Save MG Rover

Dori A Schmetterling wrote: || This is also an illusion. || || It has always been clear that the purpose of the association is || "ever closer union"" or words to that effect.

That's precisely my point. At NO TIME during the referendum campaign in 1975 was that ever spelt out to the electorate. The people who voted "Yes" thought they were voting to continue membership of a Free Trade area, nothing more.

I don't think so. Britain was already in EFTA.

From what I have heard about the referendum campaign your view (which is quite common) is a case of selective memory. Unfortunately I don't personally remember much about it.

DAS

For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling

The whole truth is that the UK has had it regarding its manufacturing industries due to the shear greed of their respective workforces and unions .Come the 5th of may we all have a choice we can either vote for more people not of English birth to come here to take all our jobs what is left of them or we can vote to control the amount of people entering this country thus at least saving some of our jobs or we can vote for higher council tax and other bloody rubbish the choice is yours . Rover made bloody good cars never forget it but the workforce let them down badly with all their strikes for more and more money .I have a

1990 216sli with 120.000 miles on the clock outside that has passed the MOT for five years on the trot now without having to spend a great deal of money on it which is more than I can say for the Fords Vauxhalls and god knows what else I have had over the years. Don't knock Rover knock its lazy good for nothing workforce .

=====================================================

(Michael Howard in No 10 on May the 5th or this country is doomed.)

Just the opposite - if he gets into power the country is definately doomed -

Who brought in the poll/council tax? - A CONSERVATIVE government

Who put the hosital cleaners out to contract thus opening the door for the MSRA virus? - A CONSERVATIVE government

Who had the highest unemployment figures ever recorded? - A CONSERVATIVE government

Who had a 15% basic interest rate? - A CONSERVATIVE government

Who made thosuands of homeowners suffer because of 'negative equity'? - A CONSERVATIVE government

Who by cutting the 'front line' hospital staff and introducing more tiers of management were responsible for the long hospital waiting lists ? - Yep you got it a A CONSERVATIVE government

Who introduced VAT on household gas and electricty bills when they really didn't have to? - A CONSERVATIVE government

Who brought in the 'fuel tax escalator' on petrol and diesel? - A CONSERVATIVE government that's who

Who cut the funding to the police forces thus reducing the number of 'plods' on the beat - A CONSERVATIVE government

Who privatised the Water Boards, Electricty Boards and Gas Boards - all at a huge loss to 'Joe public' - but forced up the costs of these essential utilities to the public by massive amounts - just to give the directors and shareholdes a big, big slice of the cake? - Oh! and don't forget the privatisation of the old British Rail in that list. - Of course it was a CONSERVATIVE government

And who was in the forefront of that CONSERVATIVE government when all the above - and much more damage done - yes, give the man a prize MICHAEL HOWARD - the man who suffers from selective amnesia and has the nerve to call other party leaders LIARS.

Unlike many who are about to vote for the first time, I lived through the 13 years of Tory rule not knowing if I would have a job to go back to after EVERY weekend. A mortgage that increased from 6% to 15% interest from the time I bought the house to making the first repayment. Millions on the dole and because of the high figures, the Tories actually begging those on the dole to sign on 'the sick' just to keep the unemployment figures down - oh! and when that didn't work, they changed the way the figures were calculated.

You also forgot to mention the Directors and Shareholders of the companies in those markets who have taken, and continue to take, millions to feather their own nests and 'sod the workers' - geuss what political party the majority of those belong to - you guessed it didn't you? The CONSERVATIVE party of course - the instigators of 'rip off' Britain.

The list of Tory cuts was endless but my rant over.

Brian G

Well Brian I won't be voting for Blair&Brown that is a certainty I won't be voting for Scotch Jock either it is also debatable whether or not I vote for Howard had Mrs Thatcher been in Howard's shoes I would have been waiting on the polling booths doorstep when they opened . To change the subject do you happen to know where the fuel pump relay is situated in a 416sli 1993 model ? .

I don't think you an blame 15% interest rates etc on any specific goverment. The economy would have done somthing like this even if the Welsh Nats had been in power. Plus, economic cycles last longer than parliamentary periods, which is why incoming governments 'inherit' from outgoing ones.

BTW, how about spelling "definitely" correctly? Or is that just a fast-impatient-typing-in-email-type typo?

DAS

We don't any more - that's the point.

One thing Brian forgot to mention is that fact that Blair did something far more ghastly and horrific than ANY PM of this country has ever done and that was send our service men and women into a war that we had no business to even contemplate being involved in. It has been proved that there was no WMD's and I have noticed that Blair has now started saying that it was right to remove Sadam what bloody right has he to say which countries rulers have to be removed. When we went into Iraq it was only to please the bloody yanks especially warmonger Bush come back Maggie and Ronnie .

Unfortunately that was the result of the Tories dropping a spherical object after we had 'joined' the ERM - but rates had been rising before then with the Tories 'boom and bust' policies.

If you look a little more carefully, you will several typo's in there that have gone unnoticed - but if that's all you have to worry about, then the best of luck to you.

Brian G

The man made a decision - rightly or wrongly - he made it and had/has the balls to stand by it, and whilst I did not entirely agree with it, I admire him for making it. By the way, I understand that the Tories also agreed with him at the time, but have since changed their minds to score political points in this election.

Would you have been saying that if Sadam did have the weapons and decided to use them? Remember, he threw the inspectors out of the country quite somem time before the invasion, and the lack of WMD was only really confirmed AFTER the troops had gone in - Ah! but I remember now, he did use them on the Kurds and the Iranians AND came close to using them during Desert Storm - remember that little fracas when he invaded Kuwait (after making peace with Iran, which he had also invaded) and then set fire to all the oil wells during his retreat.

