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There you go, twice in two posts
“Monbiot has written some great stuff. I don’t agree with everything he says but he’s one of the decent journalists/authors with a moral compass.“
When “moral compass” includes reportedly retweeting entirely false child sex abuse allegations about someone and then naming them on Twitter.
Johnathan Pie sums it up perfectly
When “moral compass” includes reportedly retweeting entirely false child sex abuse allegations about someone and then naming them on Twitter.
Yep. He admits that was stupid.
An interesting read from the Guardian
The Tories May think they’ve won - the stats tell a different story
Hopefully those 3.5 million young voters who’ve registered can overturn the wishes of the reactionary racist old Brexiteer giffers
Jezza did will there (sticks in the craw a bit)
I really noticed he stuck to his ethos of not taking personal cheapshots. Shame because BoJo left a few open goals for him and he didn't go for them. Might have been more effective if he had.
I really noticed he stuck to his ethos of not taking personal cheapshots.
It’s okay. If you watched Have I Got News For You straight afterwards, they threw all the cheapshots you could want at the Johnsons.
People know what Johnson is… there is no point Corbyn wasting time reminding people of that in a debate format (I didn’t see this one), he’s better of using the time to reassure viewers about how he would act if he was PM himself.
People know what Johnson is… there is no point Corbyn wasting time
They know who he is and they still plan on voting for him.
I suppose I'm so used to the usual mud slinging that the absence of it really struck. Johnson would leave an opening like talking about how he would support business - Corbyn could have quoted Johnson's f**" business back at him - didn't. There were a bunch like that.
People know what Johnson is… there is no point Corbyn wasting time reminding people of that
Your conclusion is correct, but your premise isn't.
Some people know what Johnson is, some think "eh, lovable rogue, my kind of guy, he really speaks to me" whilst queuing up at the food bank.
Hopefully those 3.5 million young voters who’ve registered can overturn the wishes of the reactionary racist old Brexiteer giffers
You, relying on the vote of 6th formers.
But yes, everyone under 30 should be forced to vote. That may be the only thing that saves us from the selfish and bitter over 45s creating such a horrible country.
Don’t mention 6th formers this early, you’ll wake Binners up!
The press reporting seems to be from another planet:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-papers-50695198
A heavy pro Boris lean is my interpretation. I hope their sales keep shrinking.
That may be the only thing that saves us from the selfish and bitter over 45s creating such a horrible country.
lolz
So in the super Brexity area where I live my mum works in a carpet shop and a customer came in this morning and said the cash machine isn't working because the Polish are drawing too much money out.
That is what connects Boris to the electorate. That stupid, illogical, racist mindset.
Problem is youth don't vote in anywhere near the numbers older voters do
I'm guessing that's why we are going to be stuck with another 5 years of austerity & a decade more of these poisonous negotiations
https://twitter.com/GoodwinMJ/status/1203066744119709696?s=09
I reckon enough postal votes are in that they know the red wall seats are loat
lolz
Glad you find it funny. The first time voters I know are mad as hell about where the older generations are forcing them to go. Denying them all the chances, rights and opportunities we had at their age, but now no longer need for ourselves.
Glad you find it funny. The first time voters I know are mad as hell about where the older generations are forcing them to go. Denying them all the chances, rights and opportunities we had at their age, but now no longer need for ourselves.
kelvin, there's too many frankly derogatory assumptions made on here and wish it would stop. I watched the debate last night and, as a most certainly over 45 year old, saw right through Johnson and his "get it done" mantra. Am not convinced that everyone over 45 years old will be voting Tory, I've said on here before that I last voted for them some 20 years ago. People can see how extreme they've become, you've even got an ex PM telling the public not to vote for them.
Am not convinced that everyone over 45 years old will be voting Tory
If course not “everyone” is. But if you think there isn’t a generational divide when it comes to who voters are supporting, and what they want to happen as regards Brexit, you can go ahead and point us to any study, survey or polling that suggests otherwise.
Wonderfully written piece that sums up the awfulness of it all.
If you disagree you can go ahead and point me to any general election result in the past 9 years that suggests otherwise.
If you can point me in the direction of a study that shows all English people are the same, then go ahead.
The English are selfish bastards who would rather vote to keep another 1p in their wallets and purses than pay extra to fund public services.
If you disagree you can go ahead and point me to any general election result in the past 9 years that suggests otherwise.
The majority of votes did not go to the tories. Unfortunately thanks to FPTP, the majority of seats did.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election/2017/results
If you can point me in the direction of a study that shows all English people are the same, then go ahead.
Sure. Just after you've pointed me in the direction of a study that shows all over 45 year olds are the same.
