Cameron? Anyone?

[LondonMix]

Really-- I think Cameron and Boris are both a bit lazy and shortsighted.

Robert Poste's Child Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> To put it another way, I thought he was lazy.

> Whatever you may say about Boris I don't think

> that's true of him. May I think has a strong sense

> of duty, so a very different kind of mindset.

[Robert Poste's Child]

Boris is certainly shortsighted at times, among other limitations, but I was struggling to think of a time when Cameron sounded genuinely keen, inspired or enthusiastic about anything (other than point-scoring, often at quite a petty level) which I don't think is true of Boris.

I suppose Cameron must have felt some kind of enthusiasm for creating peers as he made an unprecedented number of them, presumably to give the Tories an advantage in the House of Lords.

[Blah Blah]

That is one of many ironic acts of Cameron. Creating tons of peers while seeking to cut the number of MPs - to erm cut costs. Would have nothing to do with increasing the power of the Tories in either house then?

Agree with all the comments above.

[????]

To some degree:

Shallow

Gambler

Showman

Not much depth

Lack of judgement

But had some principles and was genuinely a liberal conservative - gay marriage made absolutely no sense for him to champion from a political point of view and his apology on Bloody Sunday was immediate and heartfelt and refreshing from a politician (in comparison with the Equivalence that Corbyn has to put in on any kind of statement against Terrorism/online intimidation/anti-semitism by comparison).

Also, he managed to pull together a coalition in very, very difficult conditions which stopped this country going bankrup. Though many on the left seem to think this was not necessary.......

In terms of history - the Referendum was poor judgement and but my feel is that it would have come in the end whatever

[Jenny1]

I agree with all that ???? except this

???? Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> the Referendum ...would have

> come in the end whatever

I don't think the referendum was inevitable.

Cameron partly called it, of course, in order to win the last election (which ironically I don't think he particularly wanted to do - he showed signs of having had enough of being PM by then). I suspect his other motive was petulance and impatience. He'd simply got tired of Tory Eurosceptics, so challenged them to the referendum campaign. That was foolish of him. You're never going to get rid of all the griping, irritating people - and must learn to put up with them.

[Robert Poste's Child]

The Brexit referendum was a bizarre mistake to make after nearly losing Scotland, hubris almost. I hope Ma'am refuses to give him the peerage he craves in the New Year's honours list.

[uncleglen]

Over 120 Conservative MPs said they were voting leave and at least 10 Labour ones including Kate Hoey, Frank Skinner and Frank Field,- hopefully representing the views of their constituents rather than toeing the party line which is what Labour politicians do all the time.

The more some of us found out about the ridiculous goings on in the EU the more likely we were to vote leave.

This article summed it up for me

http://labour-uncut.co.uk/tag/lucy-ashton/

[JohnL]

uncleglen Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Over 120 Conservative MPs said they were voting

> leave and at least 10 Labour ones including Kate

> Hoey, Frank Skinner and Frank Field,- hopefully

> representing the views of their constituents

> rather than toeing the party line which is what

> Labour politicians do all the time.

> The more some of us found out about the ridiculous

> goings on in the EU the more likely we were to

> vote leave.

> This article summed it up for me

> http://labour-uncut.co.uk/tag/lucy-ashton/

But

"MPs are governed by *** their determination *** of the best interests of their

constituency, their party and the country as a whole."

http://www.politics.co.uk/reference/mps-and-political-artiesp

[Otta]

I agree with Quids RE the good stuff that Cameron did.

But he and Osborne made a lot of deep deep cuts to public services that I believe they made because they wanted to. The whole austerity / balancing the books thing was a convenient excuse to let them do what the hell they wanted.

So for that reason the pair of them can jog on.

