Are the Tories velvet glove fascists?

First topic message reminder :

In my opinion, the UK under our extreme right-wing government is rapidly degenerating into velvet glove fascism.

Like all fascists, Hitler was against trade unions and socialists. Similarly, Michael Gove vilified primary school teachers and dinner ladies, many of whom went on strike for the first time in their lives on 30 November last year, as “militants itching for a fight”. Gove has plans for military cadets in every school (Cameron Youth?) and a return to children sitting in rows reciting lists of kings and queens in history lessons, rather than learning to think. Hitler also realised how important history was to indoctrination when he ordered the mass burning of books. Tories close libraries.

Hitler made sure that he controlled the media. The Tories have cowed the BBC by threats of fragmentation and sharing the licence fee with others, such as Murdoch. The BBC, which was required to be impartial, has become just another mouthpiece for Tory propaganda. As soon as they came to power in 2010, the Tories instructed every minister to repeat over and over again the whopping lie that Labour, not Tory bankers, caused the global credit crisis. We have the repeated lie about everyone in the public sector getting “gold-plated pensions”, when the average is only £5,600 per annum. As Goebbels said: "If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it." Cameron has proved over and over again that he’s a pathological liar.

Hitler divided and ruled the German people by scapegoating Jews and gypsies. The Tories are demonising those who receive benefits, one result of which is that disability hate crimes are increasing. Duncan Smith went on breakfast television on 27 May 2010 and made the chilling remark: "Work makes you free". That's an exact translation of the sign which used to hang over the entrances to concentration camps.

The Tories have plans to force 50,000 disabled youth to work for companies such as Sainsbury's and Tesco's unpaid. Cancer patients are being made to undergo work assessments while being treated with chemotherapy, and wounded soldiers are being sacked. (Osborne is willing to take money from the disabled and cancer patients, but not prepared to veto Hester's bonus from the largely state-owned RBS.)

The police are being trained to shoot people with rubber bullets and will be issued with water cannon, yet the Tories were so keen on helping Arab rebels in North Africa. Two unknown Scottish teenagers made a joke on 'Facebook' about organising riots, and they both received four years in jail. A prominent Tory TV presenter (and personal friend of Cameron) made a tasteless joke about murdering trade unionists on prime time television; nothing was done about it and the BBC continue to pay him £1 million a year of our money.

We don't have any concentration camps in the UK, but the principles are the same - propaganda, indoctrination, and divide and rule by demonising a section of the population. While Hitler gassed Jews, the Tories clearly don't care if benefit claimants starve to death. Even payments from the Social Fund, for those in the most desperate need, will no longer be available from job centres but will be at the 'discretion' of local councils, who will not have to ring-fence the money. All the ingredients of fascism are there, but it's just being handed out to us in a more genteel form than Hitler used - in velvet gloves.

Fascists oppose free speech......

Tosh. They certainly do. Do you remember how Thatcher stopped the BBC from allowing the voice of Gerry Adams to be heard? Or more recently, how there was a news blackout on the passage through Parliament of the bill which in effect privatises the English NHS (not your one)?

How will welfare changes affect the low paid?

Because a lot of low-paid people have been receiving in-work benefits, especially housing benefit and tax credits.

Tosh wrote:

For thousands of people on low incomes who go out each day and work, the welfare changes will hit them hard, infact more working people will suffer because of the reforms than unemployed people.

How will welfare changes affect the low paid ?

It will make the workers angry and not worth there while opening those curtains to get up and go to work that is how I see it Tosh.

Because a lot of low-paid people have been receiving in-work benefits, especially housing benefit and tax credits.

I didn't know low income people received housing benefits ?

I thought the increase in personal allowances negated the effect of WTC freezes/cuts, the only people really affected are not those considered to be low income.

Tosh wrote:

Because a lot of low-paid people have been receiving in-work benefits, especially housing benefit and tax credits.

I didn't know low income people received housing benefits ?

I thought the increase in personal allowances negated the effect of WTC freezes/cuts, the only people really affected are not those considered to be low income.

Some people that work where so low paid they did not pay tax even before the latest rise in personel allowance, so the way this gov't goes on about the people that they have taken out of tax is a "PILE OF SHYTE", if you are low paid there are benefits you claim and part of that is Housing benefit.

