Is Ed Balls the most annoying politician ever?

Is Ed Balls the most annoying politician ever?

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Discussion

anonymous-user

54 months

Friday 1st August 2014
quotequote all
legzr1 said:
http://www.cpag.org.uk/child-poverty-facts-and-fig...

The figures might not suit your argument but I'd take their figures over something like a Daily Mail link or prominent PHer with a pen and the back of a fag packet.
rofl

And you are defining poverty as... a couple with 2 kids taking home less than 18 grand !!!!

http://www.cpag.org.uk/content/uk-poverty-line

To put that in perspective a 2nd Lieutenant or Warrant Officer in the British army with a wife and 2 kids is 'in poverty'. Get a grip man. Fag packet indeed. I grew up in poverty according to you!

mybrainhurts

90,809 posts

255 months

Friday 1st August 2014
quotequote all
legzr1 said:
what concerns me is the deliberate and malicious attack on the disabled and the infirm.
That's one bloody big chip you've got on your shoulder, old boy.

What is the nature of this attack?

Foppo

2,344 posts

124 months

Friday 1st August 2014
quotequote all
fblm said:
legzr1 said:
http://www.cpag.org.uk/child-poverty-facts-and-fig...

The figures might not suit your argument but I'd take their figures over something like a Daily Mail link or prominent PHer with a pen and the back of a fag packet.
rofl

And you are defining poverty as... a couple with 2 kids taking home less than 18 grand !!!!

http://www.cpag.org.uk/content/uk-poverty-line

To put that in perspective a 2nd Lieutenant or Warrant Officer in the British army with a wife and 2 kids is 'in poverty'. Get a grip man. Fag packet indeed. I grew up in poverty according to you!
[/quot
Have these soldiers a mortgage to pay? If so that will save a penny.

andymadmak

14,562 posts

270 months

Friday 1st August 2014
quotequote all
legzr1 said:
- what concerns me is the deliberate and malicious attack on the disabled and the infirm.

Miss that point if you like wink
I do not miss that point. Can you substantiate it? Deliberate and malicious are extremely emotive words. They also suggest that a detailed plan that sets out to attack the people you describe exists. Can you show me this plan? Do you have a copy? If the plan is as widespread as you hint, there would surely be a copy of it available on line? Somebody in the civil service would certainly have leaked a copy? No?


Or is it just so much emotive nonsense and hyperbole conjured up by you to attack a government that has turned the economy around in pretty spectacular fashion but who probably wear the wrong colour rosettes for your liking?

mercGLowner

Original Poster:

1,668 posts

184 months

Friday 1st August 2014
quotequote all
andymadmak said:
legzr1 said:
- what concerns me is the deliberate and malicious attack on the disabled and the infirm.

Miss that point if you like wink
I do not miss that point. Can you substantiate it? Deliberate and malicious are extremely emotive words. They also suggest that a detailed plan that sets out to attack the people you describe exists. Can you show me this plan? Do you have a copy? If the plan is as widespread as you hint, there would surely be a copy of it available on line? Somebody in the civil service would certainly have leaked a copy? No?


Or is it just so much emotive nonsense and hyperbole conjured up by you to attack a government that has turned the economy around in pretty spectacular fashion but who probably wear the wrong colour rosettes for your liking?
If I could comment as the father of a significantly disabled 23 year old son. I do not recognise the description of 'deliberate and malicious attack on the disabled.....' My son receives a number of benefits; DLA and ESA and has a care package, which he/we control, allocated by the county council for £26k with which he buys in support for when he is out and about and at home whilst my wife and I work. He has a motability wheelchair accessible car, had a grant to convert part of our house into a disabled accessible suite and is happy and contented as far as he is able. Everything is not perfect but on the whole the system works and has not substantially changed.

I recognise that my experience is one of many but, although my wife and I have had to advocate strongly on his behalf for everything he needs, over the last 15 years or so the overall package of benefits has been unquestionably good and has not changed for the worse over the last 5 years. I fully accept that some disabled people may have a different view.

I will also add that my son's biggest wish would be to be able to work.


Stevanos

700 posts

137 months

Friday 1st August 2014
quotequote all
fblm said:
To put that in perspective a 2nd Lieutenant or Warrant Officer in the British army with a wife and 2 kids is 'in poverty'. Get a grip man. Fag packet indeed. I grew up in poverty according to you!
And, that is their choice. No one is forcing them to have an expensive outgoing (Kids) or making bad life choices.

