Manifesto 2017 pages 61/62 -
We will reform and modernise the home-buying process so it is more efficient and less costly.
We will crack down on unfair practices in leasehold, such as escalating ground rents.
We will also improve protections for those who rent, including by looking at how we increase security for good tenants and encouraging landlords to offer longer tenancies as standard.
We will make billing for telecoms customers fairer and easier to understand, including making clear when a mobile customer has paid off the price of their handset.
We will consider a ban on companies cold calling people encouraging them to make false personal injury claims.
We will take steps to tackle rogue private parking operators.
We will reduce insurance costs for ordinary motorists by cracking down on exaggerated and fraudulent whiplash claims.
We will review rail ticketing, removing complexity and perverse pricing, and introduce a passenger ombudsman to stand up for the interests of rail users suffering a poor deal. We will work with train companies and their employees to agree minimum service levels during periods of industrial dispute – and if we cannot find a voluntary agreement, we will legislate to make this mandatory
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>>We will reform and modernise the home-buying process so it is more efficient and less costly.
It would have been better if they didn't get rid of council housing with right to buy and reformed entitlement to the houses rather than let buy to let landlords force house prices up and increase rents which often get paid by the tax payer as well!
>>We will crack down on unfair practices in leasehold, such as escalating ground rents.
It is a contract signed by all relevant parties. If they didn't like it then they should not have signed it. More nanny state interference for those too incompetent to get proper advise. Remember the landlord will have given up the rights to their land for a period of time. They are entitled to compensation for it.
>>We will also improve protections for those who rent, including by looking at how we increase security for good tenants and encouraging landlords to offer longer tenancies as standard.
Fine but make it easier to kick out tennants that wreck the house or don't pay the rent.
>>We will consider a ban on companies cold calling people encouraging them to make false personal injury claims.
Surely that is covered by legislation already. Knowingly making a false claim is fraud.
>>We will take steps to tackle rogue private parking operators.
Because that went so well last time.
>>We will reduce insurance costs for ordinary motorists by cracking down on exaggerated and fraudulent whiplash claims.
Perhaps if you employed more police to chase up on these and gave proper jail sentences to those found guilty then there wouldn't be a problem.
>>We will review rail ticketing, removing complexity and perverse pricing, and introduce a passenger ombudsman to stand up for the interests of rail users suffering a poor deal. We will work with train companies and their employees to agree minimum service levels during periods of industrial dispute – and if we cannot find a voluntary agreement, we will legislate to make this mandatory
Make sure the ombudsman has teeth. Perhaps the 140 mile rail journey that I looked up this morning wouldn't have cost £150 if the market was working properly or you put proper controls in place when you first privatised the railways or reviewed the terms when you renewed the operating licences.
Last edited by: zippy on Thu 18 May 17 at 16:44
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>> It would have been better if they didn't get rid of council housing with right
>> to buy and reformed entitlement to the houses rather than let buy to let landlords
>> force house prices up and increase rents which often get paid by the tax payer
>> as well!
>>
>> >>We will crack down on unfair practices in leasehold, such as escalating ground rents.
>>
>> It is a contract signed by all relevant parties. If they didn't like it then
>> they should not have signed it. More nanny state interference for those too incompetent to
>> get proper advise. Remember the landlord will have given up the rights to their land
>> for a period of time. They are entitled to compensation for it.
Maybe, just maybe, there is a link between what's happened to house prices and the emerging scandal of developers abusing leaseholds.:
www.theguardian.com/money/2017/may/16/leasehold-uk-homeowners-ground-rents
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Selling of council houses has made mo difference to the housing market. Once you gave a council house to a tenant, it never came back for others, unless the tenant died without spouse or kids.
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>> Selling of council houses has made mo difference to the housing market. Once you gave
>> a council house to a tenant, it never came back for others, unless the tenant
>> died without spouse or kids.
>>
The rules were crazy. One person living on subsidised rent for a house meant for three because one had passed away and the kid had left home! This was not sensible use of the assets.
Councils were not allowed to re-invest the full money from the sale for new housing. If they were then the number of houses would have increased, reducing demand and therefore prices.
Lower prices would have lead to more cash available to spend elsewhere in the economy, which may have lead to inflation but could have lead to a little extra tax income via VAT and better services.
