket case.
sensibledave says:
19 March, 2016 at 8:47 am
… Very disappointed in the responses aimed at me. I go out of my way to educate and inform and these are the thanks I get! Through my comments yesterday, I made it absolutely clear that the budget changes on Disability Allowances were a disaster, unwarranted and grossly unfair. I told you that the policy would have to change because Tory voters would not accept it.
No you didn’t sensible, you said merely “I think George Osbourne is a t**t.”
sensibledave says: yesterday
This is how you do it Heedy: that is sometimes either very stupid or doesn’t think things out beyond the next 5 minutes. Disabled Benefits cuts? Maybe he thought he would receive overwhelming support for such a move (in which case he is a t**t) – or maybe he really thinks they are really undeserving of the benefits (in which case he is a t**t). Either way, on this subject, he is being a t**t.
To be fair sensibledave, this ferocious toryboy backpeddle distancing will go on for quite a while no doubt.
Or, just more of your tory bullshit sensible and who knows what a t**t actually is in toryboy world?
Aye Ruby, thoan yins fae sooth ah yoan boardurr in ithurr pairts, urr drawn tae this fantastic and best resource, iz thurr ain wans urr mingin in compairison.
Correction and in fairness to you sensibledave, you didn’t say Osborne is a t**t, just that he was being a t**t.
Even so sensible from “I think George Osbourne is being a t**t” to your idiocy today-
“Through my comments yesterday, I made it absolutely clear that the budget changes on Disability Allowances were a disaster, unwarranted and grossly unfair. ”
is quite a leap of toryboy buffoonery, even for you sensible.
Check out UK reality sensibledave,
From the UKOK henchman that tried to destroy Scotland’s democracy with their historic The Vow fraud, after one poll showed Scotland voting Yes
link to twitter.com
Keep it up toryboy’s, red and blue and sensible too:D
Foonurt says:
19 March, 2016 at 10:03 am
Aye Ruby, thoan yins fae sooth ah yoan boardurr in ithurr pairts, urr drawn tae this fantastic and best resource, iz thurr ain wans urr mingin in compairison.
Ruby replies
You are spot on! I’ve checked out some of the forums fae sooth ah yoan boardurr and as you say they are mingin. I’ll bet if you check out the local newspaper where ET lives there will be stories about ‘Mountain bike stolen from cycle rack’
‘Police tell Morris Dancers to down sticks after complaints the traditional routine was ‘offensive’ ‘Captain Birdseye Set To Return To TV Screens’
It’s no wonder he wants to get in on the act on Wings shame that he is so arrogant, uninformed & boring.
Shame too that Heedy is paying no Heed to my request to heed his post with the heeder FAO ET
Have you read about the Chilcot Enquiry being delay due to EU Ref? What I’m wondering is if all the families of the victims are poised to sue as soon as the report is published. The other thing I’m wondering about is this ‘national security editing’
Foonurt
PS Do you think ET has contributed to the Wings Fundraiser or are all the generous people who have contributed paying for his trolling?
Yes I know it is before mid day on a Saturday but YES I have taken my meds so it’s O.K.
I think (hence sentence above
) that Iain Drunken Spliff has really resigned so that he can spend more time with his *ahem* family … CARLSBERG and CANNIBIS! 
Rubes – 9.49
You wrote: “Why is it we need to have all these cuts?”
Assuming that you asked that question as a genuine request for information, let me try to help.
Its rather simple really …. the government collects taxes to pay for public services, pensions, welfare, NHS, etc. Taxes, generally speaking, come from 3 main taxes; corporation tax, income tax and VAT.
All governments have to make decisions, in the long term, to produce a balanced budget so that the deficit does not get bigger and bigger – so borrowing doesn’t have to go up and up. If you don’t, then you end up like Greece – where no-one will lend you any money and you have no option other than to do what your creditors tell you to do.
With me so far?
