Back me or …

Back me or …

A couple of days ago, the Guardian brought to my attention that a major political candidate for Prime Minister gave a Conference speech, where they demanded their party back them or sack them. They got a standing ovation, I assume for their courage and clarity. The Leader is Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, the Leader of Germany’s CDU, the major party in the country’s coalition government. Can you imagine how the press would report such an event in the Labour Party? …

Asymmetric Games

Asymmetric Games

Dungeons & Dragons is undergoing a renaissance, possibly most visibly by the podcast postings of the team at “Critical Role”. While their youtube hosted podcasts are not necessarily particularly accessible, partly because they are not scripted, because there’s too much talking at the same time and the episodes are extremely long, they are easy to find and their DM, Matt Mercer, is a great story teller, who seemingly never forgets that the story comes first. I first followed the story of Force Grey. …

It’s not a double whammy!

And it’s back to tax! WTF.  😵  Labour’s income tax proposals will not affect anyone earning under £80K, contrary to the bollocks on Question Time earlier this week. This increase represents the top 5% income earners in the country. Labour propose to tax those on over £80,000 at 45% rather than 40% and increase the rate for those earning over £150K to 50%. (These are marginal rates i.e. they are only paid on that income earned over the threshold. See http://calculate.forlabour.com.

Currently one pay’s zero on the first ~£12,000, 20% in the next ~£35,000, 40% on £46K to 150K and 45% on whatever’s left if you lucky enough to earn that much.

While issues remain about the zero rate claw back, as it impacts benefits package design i.e. encourages tax avoidance by transferring benefits from money to NPBs and particularly in London, this is not unfair; it might be better if another layer was introduced at £¼ million p.a. so that the newly burdened feel that those better off then them are carrying their share of the burden. (We should also work out how to forgive the student debt, since one of things this tax payment will generate is free (higher) education for tax payers and their children.) …  …

You gotta laugh (or not!)

You gotta laugh (or not!)

I had reason to look at a YouTube compilation of what passed for comedy when I was growing up, in the Seventies. I was shocked at how poor it was; I actually saw very little of it. One reason for this was that we had only one TV in the house and my parents controlled the channel selector switch, there was no catch-up technology. Some of what we watched, and more importantly didn’t watch may have been based on their cultural aspirations; certainly we never had “The Wheeltappers and Shunters Social Club” on in our house, or in any house in the street; I grew up in, in Ruislip, not a hot house of working class or socialist culture. …

Which Union

Which Union

A number of people are becoming active in politics and are asking which Union should they join because if a LP member, you must join a Union if eligible and must pay the political levy if the Union has a political fund. Anyway, if at work, it’s a good thing to do, for yourself and for others.

People join Unions because of where they work and who they work for; the principle is that as socialists and trade union militants, we should/must defend industrial unionism. In much of Europe, the Unions are even closer adjuncts of the political parties than in the UK and this is not a good thing.

I describe my rules and offer a web site URL below/overleaf. …