I know its all political b0llocks but at least its a step in the right direcction:

News quote:

" The Conservatives are today unveiling
plans to make Britain's roads more
"user-friendly", following their
pledge to cut fuel tax by 6p a litre.
Measures under their Right to Drive
policy include clamping down on
"troublesome" roadworks and allowing
cars to turn left through a red light
"where it is safe to do so".
There would be a new independent body
to champion the needs of road users,
variable speed limits that reflect the
nature of roads and a road-building
programme that will construct the
most pressing local bypasses with
minimum delay, the party says.
Other measures include promoting road
safety, scrapping those bus lanes it
considers underused, such as the one
on the M4, and using speed cameras
solely to reduce accidents rather
than to raise money.
Companies would be charged for each
day they dig up roads and penalise
the ones who over-run their contracts
would be penalised to reduce the
impact of roadworks.
Shadow transport minister Bernard
Jenkin said the Conservatives would
"stand up for people's right to drive".
He added: "Labour has given road users
the worst traffic jams in Europe, roads
in their worst condition for 20 years
and the highest patrol prices in
Europe. Four more years of Labour will
just mean more tax and more standstill.
"It's time for common sense. For most
people the car is a necessity. The
freedom to travel is a fundamental
human right and should not be punished
with even higher stealth taxes.""

 

As the economy, schools and health will be just as good/bad with either of the gimps in power, this is the kind of statement that will hopefully get a lot of votes. Get's mine anyway.

 

Ooooh "***** boy", I can almost forgive him that nazal,nausiating voice. Still a "Dodgy" vote though, don't ya think. Now if he was to say that all Scooby owners had free reign to drive wherever and however they liked then not only would I vote for the wooden little squirt, I'd probably.... er...... well..... his wife then anyway !

 

6p off petrol, so where are they going to get the revenue from for that then??? take from one and add to another, typical politics and roadwork? how the hell are they going to sort that out, i believe its done by local councils now so it doesnt matter whether its tory, labour or liberal they are still going to dig roads up for repair.
Turning left at red lights..... look there are enough ****'s out there now who go through red lights, more cameras on top would be better than turn left, id like to see how many accidents it would cause, i know they have the turn right rule in america but they also have a lane for it, not all lights in britain do to me its all bull to get you to vote conservative, its if they keep their promises at the end of it....... anyway who wants a Muppet like hague in

Tony

 

We currently have a muppet in power so why not give me the other muppet a go if it is better for the motorist?

I think regardless of the result, post election Hague will get shafted and Mr Portaloo will have a go.

 

Desperate populist bollox. Labour is perceived as anti-motorist so Billy figures he can get some cheap votes. Don't hold your breath...

IMHO.

 

Turning left on red lights? It works in the states (well turning right), where they have 90 degree junctions and wide pathways so you can see what's coming.

I personally think it could be a disaster over here and really hope that they are just joking in a vain attempt to get the populist vote.

Nick.

 

Turn left at a red light is something i have wanted since returning from living in the US in 93.

You treat the junction as a give way, nothing hard about that now is there?

Saying it is unsafe is nonsense, most junctions in britain are give ways, not lights. Following your logic says all junctions should have lights on them.

The whole lot of them are lying toe rags. Labour definately are Anti-Car. The torries arent exactly friendly though!

I want to emigrate!

 

So am I the only person to notice that the M4 actually runs a lot smoother with only 2 lanes coming into London? Previously you'd have a 3-mile tailback where the 3 lanes go to 2, like every day and frequent rear-end shunts.... Also cheaper petrol sounds great until you realise it generates more journeys = more traffic = more frustration in alreay over-crowded cities.

BTW, I'm not beating a drum here - Blair's as much of a muppet as the rest of them. Whoever you vote for, the Government always gets in! ;o)



[This message has been edited by EVO2 (edited 14 May 2001).]