Chlamydia

1,082 posts

127 months

Friday 1st August 2014
quotequote all
Stevanos said:
fblm said:
To put that in perspective a 2nd Lieutenant or Warrant Officer in the British army with a wife and 2 kids is 'in poverty'. Get a grip man. Fag packet indeed. I grew up in poverty according to you!
And, that is their choice. No one is forcing them to have an expensive outgoing (Kids) or making bad life choices.
The point fblm is making I suspect is that they wouldn't consider themselves to be in poverty no matter how much the left would scream they are. It's quite a revelation to me that everyone under the rank of Corporal too is classed as being in poverty according to that.

legzr1

3,848 posts

139 months

Friday 1st August 2014
quotequote all
fblm said:
rofl

And you are defining poverty as... a couple with 2 kids taking home less than 18 grand !!!!

http://www.cpag.org.uk/content/uk-poverty-line

To put that in perspective a 2nd Lieutenant or Warrant Officer in the British army with a wife and 2 kids is 'in poverty'. Get a grip man. Fag packet indeed. I grew up in poverty according to you!
Government figures - not mine nor cpag's.




andymadmak said:
I do not miss that point. Can you substantiate it? Deliberate and malicious are extremely emotive words. They also suggest that a detailed plan that sets out to attack the people you describe exists. Can you show me this plan? Do you have a copy? If the plan is as widespread as you hint, there would surely be a copy of it available on line? Somebody in the civil service would certainly have leaked a copy? No?


Or is it just so much emotive nonsense and hyperbole conjured up by you to attack a government that has turned the economy around in pretty spectacular fashion but who probably wear the wrong colour rosettes for your liking?
https://www.google.co.uk/?gws_rd=ssl#q=disabled+forced+to+work

Choose one.


Deliberate? Oh yes. Unless you think this is all an unfortunate misunderstanding between junior ministers and their minions.

Malicious? Well, could you suggest another word to describe the way government funded bodies remove benefits from the terminally ill?

"We're all in this together" doesn't quite do it justice...

Mr_B

10,480 posts

243 months

Friday 1st August 2014
quotequote all
There is some comedy in the Miliband family

http://order-order.com/2014/08/01/eds-cousin-milib...

mybrainhurts

90,809 posts

255 months

Saturday 2nd August 2014
quotequote all
rofl...beaut

legzr1

3,848 posts

139 months

Saturday 2nd August 2014
quotequote all
Mr_B said:
There is some comedy in the Miliband family

http://order-order.com/2014/08/01/eds-cousin-milib...
smile

Walford

2,259 posts

166 months

Saturday 2nd August 2014
quotequote all
He bust us once and will do it again, they should all be in jail
some £76bn from the Treasury to buy shares in RBS and Lloyds Banking Group ; £200bn worth of lender-of-last resort liquidity support provided by the Bank of England to stricken banks at the height of the crisis; £250bn of wholesale lending guaranteed by the Bank through the credit guarantee scheme; £185bn of loans to banks through the Special Liquidity Scheme; £40bn of loans and other funding to Bradford & Bingley and the Financial Services Compensation Scheme. Then, deep breath, there is the £200bn of liabilities taken on board from the Asset Protection Scheme, and the £200bn of cash poured into the economy through quantitative easing .
and please dont give me the cut and paste line

Wombat3

12,152 posts

206 months

Saturday 2nd August 2014
quotequote all
mybrainhurts said:
legzr1 said:
what concerns me is the deliberate and malicious attack on the disabled and the infirm.
That's one bloody big chip you've got on your shoulder, old boy.

What is the nature of this attack?
Its the usual emotive & disingenuous claptrap that comes from the left.

The reality is that its well known that millions (literally millions) of people were claiming disability allowances under the last government who should not have been doing so.

In the process of sorting that out mistakes have inevitably been made (and where that has genuinely happened then its regrettable) but nobody has deliberately targeted the genuinely infirm or disabled.

Meanwhile the magic money tree (that the lefties seem to think grows in the garden at Downing St) is still not growing very well because we still seem to be over £100Bn a year short.

