Reply to: Unelected Prime Minister?

[shaunbhoy]

Pensions are really a waste of time, especially since Brown's raid on in 1997 on dividend credits which has removed over 100 billion pounds from pension pots. I hope in due course that the Tories will remove this New Lie stealth tax, but perhaps private sector pensions are beyond saving after 11 years of state robbery.

To be fair to NL though, they have taken into account how worthless private sector pensions actually are, and will continue to periodically keep raising retirement age to prevent most of us from ever having to fall into pension poverty. A wonderfully prudent approach in much the same vein as that of sending 50% of our kids to university with student loans to prevent them from appearing on the jobless stats when they fall out of school, and find that the only jobs left that have not been outsourced involve flipping burgers.

[Cyberman]

And then proceeded to rob every other poor bugger's pension.

Pensions are really a waste of time, especially since Brown's raid on in 1997 on dividend credits which has removed over 100 billion pounds from pension pots. I hope in due course that the Tories will remove this New Lie stealth tax, but perhaps private sector pensions are beyond saving after 11 years of state robbery.

[ratewhore]

Is this wrong? Or just when you don't like it?

Oy, keep your nose out. You've got your own parliament now!!

Bloody sweatys...

[bogeyman]

I think every government only ever does one decent thing. This Labour lot introduced stakeholder pensions, I can't for the life of me think of anything else.

And then proceeded to rob every other poor bugger's pension.

[xoggoth]

I think every government only ever does one decent thing. This Labour lot introduced stakeholder pensions, I can't for the life of me think of anything else.

[expat]

A decent old buffer.

His resemblance to a skull was quite uncanny. He used to scare me whenever he appeared on our telly when I was a nipper.

I remember my dad was quite upset when he lost to that duffer Wilson in 1964.

I didn't like Wilson, but I find myself in agreement with him on one thing: he always thought that his greatest achievement was setting up the Open University. I think he's right; and it is a case of a politician doing something more that shuffling the money around, but actually creating something and making something better.

[bogeyman]

I liked Alec Douglas Home. He never really did anything much. Best sort of PM to have.

A decent old buffer.

His resemblance to a skull was quite uncanny. He used to scare me whenever he appeared on our telly when I was a nipper.

I remember my dad was quite upset when he lost to that duffer Wilson in 1964.

[xoggoth]

I liked Alec Douglas Home. He never really did anything much. Best sort of PM to have.

[BoredBloke]

That's not really true though is it. Everybody knew at the last general election that Blair would likely step aside and it would very probably be Brown to replace him.

This whole "unelected" thing is just a bit of nonsense hysteria people have tried to whip up as a way of putting Brown down. It's all completely unnecessary: there are pleanty of genuine reasons to put Brown down.

That is true, most people did know this, but it didn't stop Blair promising to do a complete term when he was asked the question - but then they also promised a referendum in their manifesto so why be surprised when something else they promise in the run up to an election turns out to be a lie.

As to the voting of Blair/Brown/whoever, yes it is true to say that we vote for the party, but it is also true to say that the leader in charge does carry a lot of weight with the public. Labour went into the last election knowing that Brown could not carry off the election victory meaning Blair would give his promise to do a full term and then quit. That is the problem I have with it. When Thatcher was ousted, she fought the election beforehand believing that she would do a complete term - things changed and she didn't. Blair on the other hand stated that he would do a full term knowing full well that he wouldn't. The leader of the party is very important - how else do you think Major & co managed to beat Labour, not because he or his party was popular, but because Kinnock was not.

[moorfield]

Gordon Brown became Prime Minister on replacing Tony Blair as the leader of the governing party, without having to call a fresh General Election.

No less than four Conservative Prime Ministers since WWII took office the same way (Anthony Eden, Harold MAcmillan, Sir Alec Douglas-Home, and John Major.

Is this wrong? Or just when you don't like it?

But there was a slight difference, if you know your history....

Eden immediately called a General Election 1955, and won, and then had the decency to resign when he knew he'd ballsed up on Suez.

Macmillan then won the following election in 1959.

Douglas-Home, originally a toff, renounced his peerage to work in the Commons as PM, and then a called an election, which he lost, less than a year later.

[Alf W]

No PM is ever elected in the UK.

You beat me to it.

[The Lone Gunman]

No PM is ever elected in the UK.
Show me the ballot paper where we voted for one.

We elect MPs to the HoC. When the dust settles we see which party (or coalition) has a majority. The leader of that party (or coalition) then becomes PM (assuming they are the ones asked to form a Government).

All this "unelected" stuff is just nonsense.

[VectraMan]

The big difference with Brown was that Blair gave an undertaking that he would serve the full term, knowing full well that if he told the truth and people knew they would actually be getting Brown within months, nobody would vote for them.

That's not really true though is it. Everybody knew at the last general election that Blair would likely step aside and it would very probably be Brown to replace him.

This whole "unelected" thing is just a bit of nonsense hysteria people have tried to whip up as a way of putting Brown down. It's all completely unnecessary: there are pleanty of genuine reasons to put Brown down.

[NotAllThere]

... we don't vote for a president, we vote for a political party.

That's why Jim Hacker didn't get applauded when he took up his office at no. 10.

[TheBigYinJames]

Don't like him too much, but we live in a parliamentary democracy - we don't vote for a president, we vote for a political party.

Brown's sole job is to make the Blair years seem like a golden age by comparison.