British Politics Thread

Yeah, I'm not a fan of Trident. I have no issue with NATO/the US providing defence coverage for that sort of thing for all of Europe, but I'd much rather have things like the Star Wars missile defence program.

New poll suggests UKIP wipeout, with only 1 MP.

The Scottish Daily Mail had on its front page a suggestion that it's undemocratic for Nicola Sturgeon to lead the SNP because she's not standing as a candidate. How the Hell would that work then, given someone cannot be an MP and an MSP? They'd need two different leaders of the party, which wouldn't work either.

edited 19th Apr '15 7:16:15 AM by CaissasDeathAngel

Again the answer is more in not using it, in this case not using it while the Americans are.

If some terrible accident led to Russia and the USA to launch at each other while our own independent system stayed out of it, it would provide incentive to not fire on us.

By having our own system we have a deterrent against being dragged into somebody else's nuclear wAR.

Being part of NATO blurs the line on that since we are signed up to Ally with the USA in such an event but having our own nuclear arsenal men's that we are actually giving something up to the USA in such an agreement and thus provides us with leverage in the arrangement. France may be a clearer example since they weren't always part of NATO and it was gheir independent nuclear arsenal that allowed them to be so.

edited 19th Apr '15 7:22:55 AM by SomeSortOfTroper

Again you're still thinking of nukes as military weapons, they're much more political tools than military weapons. We need them because the US can't be relied upon, because if we want to build a Europe independent of the US then we're going to need to do stuff ourselves, because the political tool of nukes allowing us to be taken serious is one that we want to be able to use independently of the US.

It's 12.6 actually, you managed to add an extra 0 there.

Plus there's a simple answer to your problem, stop the cuts. Seeing as all the anti-nuclear parties are also anti austerity I'm not seeing the connection, if they were pro-austerity it would kinda make sense. In the end it feels like Appeal to Worse Problems, the cuts aren't a reason to get rid of trident, they're a reason to stop the cuts.

X3 That's a hell of a poll, a 40 seat SNP swing?!

edited 19th Apr '15 7:30:39 AM by Silasw

That poll is terrific news if true. A UKIP wipeout would cheer me up no end, regardless of the ultimate result.

I don't believe such a swing will happen, though it's not the first time I've heard it. I love the idea of UKIP fading like that though.

My own prediction for UKIP is around 9 or 10 seats, no higher than a dozen. The council elections showed that they don't have enough support in any one specific area, which is a problem in FPTP elections. Combine that with the fact that general elections tend to attract less fringe loonies of the sort that only show for council elections, and UKIP not winning singular control over any council, and I think the idea that they will be kingmakers may be a bit far-fetched.

I'd be shocked if UKIP get into double digits. I'm gonna go over that site and work out the seat by seat distribution of seats.

edited 19th Apr '15 7:43:49 AM by Silasw

That article made me very happy.

I'm not optimistic enough to believe that they'll only get one seat, I feel like six or seven is more likely. I'm just interested to see which seats they'd be in terms of whether they usually vote left or right; I expect a lot of once safe left wing seats to vote UKIP and then be horrified when they see their policies in action.

Coalition building with those results would be nuts. It's 326 (well 323 in reality) for a majority and you'd be looking at Lab-SNP-Green-PC: 320 or Con-Lib: 310, that works for nobody. Lab-Lib-SNP: 343 would work but simply isn't gonna happen.

Though I'm unsure of those results, are we really at a point where Labour will make no gains in the South-East?

Edit: reading it slightly wrong, they've got 2 Lab gains in the South East, Hastings and Hove.

edited 19th Apr '15 9:17:37 AM by Silasw

Slightly late, but as anyone who's had this discussion with me before knows, I'm very pro-nuclear deterrent. So just pretend I'm smiling and nodding with everything Silas says.

As he pointed out, it's generally an unwise idea to make your defence reliant upon another nation - particularly when it comes to nuclear weapons. It essentially makes you a prisoner of their national policy^note They don't like you doing [xyz]? Say buh-bye to that military assistance!, and it is just begging to be left high and dry at an inopportune moment. If you want to ensure the political independence of Europe and Britain, then it doesn't make sense to me to remove Trident.

Incorrect in two separate ways. In the "I'm an annoying git who knows way too much about these" way, there were designs for nuclear mines and depth charges, as well as similar defensive munitions. In the "political" way, the prime value of a nuclear arsenal is in its deterring effect. It may not halt proxy warfare, but it does prevent an escalation of conflict - it is a conflict limiter, as the parlance goes.

Then the problem becomes that when the deception is uncovered (and it will be uncovered, sooner or later) you lose all of the benefits of nuclear deterrence and make yourself look like a laughing stock in the process.

That and even if we (i.e. the public) didn't know about it, our rivals and allies probably would sooner or later, even if only because of the abrupt lack of subs heading out of Faslane.

I'm not a huge fan of Trident, but what concerns me about the financial aspect of the debate is that, typically, budgets do not cross over. If government makes a saving in one area, that is not typically applied to another area. What usually happens is that the need for raising that level of money in the affected budget is gone and therefore the affected budget is smaller the next time it's negotiated.

For example, if Trident is X% of the defence budget, and was scrapped, it's actually dubious how much of that X% could ever be crossed over into other budgets. It's more likely that the next time the defence budget is negotiated, it's X% smaller than it would have been had Trident been a factor. Even if some of that X% can be transferred to other budgets, it's doubtful the entire X% would be.

While some budget crossover can and does happen, many government budgets are entirely different pots, and there's absolutely no guarantee (and, in some cases, no chance at all) of savings in one area being beneficial to completely different pots.