 

well i know who will be getting my vote. after clearing up after 18 yrs of tory 5h1te, then i think labour have done very well.

the economy has not been this stable for a long time and interest rates have not been this low for a long time. its gonna take more than 4 yrs to really sort stuff out that the tories left over. and if the tories cut fuel prices, then where are they gonna get that money from for all the education and health service promises they give ???????

dave



[This message has been edited by druddle (edited 14 May 2001).]

 

I used to be into politics as i found it interesting. I really can't be bothered with it anymore though. The truth is no one tells the truth, no one is transparent, no one keeps their promises. The whole political system in the UK is a mess, it is far from democratic.

Just looking at the NHS and the promises made. This is just my own experience of what a state its in now from the morall point of view.

I have 2 sisters, aged 36 and 37. Both trained as Nurses when they left college and both excelled at that. My eldest sister became the senior sister, responsible for running all the nurses on her ward in a major City Hospital. My other sister became the senior sister on a very prestigious ward at a world famous cancer treatment and research hospital.

Last year both packed it in, they were sick to death of being under paid for there skills, working with poorly trained nurses, the training is not what it was! and burdened with management admin tasks. Morall in the NHS is apalling.

What do they do now? One has moved into management of the consultants, it uses non of her nursing skills, the pay and conditions are much better. The other set up her own nursery to look after pre-school kids. She earns more from this than running a Major Ward in a large hospital.

So much for all the promises about sorting the NHS out.

The big problem about this country is that no one has the ***** to make radical changes that would actually make a diference. They are all content to just tinker a little so it takes for ever to see any change, when it comes its not noticable. They do things on the sly too, not up front and honest but by stealth.

We are living in a very old country infrastructure wise, it's costing us all a huge amount of money and time wasted.

I dont know what the answers are, what i do know is that all the parties arent smart enough to work out what to do long term to improve matters, so they just tinker whilst we go down the ****ter.

Thank god i am out of the country soon, i get back the day before the election. I wont have to listen to all the bull**** from the wannabe MP's.

 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:<HR>Originally posted by druddle:
<B>well i know who will be getting my vote. after clearing up after 18 yrs of tory 5h1te, then i think labour have done very well.

the economy has not been this stable for a long time and interest rates have not been this low for a long time. its gonna take more than 4 yrs to really sort stuff out that the tories left over. and if the tories cut fuel prices, then where are they gonna get that money from for all the education and health service promises they give ???????

dave

[This message has been edited by druddle (edited 14 May 2001).][/quote]

Dave,

What about:

Euro - Britain will lost forever the facility to set its own fiscal strategy.
Stealth taxes - Want a list? It runs to about 46 so far!
NHS - The waiting list to get on the waiting list?
Education - Pledge met on primary scooh waiting lists to the detriment of secondary school sizes.
Sleeze - VAZ, Geoffrey Robinson?
Crime - Police numbers? Crime rising
Business - More regulations on small business who can ill-afford the time taken to administer it all.
House of Lords - 2 part modernisation of the HoL when NL said that was what they would not do.
Peers - NL has created more NL peers in 4 years that the tory party did in the last 18 years.
Quango's - Loads of unelected seats on committess filled by labour supporters.

Frankly, I am appalled at the direction this country is heading under NL.

C

 

Before any of you lot start posting political speeches which prove incontrovertibly that only your view is correct … consider that many of us have no real interest in political discussions, particularly on an Impreza BBS.

Can we please have a moratorium on the political stuff, or at least an understanding that it should go in the muppet forum? I get bombarded with this stuff in the papers and on TV, there are posters in the street, and I’ve already had canvassers on the phone.

No more please, at least not unless it’s specifically car-related.

Bros

PS Just one thing to add – when the Tories talk about stealth taxes, ask them who introduced VAT on domestic fuel. And who raised it from 7.5%, come to that. Plus ca change .... and proof that there's not an original thought in Tory Blair's head

 

C,

and don't forget Rights to roam, Freedom of Information, IR35, e-commerce legislation proposals (joke)and most of all...

TRANSPORT

JD

 

The removal of your right to a jury trial is a good one too, but shhhhhhhh, that will never affect you will it!!!!!!

If you dont want to read a politically biased thread then dont read it, simple choice isnt it?

