To wonder about the values of Tory/UKIP voters

[Campaspe]

Why would anyone vote for a party that promotes austerity rather than a progressive, liberal party (Labour, SNP, Greens, Plaid Cymru)? I'm not saying for a minute that Tory voters don't care about poor or vulnerable people, so how do they square their political support with their conscience? Is it that these voters genuinely believe Labour caused the recession (most analysts now discredit this theory and point to Tory failure to manage the deficit, but maybe these voters aren't aware).

So, given the economic mismanagement stuff doesn't stick, why??? Dislike of Ed Miliband - in which case, why not another progressive party? How do such voters justify the bedroom tax, benefit sanctions, supporting tax evasion, failure to protect libraries, the growing divide between rich and poor etc etc. What are their reasons???

Well, TheChandler, aren't you a delight. I don't see where the disdain is in what you quoted. I can see plenty in your response though. 'Less of the treating people who dare to speak about a topic with disdain please' - yes, how brave of you to raise such a controversial and sensitive subject as the relative generosity of housing benefit and its equivalents in the UK and Denmark. I'm honestly not sure what agenda you're imagining I have here but you're coming off as a bit mental, to be honest.

If you can't see why European migrants would choose to move to the UK over other countries without it being because of the supposedly generous benefit system then I don't know what to say. Language, for one blindingly obvious one? The powerhouse that is London, for another?

The number of Danes and Swedes moving to other countries is incredibly low but I don't immediately put it down to their welfare systems...

I'm really not sure where you're going with this housing benefit nonsense, either. It's as if you've not read what I said about other benefits plugging the same hole in other countries.

Smilla I think your rhetoric has become a little lost...

It's as if you've not read what I said about other benefits plugging the same hole in other countries.

Gosh. Really? I haven't read "what you say", eh?

And the opposite doesn't apply, I suppose. To both the figurative and the above statement.

Is there any possibility you could use formal sources, as opposed to "what you say"?

What, formal sources like 'I knew a Danish person wot said X', 'if I asked some Danish people wot I know, I reckon they would say X' and 'I reckon EU migrants move to the UK because X, despite me providing no figures for what I say and there being many more likely factors for such a phenomenon even if it were to be the case'?

Laughable.

Basing my opinion on Thursday debate. Labour /snp and green were all willing to spend money we don't have to spend. No one was being honest and saying how that would be funded .. Which will can only be through tax. (Actually think Green Party made it fairly obvious towards the end)

Love it or hate it but farage was the only one who explained where money could be saved (and let's face it, they werent ridiculous suggestions) . And personally I believe there is nothing wrong with a points system to get into the uk... It Works well for Australia. I'm not saying ukip is the answer but in some of the biggest issues people are concerned, about I feel labour didn't have the answers for.

I think the Torys had/have us in the right path: benifits needed challenging, why should it be better to stay in bed and claim rather than get up and go to work? And why should disability benifits be challenged and better audited? Efficency savings needed to be made in public services, why should a single mum have a four bedroom house that someone who goes to work could only aspire to? Net migration is a concern. The problem is now the deep cuts need easing off... The hard work is done a concern would now be another party coming and giving away money we don't have. I can see it's getting better .. And that's from a public sector worker living in a very deprived town that's now seeing shoots of regeneration.

I don't believe from what I heard last night any one party had the answer as I would support parts from a mix. I do worry for a return to a labour government right now but that's my personal feelings and view.

I certainly wouldn't be calling anyone who didn't have the same view as me some of the names posters on here have.. The beauty of our system is we have a voice, I hate the way some people think their opinion is more valid than someone else's and reduce it to insults for not thinking the same way they do.

Smilla if you're going to make grand pronouncements about people not reading you properly, as if you some kind of expert, then yes, produce something readable.

Denmark does not have housing benefit. And suggesting that immigrants choose the UK, a non Schengen country over it because of language, is one of the most strangely uninformed things I've read. Denmark has around 9% non Danish origin population and 3% Muslim, no, but a population of around 6 million. Clearly, there are factors within the UK welfare system that are viewed as favourable, and I really don't find this left wing dogma that its not entirely convincing.

Yes, in the UK, you wont get 80-90% of your previous salary for 2 years as unemployment benefit as in Denmark, but that would hardly help the low paid or peripatetically unemployed in the UK either.

And in Denmark, I believe around 75% of women with children work, because it is the policy there and in many other continental countries to encourage women to work. Whereas discouraging SAHMs is consistently a policy which I see possibly these same left wingers complaining about.

In other words, I don't think any country has it all ways.

I'll leave you to provide the proper sources, since you keep telling us youre the expert.

I vote Tory and certainly have a conscience. But I believe in making our country strong again, people paying their way, and sorting out the economic catastrophe that Labour left when they were last in power.

I want Britain to have jobs, to have a strong NHS, to not waste money on e.g. those ridiculous child trust funds that Labour spunked so much cash on.

I also think Labour is peopled by the most appalling champagne socialist hypocrites - you only need look at tax avoider Martin Freeman for evidence of that -and am STAGGERED that Labour voters allow themselves to be talked to by people like that.

STAGGERED.

Oops posted on wrong thread, please ignore.

We aren't wealthy really, we've lost a business and are really struggling on 1 PT salary and top up benefits but I did the "Vote for policys" test and still came out Tory.

