The Political Thread

[The Legendary Shark]

Yet still the overwhelming majority of people think the "Tories" have the right to do this. It's the equivalent of a bent storesman flogging NHS gear out of the back door. The storesman gets six months but the politician gets a six figure corporate salary when he retires.

I don't think it's scaremongering at all. I think it's business as usual.

[Old Tankie]

Cameron says lots of things,doesn't mean it's going to happen.

[The Legendary Shark]

Here's a petition here for the "government" to guarantee cash will neither be abolished or subjected to negative interest rates. I think it's very important to raise awareness of this issue now, just when they're trying to quietly introduce the idea.

[Jim_Campbell]

Cameron says lots of things,doesn't mean it's going to happen.

I don't understand what you mean by this. Are you saying that despite explicitly stating that he won't exempt the NHS from the provisions of TTIP, a course of (in)action that suits the Tories ideological commitment to opening the NHS up to ever more market forces, he actually will do precisely the opposite?

[Old Tankie]

"I won't cut tax credits."

[Jim_Campbell]

"I won't cut tax credits."

I didn't ask whether he's ever said one thing and then done another, I'm asking whether you're saying in this specific instance that he will pursue a course of action that he has not only ruled out but which would run counter to his and his party's ideology.

[Old Tankie]

"I will cut net immigration to the tens of thousands." With Cameron you never know.

[Jim_Campbell]

"I will cut net immigration to the tens of thousands." With Cameron you never know.

Complete non-sequitur. How does his failure to implement policies to bring this about have any bearing on the subject at hand? Cameron has two options: do the thing he said, which involves doing nothing and produces a result that aligns with his party's ideological position, or do the opposite of what he said, which involves actively creating impediments to the implementation of that ideology.

It seems bizarre in the extreme to suggest the latter in the face of all available evidence of the Tories' ongoing assault on the NHS.

[Old Tankie]

Yep! You've won, Jim, you've lost me! But I would have thought that controlled immigration was the Tory party's ideological position, and he certainly changed his mind on that, based on the figures.

[Grugz]

The next stage of the argument will be that the NHS is unsustainable in its current form and only more private capital will save it.


[/quote/]

  emphasis on the "more" I found out recently that when a g.p. refers you to an orthapedic/spinal specialist it automatically goes to a private provider "virgin care " in my case . I had to turn them down on advbice from the spinal clinic in the hospital as they could see me quicker as I was an urgent case.
  We'd seen this coming longer than that ,at a trust "training week" we were given hints that that was how it was going...and all the managers avoided answering our question as to whether we were already being privatised by the back door.

[Professor Bear]

Once a government becomes a signatory of TTIP, they cannot opt out of it at a later date.
Even Hillary Clinton has said this is a step too far and has withdrawn her support for TPP - and TTIP and that other one I can't be arsed looking up - even though this puts her in direct disagreement with Obama and her major campaign donors.  Also worth remembering that she didn't actually withdraw her support until the text of TPP was released by Wikileaks - she didn't have access to the agreement until it was leaked onto the internet.
Ironically, TPP expressly makes it criminal to allow the spread of information detrimental to the profits of corporations even if it's in the public interest, so not only would it have prevented Wikileaks from releasing the TPP, it would have meant no VW scandal, no reporting on climate change, no releasing medical information on the effects of tobacco, and so on.

[ZenArcade]

TTIP is unfortunately a right of centre moneterist political party's wet dream. If the conservatives were in power and outside the EU, this would still be one of the first things pushed through parliament. Z

[Old Tankie]

Was it the then Labour government that started using private companies in the NHS?

[Jimmy Baker's Assistant]

Here's a petition here for the "government" to guarantee cash will neither be abolished or subjected to negative interest rates. I think it's very important to raise awareness of this issue now, just when they're trying to quietly introduce the idea.

No way I'm signing this. I'd personally benefit from negative interest rates and I don't see a reason to stop the BoE implementing them, in the unlikely event they decide it's the best thing for the UK economy.

[Jimmy Baker's Assistant]

"I will cut net immigration to the tens of thousands." With Cameron you never know.

Cameron's failure to implement this cut is one of his best features!