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Sugar Ape
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I honestly don't understand how people keep going on about it being better to stay on benefits then work

 

 

For some people it pays to sit on your arse all day. Shamefully, the system is designed that way. Surely the challenge should be to create a benefits system where doing the right thing is rewarded and naked parasitism isn't.

 

Most businesses are using the 'recession' to drive wages down because they know people are desperate for the work

 

 

Welcome to supply and demand. There's an oversupply of labour so labour is cheap. It'd be even cheaper if there was no minimum wage. I would actually be tempted to raise the minimum wage substantially.

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Of course the minimum wage should be higher, but the local newsagents shouldn't have the same rate of minimum wage as a corporation making millions/billions in profits. The only way to recovery is to get people working and spending again, not depressing benefits to the point people have to take jobs that force them deeper into poverty and spending even less.

 

The government has been quite happy to have tens of thousands of Eastern Europeans coming here and keeping these low paid jobs as exactly that, then wonder why someone in the dole office doesn't want to take a job in which they will end up with less money, it's a flaw in the system but not the benefits system more the fact wages have been kept low while the price of everything goes up 5 times a year, where is all this extra cost going because its not being funnelled back into the economy via the workers?

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  • 1 year later...
Guest Numero Veinticinco

For me, it's sad. Not that they don't deserve it, but their policies are much better than most other parties, especially UKIP and the Tories. This 'grown up' politics has been a disaster and the Tories have used them as a shield. It was naive from Clegg.

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Guest Numero Veinticinco

2/3 of any poll is a monstrous margin. You guys don't think that 2/3 of whatever polled pool thinking your system is way over generous is a problem?

 

Do you guys agree that that's a problem?

If you don't, well that's a whole other problem

Pardon me?

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Are they officially dead yet? Or will they be having a coalition with Labour after the next election

 

Fucked if I can work out what they actually stand for

 

Or who they stand for.

 

Middle class hippies/Students will vote Green or Labour now. How could you ever trust the Lib Dems again? They were meant to be the fucking nice ones.

 

I hope that's the end of them.

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I do feel some sympathy for them as the country needed governance after the last General Election and Labour had lost all economic credibility to deliver a recovery package. History will be kinder to them than the electorate will be.

 

Their problem is that the Tories will rightly claim responsibility for economic recovery, but they will be associated with the wreckage that surrounded and enabled it.

 

Why vote lib dem? As a party of power they will just be there to rubber stamp Tory or Labour policies. As a party of protest UKIP await.

 

Clegg's biggest blunder was to "demand" a vote on PR as part of their coalition participation, only to find that no-one apart from some bearded, sandal and cardigan wearing activists in Taunton were bothered about it.

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2/3 of any poll is a monstrous margin.  You guys don't think that 2/3 of whatever polled pool thinking your system is way over generous is a problem?

 

Do you guys agree that that's a problem?

If you don't, well that's a whole other problem

It is a problem.

 

It's a problem of misinformation.

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The inherent problem seems to be that in being right leaning economically and left leaning morally (basically good types that believe in market solutions) they don't seem to understand that the current system is not conducive to both.

 

The market will not give the individual freedom. Power to control supply and demand are now in the same few hands. They will be unable to escape that.

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http://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/liverpool-council-election-results-lib-7167178

 

Liverpool's Liberal Democrats crashed out in every seat they were defending as the Green Party became the city’s main opposition.

The Greens, triumphant in both their St Michaels stronghold and Greenbank, now have four seats, making them the official opposition.

Click here to reread our live coverage from across Merseyside as the day unfolded

Meanwhile the Lib Dems, after a crushing defeat in all their wards including the formerly safe Church and Woolton lost six seats, are now left with just three.

Labour romped home in numerous seats, and took five from the Lib Dems, while UKIP took no wards, but came second in 15.

The result left Labour with 79 of the 90 seats or 88%.

Labour had fought hard to try to take the third St Michaels seat,  held by Independent Cllr Sharon Green, who did not stand again, but the Greens pushed them into second place.

Green victor in Greenbank, Cllr Lawrence Brown, said his party had worked hard to win.

He added: “The support has been building in the city over the last few weeks.

“I think we have put more work in in this ward than others, but there have been policies such as improving the state of cleanliness in the ward - which it has been accepted has fallen short - that have really resonated.”

Lib Dem deputy leader Cllr Pat Moloney, who lost his Childwall seat, said he believed the pressure of the national political situation and the coalition with the Tories had been too much to withstand.

He added: “I think the issue here has been a national one and the decision we took as a party to go into coalition with the Conservatives has been the major reason for our decline here.”

