Today I'm angry about.....

[thebish]

the sale of RBS shares at a £1billion loss to the taxpayer, explained as 'because its the right thing to do' or as one financial bod said selling £10 notes for £8.

All sanctioned by a bloke who took no end of delight goading Brown about the gold sell off

So who lost more - Brown or Osbourne?

intersting response... kinda implies that it is OK for osbourne to burn money as long as it just falls short of what you think labour burned??

go on - try your best - it IS possible to vote Tory and just once - maybe twice if you dare! - criticise them!

[Bruce Rioja]

Brown fell foul of the market and lots of hindsight expert opinion

Ah right. Good job that he wasn't the Chancellor of the Exchequer at the time. Otherwise he might have been expected to have had a reasonable grasp of things like current market conditions!

[Bruce Rioja]

the sale of RBS shares at a £1billion loss to the taxpayer, explained as 'because its the right thing to do' or as one financial bod said selling £10 notes for £8.

All sanctioned by a bloke who took no end of delight goading Brown about the gold sell off

So who lost more - Brown or Osbourne?

intersting response... kinda implies that it is OK for osbourne to burn money as long as it just falls short of what you think labour burned??

go on - try your best - it IS possible to vote Tory and just once - maybe twice if you dare! - criticise them!

Seriously, Bish, political persuasions aside, I do think that Osborne's exercising damage limitation from a situation that wasn't of his making. Can the same be said of Brown flogging our gold off at the bottom of the market?

Go on - try your best - it IS possible to vote Labour and just once - maybe twice if you dare! - criticise them!

[Worthy4England]

the sale of RBS shares at a £1billion loss to the taxpayer, explained as 'because its the right thing to do' or as one financial bod said selling £10 notes for £8.

All sanctioned by a bloke who took no end of delight goading Brown about the gold sell off

So who lost more - Brown or Osbourne?

intersting response... kinda implies that it is OK for osbourne to burn money as long as it just falls short of what you think labour burned??

go on - try your best - it IS possible to vote Tory and just once - maybe twice if you dare! - criticise them!

Seriously, Bish, political persuasions aside, I do think that Osborne's exercising damage limitation from a situation that wasn't of his making. Can the same be said of Brown flogging our gold off at the bottom of the market?

Go on - try your best - it IS possible to vote Labour and just once - maybe twice if you dare! - criticise them!

Strangely enough, yes the same can be said for a number of reasons.

The gold selloff was partly to derisk our Forex reserves against a single commodity with high variability, and (allegedly) help bail out a couple of banks who were short of gold reserves...

Neither a situation in 1999 of Brown's own making...

[Abdoulaye's Twin]

Seriously, Bish, political persuasions aside, I do think that Osborne's exercising damage limitation from a situation that wasn't of his making.

He could have sold any time in the last 12 months at a higher price, so I'm not sure his mouthing off about Brown in Parliament prior to the election about selling gold off lets him off a bit of stick here. That said, Politicians of all colours seem a bit shit at buying and selling stuff.

I also note that the hedge funds that fund the Tories were the main purchasers and the timing of the sale was when the big institutional fund managers tend to be on hollibobs. According to my missus who works in the industry, it is about the worst time to sell 'em - that's coming from a confirmed Tory voter too!

[StaffsTrotter]

Seriously, Bish, political persuasions aside, I do think that Osborne's exercising damage limitation from a situation that wasn't of his making.

He could have sold any time in the last 12 months at a higher price, so I'm not sure his mouthing off about Brown in Parliament prior to the election about selling gold off lets him off a bit of stick here. That said, Politicians of all colours seem a bit shit at buying and selling stuff.

I also note that the hedge funds that fund the Tories were the main purchasers and the timing of the sale was when the big institutional fund managers tend to be on hollibobs. According to my missus who works in the industry, it is about the worst time to sell 'em - that's coming from a confirmed Tory voter too!