[LondonMix]

Otta, I think that's unfair. Some of the policies were ill thought out but reducing the deficit and controlling the debt were 100% necessary. Ideologically did they want to cut public services just because they believe in smaller government-- I'm not sure there is any evidence of that. While less publicized (because they are less newsworthy / controversial), cuts were made on various tax benefits to higher rate payers (mostly via tinkering with pension allowances and removing the tax free income allowance but other benefits as well). I think increase on stamp duty and the removal of interest deductability for BTL investors shows they were willing to hurt their natural constituents at times to do what was right for the country / win votes to stay in power. They also adopted (and admitted doing so) entire policies directly from the Labor manifesto regarding living wages etc.

Anyhow, they made a lot of mistakes and errors regarding public policy, particularly the NHS, council budgets etc etc. I'm not saying they were by any means perfect but I also don't see them as villains. I think the Tory party might very well lurch to the right without Osborne and Cameron.

[Robert Poste's Child]

I found myself wondering if the naming of Gideon/Jack Titchener in the Archers is a veiled reference to Gideon/George Osborne. Expect in 30 years he'll manifest his evil genes by becoming a MP for Borchester and wreaking havoc on the local economy.

[miga]

???? Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> To some degree:

>

> Shallow

> Gambler

> Showman

> Not much depth

> Lack of judgement

>

> But had some principles and was genuinely a

> liberal conservative - gay marriage made

> absolutely no sense for him to champion from a

> political point of view and his apology on Bloody

> Sunday was immediate and heartfelt and refreshing

> from a politician (in comparison with the

> Equivalence that Corbyn has to put in on any kind

> of statement against Terrorism/online

> intimidation/anti-semitism by comparison).

>

> Also, he managed to pull together a coalition in

> very, very difficult conditions which stopped this

> country going bankrup. Though many on the left

> seem to think this was not necessary.......

>

> In terms of history - the Referendum was poor

> judgement and but my feel is that it would have

> come in the end whatever

I agree ???? - he wasn't an intellectual giant, but neither was he some fuddy duddy old "bring back the Empire" little colonel.

[????]

I think the big issue for the Tories and the cuts were that many people (including me) believe cuts were and still are necessary - where they chose to do them wasn't always right and/or could easily spun around posh boys cutting public services. I do think, through no direct fault of their own but birth, Osbourne and Cameron have no idea how what to thenm seem trivial amounts matter to those far less priveliged. I genuinely think they just didn't get this in terms of benefits cuts etc.

But we've a far more right wing or certainly more 'ideological' govt now I think. Next election the choice looks like being 'back to the 50s or back to the 70s'!

in my view Cameron>May>Corbyn......none that good

[LondonMix]

Agree that genuine ignorance played it part in certain policy decisions.

???? Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I think the big issue for the Tories and the cuts

> were that many people (including me) believe cuts

> were and still are necessary - where they chose to

> do them wasn't always right and/or could easily

> spun around posh boys cutting public services. I

> do think, through no direct fault of their own but

> birth, Osbourne and Cameron have no idea how what

> to thenm seem trivial amounts matter to those far

> less priveliged. I genuinely think they just

> didn't get this in terms of benefits cuts etc.

>

> But we've a far more right wing or certainly more

> 'ideological' govt now I think. Next election the

> choice looks like being 'back to the 50s or back

> to the 70s'!

>

> in my view Cameron>May>Corbyn......none that good

[Otta]

???? Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I think the big issue for the Tories and the cuts

> were that many people (including me) believe cuts

> were and still are necessary - where they chose to

> do them wasn't always right and/or could easily

> spun around posh boys cutting public services. I

> do think, through no direct fault of their own but

> birth, Osbourne and Cameron have no idea how what

> to thenm seem trivial amounts matter to those far

> less priveliged. I genuinely think they just

> didn't get this in terms of benefits cuts etc.

>

> But we've a far more right wing or certainly more

> 'ideological' govt now I think. Next election the

> choice looks like being 'back to the 50s or back

> to the 70s'!

>

> in my view Cameron>May>Corbyn......none that good

I do agree that some of the problems happened because they genuinely had no idea what their policies meant on the ground. RThat was laid very bare when Cameron wrote to the council leader in his constiuency complaining about the closure of some services. The council leader (a tory) responded basically saying what the hell do you expect?