Higher house prices enriches bankers and house builders and gives those at the end of the chain a cash bonus when others behind them suffers from higher mortgage payments.
Last edited by: zippy on Thu 18 May 17 at 19:16
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>>looking at how we increase security for good tenants and encouraging landlords to offer longer tenancies as standard.<<
We have been in our rented semi detached house with garage and large garden for 10 years in June and the rent has never increased once since we moved in.
It's simple, be a good tenant, pay your rent, look after it as if it were your own and everything else falls into place nicely.
>>We will take steps to tackle rogue private parking operators<<
take steps to is the bit I'm not keen on...no commitment just hot air.
To be honest, if it was workable I much prefer the Labour manifesto after hearing JC talking to JV at lunchtime.
Pat
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>> It's simple, be a good tenant, pay your rent, look after it as if it
>> were your own and everything else falls into place nicely.
If only that were anywhere near universally the case.
You've been lucky in terms of time and incredibly so with the rent.
I wonder how this chap's tenants fare:
www.theguardian.com/money/2017/may/17/buy-to-let-millionaire-fergus-wilson-who-bans-coloured-people-faces-legal-action
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I realise that Bromp, but it works both ways.
We never call the landlord out if we can fix it ourselves at a reasonable expense, and I think he appreciates that.
Pat
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>>We never call the landlord out if we can fix it ourselves at a reasonable expense, and I think he appreciates that
Damn right. I have many tenants and I go out of my way for the 'good' ones. Often not increasing their rent at renewal just to encourage them to stay.
Troublesome ones are a different matter.
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As Fm2R whatsisname chilly chappy..nearly as right as often as Zeddo. OUCH!
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>> To be honest, if it was workable I much prefer the Labour manifesto after hearing
>> JC talking to JV at lunchtime.
>>
Trouble is the Labour manifesto is never workable ...
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>>To be honest, if it was workable I much prefer the Labour manifesto after hearing JC talking >>to JV at lunchtime.
Too right. He's promised us unicorns for everybody and glittery rainbows. What's not to like about it? I prefer the Labour manifesto too. I'm not voting for it though because I don't believe in fairies.
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>
>> Too right. He's promised us unicorns for everybody and glittery rainbows. What's not to like
>> about it? I prefer the Labour manifesto too. I'm not voting for it though because
>> I don't believe in fairies.
>>
>>
The interesting thing is that the country voted for BREXIT - those were people who were then taken in by the myths and fairies. If the unicorns and rainbows are now seen to be attractive then the same large unthinking vote could all vote Labour!
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I voted for Brexit Sherlock so can you show me where I was taken in by myths and fairies?
Pat
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>>I voted for Brexit Sherlock so can you show me where I was taken in by myths and fairies?
I'm with ^this geezer.
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>> I voted for Brexit Sherlock so can you show me where I was taken in
>> by myths and fairies?
>>
>> Pat
You'll find out when all the "out of the eu" promises dont appear and the pain starts.
Still as you said, price worth paying.
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I knew you'd have an explanation Z, but I didn't ask you because I also knew it would be all hot air;)
Now, back to Sherlock, dog and I are awaiting an explanation please.
Pat
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A simple Google will help.....
brexitlies.com/
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I'd rather hear it in his own words.
Pat
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Not at all.
If I make a sweeping derogatory statement then I'm always happy to back it up with a further explanation as to why I've come to that conclusion.
Pat
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Pat
Very little to add - Z & FM2R have saved me from posting a long post.
I did not necessarily include you in the group I identified with my 'sweeping derogatory statement'. You have chosen to include yourself. If the cap fits.......
Most posters on here (but not all!) did apply some thought processes, and have subsequently attempted to justify their decisions, but there are a large number of less thinking voters at large in the UK.
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>> increase security for good tenants and encouraging landlords to offer longer tenancies as standard
Implied message => As we can't control house price rise, we understand that many of our voters would not be able to buy houses and thus must be lifelong tenants. So, in order keep our votebank intact, we have to offer some carrots to voters.
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The point I want to make, but no-one who voted to stay in the EU wants to hear it, is that immigration was only a very small reason for my choice of whether I voted to stay or leave.
I originally voted to join the Common Market, and I think I've given it a fair time for it to work and actually benefit us all, compared to what life was like before that.
