Elections!!

[Sidewinder]

OK, my take, on some of this..

Politics should be about policies and finance, NOT, about people and what they have or have not done, and certainly should NEVER be about personal attacks, probably THE only thing Maggie Thatcher & I ever agreed on.

The media must not be believed, they will only ever publish and state what their paymasters want them to do.

That is NOT objective, nor subjective journalism, it is out and out electioneering, and should be made illegal.

Until we get impartiality in journalism, I take every comment they make as a lie.

So, basically, AFAIAC journalists are simply liars.

They say what their paymasters want them to say, and IMHO that is wrong.

As a country we used to be proud of our "freedom of the press" this no longer exists.

Why, should policies in Wales, Scotland and England be decided upon by a party who can only be elected in Northern Ireland, surely there is a legitimate legal challenge there.

All political parties court terrorists for their own ends.  The subtle difference is why the court them!

 

[apprentice87]

Paul is exactly right..

john..

 

[rapparee]

Why, should policies in Wales, Scotland and England be decided upon by a party who can only be elected in Northern Ireland, surely there is a legitimate legal challenge there.

All political parties court terrorists for their own ends.  The subtle difference is why the court them!

But by that logic a Tory or labour government has no right to govern over Scotland or ni. Considering the SNP are the biggest party in Scotland and Sinn Féin and the DUP are the two main parties here.

 

[steptoe]

But by that logic a Tory or labour government has no right to govern over Scotland or ni. Considering the SNP are the biggest party in Scotland and Sinn Féin and the DUP are the two main parties here.

Yes, and in  norn iron you can't actually vote for a Westminster government,

 

[poni]

Political spectrum of ni

you forgot a few:

NI21

People Before Profit Alliance

Animal Welfare Party

Irish Republican Socialist Party

Socialist Workers Party

Workers' Party of Ireland

Socialist Party

 

[steptoe]

you forgot a few:

NI21

People Before Profit Alliance

Animal Welfare Party

Irish Republican Socialist Party

Socialist Workers Party

Workers' Party of Ireland

Socialist Party

But do they actually get anyone apart from family voting for them,?

I  thnk @poni just put the possible viable  parties up, like omitting monster raving monies in the UK, although, tbh, they wouldn't be that bad atm. 

 

[apprentice87]

I have had more of a dig, and it appears that the EVEL thing, where once a power is devolved, to wales say, then the welsh MP's cannot vote on laws surrounding that area that affect england, is a "political" contrivance, and NOT a legal one. That is to say the government can ignore this principle, [the EVEL thing] if they want.

The best example of this is scotland; The westminster government, gave the scottish parliament, the powers to decide if scotland wanted to be independant. However, if the westminster government wanted to, they could quite legally, take this power away again, and that would be the end of independance for scotland... [Take it the scottish have not realised this...]

However, Paul has raised the best point of all, when he says; "Why, should policies in Wales, Scotland and England be decided upon by a party who can only be elected in Northern Ireland, surely there is a legitimate legal challenge there"

Not to mention; "All political parties court terrorists for their own ends.  The subtle difference is why the court them!"

The tories have always arselicked the Ulster unionists which is why NI is the best funded part of the uk, with money flooding in to keep them "on side"... Mind you, the labour lot have done this too, but not as much. Difference is, the labour lot have never tried to accuse the opposition of "talking to terrorists" concerning this.

Northern Ireland receives more public money and generates less tax revenue per head than any other part of the UK.

The region was £9bn in the red, amounting to £5,052 per person, for the year 2008/09, according to figures just released by the Northern Ireland Executive.

That's almost three times the UK average of £1,785.

Even Scotland, which is often cited as a big beneficiary of public funds, fares much better than Northern Ireland.

There, the comparable figure is £2,000 less per person than in Northern Ireland.

Ulster Bank economist Richard Ramsey said the figures illustrated Northern Ireland's public sector dominance and the weakness of its private sector - a double whammy that means the region spends large amounts of public money and raises little in terms of tax revenue.

This gives it the UK's highest fiscal deficit.

He said that Northern Ireland was likely to have slipped further into the red in the last year as more recent figures from Scotland show its deficit growing.

"Applying the same uplift you are looking at £6,315 fiscal deficit per head for Northern Ireland," he said.