So, in an attempt to get to a balanced budget, ultimately, government expenditure has to equal tax receipts.
So where the budget isn’t balanced, the government, can choose to either address the issue – or not. They can can attempt to introduce policies such that expenditure and receipts will be the same – or they can leave a deficit each year and let borrowing rise.
The problem with the latter issue is that countries that are running large deficits, indefinitely, are particularly vulnerable when tax receipts fall or when public spending has to rise.
If UK PLC, or indeed Scotland PLC, finds it hard to sell products abroad (because its customers economies are not doing brilliantly, and by degree, those customers are not buying as much) – then corporation tax from company profits start to fall. Because those companies don’t need to make as much, because customers can’t afford them, then companies don’t need to employ as many people. Those people stop paying income tax and NI – and become recipients of welfare and benefits.
In these circumstances, a situation has arisen whereby revenues go down and public spending goes up. The deficit increases and borrowing rises.
Now, within certain parameters, a deficit or national debt, isn’t necessarily all bad. However, an economy that is budgeting based upon unsustainable levels of borrowing (either because the interest payments become unaffordable and/or because no one will lend you more money) will eventually suffer a major “correction”. A cycle of falling tax revenues and increased requirement for public spending results in a disaster (again, a la Greece).
So, for the long term sustainability of an economy, a government needs to ensure that a country can pay its way and is not at risk to short term downturns causing an economic disaster.
As we know, raising any tax rates is a complex subject. For example, raising income tax rates immediately increases tax receipts for the government.
However, it also means that people are immediately left with less money to spend. Many families operate on the basis that maybe they have £400 of disposable income each month. Money that they might spend in a pizza restaurant or for a day out for the kids, buying a birthday present, or saving to buy a new car or for a holiday.
If, say, tax rates are changed such that end up with £1000 less a year – then that is about £80 per month. £80 as a percentage of their disposable income is 80 divided by 400, times 100 i.e. 20%. Those families end up with 20% less disposable income to spend each month. The pizza restaurant’s bookings and revenues fall by 20%, they need 20% less staff – but their rent stays the the same. This may mean that instead of making a profit and paying corporation tax – they don’t make a profit. The staff they “let go” are no longer paying income tax – they are claiming welfare.
So the increase in income tax receipts brought in by the government to increase tax revenues – has directly lead to reduced spending in the economy, resulting in job losses and reduced corporation tax and a fall in overall tax receipts.
Tricky job!
All public spending is paid for by tax receipts. So reducing public spending is another way of trying to balance a budget. Again, big decisions to be taken here and we all know the pros and cons of many of those decisions.
Personally speaking, and probably even you would agree with me, cutting disability benefit isn’t the way forward.
Just waiting for the rediculous claim that all the high earners are going to pack up and depart Scotland leaving us to pick up the straw around our basket case of a country if the dastardly SNP don’t follow little englands chancellor.
Any minute now….
sensibledave
‘abroad (because its customers economies are not doing brilliantly, and by degree, those customers are not buying as much)’
See that Johnny foreigner.
If only all countries were governed by us,everybody would be better off.Ay Dave?
OMG ET has posted a mile long post directed at me. LOL
FAO ET
WHATEVER!
Ruby, nae idea, in reply tae yurr question. Bit if ah wiz tae hae ah guess, it wid bae naw.
Bit ah cannae say onnae hin much, iz ah don’t hae credit-cairds. Mine ye, ah’d bae mair thin happy tae sen ah broon invullup. Bit whaur tae?
All public spending is paid for by tax receipts. So reducing public spending is another way of trying to balance a budget. Again, big decisions to be taken here and we all know the pros and cons of many of those decisions
Even that’s typical UKOK mince sensible.
If all public spending is actually paid for by tax receipts what is the giant UKOK deficit for and the even gianter UKOK giant national debt for?
Both of which toryboy world said vote toryboy, we’ll balance the UKOK books a long long time ago, and have ofcourse totally failed at.
