TUC National Demonstration Against Cuts

I've just seen the news. The TUC-stewarded parts of the demostrations are without incident; there does seem to be an anarchist presence, a number of shops have closed, and additional police are heading to Oxford Circus area - so that's probably a place to avoid/leave.

Didn't catch any estimates of crowd numbers.

Miliband is making a damp squib speech right now, and right on cue, Sky TV are simultaneously showing pictures of a breakaway group clashing with police. Everything was OK up to this point, then right on cue the anarchists step in to discredit Miliband and the thousands of peaceful protesters. Makes you wonder who these anarchists are.

agree, wb, but I see 'no cuts' on placards. Horrible anarchists ruining everything.

unlike the financially literate bankers and the financially literate politicians with their 'light touch regulation'?

purple, that's not the debate. It's not cuts or no cuts. The issue is the level of cuts, the direction of cuts, the depth of cuts, the speed of cuts.

The people asking for no cuts are financially illiterate.

Why did none of you militant marchers become active while GORDON

SHITBROWN was spending your childrens' future and ruining our country?

While he was supposed to be governing banks and yet let them run amok

and ruin our countries (England, N Ireland, Wales and Scotland's) finances.

Why, why why?

And Dittany, as always your tone is hysterical and irrational.

'These cuts are being directed disproportionately at women. It's women who will suffer, and it's women who are going to rise up and stop them.'

Let's get out the smelling salts for all you latter day Emily Davisons eh?

Ah Glasnost. You and your ludicrous comparisons of spoilt contemporary public sector workers to people suffering in the Holocaust is both witless and lacking in taste.

Everyone sat by and allowed our manufacturing industries to be killed off because we were happy to buy cheap shite from china.

I can count the amount of time I have heard people banging on about how great their "cheap" polish builders are - short term foreign labour on whole is here to support families abroad again money leaving the country.

How is it any surprise the country is now in the state it is? Such a shame everyone wasnt so motivated to deal with those problems.

I dont necessarily like where the cuts are being made unfortunately I think its a necessary evil - I am incredibly annoyed that bankers are still taking bonuses despite being incompetant.

But have a great day and remember if you start throwing fists or stones you have lost any high moral ground you have and stand no chance of being taken seriously.

Claig - That's all very well, but totally irrelevant to my point.

Dittany - David and Gideon != The tory party/Tory supporters/Tory MP's. I am uncomfortable with the way that senior politicians get pulled in to a rather rarified world, and the temptations that come with that. Blair and Mandelson are making far to much money now. That is something that you need strong institutions to counteract. This is the same problem there is with Executive pay.

TCNY, you are arranging deck chairs on the Titanic, you're not seeing the wood for the trees. Dick Turpin has just robbed the public and now the public has to pay. That's why they are out in the streets in their thousands; the old, the young, men, women and children. They don't think what happened was right, they believe the guilty got off scot-free, and the innocent are being made to pay the price. Some have travelled down for miles, they want to be heard, they're sick of the spin.

Dittany - We aren't having an argument. We are refining the terms of your point.

I think you certainly DO include the tax paid by employees when looking at the tax income provided by different industries. This is the argument for lower corporation tax - that you get a net increase in income from more companies locating in your jurisdiction and employing more people.

Persona taxation is a cost to business in the same way that personal Tax credits are a subsidy for them - if personal tax rates go down you don't need to pay people as much money for them to end up with the same amount in their pockets.

That more Corporation Tax comes from Aberdeen that the City of London tells you nothing about how much Banking contributes to the Exchequer - even if we are just talking about corporation tax. Not all the Banking Industry pays it's Corporation Tax in the City. RBS is in Edinburgh.

That's great glasnost, but I don't actually want to pay more tax either directly or indirectly so that owuld never appeal to me as a voter. I think that I am far better placed to spend my money than the government is and that the state is now so large and spends and wastes so much money that it needs to be massively reduced in size, child trust funds, health in pregnancy giveaways, endless initiative sin educatione etc are all IMO a waste of money. The waste in the public sector is astonishing. I am a frontline public sector worker BTW

We're all wise to the fact that Labour are just the same, they are all in it together. We're not fooled by their speeches, just as we aren't fooled by the crocodile tears of the bankers.

In other words the 'Tories eat babies/Labour want to take all your money' narrative is childish, unhelpful and untrue.

Is all this sudden interset in this thread a cunning ploy to waylay protesters? Get out on the demo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

These cuts are unecessary, vicious and ideological. Not alot else to add.

Bar these suggestions for alternatives to the cuts though.

Make the present, temporary, banker?s bonus windfall tax permanent, raising in excess of £500 million a year.
Extend the banker?s bonus windfall tax to other financial institutions ? such as hedge funds and private equity houses. An extension to hedge funds alone would raise in excess of £700 million.
Introduce a short-term ceiling on total remuneration, given as both cash and share options, saving around £520 million from RSB bonus payments in this year alone.
Set a 50% income tax band for gross incomes over £100,000, raising £4.7 billion annually, or £2.3 billion more than the sum raised by setting the band at its present £150,000.
Uncap National Insurance Contributions, so that they are paid at 11% on all incomes, including investment income above £110 per week. The extra tax take would be £9.1 billion.
Introduce minimum tax rates of 40% and 50% on incomes above £100,000 and £150,000 respectively in order to mitigate the ability of higher earners to displace tax burdens. The tax rates set out above would raise an additional £14.9 billion annually.
Institute a 0.05% financial transaction tax on instant sterling transfers between UK financial institutions, raising some £38 billion a year, sufficient, if devoted to deficit reduction alone, to halve the deficit by 2013/14.
Take concentrated action to bear down on tax lost within the existing system ? the £25 billion which goes missing through tax avoidance; the £28 billion of tax bills which the Treasury Select Committee (November 2009) concluded were agreed but had not yet been paid; the £70 billion which the Public and Commercial Services Union has estimated to be lost through tax evasion, such as illegal non-declaration of income on which tax might be due, or fraudulent claims for unjustified tax relief.
Separate retail and investment banking, removing the ?moral hazard? in which recklessness within finance capitalism is bailed out by the tax payer.
Establish a High Pay Commission to apply a permanent public interest test into the setting of senior salaries.

Happy demoing!!!!!!!!!

And Cagney said that was just before everything went up in flames, just like the banksters did.

Glasnost - Justice for whom? Measured how? Saying you are for Justice is like saying you believe in fairness and think murder should be illegal

Everyone is in favour of these things.

Labour and Tories both want less sick people, less poor people, the country to be richer, less crime etc. etc.

They disagree on the way of achieving these things.

There is undoubtedly some corruption and graft in politics but FAR less than in most other countries - people DON'T go into Politics (generally) in order to make money for themselves. If they wanted to do that there are much easier ways. Most politicians actually do want to make life better - regardless of what party they represent.

You're right dittany. The bankers call themselves "masters of the universe", just like James Cagney did, when he said "look at me, ma, top of the world, ma, top of the world".