Can this government really continue?

The Tories got us into Brexit and they should be the ones to get it sorted. I feel Corbyn is making a mistake if he wants to grasp this poisoned chalice.

I do not understand why almost everyone is in thrall to the two party system - other Parties and Independents are available.

Consider the Scottish Parliament where there has seldom been an overall majority for one party. Consequently the support of other parties/independents is required to get anything agreed. This leads to amendments and modifications to legislation until it can command the support of the majority of MSPs. Sometimes one other
party, sometimes another, sometimes there is a free vote with support from all corners of the spectrum.

It is harder to achieve this in Westminster, but when the party in power has a small over all majority the smaller parties can, by combining forces amend or reject proposed legislation.

I have never missed a vote, nor have I ever voted Labour or Tory. I have been lucky in that there has always been a decent SNP candidate in my area. The one time when there was no candidate for our LA , I stood myself. DD2 when faced with this dilemma when she was a student in Newcastle, voted Green and was delighted when the Green won the Council Ward.

If only people would support the alternative parties, rather than voting for the lesser of two evils, then through time we would achieve a more representative Parliament. It does work in a single seat by election and can work in a GE as happened in the post Scottish Independence Referendum GE, when the SNP took all but 3 of the seats in Scotland, thus becoming a force to be reckoned with at Westminster.

Tony Blair and the Labour government enthusiastically privatised the NHS.

Some of this worked well - using private hospitals for routine surgery - other areas were a disaster. His own wife was involved in a private healthcare company hoping to benefit from NHS contracts.
www.opendemocracy.net/ournhs/kailash-chand/moment-of-honesty-is-required-new-labour-began-dismantling-of-our-nhshttps://www.opendemocracy.net/ournhs/kailash-chand/moment-of-honesty-is-required-new-labour-began-dismantling-of-our-nhs

The NHS is constantly subjected to 'reform' - is it safe in the hands of any politicians?

I'd be very surprised if the cleaning hadn't been privatised long before Labour came to power.
Housekeeping had previously been "in house" and now it is again.

Point is the NHS wasn't free of privitisation and problems in labours term. Same goes for eduction

And also to point out that there are good private contracts and bad ones.

The privatisation of cleaning services was a disaster in every way. I remember when it first began in hospitals and walked past a puddle of dried blood on the floor of the main corridor for several days. The floor was not due to be cleaned till a certain day, with a certain company, and no-one took responsibility for it. Before someone would have spotted it, alerted the in house cleaners and they would have been on it in an instant. Why? - because they were part of the organisation and wanted the best for it - and took a pride in the work and their role as part of a big team.

You can't buy that.

I feel that some don't seem to understand how privatisation works. Civil servants negotiate contracts and award them with perhaps a signing off by an MP. This should only happen after due diligence and common sense has been applied. The contract should have significant KPIs and penalties for not achieving them. Once the contract has started the civil servants should have a monitoring process in place. This is the system in the private sector and should be the same in the public sector.

It goes wrong when the CS simply award to the cheapest tenderer or when they haven't put the KPIs in place or don't monitor them. It is not as simple as some seem to think, just a question of good practice.

If a company can do a better job than the public sector for the same price or if they can do the same job for a cheaper price, why shouldn't the public benefit from it? I believe the companies doing the standard hearing tests are doing a good job, I hope they are cheaper than the NHS.

Our rubbish collection has been outsourced and is efficient and reliable. I expect we have all heard what has been going on in Birmingham where the rubbish collection is done in house.

To summarise, I think there is room for both public and private sector to perform tasks for us all without any conflict but am sure I will get many examples of where it doesn't work. However, are those examples of properly awarded and monitored contracts?

I wonder what will happen when the Labour party nationalise the railways. Will those of us lucky enough to live in big conurbations where rail travel is free for older people lose that benefit or will all older people be able to travel on all trains without charge?

But privatisation of your rubbish collection is slightly different Nonnie it is a single service. The NHS is composed of many services some of which are attractive to people who know they will make money out of them, others are not and will become secondclass services. If we have to have the rubbish analogy how wold you feel if some of your ubbish was collected but only the recycling and you were expected to dispose of the rest yourself.
As for the rail service. If older people are only entitled to free travel at the expense of working people who are being charged more for their commuter ticket every year then perhaps they should be prepared to give it up. But actually if the money private companies make was ploughed back into a state owned service everyone would benefit.

Nonnie I had thought free rail travel over 60 was available only in London - does it apply in other cities too?

trisher I think you will find that no one is suggesting we have to deal with parts of the NHS ourselves so your analogy doesn't work.

Yes, that is one way to look at the rail service but you might also like to think about those who currently don't have a good rail service but are currently subsidising those who do. I didn't comment on whether it would be right or wrong to remove the rail travel concession from older people, I asked what would happen.

