Poll: General election voting intentions poll

[Terminal_Boy]

Ah I see - you've fallen for the Tory narrative that the Labour government were responsible for the global financial crisis and that austerity is necessary to repair the public finances, despite the evidence that the public finances only started to get better when Osborne abandoned austerity.

While Labour didn't cause the crisis, they did quietly remove the banking controls put in after the IBCC scandal which meant UK banks were able to lend silly money to the Yanks.

 

[delta0]

You couldn't make this up.

And one of the only economies recovering.

 

[Bear]

There is a lot of truth there in the way the UK does politics. Why is it beyond them not to cater for everyone but at a reduced level rather than jam today but nothing for another five years?

My guess would be that the reduced level would be so small, it would make little difference to anyone it aimed to help.

 

[scorza]

What do you mean by "abandoned austerity"? Austerity is merely reducing the deficit...



Even Labour are saying they will reduce the deficit so if anything it is Labour who've embraced Austerity.

Yeah fair point, I think there's a difference between simply reducing the deficit and the ideological austerity we've seen from the coalition where swingeing cuts have been applied with glee to public institutions, which in turn has hampered growth, hit living standards and not reduced borrowing by as much as predicted. I still maintain Osborne is the most cynical chancellor, certainly in my living memory, perhaps ever - and the current feel-good factor we're feeling is a result of a deliberate abandonment of plan A a couple of years back. Once he's back in it'll be back to plan A to finish the job - he's even said as much in his budget.

 

[estebanrey]

Yeah fair point, I think there's a difference between simply reducing the deficit and the ideological austerity we've seen from the coalition where swingeing cuts have been applied with glee to public institutions, which in turn has hampered growth, hit living standards and not reduced borrowing by as much as predicted. I still maintain Osborne is the most cynical chancellor, certainly in my living memory, perhaps ever - and the current feel-good factor we're feeling is a result of a deliberate abandonment of plan A a couple of years back. Once he's back in it'll be back to plan A to finish the job - he's even said as much in his budget.

The problem is "austerity" has been misused in the last 5 years. It seems to mean now "small state giving no or hardly any support to poor people" to most of the population, but dangerously the anti-austerity parties (like we see in Greece) know what it means and they actually believe that checks and balances on government spending should be ignored. Deficits can just rise and rise and we'll just print money to sustain it.

Globally speaking, the modern Tory party are not small state at all. They are a million miles from the Tea Party type ideology, but I do agree they may justify huge cuts to welfare to themselves by assuming everyone on it is lazy and that more people should be like them and just find a £60k job in the city.

Our deficit is still massive, we need austerity. The question is how much is done by cutting expenditure and how much is done by raising taxes/increasing the tax base.

 

[Bear]

Yeah fair point, I think there's a difference between simply reducing the deficit and the ideological austerity we've seen from the coalition where swingeing cuts have been applied with glee to public institutions, which in turn has hampered growth, hit living standards and not reduced borrowing by as much as predicted.

What are you smoking, are you buying the line of non specified nice cuts that Labour we're going on about?

The whole point of austerity to cut the deficit is to cut the structural costs so that you don't spend more than you take in. There are no nice cuts, any cut will effect some group somewhere.

 

[scorza]

What are you smoking, are you buying the line of non specified nice cuts that Labour we're going on about?

The whole point of austerity to cut the deficit is to cut the structural costs so that you don't spend more than you take in. There are no nice cuts, any cut will effect some group somewhere.

If you can achieve the same result by having less of a bad thing then surely that's better? It's not rocket science.

 

[delta0]

If you can achieve the same result by having less of a bad thing then surely that's better? It's not rocket science.

Higher borrowing costs, higher taxes and higher debt is a bad thing. As is wasting money.

 

[Bear]

If you can achieve the same result by having less of a bad thing then surely that's better? It's not rocket science.

You can't say if it could achieve the same result so you can't say whether it would have been better or not. The only thing you could say is less austerity would mean less cuts.

 

[scorza]

You can't say if it could achieve the same result so you can't say whether it would have been better or not. The only thing you could say is less austerity would mean less cuts.

Well Osborne managed to achieve exactly what Alistair Darling planned to achieve with a lot less pain. I know, hindsight is wonderful but repeating the same thing time and time again and expecting a different result is a definition of insanity.

 

[Bear]

Well Osborne managed to achieve exactly what Alistair Darling planned to achieve with a lot less pain. I know, hindsight is wonderful but repeating the same thing time and time again and expecting a different result is a definition of insanity.