To be fair sensibledave, our imperial masters running up giant UKOK debt and deficit has given the whole rule Britannia Project Fear brigade masses and masses of ammo to terrorise their Scotland region, what with our £15bn black hole so vote NO and anyone else but SNP, despite these giant debts being spent almost entirely on our chums in the south too, illegal and catastrophic war, Trident 2, HS2, HS3 and on it UKOK goes.
What an idiot you are sensible.
Foonurt says:
19 March, 2016 at 11:50 am
Ruby, nae idea, in reply tae yurr question. Bit if ah wiz tae hae ah guess, it wid bae naw.
Bit ah cannae say onnae hin much, iz ah don’t hae credit-cairds. Mine ye, ah’d bae mair thin happy tae sen ah broon invullup. Bit whaur tae?
Ruby replies
I think you could be let off the hook your posts are contribution enough perhaps you should be getting paid.
But if you are itching to spend that money that you have tucked away in ‘ah broon invullup’ you could buy a mega box of ‘Haribo Party Mix’ and post it off to Stuart Campbell, Wings Over Scotland, Bath, Somerset
Ruby
… well ruby, you demonstrated that you haven’t even got a grasp of the basics – hence my help.
Hopefully, you will now have some idea why raising taxes can potentially reduce tax receipts – and increase public spending.
I say hopefully, I actually mean “probably not a chance”. You are too wound up about “politics” to understand the Economics 101 Class. But I am a nice guy – and at least I tried to help you!
Just try and remember one lesson from it Rubes. Any government, of any political persuassion, of any economy, can increase tax rates – and end up reducing overall tax receipts!
So whether you are a dumb leftie, or a right wing loonie, the dangers are the same – increasing taxes can stop economic growth and lead to more unemployment and public spending.
Have got that now Rubes?
Heedy
You wrote: “If all public spending is actually paid for by tax receipts what is the giant UKOK deficit for and the even gianter UKOK giant national debt for?
Are you really as dumb as you pretend to be? Our current deficit and the resultant levels of borrowing are because the tax receipts were not enough to pay for all the public spending we incurred – you fool.
And before you go off on the “just increase taxes” meme – try to understand what can happen to an economy if you increase taxes.
As usual though, vain hope!
Thae micht Sugar-Tax it, whin it gets tae wurr boardurr wae EU Oot.
Are you really as dumb as you pretend to be? Our current deficit and the resultant levels of borrowing are because the tax receipts were not enough to pay for all the public spending we incurred – you fool.
Almost every western economy runs on a deficit and debt you even bigger fool. UKOK has lost complete control of theirs though, and it is theirs, not Scotland’s.
Whataboutery senisble- UKOK super rich/corporate/City tax evasion, UKOK.gov giant waste, UKOK regressive taxation, Trident 2 £120bn UKOK penis extensions?
All just part of the waking nightmare of having one country run Scotland’s economy, all of it transferring wealth to the UKOK wealthiest and south east of teamGB.
Last UK GE, Sturgeon argued strongly against toryboy world austerity, at the very least easing off a bit, vote SNP and Lab because clearly toryboy world can do nothing but make balancing the UKOK books very unlikely. Look how its all turned out, for red and blue toryboys sensible, UKOK yoons hysterical joy at Scotland’s £15bn black hole, all of it run by exact same yoonsters.
Its not fair but life isnt fair sensibledave.
Your deep rooted fear of England only running England and not running your Scotland region , on your own, in a big world economy, without feeding off/propping up Scotland and her scrounger whining populace, is rather tragic sensibledave, comic too but how frightfully UKOK toryboy of you.
So everyone’s favourite daily Labour party newspaper has the results of its Survation poll. I’ll no bother linking to it but will say that it produces the following results:
SNP on 70 seats
Tories on 22 seats
Labour on 21 seats
Greens on 9 seats
LieDems on 6 seats
and unbelievably
UKIP on 1 seat!