Nothing would happen actually. The London rail service has always been separate. In the NE the Metro system allows you to buy a years ticket for £12 once you have your bus pass humtydumpty I don't know about other local services

trisher I think you are missing the point. I was talking about nationalisation which would 'nationalise' rail services. I really can't imagine JC picking and choosing which ones!

I voted to stay and hope this will still happen. I am already one of those 'at the. Bottom of the heap' with no £ to even cremate myself with! However, I would never vote for JC and his accompanying band. So that leaves me where I was at the last GE, a choice. Between bad and even worse.

I agree Miepl no positive feelings about any of them. I've never felt so unsure about who I would vote for. Doesn't help that I'm underwhelmed by my own MP.

Agree, IMO JC should come out in favour of 2nd referendum, as part of election platform at least, since I gather majority of Labour MPs favour this.

Agree, IMO JC should come out in favour of 2nd referendum, as part of election platform at least, since I gather majority of Labour MPs favour this.

Except he wont put whats best for the party or the country ahead of his own personal opinions on the issue...

Ive been in socialist countries where nationalised trains run DAYS late sure they're cheap but they wont get you anywhere on time.....

Reluctantly I think I have to agree

Please no second referendum, because we will then have demands for a third, fourth, fifth and in 20 years time, with the 21 referendum coming up, we will still be bickering about it and nothing will have happened.

MOnica if the government had the courage to say that the referendum was binding I hope that would end it. It would after all be very different from the last one because we all know so much more now and Boris & co wouldn't be able to stand in front of that bus telling porkies without a huge backlash.

^ if the government had the courage to say that the referendum was binding I hope that would end it.^

They can't say that because it wasn't binding. There is absolutely nothing the the Referendum Act which says it was to be binding. MPs debating the Bill for the Referendum Act were assured that it was only advisory. When Salmond called for a super-majority he was told that it wasn't necessary because the referendum was only advisory.

I know that twat Cameron subsequently promised to implement the result (what happened to that promise, then? He just ran away from the mess he'd made) but his promise was in no way binding on Parliament.

I don't see what is so difficult to understand about this.

This is what MPS were advised when debating the Bill:

This Bill requires a referendum to be held on the question of the UK’s continued membership of the European Union (EU) before the end of 2017. It does not contain any requirement for the UK Government to implement the results of the referendum, nor set a time limit by which a vote to leave the EU should be implemented. Instead, this is a type of referendum known as pre-legislative or consultative, which enables the electorate to voice an opinion which then influences the Government in its policy decisions. The referendums held in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland in 1997 and 1998 are examples of this type, where opinion was tested before legislation was introduced. The UK does not have constitutional provisions which would require the results of a referendum to be implemented, unlike, for example, the Republic of Ireland, where the circumstances in which a binding referendum should be held are set out in its constitution.

From the briefing report, which can be downloaded here:

researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ResearchBriefing/Summary/CBP-7212

Nonnie the London tube service is currently run by Transport For London a local government organisation, so is unlikely to be included in a nationalised Rail system. In fact as a publicly owned body it obviously provides an excellent service and manages to give free transport to the elderly. Unlike it's near neighbour Southern Rail.
As for not Nationalising the railways it is a seperate subject, but the amount the Gov gives in subsidies and the amount made by simply leasing the rolling stock is all money which could be reinvested. The East Coast Line is a classic example of how a publicly run service is profitable.
It seems obvious now that the proposed deal will be rejected, there will be a vote on postponing our leaving and posssibly one on abandoning Article 50.

Maizie a bit of confusion. When I said 'binding' I was talking about a new referendum not the one we already had. I was thinking of the best way to satisfy the most people.

Trisher I didn't read anywhere that JC would only nationalise some of the rail services. Surely that would be very divisive? What about the other local rail services which are run by local authorities? Are you saying he would leave those alone too? Are you then saying that those of us who already have free rail passes would continue to have them and those who live in areas where the service is currently not free would still have to pay? Doesn't sound like Socialism to me.

Presumably you live in London?

Nonnie I am saying that a Nationalised rail system would take the rail system out of the hands of private companies and provide an integrated and reasonably priced rail system which served the whole country. As for those rail systems already run by public authorities that would be dependant on discussion and negotiation. You were worried about free rail travel. I am not an expert on every rail system in every conurbation in the UK but it seems to me that to argue that free travel might be lost through Nationalisation when publicly owned rail companies are already responsible for that travel is being a bit ureasonable. Perhaps you could list the other authorities where rail travel is free. Personally I would willingly swap a free local pass for reasonably priced national Rail travel for everyone. But I suppose it depends whether you are someone who thinks pensioners are badly treated and should always have more than others.

For those that think centre & right voters have a monopoly on believing scare mongering & propoganda:

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/far-left-falls-for-slick-anti-uk-videos-6x5qkt7fr?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&fbclid=IwAR3waw1jwHMa8tJZy-iVelZK8mxuVPTHm9Rx_za35vTRob7Dz2k8FZckI3E#Echobox=1547463068