Sunday 22nd April 2012
Topic: George Osborne
"George Osborne is to spend 12 months talking to charities about the impact of his tax on donations!"
Source: The People
Extract It is the first sign the Chancellor is prepared to back down over the controversial move to cap tax relief on giving.
"I want to sit down with the charities, get it right, and make sure they are protected," he said while at G20 talks in Washington yesterday. "However the very, very rich should pay some income tax."
Comment: "I want to sit down with the charities, get it right, and make sure they are protected?" a load of bollocks, as if he is interested in anyone other than himself, his wealth, and the Tory party... as I said, a load of bollocks!
Monday 23rd April 2012
Topic: EU
"Britain must find £900m in additional EU payments
Source: Telegraph
Extract: Britain will be told that it must find almost £900 million in additional payments for Brussels or else be forced to pay up by the EU's Court of Justice as the European Commission publishes its 2013 budget demand on Wednesday.
The EU executive has warned governments that an austerity busting budget, expected to be an extra £7.2 billion in cash from national treasuries next year, is needed to pay bills for European regional projects that have already been delivered.
Britain is obliged to pay a 12.4 per cent net share, based on the most recent figures, of all Brussels expenditure meaning that the government could be forced to pay an additional £890 million to the EU at a time of painful cuts to public services.
Comment: I don't understand all this you know!
Tuesday 24th April 2012
Topic: London Mayoral elections campaign
"Ken Livingstone walks out of interview after not knowing name of Crystal Palace ground"
Source: Telegraph
Extract: "Croydon needs attention," is his undeniable pitch.
But when required to deviate from the script, and asked anything specific, Ken shows quite how much "attention" he's really been paying to the places he aspires to represent.
A key plank of his manifesto is more police - but when asked how many police officers was a good number for Croydon, he couldn't say.
Asked what Croydon's main theatre was, he replied: "I don't know."
Asked the name of Crystal Palace's ground, he said: "I'm sorry, if I want to do a quiz I'll go on Radio 4. I mean seriously, this is trivial nonsense."
Asked what Croydon's population was, he replied: "Very large," and walked out of the interview.
I haven't got the slightest interest in football - but I do know what Crystal Palace's ground is called.
Part of Ken's pitch has always been that he is the detail man, the guy who knows London.
That's not really true - he's good at coming up with authoritative-sounding facts which often turn out, under close scrutiny, to be lies.
But when faced with something you cannot busk, he can't cope.
Comment: Methinks the author is not a Ken Livingstone fan or Labourite?
Wednesday 25th April 2012
Topic: Social cleansing
"London councils look to move poor families up north due to housing benefit cap"
Source: The Mirror
Extract: London families face uprooting to cities in the Midlands and the North as the Government's housing benefit cap forces councils to kick out the poor!
A sinister programme of "social cleansing" could force families to travel hundreds of miles to find a home, it emerged today.
London-based families face uprooting to cities in the Midlands and the North as the Government's housing benefit cap forces councils to kick out the poor.
Labour-run Newham council has written to 1,179 housing associations asking them to house hundreds of vulnerable people.
The Tory-run councils of Croydon and Westminster are also looking at shifting the homeless out of the capital.
The new cap limits claimants to a maximum of £250-a-week for a one-bedroom flat and £400-a-week for a four-bed home.
Comment: They'll love it if they get sent to Nottingham, just like home for them, violence, murder, muggings, shootings, knifing, unemployment, and an absolute paradise for any shoplifters or pickpockets!
Thursday 26th April 2012
Topic: Economy
"Trouble dip: Worst crisis for 80 years as Britain plunges back into recession"
Source: The Mirror
Extract: Brtain is facing its worst economic crisis in 80 years after figures yesterday confirmed the country has slumped back into recession.
The economy shrank 0.2% in the first three months of the year, as Chancellor George Osborne's plans led the country stumbling into a double dip recession.
Official figures showed the economy has shrunk 0.2% since the Chancellor delivered his Spending Review 18 months ago.
And Britain is now facing a longer recovery than after the misery of the Great Depression with Gross Domestic Product (GDP) not forecast to return to pre-recession levels until 2014 at the earliest.
Comment: Britain plunges back into recession? - have we been out of a recession? No one told me!
Friday 27th April 2012
Topic: Budget - VAT on pasties
"Does George Osborne have a point about pasties? Yes and no"
Source: The Guardian
Extract: Let's face it - the chancellor is logically correct that pasties are 'hot food' just like kebabs, and therefore subject to VAT. But politically, a pasty tax is still bad policy.
It is fair to describe pasties as hot food and therefore subject to VAT. In almost all shops they are served hot because consumers wouldn't want them any other way. They are cooked in small batches to make sure they don't hang around on the shop counter for long.
Why, George Osborne rightly asks, should his local kebab shop owner be forced to charge 20% on a doner while the Greggs next door gets away with selling a VAT-free sausage roll just because the meat is wrapped in pastry and not pitta bread?
Comment: Some interesting comments from who is obviously not a Cornish Pasty eater!
Saturday 28th April 2012
Topic: Benefit cuts
"Iain Duncan Smith opposes suggested £10bn welfare cuts"
Source: BBC News/Times
Extract: Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith says he would not accept a suggested extra £10bn of benefit cuts.
He told the Times that welfare should not be "an easy target" and the government had "a responsibility to support people in difficulty".
Comment: That's him for the chop then!
Sunday 29th April 2012
Topic: EU - Cash aid donations
"EU gives our half our cash to well off!"
Source: Sunday Sun
Extract: EU chiefs are blowing more than half a billion pounds of British taxpayers' money each year on aid to prosperous countries, MPs reveal today.
Just 46 per cent of the annual £1.23billion that the UK sends to Brussels in development cash goes to "low income" nations.
Instead countries like booming Turkey and Serbia keep most of it, says the Commons' International Development Committee.
Comment: How surprising!