Some really nice people donate to the tories eh?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2019-50686045
A co-founder of Hargeaves Lansdown, one of the UK's largest financial services companies, Peter Hargreaves is estimated to be worth £3.3bn. He was a major supporter of the Leave.EU campaign during the EU referendum, donating £3.2m. He predicted the Brexit vote would be "the biggest stimulus to get our butts in gear that we have ever had….It will be like Dunkirk again."
FFS. I'm going to need to move my Stocks and Shares ISA now.
The English are
selfishbastardswho would rather vote to keep another 1p in their wallets and purses than pay extra to fund public services.
Aye, had my suspicions for a while now...
binners
Subscriber
An interesting read from the GuardianThe Tories May think they’ve won – the stats tell a different story
Hopefully those 3.5 million young voters who’ve registered can overturn the wishes of the reactionary racist old Brexiteer giffers
See if you watch any of the debates, it's been very noticeable that the cheersleaders on either side have been very low, ie the ones that will clap anything that comes out of their favourites mouth. Been thinking for a while that that probably means there's an awful lot of floating voters out there too.
Thanks for that crazy-legs. Especially
Boris Johnson, who looks like something you’d keep your pyjamas in, and who no reasonable person would choose to lead them into a chorus, has a strangely hunched demeanour; perhaps from all the time he spends crammed inside married women’s wardrobes, like a randy jack-in-the-box.
BOINK!
This confused sex yeti...
ARGYARGHWHAT?
...has been booed by nurses: people who can remove a dressing, examine a festering wound, and still look up at you with a smile.
Bravo
With a delivery best approximated as a living checklist of stroke warnings, his bumbling posho shtick almost resembles buffering, a kind of 3G Wodehouse. He doesn’t even seem to enjoy it; throughout the campaign he’s sported a face that looks as if it’s been kneaded by a baker going through a particularly bitter divorce, and the irony that comes into his eyes every time he crowbars in a catchphrase means that he breaks the fourth wall more than Deadpool. We thought the office of prime minister was what he lived for, his consuming ambition. It’s all been a bit like hearing Tony The Tiger talk about his diabetes.
Back of the net. All well and good, but let’s be honest this just makes the naughty cuddly Bumps and Trorises of the world even more popular with the man in the street. Teflon. Any publicity is good publicity. Populism works like that. Acerbic and clever comedians either missed that memo or are simply cashing in on the wave like every other cynical grifter,
I wish I had 10% of the dignity shown by David Merritt.
I just cannot begin to comprehend how anyone could vote in such a way that supports Boris.
….It will be like Dunkirk again.
One of the most humiliating defeats in British history? Sounds roughly correct.
Am not convinced that everyone over 45 years old will be voting Tory,
Of course they won't but around 45 is the tipping point where more than 50% are Tory. Once past that age it just gets worse and worse.
As I said, a lot of that is selfishness (they have done alright by then so bring up drawbridge, cut public services as they don't need them - although they are in for a surprise when they are 80)
Kerley, what's your problem with over 45's?
To quote you.....'As I said, a lot of that is selfishness (they have done alright by then so bring up drawbridge, cut public services as they don’t need them – although they are in for a surprise when they are 80)'.
There is no evidence to support that ill-informed assertion.
Why are you so bitter?
kerley
Member
Of course they won’t but around 45 is the tipping point where more than 50% are Tory. Once past that age it just gets worse and worse.
You realise the graphic you posted disagrees? At 40-49, more people vote Labour.50-59 is where the tipping point is. And getting older, interestingly.
One of the most humiliating defeats in British history? Sounds roughly correct.
Might want to re-read your history.....
Even Churchill described it as a disaster. 60,000 killed or wounded, complete German supremacy, thousands of French troops slaughtered to buy us time, all the BEF heavy equipment abandoned..
Only a tactical cockup by the Germans allowed our evacuation.
kerley - do you know who owns YouGov? There is a Tory connection!
45 years old here and absolutely no chance of voting Conservative. If anything, I’m more vehemently anti-Tory than ever. I’m also happy to pay more tax for better services too.
You realise the graphic you posted disagrees? At 40-49, more people vote Labour.50-59 is where the tipping point is. And getting older, interestingly.
Well, I tend to disagree with this. Somewhere between 40 and 60 must be a point where we are at 50/50. The relative closeness of the scores in the 40-49 cohort and the wider gap in the 50-59s suggests to me that this tipping point happens somewhere in the mid to late 40s. I suspect that more detailed data is out there somewhere.
It's not an generic insult to all over 45s anyway, as even at 50/50 half of them are still supporting Labour, it is just that more of them are 'tending' to support the Tories than younger people. For whatever reason.
