Sir Nick Clegg

krooton said:
I've only been in the country for 16 years, but over that entire time, I thought to coalition was actually the best government we've had.
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I see people complaining about that time so much, but never really understand why it was so hated. I've lived here for all my 27 years (apart from 2), and I feel the same way as you.
 
Clegg and the Lib Dems held the Tories back with many of their policies, look at the mess we are now in without the LD reigning them in.
 
MSTRBKR said:
Free tuition fees would've been such a monumental waste of money. Glad that didn't happen, as there are so many low quality degrees out there at bad universities that have no job prospects.
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On the opposite side of the coin though, these courses still take people on that rack up the debt of tuition fee's, then end up in jobs that pay very little off them before they're wiped out. I'd personally prefer an end to degree's in such subjects and instead for them to be done at college.

Back on topic: Is Clegg being Knighted simply because he often was on the end of peoples backlash during dodgy Dave's first time as PM and as such, self-destructed his own career through trying to stop Tory policies? 2018 might just manage to be even more stupid than 2017. The year you can be knighted for a ridiculously bad decision.
 
krooton said:
I've only been in the country for 16 years, but over that entire time, I thought to coalition was actually the best government we've had.
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Why? Genuinely interested why people are affectionate about that period. Perhaps due to it co-coinciding with the reboot of the business cycle? Thought the economy was already growing again with Brown in charge.

Is it because it was seen as a clean slate compared to the New Labour years, who people had tired of and associated with over spending, recession and war? I can understand people pining more for the Blair/Brown period, as it was a long period of massive public sector investment, plus a very sustained period of economic growth and rising living standards. None of these really apply to the 2010-2015 period. They did succeed in cutting the deficit, but this is not normally top of voter's agenda, despite what the right-wing press drum up.
 
Fusion said:
Why? Genuinely interested why people are affectionate about that period. Perhaps due to it co-coinciding with the reboot of the business cycle? Thought the economy was already growing again with Brown in charge.

Is it because it was seen as a clean slate compared to the New Labour years, who people had tired of and associated with over spending, recession and war? I can understand people pining more for the Blair/Brown period, as it was a long period of massive public sector investment, plus a very sustained period of economic growth and rising living standards. None of these really apply to the 2010-2015 period. They did succeed in cutting the deficit, but this is not normally top of voter's agenda, despite what the right-wing press drum up.
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Well when I moved to the UK in 2002, it was basically war-mongering Blair, and completely inept Brown.

Admittedly, I wasn't paying a huge amount of attention at the start of that period what with being fresh off the boat and only 19, but I started gain interest after around 2007.

2010 saw me print off and fully read the manifestos of 4 parties (Cons, Lab, Libdem, Green) to see who resonated the most with my beliefs. I'm basically Libdem on social issues, and Con on economic ones.

I did notice that the UK had a similar 2 party mentality to the US, and that tribal us-vs-them aspect is seem well beyond politics (people hating other people they don't know purely because they support a different football team, Team A vs Team B in X-factor and other realiy guff).

So if your party got in, you were happy (regardless of what they do) and if the opposition got in, you would poo-poo anything they did just because.

I just felt the coalition ran without so many cockups/scandals/etc that new-lab and the current joke of a goverment had/have.
 
krooton said:
Well when I moved to the UK in 2002, it was basically war-mongering Blair, and completely inept Brown..
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And yet at that time, Brown was held in high esteem. We were the best performing economy in the G7, were in budget surplus in 2001, relatively low levels of debt (by modern standards).

I think in years to come (possibly the near future), they'll be seen as halcyon times. Of course we were involved in conflict, but this is Britain- there aren't many periods when this hasn't been the case. Meddling, instigating and reacting has been our modus operandi for quite a time...
 
Fusion said:
And yet at that time, Brown was held in high esteem. We were the best performing economy in the G7, were in budget surplus in 2001, relatively low levels of debt (by modern standards).

I think in years to come (possibly the near future), they'll be seen as halcyon times. Of course we were involved in conflict, but this is Britain- there aren't many periods when this hasn't been the case. Meddling, instigating and reacting has been our modus operandi for quite a time...
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You seem to be fanboying a bit - he was held in some respect under Blair but not so much while PM himself and made some spectacularly bad decisions as well.

I do enjoy this though :D

 
Rroff said:
You seem to be fanboying a bit - he was held in some respect under Blair but not so much while PM himself and made some spectacularly bad decisions as well.
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In all honesty I just try and present facts, and I'm particularly keen on challenging points of view. People are very quick to judge a person or government on the basis of one event, however important that was. In the process, a whole raft of other things get overlooked.

UK economic growth from 1992-2007 can't be disputed, we were top of developed world tree at times. It seemed a given that we would grow at 3% or even 4% annually. We haven't touched those numbers since 2007. Yes, a lot of it centered on the city, but it's not as though the financial crisis originated here, or solely affected these shores.
 
Fusion said:
In all honesty I just try and present facts, and I'm particularly keen on challenging points of view. People are very quick to judge a person or government on the basis of one event, however important that was. In the process, a whole raft of other things get overlooked.

UK economic growth from 1992-2007 can't be disputed, we were top of developed world tree at times. It seemed a given that we would grow at 3% or even 4% annually. We haven't touched those numbers since 2007. Yes, a lot of it centered on the city, but it's not as though the financial crisis originated here, or solely affected these shores.
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Yet a lot of that growth was fuelled by unsustainable practises - its easy to do it in the short term - much harder to make it stick.

To be fair I think a lot of good stuff came out of the early years of New Labour but they departed from the original premises which went a long way towards the undoing and sabotaging of some of the earlier efforts that should have paid off long term.
 
LabR@t said:
Like I have said, history will be very kind to Mr farage.
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I’m thinking we need to get the portmanteau ‘shart’ replaced with ‘Faraged’. That would be a fitting legacy I feel.

“Excuse me good chap, could you kindly direct me to the nearest Marks & Spencer? For I fear I may have have inadvertently Faraged”
 
Rroff said:
Yet a lot of that growth was fuelled by unsustainable practises - its easy to do it in the short term - much harder to make it stick.

To be fair I think a lot of good stuff came out of the early years of New Labour but they departed from the original premises which went a long way towards the undoing and sabotaging of some of the earlier efforts that should have paid off long term.
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I think it was mostly because it was spent on things that have no long-term return, if we now had 5-wide motorways, 4 track railway mainlines and another 500,000 houses on what we have now it wouldn't have been quite as bad.
 
altus said:
I think its his reward for giving Farage televised debates on Europe, but i think he was meant to win them.
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He as many are so it of step with the wider community, thought he would win those win those debates.

How wrong he was, and won't again with the referendum.
 
LabR@t said:
Nick plebb

Complete and utter moron.
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Aside from the fact that my wife and I consistently voted Lib-Dem, as it was the only way to ensure that Labour didn’t get in in our constituency, I knew little about Nick Clegg other than that he was leader of the Lib-Dems, and also Deputy P.M. for a while, plus his wife Miriam González Durántez, is Spanish, and a bit of a MILF.
Checking him out on Wiki, he was educated at Cambridge University, and the University of Minnesota, he speaks English, French, Dutch, German, and Spanish fluently, was an MEP and an MP.
Not bad for a complete and utter moron.
Whether he warrants a knighthood or not, I neither know nor care.
 
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