DEM not gonna CON dis NATION: Rolling UK politics in the short-lived Cleggeron era

, like i said

maudez unit

Clegg'ron

Da Cable Guy

d-lex

will.i.am 'big willy style' hague

camewrong

http://startupbritain.org/

― nutella on ma sarnie (Ned Trifle II), Monday, March 28, 2011 2:12 PM (2 days ago)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-12904585

baroness warsi

riiiiitch biitch
a muthufikkin riitch biitch

via yolandi

Haz-L aka Blearz

The Government has rejected a fresh appeal to provide immediate funding to upgrade Morpeth's flood defences.

Environment Minister Lord Henley instead suggested local people might find money to pay for a £17m scheme designed to prevent a repeat of flooding in September 2008.

He insisted local communities would be involved in discussions about how money could go further by involving them in schemes "and for communities themselves or for private money to come in to assist the public money that comes from Defra".

power to the people!

They probably vote Labour anyway, so fuck 'em

Yup

http://www.journallive.co.uk/north-east-news/todays-news/2011/02/05/morpeth-singled-out-for-grim-news-says-mp-61634-28117441/

Wansbeck MP Ian Lavery spoke out after the Government announced a decision on a bypass scheme was being delayed until the end of the year – with no guarantee that it will go ahead.

The news comes in the wake of Morpeth’s £17m flood defence scheme being thrown into doubt by cuts imposed by the Government. Work on the project was supposed to get under way in December 2011 and be finished in late 2013.

The Labour MP also fears the impact of spending cuts on employment in the town, with half of Morpeth’s workers employed by the public sector.

Mr Lavery said: “Morpeth seems to have been targeted more than anywhere else in the North East. It seems to be singled out.”

half of Morpeth’s workers employed by the public sector

Let 'em drown

Labour MP but 3 LD councillors(and it's the LDs who run Northumberland council). Probably quite relieved they're not up for re-election this year.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-12920843 <- great idea, what could go wrong

Sir Gerald's been a bad boy

I honestly can't think of any policy less likely to be popular with the electorate than privatised prisons.

idk if they gaf

think he may have mental problems :D xxp

I honestly can't think of any policy less likely to be popular with the electorate than privatised prisons.

I can

... tasteful photo accompanying that article, no?

yeah ppl are mostly cunts and retards wrt criminal justice #truisms

100 expensive, badly run private prisons vs 50 well run ~state~ prisons = former, every time

she's doing it wrong

POLL RESULTS
Should 'subordinate' drug gang members be let off easy to free up prison space?

No 36%

Yes 64%

Thank you for voting

free the heroin dealers!

they've not done anyone any harm

right

I think they should be given a smack on the wrist.

Deja vu

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1372172/David-Willetts-Feminism-widened-poverty-gap-set-social-mobility-decades.html

the universities minister, ladies and gentlemen.

Which of his two brains was he using when he came out with that?

it's not untrue though, is it? the rise of the middle class two income family has made poor families relatively worse off. the daily mail wants to plant the idea that, therefore, feminism is bad and wrong, but willetts doesn't endorse that at all.

where that falls down is the assumption that double-income families postdate 'feminism' though?

‘But I think it certainly widened the gap in household incomes because you suddenly had two-earner couples, both of whom were well educated, compared with often workless households where nobody was educated.

... and why were the other households workless and uneducated, Mr Willetts?

Lack of bikes.

Lack of oestrogen perhaps

where that falls down is the assumption that double-income families postdate 'feminism' though?

― c sharp major, Friday, 1 April 2011 12:59 (10 minutes ago) Bookmark

sure, there have been double income families for ever, but usually out of economic necessity. large numbers of middle class women staying in work after marriage and children are a recognisable phenomenon of the late 20th century i'd have thought, obviously partly down to introduction of maternity pay, extension of employment rights etc. which it's not that odd to ascribe to "feminism". if you're hinting at an alternative history, you'll have to spell it out, this isn't my area of expertise. but i think it's possible to acknowledge that there may have been some trade-offs to the gains that feminism made without being reactionary, and i don't think willetts is, in this case.

argh didn't hit submit:

also the assumption, which is Willetts' though certainly shared by the DM, that feminism exists and existed solely to widen opportunities for middle-class women.

"Feminism has trumped egalitarianism" is a line from his book from last year, which focussed on the (now quite fashionable in left-leaning circles) idea that the baby boomers fucked things for the generations that came afterwards. If falls down because a) feminism IS egalitarianism and b) Tories by and large don't believe in egalitarianism in the first place. However I don't think he's actually attacking feminism even if the Daily Mail desperately wants to present him in that light.

feminism IS egalitarianism

yeah in the abstract, but he is talking about something specific, about university-educated women and that

but ya obvi the tories don't really like egalitarianism

But I think it certainly widened the gap in household incomes because you suddenly had two-earner couples, both of whom were well educated, compared with often workless households where nobody was educated.

solution is to ban marriages between same-education-status couples? if you have a degree you must only marry someone who has had no education. problem solved!!!

yh there is quite a nuanced argument in here (and one which is being had on the left) about the intersection of gender and class, and how the workforce has been changing, and stuff-- but seeing 'feminism' as the cause is historically illiterate and also, as a politician, he is in full knowledge of what messages that sends.

and tbh i'm in a funny position here because i find myself thinking 'but how can you even talk about this when it's going to get soundbitten down into something that ignores all the nuances?'-- which is something I don't want to think, because i would like to believe that these nuanced arguments can be available to all and comprehensible by all.

Isn't it the case that after campaigners in the 70s won the battle to have mortgages based on wives' incomes as well as husbands', house prices more or less doubled overnight? Not sure if this is strictly relevant, tbh.

Also pretty sure Willets went to public school, not grammar.

Isn't it the case that after campaigners in the 70s won the battle to have mortgages based on wives' incomes as well as husbands', house prices more or less doubled overnight?

an exaggeration i think, but that is how the housing 'market' works: the more 'credit' available, the higher the prices

a beautiful thing

xp it was a grammar school when willetts was there.

Willetts, in certain parts of the country, is a synonym for dingleberries. #fyi

So disgusting:

Jobcentres tricking people out of benefits to cut costs, says whistleblower: Soaring number of sanctions against unemployed amid claims that DWP staff are being told to trip people up with paperwork