In an ideal world, savings from scrapping Trident would be pumped into other very needy areas of the economy, such as the NHS or education. In reality, however, I am suspicious that it would ever happen.

edited 19th Apr '15 10:54:16 AM by Wyldchyld

UKIP councillor assaults Hope Not Hate campaigner. His supporters barrage the victim with homophobic abuse.

edited 19th Apr '15 11:47:53 AM by CaissasDeathAngel

http://www.bbc.com/news/election-2015-32374871

See? Farage cares about migrants, just so long as they give him ammo to attack the government with. And he's not exactly wrong in this case (at least when it comes to the fact that Libya and the aftermath was a botched job), just hypocritical. Of course he's only interested in taking the Christians in, so we know it's still Farage.

edited 19th Apr '15 12:44:35 PM by Rationalinsanity

Yeah, if the Election turns out as it might, it might be impossible for any party to build a working, effective majority in whatever workable coalition they come up with. If that's the case, we have another General Election later this year...

Canvasser Report. So far, only the Conservatives have come knocking. Was disappointed to find that I am yellow, and therefore ranted at me saying it was the Lib Dem's fault that my town was the poor relation in the our district.

Gave me something to think about, but wasn't going to change my vote.

For context, our district has three groups. The largest is conservative, but the other two equally sized groups are large enough to force the district into No Overall Control. Liberal Democrats are one of these groups, but the other is Residents Organisation that naturally tends conservative anyway.

Thing is, local politics is all regional. The Lib Dem group all come from my town + one other neighbouring ward. Hence why our town gets to be the poor relation. The Canvasser's solution was for us to turn Tory, then we'd all get along swimmingly. Nice, but that's not really politics. I told him the system is at fault, and you can't blame the Lib Dem's for that.

Canvasser then said if the Lib Dem's co-operated then it would be fine, but all they do is complain. High minded optimism from our canvasser there! If you are the opposition, it's your job to complain, else you'd just get rolled over and suffer the consequences. We forget the positive stuff coming from the district, but we'll raise merry hell over the negative. In response to that, the best thing the Lib Dems can do, or any politician for that matter, is to state the fact that they are the opposition and that they don't have the votes to counter it. Of course, this sours an already poor relation further, so more negative crap comes our way.

Thing is, I've looked into our local politics and they are all as bad as each other. There is only one game in the district, and that is the following: who can stop housebuilding in their ward the best. Our district need homes, developers want to build anywhere they can, and all our councillors (regardless of party) say the same thing: sure, just not in my ward.

As a person living with my parents which is a situation unlikely to change for a few years at least, I want the opposite. I want new homes to be built, so as far as I am concerned none of them are giving me what I want.

Of course, what I wanted to say to him was "I don't know why you are bothering, your man has won anyway. My vote doesn't matter, so why do you care that I am yellow?"

Hm. Lab-SNP-PC-Green-SDLP is 323. If Sinn Fein sits out, Labour might be able to get a working majority by picking up a couple of wild cards.

If they could stand the embarrassment, they could ask Galloway for C&S.

Sinn Féin always sits out. It's a tradition that harkens back all the way to when Sinn Féin first got into Westminster.

Though if they decide to take their seats, and offer to join a coalition... that would be a recipe for hilarity.

If there is any justice on this planet, Galloway will not be re-elected.

Though given he's chosen an area that's comparable to apartheid era Johannesburg in terms of racial integration, and deliberately so, he probably will get his seat back (Bradford is pretty much segregated now)

Without question the most loathsome political representative in the country, even more so than Farage.

edited 19th Apr '15 4:27:27 PM by CaissasDeathAngel

I have personally always seen Galloway as the left wings Farage.

I had an amusing conversation with one of the waiters where I work the other night. His basic view of the election was that he was glad that he wasn't old enough to vote this year as all the possible choices were dicks.

I suspect if SF joined a coalition, you'd need to invite the DUP, and they'd accept rather than be outside govt when SF were in.

Agree that Galloway is an utter tosser. There's also the rumors that are always swirling about voter intimidation in those particular communities, where it's not so much "one elector, one vote", but "one family head, twenty votes". Could be bullshit, could also be quite true.

edited 20th Apr '15 4:15:18 AM by Achaemenid

...Con-Lib-DUP-SF?

That sounds like a ticket from Mars. I'd add UKIP except that Clegg has ruled out any coalition that involves them.

I'd personally lean towards the "quite true" end of the scale, myself.

Quick Question. Does anyone know where Magic FM get their news from? Because it was such a change of tone switching between BBC Radio 4 news at 6 to Magic FM that I think I got whiplash. BBC obviously was playing it safe saying that today was the day the SNP released their manifesto. The Magic FM news desk however led with a David Cameron quote about how the SNP were out to wreck the UK, mentioned in passing the SNP manifesto before closing with a quote from Michael Fallon claiming that said manifesto was "the most expensive ransom note in history."

Also, what is up with this thing known as the Carlisle Doctrine? I saw it in passing but couldn't commit much thought to it at the time.

No idea on the news, and do you mean castle doctrine?

Castle Doctrine is the idea that a man's home is his castle, you enter someone else's home uninvited and they can wreck your shit.

My mistake, it was a principle, not a doctrine, but it was certainly the Carlisle Principle. From what I could tell it seemed to be a proposal from David Cameron saying that Westminster should launch a yearly review on Holyrood's activities to ensure that decisions made by the Scottish Parliament do not adversely affect the rest of the UK. Named as the Carlisle doctrine because of Carlisle's proximity to the Scottish border and thus supposedly the most at risk if there were any wayward policies.

http://www.scotsman.com/news/uk/we-won-t-let-holyrood-harm-england-says-cameron-1-3747242

Milliband is adorable. Awww, bless.