And that's after the top 5-10% of earners are now contributing a greater share of tax revenues than ever before and more people at the bottom of the income spectrum are paying no tax whatsoever on a larger amount of money (income) than ever.

I sometimes wonder whether any of these socialists ever passed a basic arithmetic test.

legzr1

3,848 posts

139 months

Saturday 2nd August 2014
quotequote all
Wombat3 said:
(and where that has genuinely happened then its regrettable)

.
Regrettable?

Sigh.

legzr1

3,848 posts

139 months

Saturday 2nd August 2014
quotequote all
Walford said:
He bust us once and will do it again, they should all be in jail
Who's 'he'?

Who are 'they'?

Wombat3

12,152 posts

206 months

Saturday 2nd August 2014
quotequote all
legzr1 said:
Wombat3 said:
(and where that has genuinely happened then its regrettable)

.
Regrettable?

Sigh.
Yep, regrettable.

Mistakes have been made but when you are sorting out a clusterfk the size of the one we had (still have) WTF do you expect??

You'd be in la-la land to expect that it wouldn't happen but that doesn't mean you don't get on and deal with the problem

The point at issue though is whether there has been a deliberate policy to undermine those in genuine need and I see no evidence that there has been or is.

What there is is a policy to weed out the cheats and fraudsters who have been claiming things they weren't entitled to, and quite rightly so.

But none of that is the real point though is it, the point is the fact that there are those (like you) that would try and paint a much more sinister picture purely because it suits a cause. THAT is what I find more reprehensible than anything. Instead of criticising those that are trying to sort the mess out, what do you have to say about those that made it or allowed it to happen in the first place?

Not much I suspect.

anonymous-user

54 months

Saturday 2nd August 2014
quotequote all
legzr1 said:
fblm said:
rofl

And you are defining poverty as... a couple with 2 kids taking home less than 18 grand !!!!

http://www.cpag.org.uk/content/uk-poverty-line

To put that in perspective a 2nd Lieutenant or Warrant Officer in the British army with a wife and 2 kids is 'in poverty'. Get a grip man. Fag packet indeed. I grew up in poverty according to you!
Government figures - not mine nor cpag's.
Yep, using the governments idiotic definition you get 2.4m kids in poverty. Cpag, who you are using for your 'facts' adjust for housing costs and get 3.5m. So the threshold is effectively even higher than 18 grand!!! You couldn't make it up.

turbobloke

103,955 posts

260 months

Saturday 2nd August 2014
quotequote all
fblm said:
legzr1 said:
fblm said:
rofl

And you are defining poverty as... a couple with 2 kids taking home less than 18 grand !!!!

http://www.cpag.org.uk/content/uk-poverty-line

To put that in perspective a 2nd Lieutenant or Warrant Officer in the British army with a wife and 2 kids is 'in poverty'. Get a grip man. Fag packet indeed. I grew up in poverty according to you!
Government figures - not mine nor cpag's.
Yep, using the governments idiotic definition you get 2.4m kids in poverty. Cpag, who you are using for your 'facts' adjust for housing costs and get 3.5m. So the threshold is effectively even higher than 18 grand!!! You couldn't make it up.
Most people couldn't, but left leaning politicians wanting to exploit a less well-off but by no means poor section of society are skilled at it. Along with spin it's one of their few strengths.

legzr1

3,848 posts

139 months

Saturday 2nd August 2014
quotequote all
Wombat3 said:
The point at issue though is whether there has been a deliberate policy to undermine those in genuine need and I see no evidence that there has been or is.

What there is is a policy to weed out the cheats and fraudsters who have been claiming things they weren't entitled to, and quite rightly so.



.
Here's what happened (all evidenced by whistle blowers on the inside who, and with all due respect, know a bit more about it that you) - a conscious, deliberate plan was hatched to systematically refuse benefits to a whole swathe of claimants.
This in full knowledge that a sizeable amount would be genuine and would be caught up in the net - terminally ill patients (some with weeks to live) left without cash and told to appeal the decision.

You seem fine with this just as long as the scrounges are caught - madness.

Shoot first, ask questions later?

Fair game as long as the treasury pocket enough cash to fund the tax cut a month before the election?

