Mintball wrote:And as if by magic, here's a commentary showing yet more of just those sort of lies, right today. The very, very, sad thing about this is that despite Murdoch presiding over one of the biggest scandals ever he's still considered a fit and proper person to own newspapers.

Mintball wrote:And as if by magic, here's a commentary showing yet more of just those sort of lies, right today. The very, very, sad thing about this is that despite Murdoch presiding over one of the biggest scandals ever he's still considered a fit and proper person to own newspapers.

Not quite the right thread, I know. We have talked about Labour and its leader's lack of direction and conviction. I thought this cartoon from Steve Bell in The Guardian the other day was brilliant and sums things up perfectly, with apologies to the Edinburgh Zoo panda breeding attempt: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... iant-panda

Not quite the right thread, I know. We have talked about Labour and its leader's lack of direction and conviction. I thought this cartoon from Steve Bell in The Guardian the other day was brilliant and sums things up perfectly, with apologies to the Edinburgh Zoo panda breeding attempt: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... iant-panda

Mintball wrote:In more news, Osborne expresses shock that lots of very wealthy people aren't paying much tax at all. Now, is he naive – or does he really think he can con us? How naive of you. Most of these people have mitigated their tax by way of charitable relief. Whilst there has been some abuse of charitable relief it would seem in the higher profile cases the relief has probably been obtained by virtue of genuiune charitable giving. In other words, these 'greedy' people have given 90+% of their income to charity and not just 50% to the Treasury to be squandered. Osborne now seems to want to steal from the sick, disabled, poor to give it to the employees in the public sector. Now that is sick.

Mintball wrote:In more news, Osborne expresses shock that lots of very wealthy people aren't paying much tax at all. Now, is he naive – or does he really think he can con us? How naive of you. Most of these people have mitigated their tax by way of charitable relief. Whilst there has been some abuse of charitable relief it would seem in the higher profile cases the relief has probably been obtained by virtue of genuiune charitable giving. In other words, these 'greedy' people have given 90+% of their income to charity and not just 50% to the Treasury to be squandered. Osborne now seems to want to steal from the sick, disabled, poor to give it to the employees in the public sector. Now that is sick.

Not sure about sick, but certainly wrong. Public sector workers have had a three year pay freeze and are now making higher pension contributions. So unless he's doing it secretly, under the counter and on the condition that public sector workers say nothing and continue to protest about their conditions, it ain't happening.

Your obsession with the public sector continues to spoil any valid points you might have.

That is EXACTLY what this proposed measure will do. It's about taking from charities and putting a lesser sum of money in the general tax take. The vast majority of public money gets spent on salaries / employee benefits - whether teachers, soldiers, doctors, nurses, beaurocrats. Again, it shows a government without any coherent philosophy.

I am sick of them fecking nurses and soldiers. I seen em riding around in their big cars, flashing their money about. It makes me sick

You're missing the point. Most charities are aimed at helping the most disadvanted. By taking from them the government is redistributing income to income earning employees. It is another example of taking from the poor and giving to the (relatively) rich.

its not though is it. Because most government work is done to benefit 'the disadvantaged'. Its taking from one group of disadvantaged people who have been declared worthy of support by some fatcat and giving it to another group of disadvantaged people declared worth of support by the government (which has, unfortunately, been run by fatcats for pretty much my lifetime).

I find it difficult to see what better this money could be doing that paying teachers and nurses, and though i think we can rein back defence spending massively the issue there is with arms companies, not boots on the ground

God forbid that teachers doctors and soldiers should get any more pay

And just out of interest, the current Home Office annual report, for example, shows staff costs in the year 2010/11 as about 10% of the total annual budget, with the remaining 90% going on programme costs.

No - because a much larger part will be 'wasted' by going through the tax sysyem - costs of collection, inefficient allocation, larger salaries in administering the things it gets spent on, the fact that most spending goes on employees not beneficiaries, etc.