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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Signs are that 2017 could be a big Westminster by-election yea
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Signs are that 2017 could be a big Westminster by-election year topping even 2016
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Should be fun.
Thanet South spending limit - £15,016.38
Total declared by Craig Mackinlay and his agent - £14,837.77
Breach yes - by election though? I think it's unlikely they will overturn the result.
Kippers will be very disappointed not to take the seat
Can you unknowingly overspend £185,000 plus?
Ahem - has John Curtice been reading PB. Because I made this precise point back in mid-October - 11. http://www2.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2016/10/14/cyclefree-with-a-mischievous-suggestion/.
Lab 460 Con 283
TSE are you taking odds on a 2017 by-election in South Thanet
"Italian reports say a man was killed in the shootout near the train station in Milan after he was stopped by police on a routine check in the early hours of Friday."
And he had apparently travelled from France.
I think UKIP would have a very decent chance tbh.
http://tinyurl.com/zpaxetb
BBC
Two men arrested in Germany on suspicion of planning attack in shopping centre in Oberhausen, police say https://t.co/teBKYJlMRH
Like all things in life, it's a question of trade offs.
On there being one.
I wouldn't favour routinely armed police, but training most police to use firearms and having the firearms in reserve might be a good idea. We currently have no ability to carry out the protective duties that the French police and military are doing during the state of emergency. I think we need to be able to match that.
4 people have been shot dead by police this year so far.
Are we really saying that that number wouldn't increase substantially?
Are there a higher proportion of gun-related deaths in those countries (by both criminals and police officers) than in the UK?
(P.S. Spotted a good typo just before posting: "gin-related deaths"!)
Every Hollywood film for 77 years was clearly talking rubbish!
Edit: and in today's other news for Merkel, that may be about to apply to banking as well;
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/38412816?client=safari
Besides that I don't want routine arming, but if in an emergency we do need an armed guard at every train station or whatever, it would be good if we could do that without having to rely on the army.
It's obviously not that simple, but it makes the EU look weak, naive, and unable to protect it's own citizens.
https://gov.uk/government/publications/2010-to-2015-government-policy-armed-forces-support-for-activities-in-the-uk/2010-to-2015-government-policy-armed-forces-support-for-activities-in-the-uk
One way and another, the last few weeks has looked suspiciously like the start of a handing over process.
Which makes me wonder about this reported cold the Queen had. She was feeing unwell so decided not to make a medium length journey by train. OK, fair enough. But she was fit the following day to travel by helicopter? That really doesn't make sense to me. I can imagine no circumstances where somebody would be too ill to travel in comfort at a moderate speed on a luxury train, then immediately after well enough to travel in a rough, noisy and probably cramped helicopter. The advantage however is that it is very quick - so somebody with a long term condition is not away from treatment for long,
Perhaps we're having the ground prepared for an announcement about either her or Prince Philip.
Or perhaps simply because getting from Germany to Italy involves going via either Switzerland, France or Austria.
Edited extra bit: longer to go via France, though. And I'm sure the French must be rather on edge given how bad the last year or two has been for them.
(Literally)
BREAKING: Maltese prime minister tweets that he has been informed of potential hijack situation of internal Libyan flight diverted to Malta
I hope this isn't like 1985
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/november/24/newsid_4356000/4356024.stm
I'm just looking out for the long term health of the Monarchy! Republicans everywhere need to be squashed and with the passing of the Queen they will take their opportunity. Maybe they see it and the plan is for the Queen to abdicate to Charles and when she does Charles will abdicate for William who will hold it for the long term.
Hijacked Libyan plane 'with 118 people on board' lands in Malta https://t.co/44CD6cR2D9 https://t.co/LSOn880zg7
The cost of securing long land borders is non-negligible, either in terms of the amount of manpower required, and in terms of the frictional costs on people in getting from a-to-b. Not only that, but long land borders are inherently porous. You can ski from Italy into Switzerland, for example, and no fence or wall is going to stop that.
So, as a country you have a choice: do you want to take the significant economic costs, inconvenience law abiding citizens, and which may still have only a limited effect on terrorists' ability to cross borders.