Even more interesting, or possibly hilarious depending on your view point, is the leader ratings.
Kezia Dugdale … MINUS 9
Willie Rennie … MINUS 7
Ruth Davidson … MINUS 6
Patrick Harvie … MINUS 1
Nicola Sturgeon … PLUS 21
And before you go off on the “just increase taxes” meme – try to understand what can happen to an economy if you increase taxes.
As usual though, vain hope!
People like me have had to listen to buffoonery like this our whole lives sensible and the only way out is Scottish independence.
Vote NO vote Tory, red or blue, we must cut public spending, UKOK austerity really weally works, if not, we’re UKOK bust.
Reality, same UKOK torboy’s borrow more than ever before, and then Scotland gets Project Feared with it all, by a BBC led freak show media, that we want nothing to do with.
Ruby, Jimnarlene, Onward, Skooshcase thank you for replying to the earlier point about MSM causing the 5% of yes/no swing voters to stall and remain in the no camp. Thereby the MSM deprive us of Independence (4:11 pm)
Skooshcase I really liked that article by Ross Dawson that you linked…
link to rossdawsonblog.com
“Launch of newspaper extinction timeline for every country in the world”.
With the honourable exception of The National and perhaps half of the Sunday Herald I can’t wait for dead-tree newspapers to become extinct.
It is of course sad to see many fine Yoon journalists get their jotters, but hey ho, there you go
Ruby, I didn’t say I agreed with the premise of the raising of the point at which the 40% rate cuts in , indeed, I don’t. I was merely pointing out that the increase affects *all * people paying tax who earn £42k and above , not this strange 42k-45k window that was highlighted in the article .
Hope that answers your question .
Arbroath1320
It looks as if the SNP have got some powerful brain washing magic!
Arajag: Oh I see! Well I think I do! But hey does it matter if I don’t? I would have added a smiley face thingy if Arbroat1320 could tell me how.
Ruby:
Colon : then dash – then bracket )
Altogether:
K1 says:
19 March, 2016 at 4:38 pm
Ruby:
Colon : then dash – then bracket )
Altogether:
Ruby replies
Oh great :-):-):-):-):-)
What about the winky smiley thingy?
Oh great
Is that better?
@ Arajag
If you had read the comments in this thread all the way through, you would have noticed that your objection has been raised several times already; the article has been amended to take account of this – with an announcement to that effect also in the comments.
Ruby
Semi colon, then dash then…
Also, not so happy, even sad: colon,dash, open (:
:-
;-
I’ll try again! It seems I don’t know my colon from my elbow!
Thanks K1 I’m sure I’ll eventually get it right.
;?)
*-) *) ;?] ;] ;D ;^) :?,
Ruby, thankyou!
I didn’t realise I doing something as sophisticated as SQP!
Saves alot of time and I don’t need my day polluted by folk who get their kicks by being misleading, uninformed and just downright nasty.
Oft times I’ll read informed Wingers’ responses. I usualy learn something interesting and new from those posts!
Well done to those who have the knowledge base and the strong stomach to take on that nonsense! = )
PS Just turned out my lights for World Turn Out Your Lights Day. Still got laptop turned on, that can’t be right…
Well I got the sums budget tax figures right, just by reading the budget statement made by Ossie, but the Media news report that really had me in kinks of laughter was the BBC Scotland one that went:-
“Ben Nevis gains a metre thanks to GPS height measurement.”
The meaning of that BBC statement is that Ben Nevis has suddenly grown a metre taller due to GPS technology.
Ben Nevis, however, is factually still the same height but a more accurate GPS measurement shows it has always been a metre higher than stated in the past. The Ben is the same height it always was. It is only the stated measurement that has changed.
Is there anything those numpties at BBC Scotland ever get right, (Besides the Football scores for Celtic and Rangers, that is)?
The Crumbling Conservatives daisycollinsblog.wordpress.com/2016/03/20/the…
Feedback much appreciated