http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/poli...-once-led.html

Iain Dale after the death of Jack Jones:

http://iaindale.blogspot.co.uk/2009/...ack-jones.html

That 50% success rate does not mirror the national success rate of 3.6% and is therefore highly unusual.

http://www.iaindale.com

Those of us lucky enough to live in the dormitory towns of the south east were able to leech off the obscene amounts of money flying around the city at the time.

My extended family, still living in Yorkshire and the lowlands of Scotland weren't so lucky and the effects of her scorched earth policies are still being felt there and will be for generations to come.

And yet this doesn't reflect the DWP's own research and statistics on workfare at all. Not saying what you're claiming isn't true but it's massively different from official and many unofficial reports. Atypical rather than typical.

NIck Ferrari has just mentioned this story in the FT:


It not only mirrors some of what happened under Thatcher but also perhaps explains many calls from London-based or South Eastern callers who don't believe that current austerity is either happening or is bad as others have said. People are genuinely hurting in many areas through no fault of their own and yet LBC's default line is that 'there's jobs if you want them', 'benefits are overly generous' &c.

And how often do their regional views turn into national policy suggestions: 'yeah, we need to cut benefits more', 'loads o' jobs, they're all workshy, stop their benefits' &c.

Ferrari has pushed a 'factoid' about the Thatcher government building more 'social housing' than Blair's government. Not only does he ignore the general trend that started under Thatcher, he's a bit misleading because it misses out what happened with the Major government when local authority building stopped altogether.

So the combined local authority and housing association stats that existed under both Thatcher and partly under Major don't apply to Blair's government. If you combine two lots of numbers then compare to a later date when one of those stats are irrelevant, it's hardly a surprise the first total is larger than the later.

http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/image...ilding_464.gif

I enjoyed Hartley-Brewer getting challenged, belatedly, over a similar thing the other day.

Ferrari is speaking now, he dosent even know why Mark Thatcher is a "Sir"!! DOH.

So right.

It is where the quote made by Mark M in 2009 came from on the other thread.

Isn't it good that the union members have to continue paying for Mr Scargill's London flat even though he retired from them 9 years ago.

A bit like Bob Crow living in a house aimed at low income families, and it is paid for by the rail workers.

Nick work if you can get it !

One wonders why he needs an appartment at the Barbican and also a pad in Yorkshire - all at someone else's expense.

Yes. That surprised me too. Although it shouldn't have.
I've noticed that when so many of these 'know-it-alls' go on quiz shows, their general knowledge is, often, lamentable.

Double standards from Mr Dale as I am sure you agree.

Which bit is double standards?

I do realise that some readers' eyes will glaze over at longer posts, but so be it.

I think it needs to be said that many of these Left/Right issues, and the way people feel about them, can often come down to both personal experience mixed with the dominant media perspectives of the time - which often seem to have a lasting effect, especially if they enter into the realms of 'mythology'.

Firstly, on the issue that Martin raised regarding Tony Benn and the offshore Pirate Radio stations - I would agree that they (the pirates) had a positive influence on mainstream and commercial radio, opening up what had been a very stiff and stifled area of that section of the broadcasting media. Before the Pirates launched, I can remember having to listen to Pop music on a rather weak and fluctuating signal from Radio Luxembourg, as there was no way that the BBC Light Programme or the World Service would play that type of music.
Martin's point that LBC (etc.) also would not exist had the cartel not been broken, was well made.

As Postmaster General at the time, I would suppose that Tony Benn had no option but to close down, or attempt to close down these stations that (it was said) were operating illegally, even though (as far as I know) they were anchored outside of British territorial waters.

Had there been a Conservative government at the time, presumably the action and result would have been the same - although I'm not entirely convinced of this. In my experience, support for The Arts tends to be more positive under left-of-centre governments, and less so under right-of centre ones. If anyone has any figures to disprove this, I would be happy to be proved wrong - but it's certainly my perception over sixty-odd years.

Maybe it goes to show that sometimes, a little anarchy and bucking the system, as the pirate radio stations did, can have a lasting and positive effect. Much of this nation's GDP is derived from creativity in the Arts and has an extremely positive effect on how the world sees us. This creativity needs a platform and should not be stifled. As Martin also wrote, the setting up of Radio London, and the liberation of the airwaves, was a direct result (it could be argued) of the bravery of the Pirates.

I am splitting this post into two, in order to keep them relatively short. I hope they are not too off-topic, but I just wanted to reply to a couple of points that have been made here. My next post will be about Arthur Scargill and the miners' strike. I bet you can hardly wait!

Oh, she hates that. Experts call in to the show, explain her "mistakes" with the statistics and she sits there agreeing with them. When they are gone, she ignores everything they told her and spouts the lies again.

I remember one particular show, where she condemns the latest figures relating to prescriptions of Ritalin. The Daily Heil slams the statistic that over seven hundred thousand prescriptions were issued for the drug in the previous year. She relates that data to there being seven hundred thousand children diagnosed with ADHD (you know, the condition that according her is just naughty boy syndrome ). The expert, whom she thought would back her up, informed her that those prescriptions were often weekly or monthly. Thereby bringing the number of children being treated with drug as fewer than thirty thousand. When she was clearly challenged on her BS, she turned on the expert telling her that ADHD didn't exist and that it was just pandering to lazy parents wanting to claim more benefits.

One of my favourite ones is the mythical statistics relating to grammar schools.

How can I steal some of this work thing, then?

Maybe he meant "Nick work if you can't get it".

From Wikipedia:

I listened to short excerpt from Ferrari's show this morning. Some idiot called to moan about people getting benefits whilst they were still working. He declared that they should just go out and get more work. He apparently had to work three jobs. His main job was a twelve hour shift, with travelling time that made it fourteen hours, when he finished there he started another job packing chocolates and then went on to another job. As usual Ferrari lapped it up, forgetting of course that the man described a twenty-six hour working day.

Become a trade union leader !

Could be because of his nasty comments and criticism of Jack Jones after his death yet slamming people for criticising Thatcher after her death. .

Also from Wikipedia

1982: Arthur Scargill (Honorary President from 2002)
2002: Ian Lavery
2010: Vacant

(there we go Makeba, there maybe a job waiting for you!)

In 2012 it emerged in court cases between the NUM and its former president Arthur Scargill that a substantial proportion of union members' subscriptions was still being spent on expenses for Scargill, including unauthorised rent payments for a flat he owned in the Barbican, London.

Daily Telegraph

Chris Kitchen, the general secretary of the National Union of Miners, said the former president (Arthur Scargill) ....

... legal battles with the NUM, from which he retired as president in 2002

BBC News

Although the NUM has now severed all its links with its former President

He was hardly 'dancing on the grave' of Jack Jones. In fact he said

Really? So which countries' jurisdiction did they come under, considering they wer only broadcasting a couple of miles offshore? Why do you think these radio stations were referred to at the time as 'pirates' if they weren't operating illegally? And if they were operating outside the British jurisdiction then clearly no British law could have had any effect. It was well known that the ptrates paid no music royalties. It was one of the major criticisms at the time.