45 years old here and absolutely no chance of voting Conservative. If anything, I’m more vehemently anti-Tory than ever.
I share this position, I'm 49 and are more vehemently anti-Tory than ever, and I can't see that trend reversing into my 60s and beyond (unless I go senile, obviously) - I wonder whether, after the experience of the past few years, the trend of older=more Tory will reverse and you'll get a substantial and persistent Labour vote emerging.
A wee theory I've built- its Johnson's team that are doing the recent leaks, via Corbyn.
The latest this week was NI, and the border, which we all knew was the way it was going to go. This report, like the others before it, was suppressed.
So why is it out there now?
Simple- BJ doesn't need the DUP any more.
See if this makes sense to you- he's needed them up to now for supply and comfort, and its cost him politically (and financially). Clearly, he's rather dispense with them- but can only do so if the parliamentary arithmetic works out.
Up until very recently, this wasn't certain. But now that TBP are on the retreat, and its high-profile members (Annunziata Rees-Mogg and others) are advising members to vote for the Cons as an avenue to hard Brexit*, the DUP can be sidelined.
So why release the report? Simple. To convince the faithful that he's serious about delivering a hard Brexit- they all know, deep down, that NI is the obvious cost of HB, and by getting this report out there he shows that he's up for doing it.
Corbyn, sadly, has to run with this and make any capital that he can.
*TBP is now revealed for what its always been- a pressure group designed to whip the Cons into line.
Further evidence- when Gavin Williamson spilled the Huawei report this year, May instantly flushed him out via an internal inquiry. No such inquiries have been forthcoming on any of the recent 'leaks'.
For whatever reason.
Fear, the tories are masters at creating, selling and capitalising on fear.
Labour sell hope.
It's after 40 that all the hopes you had when you were young are squeezed out of you by experiance, and fear starts to take a more prominent role in your psych. At least for most people IMO.
It’s not an generic insult to all over 45s anyway
Of course it isn’t. And you also get plenty of youngsters (some privileged, some just right wing) who voted for Brexit and will vote Tory. But, when it comes down to it… it is mostly the older generations that voted to close Europe off to young workers and will vote Tory despite the further effect it will have on the education system and other services that so many young people could benefit from.
https://twitter.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/1203347824789856256?s=09
Come on!
I don't trust any of the polls but I need the hope!
Cock up and humiliating defeat are not the same thing. The battle for Western France was a defeat and a cockup. The battle for Dunkirk was anything but. They were successful in fighting to the sea, in maintaining a beachhead against incredible odds,the "cheese eating surrender monkeys" held off 5 divisions with a battalion to allow 370,000 troops to escape. The ordinary people who took their pleasure craft into a war zone to exfiltrate those troops with no thought for themselves. No one involvwd in that shoukd feel either humiliated or defeated. A little bit more of that attitude and maybe brexit wouldn't be a thing. Nor would the Tories.
I don’t trust any of the polls but I need the hope!
I think quite a few of us will take any hope we can get, me included.
Another 40 something that’s never been more anti Tory than I am now.
If anything, it’s fear of what the Conservatives will continue do to the poor/vulnerable that have driven that.
Dr Bob Gill's latest film "The Great NHS Heist" and worth a watch.
Can I just say 65+ and as above? I know a lot like me too.
I'm in my 40's too and am more anti-Tory than at any stage in my life
I'll be voting tactically to try and get rid of the Tories from my seat (~1800 majority currently)
I can't ever foresee a situation where I would consider voting Tory, I cannot forgive them for what they've done to this country
I'm in Fife where the SNP beat the LibDems by just 2 votes in 2017. I'll likelyu vote SNP this time rather than LibDems as I think there's less risk of them getting into bed with the Cons. Plus the LibDems revoke Brexit policy seems immature & their dodgy campaign leaflet figures made them look like they were joining the current fashion for lies. Plus Sturgeon seems like an adult politician compared with the rest. I'd consider Labour if they weren't a distant 3rd here, but FPTP makes voting for them pointless.
I just wish the SNP would tone down the IndyRef2 talk a bit & not be so pushy about getting it in 2020; I voted no in IndyRef1 but would probabl vote Yes in IndyRef2 - but only if the UK had already Brexit'ed. I guess it'd be a bit politically muddy for SNP to campaign this election like that though. Ho-hum, interesting but worrying times.
I'm 60, never voted Tory in my life and definitely not going to start now. They disgust me, and I just cannot understand why anyone would vote for them. I'll be voting tactically in the hope of keeping them out in my constituency.
kerley – do you know who owns YouGov? There is a Tory connection!
For a polling company, letting political bias skew their results is commercial suicide. It's just bad business. So they don't.