I know of lots of people on low incomes who recieve benefits, I refer to working people, there are many thousands of working people who will be hit hard by the bedroom tax, people who are not scivers, not scroungers or lazy, but hard working people who struggle, and who will now struggle even more.

witchfinder wrote:I know of lots of people on low incomes who recieve benefits, I refer to working people, there are many thousands of working people who will be hit hard by the bedroom tax, people who are not scivers, not scroungers or lazy, but hard working people who struggle, and who will now struggle even more.

WF it is something that the Spin doctors in the Tory party have put out to try to justify there cuts on the working man/women, but nothing can justify the nastiness of the ~Tory cuts and I hope that Cameron suffers the same fate as Thatcher.

What is this bedroom tax you speak of and can someone please tell me what housing benefit one receives on a low income ?

Some people that work where so low paid they did not pay tax even before the latest rise in personel allowance, so the way this gov't goes on about the people that they have taken out of tax is a "PILE OF SHYTE", if you are low paid there are benefits you claim and part of that is Housing benefit.

WTC FOR LOW INCOMES HAS BEEN FROZEN NOT CUT AND YOU CANNOT HAVE A FULL TIME JOB AND EARN LESS THAN THE PERSONAL ALLOWANCES.

What housing benefits ?

Please stay on topic.

You can find all you need to know about the bedroom tax here:-
https://cuttingedge2.forumotion.co.uk/t792-will-the-bedroom-tax-be-the-new-poll-tax

Housing benefit is a benefit for people whose incomes are too low to pay their rent, whatever their working status:-
http://touchstoneblog.org.uk/2012/10/telling-the-truth-about-who-gets-housing-benefit/

Tosh wrote:What is this bedroom tax you speak of and can someone please tell me what housing benefit one receives on a low income ?

Let me try an enlighten you Tosh Bedroom Tax is another Poll Tax for Cameron, what it means if you have a spare bedroom in your home they will cut your benefits by £14.00 per week if you have two spare bedroom (family has grown up and moved out) your benefit will be cut by £25.00 per week, if you live in a council house, the problem with this is there is not enough smaller houses within the councils across the UK for people to move into so they do not incur this cut in benefits thanks to Thatcher for selling them in the 80s and not building more to replace them. So the people of the UK are still suffering from the Thatcher years "I AM GLAD THE OLD WITCH IS DEAD"

Okie Dokie,

So only about 20% of people claiming HB are low income workers and some of them may lose money if they do not downsize.

What is wrong with that ?

bobby wrote:"I AM GLAD THE OLD WITCH IS DEAD"
You couldn't be any gladder than me Red. The only thing is I would have liked to watch her croak, or better still to be directly responsible for the Bitches demise.

I INTEND TO HAVE A P**S AND DUMP ON HER GRAVE WHEN I FIND OUT WHERE THEY ARE GOING TO STICK HER AND I THINK IT WILL HAVE TO BE MORE THAN SIX FEET DEEP with the amount of hatred she has from right across the UK even today she is still hated just as much now as she was then.

We need another Thatcher, Cameron is a closet commie.

witchfinder wrote:I know of lots of people on low incomes who recieve benefits, I refer to working people, there are many thousands of working people who will be hit hard by the bedroom tax, people who are not scivers, not scroungers or lazy, but hard working people who struggle, and who will now struggle even more.

The tories are on the side of strivers - so they keep telling us. Perhaps they think people doing mundane, dead-end, low paid jobs aren't striving enough.....but where would we be without the people willing to do those jobs - they are undervalued, and underpaid.

And why do the Tory party keep saying they are 'on the side of strivers'? The inference is that we must choose which side we are on - shouldn't they be governing for the greater good of all instead of encouraging, and creating, opposing gangs in the playground?

The tories are on the side of strivers - so they keep telling us. Perhaps they think people doing mundane, dead-end, low paid jobs aren't striving enough.....but where would we be without the people willing to do those jobs - they are undervalued, and underpaid.

I agree that we should strive and pay all those who strive a wage that enables a reasonable quality of life, I do not undervalue anyone who works.

some of them may lose money if they do not downsize. What is wrong with that?

