Labour Manifesto

ferg · Nov 23, 2019

All the mainstream politicians are a bunch of lying barstewards, in itself not particularly worrying.

What is worrying however is what usually happens when the public lose all faith in mainstream politicians.

telectrix · Nov 23, 2019

jc was in stoke ths week while i was at my son's for a few days. he was trying to tell pottery workers that their jobs would go if brexit happened. one guy shouted out that a sagger makers bottom knocker can find work knocking off politicians.

Pete999 · Nov 23, 2019

ferg said:
All the mainstream politicians are a bunch of lying barstewards, in itself not particularly worrying.

What is worrying however is what usually happens when the public lose all faith in mainstream politicians.

Bring on the revolution. nothing but a bunch of self financing parasites. vote for em???????. get JC in number 10 and he would turn the rest of Downing Street into a Commune for his unwashed Mates. and DA of course

pirate · Nov 23, 2019

andyb, I'm obliged to you for that clarification over the number of council houses to be built. I suspect most readers recognised the hyperbole, and in effect it matters little. The suggested building programme is far too ambitious for the available workforce and budget.
Traditionally, council housing was built to a good standard, partly because they built better houses anyway, and partly because it was important to minimise the cost of ongoing maintenance, thus saving the taxpayers' purse. Ex-council houses in my area were much sought after due to the much larger room sizes, the better build quality, gardens, and proximity to local services.
Following the crash in 2008 some "mainstream" house builders tried to offload excess stock onto local authorities, but they didn't want these flashy, crappy boxes, as they were in the main of poor build quality, and just scraping through BCs standards. Ongoing maintenance was a big issue here, so few LAs took the bait, preferring to get smaller builders to undertake small developments for them, of better quality and with a smaller profit margin. This worked quite well, as the small firms needed the work and could keep going on tighter margins, not having the heavy overheads of the large companies, and without shareholder pressure.
All I was really saying was that Labour's manifesto is completely unrealistic as to the possibility of building so many houses, funding those builds, finding the land, finding the labour to construct and fit them out to a decent standard. If they release greenbelt land and let any Tom Dick or Harry bash them up, we will end up with huge estates of substandard houses that will come back to haunt us in years to come.
Mainstream builders will not be interested as there is no real profit in it for them-they like a profit from every unit right away. The government will get a return, of course, but it will be spread over a very long period.

telectrix · Nov 23, 2019

think I will have to stand. here is mymanifesto.....

1. force brexit through , deal or no deal.
2 scrap HS2. nobody wants a rail line through their back garden up here.
3. legalise all drugs on prescription (no free ones. £30 ish a pop). this will rduce drug related crime and make the NHS profitable.
4. Cut tax on beer and smokes.
5. Reduce VAT to 10%
6. impose a levy of £1 on every comment made on facebook to offset the vat reduction
7. Ban timber frame houses, dry lining, and "throw it up as cheap as possible".
8. make Liverpool the country's capital and re-purpose westminster , downing st, and half of london to homeless hostels.
9. would also propose the summary execution of plumbers, but i think that might be going too far.

Baddegg · Nov 23, 2019

People keep asking where is the labour/workforce coming from to build labours 1 million houses......if labour get in there will be an abundance of cheap labour...

Pete999 · Nov 23, 2019

telectrix said:
think I will have to stand. here is mymanifesto.....

1. force brexit through , deal or no deal.
2 scrap HS2. nobody wants a rail line through their back garden up here.
3. legalise all drugs on prescription (no free ones. £30 ish a pop). this will rduce drug related crime and make the NHS profitable.
4. Cut tax on beer and smokes.
5. Reduce VAT to 10%
6. impose a levy of £1 on every comment made on facebook to offset the vat reduction
7. Ban timber frame houses, dry lining, and "throw it up as cheap as possible".
8. make Liverpool the country's capital and re-purpose westminster , downing st, and half of london to homeless hostels.
9. would also propose the summary execution of plumbers, but i think that might be going too far.

I for one would like to know Mr Corbin and D would finance the NHS after they Nationalise it, where would the money come from to finance e this ridiculous idea? cutting credits for those in genuine need? we as a Country need to help our population, stop pouring £Millions into Foreign aid, help by all means but not to the detriment of our own Population, answers on a postcard to me, can't wait for the Labour candidates to grace my doorstep over the next few days,
PS I'm not anti aid but look after number one first, seems the norm these days. Freedom of speech rule here?????????

snowhead · Nov 23, 2019

pirate said:
If they release greenbelt land and let any Tom Dick or Harry bash them up, we will end up with huge estates of substandard houses that will come back to haunt us in years to come.

They'll have no trouble finding the land, they'll just seize it from the Developers.
Ooh, another own goal.

They won't get them built anyway GRETA will stop them because of the millions of miles lorries and transit vans will be doing all around the country, killing of her planet again.

telectrix · Nov 23, 2019

can just imagine under labour (with the support of the lib cretins) all lorries will need to be electric, not diesel, to transport all the building materials to site. no timber to be used, as that entails cutting down trees. bricks will also be banned as the need to be fired in kilns which use fossil fuels. new houses will be constructed entirely of kingspan to comly with energy efficiency.

Midwest · Nov 23, 2019

telectrix said:
can just imagine under labour (with the support of the lib cretins) all lorries will need to be electric, not diesel, to transport all the building materials to site. no timber to be used, as that entails cutting down trees. bricks will also be banned as the need to be fired in kilns which use fossil fuels. new houses will be constructed entirely of kingspan to comly with energy efficiency.

