The Politics Thread

[thebish]

meanwhile...

The justice secretary, Michael Gove, has scrapped the controversial mandatory criminal courts charge after more than 100 magistrates resigned in protest.
The abrupt U-turn ditches a money-raising scheme introduced by the previous justice secretary, Chris Grayling, that only came into force in April this year.
The announcement was made by Gove in an address to the annual meeting of the Magistrates Association in central London.
He explained that every time he spoke to any magistrate they warned him about its negagtive impact on the adminstration of justice.
Critics warned that the charge – ranging from £150 up to £1,200 – was unlikely to be collected and created a perverse incentive for the innocent to plead guilty.

it's a shame that so many magistrates had to resign before the govt. thought this through properly...

[Worthy4England]

meanwhile...

The justice secretary, Michael Gove, has scrapped the controversial mandatory criminal courts charge after more than 100 magistrates resigned in protest.
The abrupt U-turn ditches a money-raising scheme introduced by the previous justice secretary, Chris Grayling, that only came into force in April this year.
The announcement was made by Gove in an address to the annual meeting of the Magistrates Association in central London.
He explained that every time he spoke to any magistrate they warned him about its negagtive impact on the adminstration of justice.
Critics warned that the charge – ranging from £150 up to £1,200 – was unlikely to be collected and created a perverse incentive for the innocent to plead guilty.

it's a shame that so many magistrates had to resign before the govt. thought this through properly...

To be fair, most Magistrates I've come across are fcukwits anyhow, so we're unlikely to miss 'em.

[thebish]

that'd be "fcukwits, your worship" to you matey!

[Worthy4England]

that'd be "fcukwits, your worship" to you matey!

Just add Contempt to the charges...

[thebish]

that'd be "fcukwits, your worship" to you matey!

Just add Contempt to the charges...

[Worthy4England]

I attended before one Mrs Sybil Mort once. She didn't understand how her name could possible be funny - humourless old boot.

[Enoch]

I attended before one Mrs Sybil Mort once. She didn't understand how her name could possible be funny - humourless old boot.

I don't find it in the least amusing!

[Worthy4England]

I attended before one Mrs Sybil Mort once. She didn't understand how her name could possible be funny - humourless old boot.

I don't find it in the least amusing!

Don't tell me you're Enoch Mort...

Hoboh would have had me deported as it is.

[Enoch]

I attended before one Mrs Sybil Mort once. She didn't understand how her name could possible be funny - humourless old boot.

I don't find it in the least amusing!

Don't tell me you're Enoch Mort...

Hoboh would have had me deported as it is.

See, now that's funny.

[thebish]

How can Labour possibly not win the Oldham by-election by a huge majority? Corbyn has re-engaged a tidal wave of disenfranchised lefties and is leading a brave new political revolution?

Who was the guy on here who kept arguing that? I forget....

I think you must have swallowed the anti-corbyn media narrative a teeny bit hooklineandsinker... that narrative: "in Jeremy Corbyn's first real test as leader, Labour would at best scrape home, and more likely lose to a resurgent UKIP because of Jeremy's unpalatable views in traditional Labour heartlands."


what ACTUALLY happened is that labour romped home increasing their already-massive share of the vote by 7.5% - now up to 62.2%.


Jim McMahon (Labour) - 17,209 (62.11%)
John Bickley (UKIP) - 6,487 (23.41%)
James Daly (Conservative) - 2,596 (9.37%)
Jane Brophy (Liberal Democrat) - 1,024 (3.70%)
Simeon Hart (Green Party) - 249 (0.90%)
Sir Oink A-Lot (Monster Raving Loony) - 141 (0.51%)

[Bruce Rioja]

Maybe it was just that my timings (bedroom/bathroom/car) clashed here but this morning, despite a huge Labour victory, the only person that I heard and saw being interviewed was Farridge (talking absolute shite). How so?

[Worthy4England]

Maybe it was just that my timings (bedroom/bathroom/car) clashed here but this morning, despite a huge Labour victory, the only person that I heard and saw being interviewed was Farridge (talking absolute shite). How so?

He's complaining the postal vote was rigged - which in context of a pretty safe Labour seat is a pretty serious allegation...

The nub of it appears to be that Labour run the Council, therefore control the council housing and have strong ties with mosques and other churches (who'd have thought that about a council?)...so "It means that in some of these seats where people don't speak English but they are signed up for postal votes effectively the electoral process is now dead"

I guess the implication is that someone else filled in the postal votes.

[thebish]

^ it seems like an impeccably built logical case with the obvious conclusion that UKIP were ROBBED by immigrants.

[Athers]

UKIP went from 20.6% to 23.4%, doens't seem particularly fishy to me.

Jim McMahon future frontbencher when the centrists take back the party..

[Worthy4England]

I think the fishy bit is that there were 7000 postal votes out of 27000. That does look on the high side, compared to the General Election where the postal vote was around 15.3%...

Edit: That stat might be relating to 2010 General Election....

[Athers]

Could it be explained by timing? A wet windy December night vs general election in May

[thebish]

faridge says he has an "impeccable source" claiming widespread corruption - yet has made no official complaint - preferring to spend his time spouting off vague allegations to the press.

put up - or shut up. of you have an impeccable source and evidence - then go to the police or at least the returning officer, who - in turn - would go to the police.

even if every single one of the 7000 postal votes were fraudulently attributed to labour - and were all wiped off - labour would still have won this by-election by a comfortable margin of about 4000 votes


(the returning officer tells us that every single postal vote was checked to see if DoB and signature matched the registration form. any that didn't were rejected.)

[Hoboh]

Meanwhile, the Corbyn Trotsky trolls prepared their Facebook/twitter campaign to deselect a potentially good centrist MP if he is found not to be able to quote Marx or Mao.

[thebish]

Meanwhile, the Corbyn Trotsky trolls prepared their Facebook/twitter campaign to deselect a potentially good centrist MP if he is found not to be able to quote Marx or Mao.

what on earth are you talking about?

[Worthy4England]

It's a bit strange. I can't turn up any stats around what the postal vote % were last time around and there does appear to be large differences across constituencies - the largest postal vote %ages seem to be up in the North East when they can get up towards 40-45%. Other Constituencies are in low single digits.

The broad contention from Farage seems to be entire families who can't speak English are getting support from somewhere to do all the applications for postal votes - which isn't illegal etc. then help filling the ballot paper in - which I'm sure gets more murky.