It hasn't done what it said on the tin.
Life wasn't better, didn't improve and looking at the state of things over the past 5 years or so, it started to go down hill even faster.
We, as a country, seem to be happy to allow our long term unemployed claim more and more benefits to shirk any sort of work that they feel is beneath them.
Of course, we can allow that to happen if there is a never ending supply of willing hard working immigrants prepared to do it.
IMHO, the immigrants deserve better jobs and our aforementioned unemployed should have all benefits stopped and forced to pick sprouts of the field in winter, clean hospitals and roads and work in the care sector doing the 'not very nice' jobs.
When they are prepared to do that with the dedication the EU immigrants do it with, then they can move on to something better.
The foreign lads I work with are excellent workers and do the job right.
I can also swear in Polish, Rumanian, Lithuanian and Russian now.....that should fox the swear filter!
Pat
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>> I originally voted to join the Common Market, and I think I've given it a
>> fair time for it to work and actually benefit us all, compared to what life
>> was like before that.
>>
>> It hasn't done what it said on the tin.
>>
And it never could, no outside organisation, group of countries or whatever, could ever make everything better, being in the Common Market / EEC / EU is and was always about what we made of it, not about what magic it could work for us.
Neither will Brexit make everything right, I believe it takes away some opportunities but the decision is made so fair enough.
Going forward whatever happens will be what we make happen for ourselves, as individuals and as a nation.
And before you get too interested in Mt Corbyn's fairy stories and everything will be fine if we go back to the 70s with public ownership and big union influence. Think back, how did that work out then.
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>>And it never could, no outside organisation, group of countries or whatever, could ever make everything better, being in the Common Market / EEC / EU is and was always about what we made of it, not about what magic it could work for us.<<
But we were told it would work, and I was young and gullible then.
I'm older and wiser now and capable of making my own decisions without believing blindly what either JC or Mother Theresa tells me.
I did learn a little from my own mistake.
....and I won't be voting Labour, don't worry, there's a certain Union element involved which would never, ever allow me to do that!
Pat
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>> And before you get too interested in Mt Corbyn's fairy stories and everything will be
>> fine if we go back to the 70s with public ownership and big union influence.
>> Think back, how did that work out then.
1973, Three day week.
1979 Winter of discontent
All union driven.
2017, Corbyn, a union patsy.
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Bill Bryson, in Notes from a Small Island, says that in just one week in March 1973, these were headlines he noted:
Strike threat at British Gas Corporation
2000 Civil servants strike
No London edition of the Daily Mirror
10000 laid off after Chrysler men walk out
Unions plan crippling action for May Day
12000 pupils get day off as teachers strike
Last edited by: Crankcase on Fri 19 May 17 at 15:36
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>>No London edition of the Daily Mirror
Every cloud.....
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>> Of course, we can allow that to happen if there is a never ending supply
>> of willing hard working immigrants prepared to do it.
>>
Yet the number of vacancies increases. Plenty of jobs in Brexit UK:
latest ONS report -
Unemployment in the UK fell to 4.6 per cent in the first quarter, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
The total proportion of people employed in the UK, known as the employment rate, reached a record 74.8 per cent during the same period, with the number of job vacancies in the three months to April also reaching a new record of 777,000.
In the three months to February, the employment rate for people was 74.6 per cent, the previous joint highest since comparable records began in 1971.
The FT said:
There was better news on job creation as employers continued to hire more staff. The employment rate breached a new record high of 74.8 per cent after another 122,000 people found work — a bigger number than economists were expecting. They were also encouraged by the types of jobs that were created. The number of full-time employees surged while part-time and self-employment fell.
Andrew Sentance, a former UK rate-setter now at PwC, expects the unemployment rate could make further strides lower: “The vacancy rate points to a pick-up in the demand for labour. The number of unfilled vacancies has risen to its highest level since the current data series started in 2001.â€
Last edited by: BrianByPass on Fri 19 May 17 at 15:27
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>
>> I originally voted to join the Common Market, and I think I've given it a
>> fair time for it to work and actually benefit us all, compared to what life
>> was like before that.
>>
>> It hasn't done what it said on the tin.
>>
>> Life wasn't better, didn't improve and looking at the state of things over the past
>> 5 years or so, it started to go down hill even faster.
