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How Tony Blair Inc spent £57 million in four years Pretty remarkable for someone who tells us his total accumulated wealth is only £10M. Well... I suppose it's just that socialism has come an awful long way since Clement Attlee. Tony probably needed to form a lawn-edging consultancy subsidiary to get his trimmed. But, we must remember that Tone didn't get that lucrative non-job in Brussels he'd set his heart on because the nasty British voters send a whole bunch of Fruitcakes, Loonies And Closet Racists to rock the Euro gravy train. So... really... he does need to earn a few extra bob on the side. And, his office assures us:- Technically true, but how much is he sheltering in this unfathomable web of companies that the UK tax man doesn't even get to know about? And just how much are we paying for this squad of Metropolitan Police close protection officers that jet around the world with him? The arrangement for protecting ex-PMs never envisioned that ex-PMs would be running multiple highly lucrative businesses after office, or exposing themselves to risk here there and everywhere. I do hope that we aren't paying those £5000 a night hotel bills for them too. We really should be told!

Tony.....

Malcolm didn't get that kettle & pot thing........................................ It goes to show how stupid people are that vote for a party to represent you in Europe that don't want to be init.................................................Really Tonyp?

Tomtom, 'We' are the Bedlington Community tomtom. You know the ones that like to moan and complain about everything but stop abruptly when asked to actually do something............................................. If everyone that moaned about Bedlington not having a sports centre laid one brick we would have one built in no time. ......................... 'We' are the people that need to understand nothing is laid on for us anymore we have to make things happen ourselves; nobody is going to do us any favours 'we' have to do them for ourselves! ................................ This community has enough and always had enough latent talent to make the difference but somehow lacks the determination or foresight or imagination to see it through. I could offer my own reasons why it's come to this but that's politics and seemingly a switch off!

There's still bad youth unemployment, so why ignore that and focus on zero hour contracts - people who are at least on the first step of the employment ladder? OK, so it makes a good doctrinaire political point, but back in the real world where compromises are generally required... Is it a coincidence that youth unemployment now just about matches the number of jobs being filled by immigrants from the EU? A high proportion of the EU'ers earnings is spirited out of the country straight away, and completely lost to the economy, whist every quid of UB has to be funded by the UK tax payer. The EU'ers earnings have to be offset by export earnings in ever-more-competitive (and now deflationary) international markets. The immigrant rate is accelerating, and there's nothing Gov-UK can do about it but pray that the EU won't go completely down the plughole. Another politico's social engineering experiment going rapidly TU!