+1

[thebish]

the sale of RBS shares at a £1billion loss to the taxpayer, explained as 'because its the right thing to do' or as one financial bod said selling £10 notes for £8.

All sanctioned by a bloke who took no end of delight goading Brown about the gold sell off

So who lost more - Brown or Osbourne?

intersting response... kinda implies that it is OK for osbourne to burn money as long as it just falls short of what you think labour burned??

go on - try your best - it IS possible to vote Tory and just once - maybe twice if you dare! - criticise them!

Seriously, Bish, political persuasions aside, I do think that Osborne's exercising damage limitation from a situation that wasn't of his making. Can the same be said of Brown flogging our gold off at the bottom of the market?

Go on - try your best - it IS possible to vote Labour and just once - maybe twice if you dare! - criticise them!

I see you still can't quite do it!!

as you well know from reading the politics thread, I don't shirk from criticising labour and labour politicians! yeah - on balance - Brown got that one wrong, at least politically..

I don't know if you are bothered by what actually happened with the gold and whether it was ACTUALLY the huge financial BOOB costing us the $9billion that the tories would have you believe the country lost out on? (I hope you haven't simply swallowed that tabloid narrative uncritically?) If so - then there's plenty to say to set that decision in context and paint it in a very different light - which I will happily say if you are interested and it is not simply a yah-boo attack on Brown to cover up a question about Osborne on a football forum!

[Montreal Wanderer]

Friends of Cecil are upping the ante.

[Prufrock]

[TANGODANCER]

[Hoboh]

I just wish!
There's plenty other things we should be hunting in parts of Africa, not poor animals.

[TANGODANCER]

There's plenty other things we should be hunting in parts of Africa, not poor animals.

The real animals are the ones behind the triggers.

[Bruce Rioja]

[Hoboh]

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015 ... stone-exit" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I suppose it was inevitable at some point!
Time for the Ghurkhas to guard the French side we seem to be responsible for, let that bunch of illegals try to take the piss out of them.

[Hoboh]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/a ... grant-camp" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Now that really takes the biscuit!
I hope ALL public funding via the licence fee is withdrawn from the BBC, bastards encouraging illegals.

[Bijou Bob]

Feck me Hoboh, how does holding a service of worship 'encourage' them??! As the majority in the 'camp' are allegedly from the Islamic faith, that could well prove interesting.

[Hoboh]

Feck me Hoboh, how does holding a service of worship 'encourage' them??! As the majority in the 'camp' are allegedly from the Islamic faith, that could well prove interesting.

Just what the hell do they think they are playing at?
The only thing 'British' these people should see are fully armed Parra's if they try to sneak into the UK, not someone whose dropped balls make him a total irrelevance and a host of God botherers!

[Prufrock]

Cor, makes you proud to be British doesn't it?

What happened to this country to make people so *hateful* towards these people? A pragmatic "well there's just no room" whilst IMO misguided is understandable, but genuine hatred for people trying to get a better life ?

[bobo the clown]

Cor, makes you proud to be British doesn't it?

What happened to this country to make people so *hateful* towards these people? A pragmatic "well there's just no room" whilst IMO misguided is understandable, but genuine hatred for people trying to get a better life ?

I'd take more issue with the BBC execs basically mooning at its audience tbh. It has to be said it's deliberately provocative.

[thebish]

Cor, makes you proud to be British doesn't it?

What happened to this country to make people so *hateful* towards these people? A pragmatic "well there's just no room" whilst IMO misguided is understandable, but genuine hatred for people trying to get a better life ?

I'd take more issue with the BBC execs basically mooning at its audience tbh. It has to be said it's deliberately provocative.

not being one of the regular audience for Songs of Praise (nauseous programme), I can't really say - but I do know people who watch it - and I doubt they would see it as the BBC execs mooning at them or see it as particularly provocative - my guess is that they will see it as an interesting insight into stuff that we don't normally hear about, that's all... I may be wrong, though... you sound a lot more sure of your opinion... (do you watch SoP?)