Clearly you and I live in different countries. And dont try the "Ah but I live in the fens you should see what life is like here" MY family have been inbreeding in the fens longer than you have been living there. It was a poor depressed part of the country. Peterborough hospital was a rat hole (I know I was treated there, I have had family die there) The fens are an immensely more prosperous place within the EU.
>> We, as a country, seem to be happy to allow our long term unemployed claim
>> more and more benefits to shirk any sort of work that they feel is beneath
>> them.
Do you know the current long term unemployed rate? Do you know if its changed within or out of the EU?
No you dont so you can't possibly make that comment. Do you seriously think the shirkers are going to work? They didn't before the EU and they wont now. We are currently approaching what is known as "full employment"
You really take the biscuit, trying to make your No vote down to the long term unemployed. Just confess, as you unguardedly did some time back "Its because i don't like seeing signs in Polish in the canteen"
I have accepted the no vote, I am no remoaner, I am financially able to weather the fall out, I am looking forward to the day when I can say "I told you so" "here is where you start paying for your gross stupidity"
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>> And dont try the "Ah but I
>> live in the fens you should see what life is like here" MY family have
>> been inbreeding in the fens longer than you have been living there. It was a
>> poor depressed part of the country. Peterborough hospital was a rat hole (I know I
>> was treated there, I have had family die there) The fens are an immensely more
>> prosperous place within the EU. <<
I lived in Oakham Rutland and then in rural Leicestershire at the time of the Common Market vote so that dispenses with that one.!
>>
>> Do you know the current long term unemployed rate? Do you know if its changed
>> within or out of the EU?
>> No you dont so you can't possibly make that comment.<<
I can, do you know the percentage of different nationalities who are unemployed in this Country?
>> Do you seriously think the shirkers are going to work? They didn't before the EU and they wont now. <<
Going hungry worked for me and it would for them too if we didn't mollycoddle them.
>> You really take the biscuit, trying to make your No vote down to the long
>> term unemployed. Just confess, as you unguardedly did some time back "Its because i don't
>> like seeing signs in Polish in the canteen"
Ah yes, lets call me a racist 'cos I prefer to read a coffee machine in English in Britain....and I dare to say so.
That's boxing below your weight even for you Z.
Pat
>>
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>> Ah yes, lets call me a racist 'cos I prefer to read a coffee machine
>> in English in Britain....and I dare to say so.
>>
>> That's boxing below your weight even for you Z.
>>
>> Pat
>> >>
Well at least we got the nub of the matter rather than sheepishly trying to hide behind made up crap.
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No, you got to what you want to believe with your head stuck up your(I can't say that anymore on here) stuck in the sand.
So be it....realisation will dawn one day, I couldn't give two FF's if you think I'm racist or not.
The people I meet on a daily basis, who know me are who matter.
Pat
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>> I am looking forward to the day when I can say
>> "I told you so" "here is where you start paying for your gross stupidity"
>>
Relax.Stop being bitter. Enjoy your life rather than wait for a day to come when you can justify your bitterness.
After all, the Remainers might be proven to have been the stupid ones.
Hindsight Fallacy:
"Every point in history is a crossroads. A single travelled road leads from the past to the present, but myriad paths fork off into the future. Some of those paths are wider, smoother and better marked, and are thus more likely to be taken, but sometimes history – or the people who make history – takes unexpected turns.
History cannot be explained deterministically and it cannot be predicted because it is chaotic. So many forces are at work and their interactions are so complex that extremely small variations in the strength of the forces and the way they interact produce huge differences in outcomes.
Not only that, but history is what is called a ‘level two’ chaotic system. Chaotic systems come in two shapes. Level one chaos is chaos that does not react to predictions about it. Level two chaos is chaos that reacts to predictions about it, and therefore can never be predicted accurately."
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>> Relax.Stop being bitter. Enjoy your life rather than wait for a day to come when
>> you can justify your bitterness.
Not Bitter, I am enjoying life and looking forward to my ITYS moment.
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>> Not Bitter, I am enjoying life and looking forward to my ITYS moment.
>>
You are sure to have a very long long long enjoyable life, waiting for the ITYS moment which will never come.
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Shouldn't all this be in the other thread?
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Does it really matter where it is?
Life is too short to worry about thread drift.
Pat
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>> Does it really matter where it is?
