1.Socialist Labour governments have done nowt for us in the past.

2. I don't regard Labour as socialist.

You are joking Snowy , aren't you ? a lot of us are surviving on what the Labour Government of Attlee and Bevan did for us after the war, nationalisation , NHS, welfare state etc

Labour haven't been Socialist probably since then, certainly since the mid 60s, but Corbyn is taking us down that route, for the best I say.

That is why Education is the spine of a decent society. The standard of basic education in comparison to countries like Norway, Canada , Holland, Germany is shi*e , but then those countries don't have the opportunity to bomb Syria.

Not sure what you mean by ordinary people. I would suggest most of us on here are ordinary people.

Most on here have the ability to understand bsaic logic. But some are refusing to accept reality.

I agree entirely with Horden on this thread, yet it makes perfect sense to me why HS2 is happening and why it would never go through hartlepool, nor why any big business would re-locate here.

Its also creating 1000's of jobs over the next years, which will mostly be working class jobs, yet in the main people are against it.

We dont need hinkley point either but that is creating tens of thosands of jobs. Again mostly working class jobs. Again forgotten about by the coially conscious.

What is wrong is the profiteering. And that sadly goes unchecked. The workers will be well paid, but the excessive costs is down to greed of the firms involved.

I wouldn't have expected HS2 to come through hartlepool but somewhere north of York would have spread the benefit. Say the same route as virgin, Newcastle, Durham or Darlington

It is going to York, and I expect it to be extended to Glasgow and Edinburgh, probbaly via Newcastle.

You've just proven my point, they really haven't been socialist for over 50 years, that's roughly our lifetimes.
They call themselves socialists, but most MP's prior to Corbyns election were and still are middle class graduates who purport to understand the worker but have no idea what the working person has to contend with.
Corbyn himself says the right things, but.......?
The Labour Party has been out of touch with its roots for years and pays lip service to socialism. Maybe I hold a more fundamental interpretation of what socialism really is.

Not sure why being a graduate is associated with not being socialist.

I think you will fnd the vast majority of university students these days are very much socialst.

Never mind HS2, wait until Northern start their direct service from Middlesbrough to Newcastle via the Stillington line. Where does that leave Hartlepool?.......and when Virgin start their Middlesbrough - London service, Grand Central will struggle.

You are joking Snowy , aren't you ? a lot of us are surviving on what the Labour Government of Attlee and Bevan did for us after the war, nationalisation , NHS, welfare state etc

Labour haven't been Socialist probably since then, certainly since the mid 60s, but Corbyn is taking us down that route, for the best I say.[/quote]
You've just proven my point, they really haven't been socialist for over 50 years, that's roughly our lifetimes.
They call themselves socialists, but most MP's prior to Corbyns election were and still are middle class graduates who purport to understand the worker but have no idea what the working person has to contend with.
Corbyn himself says the right things, but.......?
The Labour Party has been out of touch with its roots for years and pays lip service to socialism. Maybe I hold a more fundamental interpretation of what socialism really is.[/quote]

But as I said, Socialist or not, most people are still living off the backs of those policies dreamt up by post war Socialism

You've just proven my point, they really haven't been socialist for over 50 years, that's roughly our lifetimes.
They call themselves socialists, but most MP's prior to Corbyns election were and still are middle class graduates who purport to understand the worker but have no idea what the working person has to contend with.
Corbyn himself says the right things, but.......?
The Labour Party has been out of touch with its roots for years and pays lip service to socialism. Maybe I hold a more fundamental interpretation of what socialism really is.[/quote]

But as I said, Socialist or not, most people are still living off the backs of those policies dreamt up by post war Socialism[/quote]
That was then, this is now. There's lots of other things they should have done since then but didn't.
Labour aren't socialist enough. But if you're happy with it......!

Depends what you define a socialist as? Theorising about it and experiencing it are two utterly different concepts.

Eh?

Are you mixing being a socialist with experiencing poverty?

Do you have to suffer one to be able to be the other?

And I think you seriously misunderstand the younger generation.

The NHS and welfare state are more relevant than ever. It's a travesty that we have got to this point before people are waking up to what has been going on.