As a matter of interest, go and have a chat to the 'ordinary' Iraqi and ask him his feelings of the invasion - at least they no longer have to be afraid of the 'knock on the door' in the wee early hours.

BTW, the alliance between Maggie and Ronnie was to me even more horrendous than the one between Blair and Bush.

Brian G

Our whole alliance with Bush is wrong we should be siding with the Europeans not some country six thousand miles away but that isn't to say that that I agree with our membership of the EU because I don't. It will only take one party to say they will pull us out of the EU when elected and they will get my vote no matter who .

Which country is that? I know my maps are a bit old - have they moved the USA?

==========================================

"Our whole alliance with Bush is wrong"

Do you think that Western society could have/can survive totally intact without an alliance with the United States?

That fact that both Bush and Blair were involved is simply that they are the incumbent leaders at the time - the same as Reagan and Maggie (Falklands), Roosevelt and Churchill (WW2 and Wilson and Lloyd George (WW1).

With regards to being pulled out of the EU - then whilst I don't entirely agree with the gravy train, how the hell do you think that this country can survive totally alone? We have to import Iron, Steel, Coal, Gas, Oil, Cars and a multitude of essentials as our manufacturing base and natural recourses were either sold off or shut down during the reign of Maggie Thatcher.

I really would suggest that you sit down and decide why you are voting and the reasons for voting for the party of your choice - in other words, vote with your head and not your heart.

Brian G

How on earth did we manage to survive prior to Heath rushing over to Brussels to sign us up before he had even had time to make his bed in number 10 after winning the election that year ?????? .

These where all closed down or sold off due to the sheer greed of the British workforce and unions and nothing else ,it had nothing to do with Mrs T but none of you labor lovers will ever admit this .

Exactly I know which party I have always been better of under and it isn't labor if Blair gets in again the lives of all the sick,disabled, and unemployed will be reduced to less then poverty level the 200.00 fuel payment will be the first to go accompanied with a far worse than it is now NHS more tax on fuel a higher rate of VAT on everything. Up will go council tax in Brown's first budget along with car tax and tax on cigarettes and tobacco this last measure will not effect me has I go the Belgium for all my tobacco every three months or so . We get nothing out of the EU countrywide but have to pay a hell of a lot of cash into the EU to keep the French farmers in the life of luxury that they are used to . On a personal level we can go over to France and Belgium and gain by avoiding the outragious tax on beer,wine,spirits, and fuel that is having to be paid here.

That is the answer to your question "How on earth did we manage to survive" because surviving is what this country was doing and nothing more.

Whilst I accept that 'union greed' was a contributing factor in some cases - why did Maggie privatise all the utilities at a knock-down rate to the shareholders and then allow those to fall into decline whilst the profits were used to line the pockets of the directors and shareholders and when these profits began to decline... they increased the prices?

Whose greed was that then? As a matter of interest, how many of those now belong to British companies?

Labour lover - a bit strong I think, but I KNOW that I am better off under a Labour government than under a Tory one.

It was because a Tory govenment privatised the domestic fuel industry AND slapped 17.5% VAT on it and then wasted the revenue from the North sea gas and oil fields that prices are now so high that the £200 fuel payment has to be given - by the way, which party removed the Inflation Index from the pensions thus devaluing them - you got it in one a CONSERVATIVE government thus dropping many pensioners below the poverty line.

If I recall correctly, when VAT was introduced, it was around 7.5% and when Maggie got into power, she denied that she would raise this to a higher level - guess what... within months of making this statement she raised it to 17.5% again for no reason, other than to line the pockets of those that needed it least. As a matter of interest, a Labour government actually dropped VAT on domestic fuel from 17.5% to 5% the lowest that the could do.

A CONSERVATIVE government caused the crisis in the NHS by introducing crippling cost cutting so that people would be forced to use the private sector for their health care - something that only the 'middle class' up could afford.

One of these cost cutting exercises was to throw hospital cleaning to the wolves of the private sector - cleaning done on the cheap allowed the likes of MSRA to flourish - who forced this - yep, you got it a Conservative govenment.

As a matter of interest, who scrapped the Fuel Tax Escalator that a CONSERVATIVE government introduced Yep, you got in one again. By the way, the Tories started slamming tax on fuel way back in the 1930's and 1940's so they must take the full blame for any continuation of this.

Council Tax unlikely, car tax possibly - but that will be a lot less than the conservatives will have to do to make their figures balance - remember, no matter what a politician promises, it still has to be paid for using taxes - cut one tax and you have to increase or introduce another that's sods law and it is unbreakable.

and

There you go, an old YUPPIE motto, sod you Jack, I'm alright - a very old Tory motto.

That's the biggest load of bull I have ever read... (apart from the French farmers) but do I detect a hint of jealousy there - they can have it, but I can't? Oooh you poor thing you, diddums throw your toys out of the pram?

On a personal level we can go over to

The problem is that these taxes still have to be paid - whether they be directly from your income or as a so called 'hidden tax' - you want the services, you pay the taxes.

I find it more abhorrent that a workforce can take a company from nothing into an international concern and be paid a pittance of a wage whilst directors and shareholders pocket millions and then complain when the 'workers' want a decent pay rise.

There We Are Then, I suppose you are one of those that caught the Thatcher disease in the seventies (f**k you mate, i'm alright) and only care for yourself and not others in this country?

PS. You're not a yank in disguise are you?

Brian G

(Who has decreed that these are his last words on this subject and there will be no reply to further postings)

That one struck me particularly....

Maybe I need a holiday.. :-)

Trouble is, too much traffic on the motorways over a bank holiday... :-(

Oh well, roll on summer.

DAS

For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling

Perhaps he means California? I'll have an alliance with them anytime...

DAS

For direct contact replace nospam with schmetterling

Agreed. It is a great place.