>>
Not normally no, but there is a thread about that anyway. Plus I know some find it utterly fascinating about who voted which way and why but not everyone is.
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>>
>> I originally voted to join the Common Market,
Pendant Corner.
No, you didn't.
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Ok Duncan you are correct...but only because Sir Edward Heath had signed us up for it a year earlier without asking us first.
Pat
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>> Ok Duncan you are correct...but only because Sir Edward Heath had signed us up for
>> it a year earlier without asking us first.
He did ask. His 1970 manifesto was explicit that he would negotiate entry and there was a free vote in the commons in October 1971.
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So I'm officially politically incorrect.
Pedants 2 Pat 0
I'm off out in the sunshine where the wildlife seems a far more preferable option.
Pat
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>> So I'm officially politically incorrect.
>>
>> Pedants 2 Pat 0
It wan't a dig at you personally but the idea that entering the EEC was an act of deception perpetrated by Heath is one of the myths touted by the leave enthusiasts.
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>> So I'm officially politically incorrect.
Well, I would have said historically incorrect, but I don't want to appear pedantic.
Enjoy the sunshine.
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It's often said and a case can be made that the EU became, and could only have become, what it is by degrees and when required mass deception.
Jean Monnet and a small number of other "founding fathers" usually get the blame for this, for example (Wikipedia)
The following quote is often attributed to Jean Monnet; in fact it is a paraphrase of a characterization of Monnet's intentions by British Conservative Adrian Hilton:
"Europe's nations should be guided towards a super state without their people understanding what is happening. This can be accomplished by successive steps each disguised as having an economic purpose, but which will eventually and irreversibly lead to federation."
Monnet is reported to have expressed somewhat similar sentiments, but without the notion of intentional deception, saying "Via money Europe could become political in five years" and "… the current communities should be completed by a Finance Common Market which would lead us to European economic unity. Only then would … the mutual commitments make it fairly easy to produce the political union which is the goal."
Our politicians who supported successive treaties have all gone along with it more or less, as required, no doubt for a range of reasons - principled belief in political union which they had to keep quiet about, career reasons, coercion, or whatever.
I don't think that is especially surprising, it's just politics, diplomacy, and negotiation in the real world: but it does illustrate how the electorate in a democracy is always more or less manipulated and the less educated they are, the easier it is. And in this context, ever-improving A level statistics have nothing to do with education.
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>>>and the less educated they are, the easier it is. And in this context, ever-improving A level statistics have nothing to do with education.<<<
So true!
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Undoubtedly everyone has/had differing views on what the EU was all about, and it would be inevitable that it would change it's shape and influence as time passed.
So while that theory is genuinely interesting, and may align to the aspirations of some, my feeling is that it is a fairly typical twisting and melding of facts by conspiracy theorists to support a particular outcome.
I would have thought that, were it substantially true, and considered as unpalatable to many as it could be interpreted, some investigative journalist or just a smart Joe Public would have made a bit more of a song and dance about it than an entry in Wikipedia...
I'd agree entirely with your last para though.
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>> I'm off out in the sunshine where the wildlife seems a far more preferable option.
Poor old Pat.
She still hasn't grasped the concept and principle of an internet discussion forum.
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On the other hand of you want to go out in the garden while the sun is shining you should seize the opportunity and let the internet wait.
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No Duncan, you are so wrong with the 'Poor old Pat' routine.
I have a full and busy life away from car4play, and one that I intend to enjoy to the full when I can.
I have a rare Saturday off from work today but to counter that I am at work at 5.30am tomorrow for the rest of the day.
If you think I'm going to waste that valuable time on pedantry you are sorely mistaken.
However, your interminable sarcasm is duly noted.
Pat
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>> No Duncan, you are so wrong with the 'Poor old Pat' routine.
I apologise for the patronising tone of my response.
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Apology accepted and appreciated:)
I think both of us, at times, tend to come over in print entirely different to how we mean to!
Pat
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I have just received a patronising "personalised" letter from Theresa May.
It's disturbing in two ways. It's tone is"vote for me" rather than "vote Conservative" and it mentions Corbyn by name 10 times.
There is NOTHING about what is in the Conservative manifesto. It's all about rubbishing Corbyn and bigging herself up.