Tosh. For a start, there probably isn't anywhere to which they can downsize. Now please stop being a troll, Roxanne, and stick to the topic.

sickchip. You have excelled yourself today with your superb posts. I agree with every word of them.

Tosh wrote:

The tories are on the side of strivers - so they keep telling us. Perhaps they think people doing mundane, dead-end, low paid jobs aren't striving enough.....but where would we be without the people willing to do those jobs - they are undervalued, and underpaid.

I agree that we should strive and pay all those who strive a wage that enables a reasonable quality of life, I do not undervalue anyone who works.

Sorry Tosh, but if people don't get paid a 'living wage' - ie: a wage that enables them to live, and pay rent and bills without depending on the state subsidising that wage (hence the employer) via benefit top-ups then they ARE being undervalued and under-rewarded for their labor.

Sorry Tosh, but if people don't get paid a 'living wage' - ie: a wage that enables them to live, and pay rent and bills without depending on the state subsidising that wage (hence the employer) via benefit top-ups than they ARE being undervalued and under-rewarded for their labor.

No argument there, anyone who has a full time job should not need state support to bring up a few kids, but Britain is not an economic island, there lies the rub.

The solution is obvious, the majority must pay more tax to fund the low paid, the majority must fund the lifestyle of the low paid.

Weasel words which fall so readily from Tory lips.

"Lifestyle".
life·style also life-style or life style (lfstl)
n.
A way of life or style of living that reflects the attitudes and values of a person or group: "It was a millionaire's lifestyle on the pocketbook of a hairdresser" (People).
Usage Note: When lifestyle became popular a generation ago, a number of critics objected to it as voguish and superficial, perhaps because it appeared to elevate habits of consumption, dress, and recreation to categories in a system of social classification. Nonetheless, the word has proved durable and useful, if only because such categories do in fact figure importantly in the schemes that Americans commonly invoke when explaining social values and behavior, as in Rachel Brownstein's remark that "an anticonventional lifestyle is no sure sign of feminist politics, or indeed, of any politics at all." Fifty-three percent of the Usage Panel accepts the word in Bohemian attitudes toward conventional society have been outstripped and outdated by the lifestyles of millions of young people. An even greater number, fully 70 percent, accepts the word in Salaries in the Bay Area may be higher, but it may cost employees as much as 30 percent more to maintain their lifestyles, where the context requires a term that implies categorization based on habits of consumption.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/lifestyle

Whatever impels politicians to say that a poor person has chosen to be poor as a Lifestyle?

Three obvious solutions to the problem of wages being inadequate for people to live on:-

1. Raise the minimum wage to a 'living wage' - I suggest £9 an hour. (The Tories will never do that; in fact, they're now talking about freezing or lowering the minimum wage.) If you can't pay a decent wage, you can't afford to employ people.

2. To help offset the costs of number 1, reduce the taxes and business rates for SMEs. That would be a better use of public money than paying benefits.

3. Introduce rent controls, so that housing benefit stops being "a nice little earner" for greedy landlords.

Then watch employment and the tax take increase, while benefit claims fall.

Whatever impels politicians to say that a poor person has chosen to be poor as a Lifestyle?

Never heard any politician say that, got a link ?

There are few if any low paid jobs that are skilled, if one increases their cost then these jobs will be moved off this island where unskilled jobs cost less.

This will create more long term unemployment for the unskilled, this is the reason govts indirectly subsidise the low paid through a tax credit scheme.

You cannot reduce tax for all SME companies, it would be impossible to regulate.

Tosh wrote:What is this bedroom tax you speak of and can someone please tell me what housing benefit one receives on a low income ?

The bedroom tax is a levy or penalty which a person living in social housing must pay if they have a spare bedroom, the Conservatives and their supporters do not like the phrase "bedroom tax" because it sounds so unfair, which of course it is.

As for Housing Benefit, its not simply the unemployed, sick, disabled or pensioners on basic pension who receive it, there are many people on low incomes who also receive it too.

Dont you find it amazing that with the Conservatives, it always seems to be the least well off, the most vulnerable who are hit, the very wealthy get tax cuts, the bankers and big business who avoid billions in tax scams just get away with murder.