The sad fact about politics at the moment , is that the working class have split into at least 2 groups. As a Socialist I used to think I represented the whole of the working class, but a lot of the working class who are doing well , don't believe in Socialism anymore, why ? because they feel they don't need it anymore, BIG MISTAKE ! as they will surely find out shortly. So who does the Socialist represent ? well probably what is now known as the underclass, generally those that are unemployed, sick, disabled, vulnerable, criminals etc. Ironically a great chunk of these people don't believe in Socialism either, a lot of them don't even know what it is and certainly couldn't spell the word. A lot of these UKIP types would lynch a Socialist as soon as look at them. Turning on the very people who could improve their lives.

This is what a race to the bottom begins to look like, but we are nowhere near the bottom yet, things will get a lot worse , if people don't wake up . Do we really want to end up with a society like Brazil ? where one half live in gated communities , with guard dogs and electric fences around their homes, to keep out the other half , who are living hand to mouth.

You've just proven my point, they really haven't been socialist for over 50 years, that's roughly our lifetimes.
They call themselves socialists, but most MP's prior to Corbyns election were and still are middle class graduates who purport to understand the worker but have no idea what the working person has to contend with.
Corbyn himself says the right things, but.......?
The Labour Party has been out of touch with its roots for years and pays lip service to socialism. Maybe I hold a more fundamental interpretation of what socialism really is.[/quote]

But as I said, Socialist or not, most people are still living off the backs of those policies dreamt up by post war Socialism[/quote]
you,ve got it right there horden. over the last 20 years you had a choice of right wing tories or left wing tories. with the introduction of corbyn at least the party is being more socialist as we know it. problem is a good number of labour politicians are having to be dragged into supporting him. if they all got behind him that would really p off the tory press as they jump on every disagreement with fervour. even maggie showed the wets for what they were. quicker they all get behind corbyn the future could be brighter.

You know which group of people will save this country?

The current young generation. The 14 to 25 year olds. They are more socially conscious than anyone has ever been. Yet the get slaughtered by many middle class pricks.

They will turn the county round.

And yes many of them are at university. But they care, are tolerant and live life to the full.

And old bigots that voted for Brexit will have to accept that their racist views and miserable existence will not bring the youngsters down.

They've been saying the young will save us since the Greeks. As history shows, in most cases they'll save themselves.

The young have saved this country many times ,through voting Labour and saving the country from a lurch to far right Conservatism, after the war, during the 60s and 70s. These were the periods when things that improved the lives of the working class came into being, the NHS, sick pay, holiday pay, council houses, benefits , Sex Discrimination Act and many other Acts,better pay and conditions etc. Things people are still benefitting from now.

Any idea what power units have been specified for the new choo choos?

Remember when we could build these things ourselves. Always been the trouble with this country, we applaud the classical scholar, but if you're an engineer or designer( unlike Germany) you're regarded as a piece of shit.

been like that for over 50 years at least. i actually attended a proper old grammar school and you were constantly being told to get into higher education for the top few and the others were pushed into white collar jobs. anyone who wanted to be an engineer of any type were more or less told it was a dirty dead end job. know one or two who ignored em and paid more tax than i ever earned. this snobbish job attitude never seemed to happen abroad and look how they,ve done.

Interesting article in today's Guardian:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... leaving-eu

For those who can't be arsed to read the whole thing, here's the relevant bit:

"The four freedoms of the single market have made it easier for companies to move money, goods, services and people around the EU, but workers have not benefited. There has been virtually no growth in UK per-capita incomes since the start of the financial crisis in 2007, something that has not happened outside wartime in the modern age.

Britain is a low-wage economy with a chronic balance of payments problem. Repeated bouts of de-industrialisation mean there has not been a surplus on manufactured goods since the early 1980s. Growth has become ever more dependent on consumers’ appetite for debt, and the willingness of the Bank of England to make servicing that borrowing as cheap as possible. The UK’s poorer regions are 20 years behind the south-east in terms of living standards.

These problems are not new. They were there long before David Cameron decided to hold an EU referendum, and they will be there regardless of whether Brexit happens or not.

Capitalism’s ability to see off its rivals has always been based on the notion that it will make people better off, even if some people benefit more than others. But that pledge has been broken.Historically, profound political change only happens at times of crisis. Without the Great Depression and the second world war, there would have been no Labour landslide in 1945. Without the crisis of the mid-1970s, there would have been no Thatcherism. Without the crash, there would have been no Brexit – and Corbyn would still be a backbencher.