If she thinks she can create a cult of personality I think she is mistaken. She is no Iron Lady.
It will also enrage the pedants, who I hope have a high propensity to vote, with ""Labour under Jeremy Corbyn are a shambles..."
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...yup. I mentioned mine in the Brexit thread.
It does make you wonder just whose manifesto it is, though, since the word 'Conservative' seems to have been well and truly airbrushed from much of the campaign. It's not on the battle-bus (which is Treeza's), and I was the recipient today of a 'personal' election communication from herself that (in two sides of banner and close type) didn't contain the word 'Conservative' once, and extorted me to vote for her three times more than it did for my local Conservative candidate.
If it's like mine, you'll be lucky if you can find the name of your Conservative candidate in there (and even more lucky if you can find the word "Conservative" at all - without which, as a piece of electoral communication - I'm not even sure it is legal!)
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I can't find "Conservative", but I don't think it is obligatory to name the party. It should be IMO but when the Electoral Commission made the rules, it probably never occurred to them that anybody would omit it.
Election literature must have an "imprint" and it does - in this case it is promoted by Jeremy Page on behalf of David Gauke, and the printer is named, both with addresses.
Gauke is referred to as "my candidate". Trumpy, almost.
There's a very small code on the back, after the P.S. -
LAB/MILTON KEYNES TEAM 2/nnnnnnnn
nnnnnnnn is different for me and the boss. I wonder if the LAB bit means there are different versions depending who the number two party is in the constituency.
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>> I can't find "Conservative", but I don't think it is obligatory to name the party.
>>
...it would depend very much on how you interpret the requirements for the imprint.....
What must you include?
On printed material such as leaflets and posters, you must include the name and address of:
ï‚· the printer
ï‚· the promoter, and
ï‚· any person on behalf of whom the material is being published (and who is not the promoter)
The promoter is the person who has caused the material to be published.
If the promoter is acting on behalf of a group or organisation, the group or organisation’s name and address must also be included.
(my bold)
..If the literature was clearly in support of the local candidate, there is an argument that the bold bit might not apply (though there is also an argument that it might).
Given the wording of the document in question (which concentrates on Mrs May, not the local candidate) there is a very strong argument that it is on behalf of the Conservative Party as a whole - and that fact features nowhere in the document, let alone the imprint.
Last edited by: tyrednemotional on Mon 22 May 17 at 12:41
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The Conservatives are screwing this up with a terrible campaign. All the slagging off of Corbyn is starting to get him a sympathy following, rather like the abuse the leave side got in the run up to the referendum did for the remains. They should have learned their lesson back then, that if you play the man and not the ball you will get people's backs up and it will cost you.
They have been too complacent and if they don't wise up not only will they lose the chance of a decent majority they could conceivably not get one at all.
Last edited by: Robin O'Reliant on Mon 22 May 17 at 17:40
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I know they are about to back down a bit on the care plan but did they really not think it through. If you live almost anywhere you will have people with homes worth more than £100k. And down south you'll have many people in homes considerably more - like closer to £1m easily. Why should they lose out on giving this an inheritance.
As it stands inheritance tax will be £0 for many!
I'm sure there'd be ways to give away your assets before you're in need of care and then they cannot touch your wealth.
Tories are proving to be pretty stupid in the last few weeks. They might not get that majority like they'd hoped for to negotiate BREXIT. But Labour's manifesto is equally barmy on many counts in my opinion.
It's like Trump vs. Clinton for the UK.
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If you are wealthy & retired - say several £millions or so it can be easy to dispose / shelter ( a trust) assets from Inheritance Tax. Give away over time to children/grandchildren & still have a "rainy day fund" should you need cash for whatever reason.
If you comfortably off - say you own your home outright, have a £few hundred K & a modest pension on top of the State Pension it is not so easy to hand over the cash to kids & grandkids.
You might need the cash to meet unforseen demands & at the same time you do not know how long you will live or if inflation will take off & hit SAY 15% as in the early 90s - CASH DEVALUES TO HALF IT'S VALUE IN UNDER 5 YEARS.
When my own parents retired they had a fairly substantial amount of cash & shares aged 60 However, a combination of high inflation, help with tasks etc & living into their 90s saw the assets fall to a modest amount.
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For motorists & consumers - Tory manifesto 2017 - zippy