Tosh wrote:

Whatever impels politicians to say that a poor person has chosen to be poor as a Lifestyle?

Never heard any politician say that, got a link ?

I don't work here, Tosh. If you want to find a link try Gideon Osborne's tirade against the "benefit claimant" who lost six children in a house fire.

And do try to keep up if you're going to play with the big boys.

Tosh wrote:

Whatever impels politicians to say that a poor person has chosen to be poor as a Lifestyle?

Never heard any politician say that, got a link ?

Cameron said it only yesterday. Here's one of many links:

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=3&cad=rja&sqi=2&ved=0CD8QFjAC&url=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.sky.com%2Fstory%2F1074902&ei=xUBjUZrgAaTS0QXpo4GYCQ&usg=AFQjCNGRi8v8afP0gE8yQxCjoQvT6Y2C1w&sig2=AC4KkScRh9OgP7wb3WzD1w&bvm=bv.44770516,d.d2k

Mr Cameron said the system had "lost its way" and had become a "lifestyle choice for some".

It's a common staple for the Tory front-benchers - hardly a new departure for them.

If you want to find a link try Gideon Osborne's tirade against the "benefit claimant" who lost six children in a house fire

OW....Maybe you and a few others here should read this article and just maybe you will take your head out of your bums for once

George Osborne has a point on Philpott. Labour is dangerously out of sync with public opinion

http://labour-uncut.co.uk/2013/04/08/george-osborne-has-a-point-on-philpott-labour-is-dangerously-out-of-sync-with-public-opinion/#more-16111

Osborne used the Philpott story to class EVERY claimant the same as that Low life murderer of his own flesh and blood with the Cameron came up the rear to back his Incompetent Chancellor.

Do they really do that, do you think?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2QXX8vV9_U

to recite facts and figures a person first has to be able to read and write, not a bad starting place for any freethinker

tlttf. Not only is that remark absurd, but it shows that you haven't got a clue about what was being discussed. Nobody's arguing about the importance of learning to read and write, this was all about history teaching.

For the last forty years, most history teaching has been based around using evidence to learn skills. Gove, and only Gove (as you would see if you had bothered to read the article), wants to take us back to the time when history lessons involved reciting loads of boring facts, such as which medieval king followed which, and the only skill required for that is to open a book or log on to Google. The best historians are not people who can rattle off snippets that might help you win a pub quiz, but people who can analyse sources and extrapolate information from them. Learning by rote turns you into a parrot, not a free thinker.

http://www.newstatesman.com/culture/culture/2013/03/michael-gove%E2%80%99s-history-curriculum-pub-quiz-not-education

Learning by rote lives in the same cupboard as prohibiting the use of calculators.

Altogether now ..... Two twos are four; three twos are six ....
thirteen twos are puzzled silence.

blueturando wrote:

If you want to find a link try Gideon Osborne's tirade against the "benefit claimant" who lost six children in a house fire

OW....Maybe you and a few others here should read this article and just maybe you will take your head out of your bums for once

George Osborne has a point on Philpott. Labour is dangerously out of sync with public opinion

http://labour-uncut.co.uk/2013/04/08/george-osborne-has-a-point-on-philpott-labour-is-dangerously-out-of-sync-with-public-opinion/#more-16111

The very inclusion of the word 'Labour' in the name of the website is grossly misleading. This is a vehicle for Tory misinformation - nowt more, nowt less.

Tosh wrote:Okie Dokie,

So only about 20% of people claiming HB are low income workers and some of them may lose money if they do not downsize.

What is wrong with that ?

There is not enough smaller houses for them to EFFING move too tosh, that is WT F is wrong with it.

Didn't Labour introduce this policy for private rentals, whether that person/family were low earners or not?....Just asking?

You may find that was two other people on a planet far, far away, blue.
Well it's certainly vague enough.

blueturando wrote:Didn't Labour introduce this policy for private rentals, whether that person/family were low earners or not?....Just asking?