There were no celebratory speeches from Labour at the end of the count at the Wavertree Tennis Centre, with Mayor Joe Anderson taking to the microphone only to thank returning officer Ged Fitzgerald, the counting staff and the candidates for their efforts. 

Green leader Cllr John Coyne said: “Maybe he is feeling shy and reticent, but I don't like to try to work out what's in people’s minds.”

Tom Crone, who won the St Michaels seat that means all three are now held by the Greens, added: “We want to work constructively with opposing parties and get results for Liverpool.”

Overall, Labour votes were down but their majorities in the wards were up.

While some of the councillors who were re-elected were up to 2,000 votes shy of their tallies in 2010, that could largely be put down to the fact that 2010 was a General Election year also and so turnout was higher. 

Turnout was recorded at 35%.

Former Liberal Democrat councillor Stuart Monkcom,  standing for UKIP in his former West Derby ward, said: “The Lib Dems have lost the faith of the electorate and we've picked it up.”

In half of the wards available UKIP came second, often with votes into the multiple hundreds, far outshining any other minority party.

The Trade Union and Socialist Coalition, spearheaded by former Militant Labour mastermind Tony Mulhearn, polled low in many areas. getting their best result in Kirkdale with just 236 votes for Unison man Roger Bannister.

Liverpool Central ward Cllr Nick Small, who won his seat comfortably, said: “The results showed great confidence in the Mayor's agenda for the city.

“The Lib Dems have been wiped out in Liverpool and will probably never come back again. We've maintained our support in broad terms from where we were two years ago. The Lib Dem vote has had to go somewhere.

“I think across the country there's quite an anti-politics vote out there, and some of it is going to UKIP and some of it going to the Greens.”

Of the Lib Dems’ remaining seats, one is that of next year’s Lord Mayor Cllr Erica Kemp.

Convention requires that she is politically neutral during her mayoralty.

Leader Cllr Richard Kemp, who must now get used to sharing his ward with Labour's member in Church Cllr Richard Wenstone, said: “The Greens are very erratic in the chamber at times. Sensible opposition is what counts.”

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The Greens are arseholes. Anyone who ties their whole philosophy on one particular aspect of existence is a protest group not a party.

I spoilt my ballot. For the first time ever and I feel nothing. I would feel a cunt had I voted for the Lib Dems.

I guess it is our fault and Labours. As a scumbag I will never be a Tory even if I have a bob or two. They are just different. I've flirted with the idea as a business owner but they don't care about me and more importantly don't give a shit about my customers.

 

Ukip are mental. Fuck Off. Milliband is the antithesis (sp) of a labour man, intelligent as he is, he can fuck off. Clegg is just a Tory who took pity on poor school mates who only got 30k a year tuck room allowance. Wanker.

 

What we have to get into our heads in this country is that it is alright to work for a living. Good brickies should be paided the same as good administrators. Just because you wear a tie and call yourself the head of brick distribution does not men you should earn more the Ted the Brickie.

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The Greens are arseholes. Anyone who ties their whole philosophy on one particular aspect of existence is a protest group not a party.

I spoilt my ballot. For the first time ever and I feel nothing. I would feel a cunt had I voted for the Lib Dems.

I guess it is our fault and Labours. As a scumbag I will never be a Tory even if I have a bob or two. They are just different. I've flirted with the idea as a business owner but they don't care about me and more importantly don't give a shit about my customers.

 

Ukip are mental. Fuck Off. Milliband is the antithesis (sp) of a labour man, intelligent as he is, he can fuck off. Clegg is just a Tory who took pity on poor school mates who only got 30k a year tuck room allowance. Wanker.

 

What we have to get into our heads in this country is that it is alright to work for a living. Good brickies should be paided the same as good administrators. Just because you wear a tie and call yourself the head of brick distribution does not men you should earn more the Ted the Brickie.

 

What?

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I'm not buying this idea that Ed Miliband isn't a Labour man. I think the fact he's got the likes of Cruddas and Wood on his policy team shows that he is going to be looking at redistribution of wealth (or predistribution) and I particularly like Cruddas' ideas on selling sophisticated self-interest (as in "I am a socialist as a fairer society is better for everyone...which is better for me because of x, y & z).

 

I'd much prefer someone willing to move people's views to the left through convincing and inspiring leadership, other than follow their views in the numbers, win what they need to win and then to try and slip socialism under the radar when in power, but I'll take option 2 over anything else on offer at the moment.

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What aspect of that is difficult for you to understand?

 

I think he's struggling to understand why you think they have tied themselves to one aspect of existence. 

 

Especially given that most of their offering now is quite broad and sensible, and not just "Save the whales".

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