Imagine the (deserved) uproar on here if company directors had all assets frozen pending a long appeal process because some of them were up to no good.
Then pretend some of them were cancer victims.




fblm said:
Yep, using the governments idiotic definition you get 2.4m kids in poverty. Cpag, who you are using for your 'facts' adjust for housing costs and get 3.5m. So the threshold is effectively even higher than 18 grand!!! You couldn't make it up.
Ah, I see.

The governments own figures are idiotic because they don't suit your argument on an Internet forum?

Jesus, you are a character aren't you...

Read my post where I mention the figure - I'm aware that politically motivated groups can 'massage' numbers just as readily as any government department so I chose a figure somewhere in the middle. Three million.

Are you suggesting that 3.5M or 3.0M is way, way too many but 2.4M is somehow acceptable, a price worth paying for the 'fastest growing economy in Europe' ?




mercGLowner said:
If I could comment as the father of a significantly disabled 23 year old son. I do not recognise the description of 'deliberate and malicious attack on the disabled.....' My son receives a number of benefits; DLA and ESA and has a care package, which he/we control, allocated by the county council for £26k with which he buys in support for when he is out and about and at home whilst my wife and I work. He has a motability wheelchair accessible car, had a grant to convert part of our house into a disabled accessible suite and is happy and contented as far as he is able. Everything is not perfect but on the whole the system works and has not substantially changed.

I recognise that my experience is one of many but, although my wife and I have had to advocate strongly on his behalf for everything he needs, over the last 15 years or so the overall package of benefits has been unquestionably good and has not changed for the worse over the last 5 years. I fully accept that some disabled people may have a different view.

I will also add that my son's biggest wish would be to be able to work.
Apologies, I missed this post.

I'm genuinely happy that you've managed to maintain benefits but I'm guessing it was no easy task.

I wish it was the same for all households in your position but clearly it isn't frown




turbobloke said:
Most people couldn't, but left leaning politicians wanting to exploit a less well-off but by no means poor section of society are skilled at it. Along with spin it's one of their few strengths.
Let's ignore child poverty and attacks on the most vulnerable and put it all down to left-wing spin then shall we?

Obviously, 'that' you could make up...



Shameful frown







turbobloke

103,955 posts

260 months

Saturday 2nd August 2014
quotequote all
legzr1 said:
Wombat3 said:
The point at issue though is whether there has been a deliberate policy to undermine those in genuine need and I see no evidence that there has been or is.

What there is is a policy to weed out the cheats and fraudsters who have been claiming things they weren't entitled to, and quite rightly so.
Here's what happened (all evidenced by whistle blowers on the inside who, and with all due respect, know a bit more about it that you) - a conscious, deliberate plan was hatched to systematically refuse benefits to a whole swathe of claimants.

This in full knowledge that a sizeable amount would be genuine and would be caught up in the net - terminally ill patients (some with weeks to live) left without cash and told to appeal the decision.
This ^ is known to you how? Documents? Tape recordings?

It couldn't possibly be by word of mouth from a friend of a mate who knows?

If it really happened as above there are whistleblowing mechanisms that will either a) operate as intended or b) lead to large gagging payouts to secure silence as per NHS.

legzr1 said:
Shoot first, ask questions later?

Fair game as long as the treasury pocket enough cash to fund the tax cut a month before the election?
You forgot the bit about it impacting on areas where people don't vote Tory.

legzr1 said:
Imagine the (deserved) uproar on here if company directors had all assets frozen pending a long appeal process because some of them were up to no good.
This, although jackanory, rests on the initial claim being validated.

legzr1 said:
turbobloke said:
Most people couldn't, but left leaning politicians wanting to exploit a less well-off but by no means poor section of society are skilled at it. Along with spin it's one of their few strengths.
Let's ignore child poverty and attacks on the most vulnerable and put it all down to left-wing spin then shall we?
Based on that propagandist comment, as emotive as they all are but empty and pure rhetoric as it's based on absolutely nothing (nobody has suggested ignoring child poverty, where it actually exists) are you ignoring actual attacks on child poverty via 13 years of Labour failure? To do so would be shameful.

Guardian headline, 10 years in, based on Gov't data:
Up. Up. Up. Child poverty, pensioner poverty, inequality

Data from the Department for Work and Pensions showed that the Labour's third term failed to help the least well-off. Result! Labour success!!

nuts