As it is, Labour is now led by somebody who spent years in the political wilderness with a simple message: that there was something inherently rotten about modern capitalism; that there were radical solutions to that malaise; and that Europe was part of the problem, rather than part of the solution."

Europe, the political entity has always been a problem to the left and I can see where they're coming from .A mobile labour force is a way to stifle wages, increase profits and eventually obtain a more compliant workforce. An employers dream.
The worker, the average earner expects to see living standards or the quality of life to keep getting better within reasonable bounds, but it's stalled.

Good article that Mr Dawes.

Snowy - Have workers in other EU countries seen their standard of living fall though? I have no problem in theory with the EU , I just think the UK was the bad apple in the barrel ,wanting to dictate the terms/run the show, so that in the end they could shaft their fellow countryman and take them back to how things were before the war , whilst quadrupling the incomes of the top 10%. Of course they conned the man on the street into thinking that by leaving the EU this wouldn't happen, but in reality it will continue to happen , but this time on probably a more grander scale, with a speeding up of taking the workers back to were they were pre war, and yet more money finding its way into the hands of the 10% due to the slaughter of what's left of the unions and an attack on pay and conditions and workers rights, which without the EU will be on rocky ground. Its was a win win situation for the top 10%, though they probably preferred it as it was, rather than have to go out and find new partners in crime outside the EU. A problem they will have though is the cessation of cheap labour from the EU ( old eastern bloc countries) that will force the government to either have to invest in our own workforce or force the unemployed into low paid, low skilled jobs in return for their benefits. Now a lot will say " good idea , the lazy good for nothing scrounging ba*tards, but remember a lot more of us will be joining the ranks of the unemployed in the next few years, particularly up here in the forgotten North East.

As we all know the theory that you can get the lazy scroungers off their collective arses to do manual work is the biggest load of bollocks ever spouted by the far right.

I wouldn't want to employ them especially doing something that could adversely impact on others like the building industry.

We would prefer them to stay bone idle and not be forced onto us.

I am sure most other industries feel the same.

We need foreign workers more than ever. Yet these same groups named above had a vote to get rid of them.

You couldn't make it up.

Are you advocating a form of ethnic cleansing of the unemployable . Stick them out of sight and send them a giro and just write them off? You appear to want a cosy world of your kind of people, a sad state of affairs.
I find that idea frightening. There's plenty of decent people out there who'd love a chance of a job, but no, let's just tell them 'to live together in ghettoes and not bother our kind of people. After all, we know what we're talking about' We could call it apartheid.
Very disturbing.

I would employ anyone that wants a job.

I didn't say what you are claiming.

I was referring to those that don't want to work.

There is a huge difference.

Who decides who's classified as a 'lazy scrounger'....? It's just not that easy.

I would argue there are those that want a job , even if its min wage/agency etc ,those that don't , and those that want a job if it is worth doing financially. Why would anyone want to work to be no better off than being on the dole. Some of the so called lazy scroungers actually want to work but are too clued up to be exploited.

I think I'll have to do a pier head jump .............⚓️

can,t blame the so called scroungers. its not them but the system. you can,t beat the system but you can use it.

I wasn't . I was saying I don't blame them for bucking the system or using it in your words, when the only work available pays no more than they would get on benefits. I know lots of people who have lived this way for years. If you are shrewd and do a bit of work here and there for people , you can survive, which is the same as working in Macdonalds on the minimum wage, but not as soul destroying.

There is no such thing as "so called" scroungers.

I know plenty of people that are on benefits that will do work and hard work.

And no person that cares would criticise them for it. The system stinks and keeps people on criminally low wages.

There are scroungers about though.

So stop generalising and putting words into people's mouths.

I wouldn't work for the minimum wage. If I am ever in that position I would take every benefit I could and make up my money in other ways.

Any business that only pays people the minimum wage are run by utter c unts that deserve nothing but pain.

But there are some that will justify it.

Just watching portillo on TV and they reckon vacuum hyperloops will be working in 10 years.Virtual meetings on the horizon etc etc
HS2 to the "north" by 2040.
Would not this money be spent on more useful purposes?

Of course there are scroungers but not so many. Most people want to go to work and support their families. It’s not really too much to ask.

[quote="Mr Irrelevant"]Of course there are scroungers but not so many.
imagine there has been the workshy since work began. just because someone actually has a job does not mean they are actually workers. bet all of us knew someone that we carried in some jobs we did either now or in the past.