Who are Labour trying to help these days?

[Mister M]

The Tories do actually believe that their policies are what is best for the country and if that helps their mates as well, all the better.

 

Labour just want to help themselves, their mates, and a perpetual Labour government.

 

What we are really missing in this country is a empathetic truely Liberal party that believes in liberty and isn't full of drips.

 

Baffles me why anyone slightly liberal in nature would want anything to with any iteration of the Labour party since Attlee packed it in. I guess they think that Labour care.

 

I'm bemused by your post, don't all politicians believe that their policies are what's best for the country? And whilst you pointed out that Labour just seem to want permanent Government, you omitted to mention that it is the Tories that have been the Government who have been in power most years since 1900; almost as if they find themselves in government by accident.

[tinfoilhat]

I'm bemused by your post, don't all politicians believe that their policies are what's best for the country? And whilst you pointed out that Labour just seem to want permanent Government, you omitted to mention that it is the Tories that have been the Government who have been in power most years since 1900; almost as if they find themselves in government by accident.

 

I think labour feel the need to "do" more. More tax rules, more different types of benefits, more tests for kids that sort of thing.

[spilldig]

that is a misquote, although what Healey was supposed to have said, was in fact 'we will squeeze the rich, until the pips 'SQUEAK'.

 

the first person who used this phrase, was Lloyd George. Decades later, Healey quoted Anthony Crosland who used the phrase to refer to specifically refer to property speculators, not the rich in general.

 

You got what he said then. One thing I do know about that government was that the rich was anybody working from the highest payed to the lowest paid.

[geared]

I think labour feel the need to "do" more. More tax rules, more different types of benefits, more tests for kids that sort of thing.

 

They do need to get out of the 1970's is what they do need to do :nod:

[Mister M]

I think labour feel the need to "do" more. More tax rules, more different types of benefits, more tests for kids that sort of thing.

 

And yet I've recently read that Nicky Morgan, the Conservative Education Minister, is considering more rigorous assessments for seven-year-olds – including the reintroduction of national tests; resits for Maths and English for pupils in their first year of secondary schools....

 

I certainly think that since Blair there has been more 'micromanaging' of schools, hospitals and other public services, almost as a 'quid pro quo' for extra funding. Personally I don't like the culture that this fosters in public service, it's as if the accountants are in charge. Nobody is saying that there shouldn't be accountability for public money, of course there should; but I do get a sense that the internal market in the NHS has created more bureaucracy to manage that market; there is increasing emphasis in Education on money being spent, by each school on business managers & general managerial functions.What about local accountability, and accountability to your patients, students....Anyway I've digressed.

[tinfoilhat]

And yet I've recently read that Nicky Morgan, the Conservative Education Minister, is considering more rigorous assessments for seven-year-olds – including the reintroduction of national tests; resits for Maths and English for pupils in their first year of secondary schools....

 

I certainly think that since Blair there has been more 'micromanaging' of schools, hospitals and other public services, almost as a 'quid pro quo' for extra funding. Personally I don't like the culture that this fosters in public service, it's as if the accountants are in charge. Nobody is saying that there shouldn't be accountability for public money, of course there should; but I do get a sense that the internal market in the NHS has created more bureaucracy to manage that market; there is increasing emphasis in Education on money being spent, by each school on business managers & general managerial functions.What about local accountability, and accountability to your patients, students....Anyway I've digressed.

 

It's not an accountancy issue in my view but a political one. If you have all these test results etc showing X amount of progress it's a nice sound bite. If it can't be quantified it can't be shown off and/or criticised.

[Mister M]

It's not an accountancy issue in my view but a political one. If you have all these test results etc showing X amount of progress it's a nice sound bite. If it can't be quantified it can't be shown off and/or criticised.

 

Possibly, but if political one then it has backfired spectacularly; endless paperwork, targets, performance management have become dirty words. Plus the fact that very few people have faith in statistics as they are open to interpretation and manipulation and selectively quoted.