What sort of deal do you think the Tories will offer the broker??? They won't, they'll be in no position to dictate terms because Ukip simply isn't going to keep a Tory government in power unconditionally like the Lib Dems have. There may be a "supply and confidence" deal providing we get a referendum on the EU straight away, and not after Cameron has had time to stack the deck. Getting this country back on its feet implies giving the requisite two years notice to the EU, and the sooner that happens the better. Once our notice is in then whoever is tasked with negotiating will have a much stronger hand - it's quite likely we'll be offered associate membership on very favourable terms. All the trade, without any of the political crap. Where do you think the money has come from for this turnaround in the countries fortunes. Not everything is about handouts or robbing Peter to pay Paul. In fact we are much deeper in debt that when Brown left office. What the politicos are talking about is the rate at which the debt is increasing. They are not very keen to explain this though, so they refer to the rate of increase as the deficit, not the actual debt itself. Yes, none of us could get that past our bank manager for one second, but (with very few exceptions) all governments are heavily borrowed - mainly because they can, and because it's a very easy way to buy votes. There is no additional money, just a bit more confidence in the minds of those we borrow from that somehow we'll be able to repay when the crunch comes. That increase in confidence means we are borrowing at record low rates, and far less than most other countries. Not having to pay so much interest means we can service the debt and less taxpayers money needs to be channelled in that direction. Overseas investors are happier to hold pounds and not swap them for something more risky, so the value of Sterling goes up. The way to blow the whole thing, and to go back into crisis, is to start spending like there is no tomorrow once again. Balls knows all this and with typical duplicity is telling the markets that he's going to be very responsible, and in fact might have to cut back spending more than the Tories. But, he's trying to give the opposite impression to the electorate. If you analyse his LPC speech he's actually proposing bigger NHS cuts than the Tories, but the idiots at conference (those who weren't actually asleep) were applauding this. If you doubt this I can point you at an apolitical analysis of his proposals. Mostly from the welfare cuts & I don't mean the dole,it's come from the selling of our assets this time the royal Mail cutting back on the national health,education the list goes on if they get in next time God knows what will happen more zero hour contracts it could get even worse..everybody tries to blame the last government but it was a worldwide meltdown. Hmm.. as I said there is no new money. Remember that it was Labour who introduced the private sector into the NHS. In principal some of it made sense, but they completely botched PFI and landed the NHS with huge debts that it now has to pay out of current income - money that should have been available for treating patients. Once again I can go into detail if you doubt this. Woah, we are back to Gordo's "it's a global problem"! That's far too simplistic. Yes, there was a global turn-down (there's an argument that it started right here with the stupidity at Northern Rock). But, Gordo brainwashed himself into the idea that the good times were bad times, and that everything would come right in the end. Economists were telling him for years that he'd misread the economic cycle, and that he shouldn't be spending on the assumption that revenues would increase to cover it. We'd settled into a fairly regular 11 year economic cycle, but Gordo kept repeatedly adding a year to the official forecasts. He simply wouldn't accept that he'd completely misread the charts. He lectured in economics at a crappy polytechnic, and arrogantly thought that he knew better than hundreds of top-flight economists who constantly analysed all the figures on banks of computers. It was the classic Nick Leeson story: a guy who'd made the wrong call, and, rather than come clean at an early stage to limit the damage, sailed on with the hope that it would all come right on the next move - and so completely bust the bank! In part he caused that global problem! A decent chancellor should have been comparing notes with others, and counselling caution, not junketing around the world boasting that he'd "ended boom and bust"! An easyway to stop people from the rest of Europe coming here is to make the minimum wage the same in all eu countries,that would stop loads thinking of coming here..some countries pay £2.50 ph we pay £6.55ph but both of these amounts are s***...If we come out of the Eu what sort of prouduct can England of the rest of the world & who could we trade with....Malcolm didn't get that kettle & pot thing.. You going to nip over to Romania or Greece or... and tell the PM that they should hike their minimum wage three or four times Tony? They'll say that's brilliant, please leave your cheque for a squillion of your Breetish pounds on the table as you leave to pay for this. The Euro's too dodgy as we are figuring out how best to hit the Germans in the pocket when we abandon it one Friday night after foreign bankers have left for their luxury villas. No one told us that the Germans would be running our country and telling us what to do, and - as our parents told us - you magnificent Breetish don't do that! Ah, the our economy depends on the EU argument! No it bloomin' doesn't! Our little island didn't get to be the most successful trading nation on the planet by shelling out a significant proportion of our GDP to Europe. The EU accounts for an ever-decreasing portion of our exports, and we buy significantly more from them than they buy from us. Did you notice an increase in trade or in jobs when we joined? But, here's the really interesting bit that LibLabCon won't tell you (or they will once the British people have presented them with a firm Brexit instruction): the EU treaties require the EU to negotiate trade agreements on favourable terms with any member who gives the requisite to years notice of leaving. As they have more to lose from a lousy deal than we have, it's near certain that trade-wise things will continue pretty much as they did before. But, we will be freed from the crippling and continuing demands for more money to prop up the failing EU, and we will be free to negotiate trade agreements outside the EU on any terms that suit us. Economists who have looked at this dispassionately and worst-case (certainly not the EU funded LSE!) calculate that we will take a small hit in the first year; so small that it likely will go unnoticed. But, from the second year onward we'll be boosting our trade worldwide as we get our act together. From then on the sky's the limit for an independent UK, and your union buddies can start demanding more money!