Like Scotland, Northern Ireland benefits from the Barnett Formula which calculates the amount of public spending in the regions.

But other factors beyond Barnett seem to be driving Northern Ireland's high deficit.

Disability payments

Although the region's unemployment rate is just below the UK average at 7.3%, it has a much higher percentage of people claiming sickness benefits.

While there are just over 60,000 people claiming Job Seekers Allowance, there are more than 180,000 people on Disability Living Allowance - that's one in ten of the population.

Figures for 2011 reveal more than 50,000 on Incapacity Benefit and around 260,000 people receiving a mixture of these disability related benefit payments.

And information released from the Office of National Statistics this week identifies "sick or disabled" as the main reason for worklessness in Northern Ireland.

These high levels of economic inactivity push the deficit up by increasing the public spend while reducing the potential for revenue growth.

In all major revenue streams, Northern Ireland contributes less than its population size might imply. The exceptions are fuel and tobacco duty suggesting an above average liking for cigarettes and cars.

Honest!!!

john..

 

[poni]

yes @steptoe quite right as usual ,just wanted to show what happens when you have PR, Voters have as many preferences as there are candidates. They mark the candidates 1, 2, 3, etc. in order of preference with 1 for their first choice of candidate, 2 for their second and so on. Voters do not have to state a preference for all candidates – they can choose as many or as few as they like.,

 

[apprentice87]

Yes, and in  norn iron you can't actually vote for a Westminster government,

If NI is part of the UK, why is there not the same political parties as we have, or is it just that the NI lot would rather vote for their "own" parties, than the "conventional" Uk parties, and so none of them field candidates there??

john..

 

[rapparee]

you forgot a few:

NI21 - a personal vanity project by Basil McRae after he failed to win the leadership of the UUP. He wanted to promote moderate unionism, fell apart after he was accused of sexually harassing a female assistant.

People Before Profit Alliance - non sectarian socialist party, often used as a protest vote against Sinn Féin by nationalists

Animal Welfare Party - irrelevant

Irish Republican Socialist Party - political wing of the INLA, they killed Airey Neave, still in existence around Strabane

Socialist Workers Party - old style Trotskyite party, dissolved and subsumed into the People before profit alliance

Workers' Party of Ireland - political wing of the official IRA, the stickies have been on ceasefire since 1972

Socialist Party - dissolved in ni in the 1940s still active in the Republic, ran candidates under the people before profit alliance banner

Green Party - two MLAs, popular around , south Belfast amongst ex QUB graduates.

Cannabis is Safer than Alcohol - they lasted for a year from 2015 until 2016

United Kingdom Unionist Party - vanity project for Robert McCartney after he fell out with the UUP, 

Sorry Poni I can't think of any more

Edit, it was actually Lord Maginnis from the UUP who compared gay marriage and beastiality, he is now an independent peer in the House of Lords.

Did i mention i have a degree in law and politics lol.

 

[M107]

Eh?? here is a picture of a chap that was their leader from 2008 until 2015... [The bloke on the left]

View attachment 8115

who's the bloke pretending to be the RSM

 

[M107]

Sod all this politics carp.........................lets go down the pub Guinness

 

[steptoe]

yes @steptoe quite right as usual ,just wanted to show what happens when you have PR, Voters have as many preferences as there are candidates. They mark the candidates 1, 2, 3, etc. in order of preference with 1 for their first choice of candidate, 2 for their second and so on. Voters do not have to state a preference for all candidates – they can choose as many or as few as they like.,

I don't think I was right, just as nothing is right with NI politics, its all a mess,

 

[Murdoch]

I'm not sure I agree with the bit about the NI MP's not being able to vote in Westminster..... The NI seats count towards the 650 UK MP's

 

[user 28595]

@steptoe  serious question, what are the DUP like? Clealry staunchly British, very Orange, and from what I can see very conservative / old fashioned in their views. Would I be correct in thinking these guys are the legal face of the likes of the UDF / UVF?

Religious conservatives, anti abortion, creationists, global warming deniers. Thoroughly modern lot, not!

cheers, Paul

 

[apprentice87]

Did i mention i have a degree in law and politics lol.

Ha!! Now he says!!

john..

 

[apprentice87]

I don't think I was right, just as nothing is right with NI politics, its all a mess,

It is not looking so good here either.. Yes, sod politics, bored with it all now...

john..