It's like this: we could cut road deaths 40% over night by dramatically reducing speed limits in the UK. But as a society there's been a tacit acceptance that the current limits have an acceptable casualty vs economics vs convenience trade off. The same is true of terrorism and crime.
In the early 1980s, with a major terrorist problem in Northern Ireland, and with IRA members flitting over the (Schengen-like) border without difficulty, Mrs Thatcher faced the same choice. Impose border controls and build a wall - with serious economic consequences on an already economically depressed region - or allow the terrorists to easily cross the border. They decided that the border could not be efficiently sealed, and therefore the costs were not worth it.
Now, you are free to say the countries of the Schengen zone (which, of course, includes Switzerland, who voted in a referendum to join), should prioritise prevention of terrorism. But I suspect they'll make the same calculation Mrs Thatcher made, and - except where there are obvious choke points that can be easily policed - leave the borders open.
It's so out of balance.
Tunisia is not a country from which people need to claim asylum.
Someone who comes to Europe, commits arson and goes to prison should have been sent back to Tunisia not allowed to roam freely around Europe.
Someone who was on the watch list of the German security services and was heard announcing that he wanted to be a suicide bomber should have been picked up.
Someone who lost his claim for asylum (why was such a claim even entertained?) should not have been given "leave to remain". Why, in God's name, would you give leave to remain to a convicted criminal who has no claim to asylum? What possible advantage to Europe - or any country within it - is there in having such a person within its borders?
At all stages the authorities have been weak, have turned a blind eye to the risks posed and have passed the problem onto others.
I have some sympathy for the German intelligence services. Their chancellor allows into the country a mass of people from areas of great instability, at a time when terrorism and extremism is rife and when terror organisations have said they will try to smuggle operatives in, in a short space of time and with little ability to do any sort of vetting and they are then expected to protect the German people from the consequences of a hurried and ill-thought out decision.
Even the national anthem is going to change!
"Tomorrow's @theheraldsun front page tonight #springst #auspol https://t.co/ckqUVAgCdC"
Do you belong to some fascist or islamaphobic website so you can distribute this sort of shit before anyone else?
If they are called to perform such duty, you have to acknowledge that there is a high chance of mistakes. Hence, they should only be used when you can be fairly sure (not certain) that the risk they are on the streets to prevent is greater than the risks from mistakes.
Much of the above depends on the type of emergency as well: if it is one where the population is in favour of them being there, the risks are much reduced over a NI-style situation.
As an aside, this morning's news is one of the reasons I'm nervous about stop and search being weakened. Police should be able to stop anyone on a hunch, without having to have perfectly good cause. On the other hand, individual policemen doing it too frequently, or for reasons other than public safety, should be weeded out.
It's a difficult call.
Not good news for Merkel despite her doing and saying the right things now.
It is not entirely surprising that he went on the run to Italy, having lived there for 4 years before moving to Germany.
That is what will increasingly happen if we don't control who comes into Europe.
Re NI, the borders weren't closed for all the reasons you describe. But the security services embarked on a pretty serious and, ultimately, successful campaign to make it difficult for the terrorists to operate. It's not at all clear that the same is being done by all the relevant European authorities in relation to the threat the whole of Europe faces from Islamist terrorism.
LDEM: 64.5% (+22.5)
CON: 25.2% (-2.4)
LAB: 10.3% (-1.7)
LDem HOLD
Cranleigh West (Waverley) result:
CON: 58.7% (+2.9)
LDEM: 29.1% (-1.0)
UKIP: 12.1% (+12.1)
Con HOLD.
Aylesham ward of Dover Council
Lab HOLD
"On the other hand, "Europe" caught him."
Hmm ... Came to Italy from Tunisia, served a long jail sentence, moved over to Germany and applied for asylum (who from?), watched by security forces until they got bored with him, commits atrocity, wanders back to Italy despite Germany's best efforts, and is shot dead in a "fortunate" meeting with Police. It seems that the EU was his playground.
If this were a black and white film by Mack Sennet, we could all applaud.
Yes, I know you were joking.