[Otta]

I also agree that May is MUCH more of a "Tory" than Cameron.

[rendelharris]

LondonMix Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

Some of the policies

> were ill thought out but reducing the deficit and

> controlling the debt were 100% necessary.

One can argue both sides re the necessity for reducing debt - the Tories made it sound as if no government in history had run a deficit before Blair/Brown - but as the national debt in 2010 was a whisker under one trillion and at the end of the 2015-16 financial year was over one and a half trillion (in 2005 it was 38% of GDP, it's now 80%) they've manifestly failed in their own terms.

http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/uk_national_debt_chart.html

[Otta]

I think the finances needed looking at for sure. But they were able (largely because Labour inexplicably sat there and let them) to just keep repeating that Labour were solely responsible for all of the world's finacial ills, and they were basically given a free pass to do their worst. And with some of the cuts they really really did. And in far too many ways it was the vulnerable that suffered most and contine to suffer most.

I do take on board what LM says about those cuts which affected the better off, but at the end of the day, they're better off, so the cuts are a pain but not really that big a deal.

I think the issue is that the effect of a lot of the cuts are not easily quantifiable, so it's easy for politicians to ignore the families who are losing support right left and centre, because it's not recorded.

[Earl Aelfheah]

They didn't reduce the debt. They decreased the deficit.

[LondonMix]

Exactly rahrah-- as long as there is still a deficit the debt will continue to go up. Only a surplus position can reverse that.

I agree that the rich should and are better placed to shoulder the burden. The truth is though, that the rich are two small a segment of the total population to be the only solution to long term structural financial problems. The hard choices have only just begun-- the NHS boss who recently came out and said its time to admit the NHS can't provide the level of target service with the funding it has and its time to decide to formally reduce service levels isn't being alarmist. Hospitals are on the verge of closing A&E services overnight. That's just the NHS. There are many other difficult decisions that need to be tackled regarding public services and taxes.

What really annoys me though is everyone happily accepted their tax cuts from the government while in the same breadth complaining about the cut in public services. Its one or the other.

[JohnL]

LondonMix Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Exactly rahrah-- as long as there is still a

> deficit the debt will continue to go up. Only a

> surplus position can reverse that.

>

A country can run a deficit and inflate/grow it's way out

of debt IIRC.

%GDP is the correct measure I think.

Edit: this website shows it's actually leveling out now.

http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/uk_national_debt_chart.html

[LondonMix]

Not in absolute terms which is what was being discussed. The debt to GDP ratio of course can change if growth is higher than the deficit but the actual quantum of debt cannot go down without a surplus position. The real value of debt in inflation adjusted terms also can go down if the deficit is lower than inflation.

I'm not anti-deficit. A moderate deficit is perfectly healthy under the right economic conditions. Also deficit spending on long term investment that will support growth is very different to structural deficits on ongoing spending commitments.

[Otta]

LondonMix Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> What really annoys me though is everyone happily

> accepted their tax cuts from the government while

> in the same breadth complaining about the cut in

> public services. Its one or the other.

Totally agree.

Personally I'd happily pay a bit more tax, and see less cuts.

Although to be honest, less cuts would mean less stress for me at work, so I'd be paying for bettwe wellbeing.

[????]

The problem with the defeceit/debt is the near & medium term future not this years or even this Parliament - demographics, increased longevity and modern health and pensions costs means it will mushroom. The NHS is fucked with it's current model and sticking the top rate back upto 50% and corporation tax to EU norms is chickenfeed and not going to come anywhere near to funding it (and, in my opinion would be tax negative anyway)

[rendelharris]

If you want to talk about deficit rather than the total debt, the 2010 Tory manifesto promised "an emergency budget within fifty days to pay down to bulk of the deficit." As of 2015 the deficit had been reduced by a third, which is hardly "the bulk" of it - so again, by their own yardstick, they failed.