 

Bros,
I reckon this sort of thing is important to know. Maybe its just political bulsh1t but I reckon that you are a scooby owner, which makes you a scooby driver, which means that you are goverened by all the road laws/taxes that are imposed on us by the government, and therefore potentially influenced by any ideas and changes (improvements maybe?) that could be introduced by a new government.

Mindyou I agree that they are all a bunch of muppets :-)

Dan

 

Could anybody tell me what this fuss about turning Left (or right) at a red light is ? Here in Portugal, we turn left or right at red lights without any particular problems, and the roads are NOT wide like in the states. Well, I mean, we don't have any more problems with that then with everything else

Max

 

Quote:

"Could anybody tell me what this fuss about turning Left (or right) at a red light is ? Here in Portugal, we turn left or right at red lights without any particular problems, and the roads are NOT wide like in the states. Well, I mean, we don't have any more problems with that then with everything else"
Max

without any particular problems?.....well that is apart from tne poor tourists like me who need at least 2 days before they realise that for the locals red means go, amber means go & green means go with caution 'cos another car will be coming the other way!!!

 

Can I just speak for the muppet collective and say "We don't want the political B*LL*CKS, thanx"


Anyway, the way I see it is,

All the parties are crap
They all promise things they can't/won't deliver
We're gonna get sh*t on by whoever gets in

Bob

 

Was the country in such a mess under conservative???

inflation was low, unemployment was falling, interest rates were low.... the main reason the tories were ousted was sleeze and the fact that The Sun got into bed with Tony....

Strange how NL sleeze doesn't get the same press... Mandelson, Vaz, Robinson, Mandelson again, Eccleston and so on and so on....;

Has anyone listened to what Haigue has to say, he actually talks a lot of sense a lot of the time, ok so he looks odd etc and is a little odd, but Tony lets get real....

Dave 'Thatcher' P

oh and Bros, if you have no interest in politics hit the back button.

 

Bob

Have to agree with you 100%...they're all as bad as each other if you ask me...but if the Tories are serious about this roads policy I'm willing to give them a go.

Bas

 

OK, the tories had their shot. They started all this anti car stuff, they started running down the NHS, police etc etc. Their crusade against inflation consisted of two main weapons, removal of exchange control and fear of unemployment. And just who did the crusade against inflation benefit most? People who have lots of money!!! Wahey!!!! And who stood to suffer most..............

Historically Labour have never been able to hold power for much more than one term, with anything like a decent majority.

When they have tried to be radical, they wash up on the beach of public school, Sir Bufton Tufton type placemen in the civil service. Watch "Yes Minister" if you don't know what I mean.

"New" Labour have it right, they would be wasting their time trying to be radical because the reactionary establishment, which includes the press, will have 'em out on their ear. Watch "A Very British Coup" if you don't know what I mean.

When Labour have had as many successive terms in office as the Tories, and they have their own placemen in position in the civil service departments then they might get something useful done.

The Euro is an issue for all parties, I'm not sure how much use a referendum is on such a thing, we ruin it for our kids one way or another!

Anyway, remember "Vote for ME".

Oh, yeah and "Freedom for Tooting".

 

My 2 penneth:

18 years of Tory rule turned this country into a bickering 5hitehole.
They turned people greedy: encouraging everyone to own their own home; a cheap ploy to lock the working public into debt and leave them in fear of their jobs. Cue the end of the Unions.....
They encouraged Joe Public to dabble in shares by selling off the country's utilities. That was a deal Arthur Daley would have been proud of; selling you something you already owned!!
They raised VAT from 7.5% to 17.5%, increased prescription charges 20 fold, diluted health services into the private sector and introduced insurance tax without announcement.
Lets also not forget that they started the Millenium Dome project and took us deeper into the "common market" than Labour had ever done (although the progression of this policy is something I hate about Labour).

In summary, I don't think any of them have a clue and I'm with John Felstead: I'd like to emigrate (not with John you understand, just his point of view )

But hey, what do we know, we just employ these people to look after our country.

Neil.