Darling said he would cut more slowly by taking longer to reduce the deficit. Osbourne reigned in his cuts close to what Darling proposed in the end. Without knowing where the cuts would be made by Darling, how do you know there would be a lot less pain?

 

[Hellsmk2]

Do I want throat, bowl, or testicular cancer? Tough decision - I'll go with none of those thanks!

 

[Angilion]

What about this one?

http://election2015.votematch.org/

Just did it, very quick and easy. Got:

79% Green
70% Labour
64% Lib Dem
40% Conservatives
Excluded UKIP

Nowhere near enough detail in the questions. There's so llittle detail that the questions (and therefore the results) are almost meaningless.

For example, the question I'm currently looking at is "The government should have the power to read anyone's digital communications". The only options for answering are yes/no/don't mind either way. But there's no distinction made between extremely different things that equally match the question. There's a world of difference between being able to read communications to/from a specific person if a warrant has been granted on the basis of having reasonable cause to suspect that person and routinely monitoring everyone's communications as a data gathering and trawling exercise.

As far as I can see, all of the questions are lacking crucial details.

I can't be bothered to create a temporary email account to get my results, so I don't know what they were. It's a bit annoying that the whole thing is an email farming page.

 

[Angilion]

I don't think it's right to put that much on the party leader when voting. You're voting for your representative (in your constituency) in parliament. The GE shouldn't be a popularity contest of the leaders.

But in practice you're not really voting for your MP. Due to the way our parliament works, you're effectively voting for a political party and thus to a large extent to the party leader (since the PM has a great deal of power within our political system).

Sadly this does seem to be the way it's going, more like the American way where the leaders spend weeks roaming around trying to appeal to people.

Which makes more sense here than there - the UK PM has more power within our political system than the USA President has within theirs.

Much better IMO to consider the party policies as a whole (by skimming the manifestos) and look at all the candidates in your area, than paying too much attention to "can he eat a bacon sandwich".

Party policies as a whole, sure. But it's the party leader who has the most influence on those policies and how they're implemented (or not). It shouldn't be about trivialities like clothing and suchlike, but it is to a large extent about the party leader.

 

[Mickie]

If labour like killing in other countries and conservatives like killing old and the vulnerable in its own country, which party should we vote for if killing isn't your thing ?

 

[No1newts]

Killing the old in its own country?

 

[Mickie]

http://blogs.mirror.co.uk/investigations/2012/04/32-die-a-week-after-failing-in.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...ed-in-leaked-government-analysis-8731985.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-170371/Cuts-old-people-dying-cold.html

 

[Vanquish-Storm]

I'm in a safe Labour area, so I can effectively only vote a protest vote.

I am right near yourself (Warrington) but if everyone that didn't vote because the seat is "safe" it would make a difference. Even if it was close this time round the seat wouldn't be as safe next time round.

 

[estebanrey]

http://blogs.mirror.co.uk/investigations/2012/04/32-die-a-week-after-failing-in.html

Correlation does not equal causation. People die all the time, you can't just start counting after a new policy is brought in and claim every death thereafter is directly attributable to the change.

I stubbed my toe this morning after stroking my cat, does that mean petting animals causes foot injuries?

They also seem to disprove their own argument....

We've used the Freedom of Information Act to discover that, between January and August last year, 1,100 claimants died after they were put in the "work-related activity group".
This group - which accounted for 21% of all claimants at the last count - get a lower rate of benefit for one year and are expected to go out and find work.

This compares to 5,300 deaths of people who were put in the "support group" - which accounts for 22% of claimants - for the most unwell, who get the full, no-strings benefit of up to £99.85 a week.

So, you're almost 5 times more likely to die after being given the full support and not the lesser one which expects you to work. Isn't that the opposite of what they're trying to imply?

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...ed-in-leaked-government-analysis-8731985.html

Being 5 percentage points out after guessing how many people will die in a given time is pretty good I'd say, given the unpredictability of what you're trying to estimate.

Now if it was 20% or more then I'd ask questions.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-170371/Cuts-old-people-dying-cold.html

Conjecture, but I don't think you read your own link. That story refers to changes made by LABOUR, it mentions 'Tony Blair' as being the Prime Minister (so God knows how old it is).

 

[Monkeynut]

I am right near yourself (Warrington) but if everyone that didn't vote because the seat is "safe" it would make a difference. Even if it was close this time round the seat wouldn't be as safe next time round.

I'm Ellesmere Port and Idi Amin would win if he were Labour.