Blue I lived in London in 1963 because that is where the work was HALF my weekly wage went to a private landlord for a pokey bedsit with shared kitchen & toilet & bath, and as time went on the private rents went up and up, but still had the same amount of space. If your trying to blame the Labour party fro the private sector DO NOT BOTHER we all know that is the Tory party favourite sector, going back to 79 to 96 they privatized gas electric phone and railways, and still today they are trying to privatize OUR NHS selling everything off and the best is "Its not there's to Sell" it belongs to the entire UK. DING DONG

Mussolini said that fascism was the merger of state and corporate power. I’m not even sure about the ‘velvet gloves’ in the UK any more.

Corporate power has turned Britain into a corrupt state

Extracts from an article by Seumas Milne:-

“If you're under attack, create a diversion. Cameron and Clegg promised to deal with parliamentary influence-peddling, yet did nothing about it. So they came up with a plan: to crack down on trade unions. Wrapped in a panic bill to set up a register of lobbyists are to be powers to police union membership lists and cut union spending in election campaigns. The first will make what is already the almost impossible task of holding a legally watertight strike ballot still harder. The second is a direct attack on Labour funding.

The contemptuous class cynicism of the coalition leaders' response takes some beating. Not only are unions the most accountable and only democratic part of the political funding system; but by including anti-union clauses in the new bill, Cameron and Clegg want to ensure Labour's opposition – all the better to change the subject and wrongfoot the opposition in the process. Even Tory MPs were embarrassed at the crude chicanery of it. Just as absurd is the fact that the register would have done nothing to prevent the latest lobbying scams.

Cameron's own election adviser, Lynton Crosby, is a lobbyist – for tobacco, alcohol, oil and gas companies. Which is why Cameron came under attack for dropping curbs on cigarette packaging and alcohol pricing. His party treasurer Peter Cruddas resigned after offering access to Cameron for a £250,000 party donation. His defence secretary, Liam Fox, resigned over his relationship with the lobbyist Adam Werritty. More than ever the Tory Party is in thrall to the City, with over half its income from bankers and hedge fund and private equity financiers.”

Unlike one of our Tory friends, I won’t tell you to “read more”, but there is more here for anyone who wishes to read it:-
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/04/corporate-britain-corrupt-lobbying-revolving-door

For example, David Hartnett, who was head of tax at HM Revenue and Customs until last year, and the man who allowed Starbucks and Vodafone to avoid paying billions in tax, now works for the giant City accountancy firm Deloitte, which works for….Vodafone.

P.S. A link to a source is an acknowledgement that the source has been used. It is not the same as an advert, such as one telling you to follow a newspaper on Facebook or Twitter. But then you ALL know that don’t you? Regrettably, at least one bloody-minded individual thinks he can muddy the waters by suggesting otherwise.

So a mistake was made, not an advert added, did anybody read the link though, regarding Labour allowing donations to be made in a way that circumvented the tax system. Good game if you can afford the entrance fee.

Ivan, once you accept that all 3 major parties are systematically fleecing the electorate and begin to promote individual mp's rather than follow the party b*llocks the better you'll feel about yourself. It must be hard being a socialist without a genuine choice in opposition.

tlttf. You copy/pasted an advert for the umpteenth time, despite previous warnings. That is “adding” an advert to this forum, however you care to try and twist it. Maybe it’s time you started learning from your “mistakes”.

You say you get bored, well so do some of us. It’s utterly predictable that whenever ‘The Daily Mail’ tries to make a mountain out of a molehill, you’ll be here at 6am trying to ram the grubby little snippet down our throats. As to your comments about “the three main parties”, if you’re going to try and tell us that UKIP - with Farage trying to get into bed with Murdoch, and with racists being exposed almost daily (strange that you never rush to tell us about those) – is the best thing since sliced bread, don’t bother. I’ve encountered enough UKIP boneheads on Twitter to get the ‘feel’ of that nasty, squalid party.

Returning to Mr Mills’ gift of shares to the Labour Party. A spokesman for the Electoral Commission said it was unique among major political parties and had not broken any rules. He said: “The Labour Party did contact the Electoral Commission prior to accepting the donation and we advised them that they could accept the donation subject to carrying out the necessary permissibility checks on the individual.”

Try again.

Poor Ivan, I've never said it illegal, they've simply circumnavigated the tax system exactly as all the major companies do, I've yet to here you defend them for doing what a major (small m) political party does.