Quite simply I believe that creating a strong enterprise market is the better way to a strong economy. And getting people into work off the cushion of benefits will ultimately be better for the morals of society.

I don't believe that Labours economic policy of ploughing money into public services to create wealth is viable in the long term. And while I agreed with LibDems on their education policy and Greens on the NHS that's not enough to vote for them.

Do I agree with everything Torys do? No. But I see their end game.

Do I hate Ed? No actually he seems like a really decent guy. First labour leader I've liked.

Do I think UKIP and Torys are the same? No not in any way. I'm a mixed family UKIP would hate us.

Your OP is too black and white and simplistic.

I feel that threads like this show why so many Scottish people feel like mainstream UK politics doesn't represent them.

The consensus in se England (where most MPs represent) is so much more right wing, even amongst the working classes/labour/ex labour supporters.

A lot of Scottish people may have been against indyref/anti snp/ Scottish Tory supporters themselves but they don't routinely come out with many of the sentiments so common on threads like these on mn.

He's voting ukip to teach labour a lesson, he thinks that if enough people do then labour might start supporting the working class again and stop taking their support for granted.

Labour for the working class are long gone.

I disagree Jackie.

I think the problem is simple - Labour are NOT a socialist party . Haven't been for years and most of the UK can see that. Those on the left, quite rightly, want a proper left wing party to represent them. Not a bunch of arrogant, sneery, self serving , hypocritical, tax dodging millionaires. You have that in Scotland. We don't in England.

So UKIP step up to fill the gap in some ways.

Um, UKIP don't fill any socialist gaps that I can think of. Ken Loach popped up the other day with a radical left party launching its manifesto in a squat. I'd be looking over there for a copy of Das Kapital or the Communist Manifesto. I don't think Farage would know what either of those were, even if he was throwing them at the Romanians next door.

Labour are my party. However, they spend money like someone on their last shopping spree. They create the money holes, then people vote in Tory to plug them up. The Tories go too far, hurt the people who can't afford to lose more, so they bring in Labour for the 'common people'. Until there's a party who can be fair and economically brilliant, we will keep flip flopping between the two. If the only other alternative is UKIP, I'd rather put with 5 more years of Tories

I've only got to page 2 but that is spot on. Ideally I'd like the best of the 2 . Moderate Tories who are not judgemental and illiberal on social/sexual/personal issues and moderate Labour who understand economics.

I absolutely do not want a Government which is dictated to by single issue fanatics like Sturgeon or bonkers Greens with their weird mix of extreme interventionist left wing policy and libertarian policy.

Dora, why then is a place that is solidly working/lower middle class like Eastleigh UKIP?

They DO fill a gap. Labour does not appeal to old fashioned manual labourers.

Do you really think any "old labour" voters feel represented by Miliband?

Absolutely Baby.

UKIP are making inroads in traditional, white , blue collar areas. They don't satnd a hope in hell in affluent, middle class suburbia.

It is because of complacency by Labour that UKIP has been on the rise and so many true Socialists feel let down and forced to vote Loonytunes Green.

I haven't experienced David Blunkett's southeast coast services being swamped, personally. But, UKIP is banging the same jonny foreigner drum and banging it pretty hard in SE coastal towns. Do manual workers feel represented by Hampstead Socialists? No, of course they dont! They probably don't even know what the dinner party set is talking about, mind you, I'm not sure the dinner party set knows either. (But, that's by the by.)

So, yes. UKIP is filling a political hole. There's no doubt about that. But, it's not a socialist one. It's a xenophobic one.

Ken Loach popped up the other day with a radical left party launching its manifesto in a squat.

Wonder why he didn't launch it from his multi million pound home ?

But, it's not a socialist one. It's a xenophobic one.

Agreed. But try telling that to the disillusioned working class.

I know no UKIP supporters at all. My social circle is highly educated, well off and generally self made. They have no truck with Farage or Miliband.

For the same reason Cameron walks around in a dayglo donkey jacket and hard hat. I'm guessing he doesn't know which end of a trowel the mortar goes on.

I think it's a bit daft to think that any of the 3 amigos are worse than the other TBH. Cameron, Miliband and Clegg. Just typing the names is depressing....

They all support austerity budgets, benefit cuts, tuition fees, Trident missiles Continued NHS privatisation, bank bail-outs, detention without trial for "terrorist suspects". They'll support more countries to go to war against in the interests of big business and lastly - they all oppose rail nationalisation. Why get your knickers in a twist about one in particular?

Because some look better eating a burger than others do. We didn't study politics for nothing, you know.

I dunno. Al lpoliticians and their followers are hypocrites but some are more hypocritical than others.

Martin - I'm looking at you.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3025156/Red-Ed-s-hypocrite-Hobbit-tax-avoider-know-double-standards-champagne-socialists-investigation-shows-Labour-s-new-celebrity-poster-boy-really-takes-biscuit.html

He's not a politician; he's an actor. Maybe acting as if he gives a toss. But, that's by the by.

FFS Martin Freeman's accountant fucked up. Freeman himself was probably completely unaware. Oh, and he has a big house. So what, are you not allowed to be well off and be a socialist. The fail really does need a grown up to start writing for them. I'm not even voting Labour!