That actually sounds a good idea. Make it no.10 on your manifesto.

telectrix · Nov 23, 2019

Midwest said:
That actually sounds a good idea. Make it no.10 on your manifesto.

was thinking of making no'10 the banning of VW vans, give the owners a £1 trade-in against a 10 year old Hiace. they know it makes sense.

buzzlightyear · Nov 23, 2019

telectrix said:
1. force brexit through , deal or no deal.
2 scrap HS2. nobody wants a rail line through their back garden up here.
3. legalise all drugs on prescription (no free ones. £30 ish a pop). this will rduce drug related crime and make the NHS profitable.
4. Cut tax on beer and smokes.
5. Reduce VAT to 10%
6. impose a levy of £1 on every comment made on facebook to offset the vat reduction
7. Ban timber frame houses, dry lining, and "throw it up as cheap as possible".
8. make Liverpool the country's capital and re-purpose westminster , downing st, and half of london to homeless hostels.
9. would also propose the summary execution of plumbers, but i think that might be going too far.

vote for Tele on 12 December .lol.

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telectrix said:
1. force brexit through , deal or no deal.
2 scrap HS2. nobody wants a rail line through their back garden up here.
3. legalise all drugs on prescription (no free ones. £30 ish a pop). this will rduce drug related crime and make the NHS profitable.
4. Cut tax on beer and smokes.
5. Reduce VAT to 10%
6. impose a levy of £1 on every comment made on facebook to offset the vat reduction
7. Ban timber frame houses, dry lining, and "throw it up as cheap as possible".
8. make Liverpool the country's capital and re-purpose westminster , downing st, and half of london to homeless hostels.
9. would also propose the summary execution of plumbers, but i think that might be going too far.

vote for Tele on 12 December .lol.

[automerge]1574545626[/automerge]

telectrix said:
1. force brexit through , deal or no deal.
2 scrap HS2. nobody wants a rail line through their back garden up here.
3. legalise all drugs on prescription (no free ones. £30 ish a pop). this will rduce drug related crime and make the NHS profitable.
4. Cut tax on beer and smokes.
5. Reduce VAT to 10%
6. impose a levy of £1 on every comment made on facebook to offset the vat reduction
7. Ban timber frame houses, dry lining, and "throw it up as cheap as possible".
8. make Liverpool the country's capital and re-purpose westminster , downing st, and half of london to homeless hostels.
9. would also propose the summary execution of plumbers, but i think that might be going too far.

vote for Tele on 12 December .lol.

GBDamo · Nov 24, 2019

Zerax said:
.....If they charged council housing at market rent, then upped the housing benefit to compensate, you'd solve the problem...

Council housing should be low rent on a need basis, for life if desired.

Matching council rents to market rents will have an inflationary effect on market rents as most people would, if they could, pay more not to be in council accommodation, sad but true.

The problem is social housing has become an investment class worth over £20Billion so rational polices that deliver a workable solutions are resisted by lobbyists on behalf of the lettings and construction industry.

That £20Billion has doubled over the last 20 years. It's time we stopped looking ar these payments as a gift to the Tennant and rathera gift to the Landlord.

It is only legislaton that stops local authorities building, maintaining and selling their own social housing.

The problem is nobody has figured out how to stop public works departments descending to the largesse of the 70s.

Baddegg · Nov 24, 2019

Council houses should be for the most needy,rents should be set to a percentage of income.....that would stop the likes of Bob crow (now deceased) and many others I’ll wager living in a council house whilst earning £120000 a year, that ain’t right

andyb · Nov 24, 2019

Baddegg said:
Council houses should be for the most needy,rents should be set to a percentage of income.....that would stop the likes of Bob crow (now deceased) and many others I’ll wager living in a council house whilst earning £120000 a year, that ain’t right

I grew up on a council estate. Back then, the 60s and 70s, the people on the estate represented a cross section of society. My neighbour worked in a factory, his neighbour had a paper shop, I remember there was a GP, my dad was a milkman and my Mum managed to get a job at the Bank of England when we were in our teens.

I think it’s for this reason that the estate was clean and the houses were kept well and the gardens cared for.

The problem nowadays is that in a lot of areas, social housing is so rare that only the very needy get it. This means that you don’t get a cross section of society living together, no professional or skilled people, only the very poorest or neediest. They’re not pleasant places to live, so the more reasonable people move out.

So, I firmly believe that the rents should be reasonable, not related to wages, that’s what housing benefit is for. And you should be able to keep them for life, regardless of whether or not your circumstances change.

Oh, and Bob Crow never earned £120 000.

Pete999 · Nov 24, 2019

andyb said:
I grew up on a council estate. Back then, the 60s and 70s, the people on the estate represented a cross section of society. My neighbour worked in a factory, his neighbour had a paper shop, I remember there was a GP, my dad was a milkman and my Mum managed to get a job at the Bank of England when we were in our teens.

I think it’s for this reason that the estate was clean and the houses were kept well and the gardens cared for.

The problem nowadays is that in a lot of areas, social housing is so rare that only the very needy get it. This means that you don’t get a cross section of society living together, no professional or skilled people, only the very poorest or neediest. They’re not pleasant places to live, so the more reasonable people move out.

So, I firmly believe that the rents should be reasonable, not related to wages, that’s what housing benefit is for. And you should be able to keep them for life, regardless of whether or not your circumstances change.

Oh, and Bob Crow never earned £120 000.

Who is Bob Crow?

Baddegg · Nov 24, 2019

My bad....bobs “basic” salary was just under £90000....more than enough to buy his own place or rent privately and free up his house for people that aren’t as fortunate or pay a fair proportion of his earnings.....how can anyone on that amount of basic salary qualify for subsidised/low cost housing? There are children out there who have nowhere to live!
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