The English are selfish bastards who would rather vote to keep another 1p in their wallets and purses than pay extra to fund public services.
Scots are no different. The SNP went nowhere while they had their 'Penny for Scotland' policy. As soon as they dropped it their vote picked up dramatically.
Plus Scotland's had tax raising powers for yonks now and they *still* haven't put income tax up to be significantly more than the rest of uk.
The Lib dems have a 1p increase in income tax policy this time (I've voted for it) and their leader is highly likely to lose her Scottish Seat.
So it's not an exclusively English/Welsh/Irish problem by any means.
Stereotypically I should vote Tory. I'm probably one of the top 1% richest people in the this country, let alone the world.
But I work for charities, pet cats, play guitar and ride bikes and vote for who I think will help poor folk best, not me - I'm pretty much insulated from anything a government does.
For a polling company, letting political bias skew their results is commercial suicide. It’s just bad business. So they don’t.
+1.
And as with all crazy conspiracy theories you have to explain how it's been kept secret. Yougov must employ dozens of professional actuarial types. How you going to keep all of them quiet when they swap jobs and go to a competitor?
Stereotypically I should vote Tory. I’m probably one of the top 1% richest people in the this country, let alone the world.
Yep, and mine is all down to luck (genetics, finding high paid jobs that suit my ability) but we are clearly not selfish and would like life to be better for the less fortunate.
A lot of people don't.
A wee theory I’ve built- its Johnson’s team that are doing the recent leaks, via Corbyn.
Nah, it is the Russkies again.
This destabilization of other countries and blocs is the stock in trade of the likes of Vladislav Surkov. Keep everyone guessing, chasing their own tails until no one knows what is true and what isn’t. That way Putin et al get to play the ‘it is a dangerous world out there, fellow citizens, but you are uniquely lucky to have steady hands like us to look after you’ card.
They will often do things that seem counter to their own interests, but you have to remember it is the uncertainty they cause outside of Russia that is their true aim.
we are clearly not selfish and would like life to be better for the less fortunate.
Unless you both make significant donations to the Treasury in accordance with what you think you ought to be contributing there's zero cause for the mutual back slapping.
'Member
A wee theory I’ve built- its Johnson’s team that are doing the recent leaks, via Corbyn.
Nah, it is the Russkies again.'
No, its Johnson 🙂 that Russian thing has already been discredited.
that Russian thing has already been discredited.
Linky?
I’m in Fife where the SNP beat the LibDems by just 2 votes in 2017
My work mate lives in Fife in Stephen Gethin's constituency - on the day of the 2017 election he asked me who they should vote for as they weren't 100% sure what was best to deny the Tories. I suggested that in that constituency probably the SNP. That evening he and his partner both voted SNP.
Next morning the look on his face was priceless
I was 50 this year and have never voted conservative, and hope to christ I never have to. But, and it's a big but, suppose one day something worse comes along and looks like it might take your seat? Would you tactically vote tory to keep out farage?
I remember growing up through the Thatcher years, the national misery of it all, the degradation of communities and the massive increase in personal greed and wealth. The endless Steve Bell cartoons. On a personal level my family was torn about by government policy, and probably never recovered. Toward the end of those years I worked in areas decimated by the destruction of industry, god it was pitiful even to someone's eyes who had seen nothing better. And then, and then...the Blair years of hope and prospects and what seemed like a fair crack of life's whip. Things worked, life seemed sensible and smoking got banned in public places.
And then the stupid bastard took the yankee dollar and ****ed it all.
Lets not forget wee Gordie though, even then there was hope and what I think was respect. I didn't listen to the radio on the way to work and think 'my god I am actually Sarah Connor'. Michael Gove didn't exist in that world. We laughed at ghouls like Duncan Smith and Mogg because that is what they were. Now, they have the wheel.
I'm a moderate, left of centre kind of guy but it seems to me that by and large I have been a loser in my short time on earth. Not on a personal scale - I have a nice life that I wouldn't change - but on a geopolitical scale. Despite everything, all the evidence to the contrary, vast swathes of the country can't get enough of being treated badly, disdainfully and without respect.
I reject that from anybody, let alone a Government, and so should you.
Years ago I found myself by chance having breakfast with a random priest in a cafe. I am the least religious guy on the street but I do enjoy a blather now and then. Anyway, I have no recollection of what he said apart from one thing -
'when everything else has gone, you will always have hope'.
Opinium have a very different poll
No movement at all for any party in well over a week?
Balls I say.
So it’s not an exclusively English/Welsh/Irish problem by any means.
You might want to read the post above mine
Near 50 and never more anti labour. If I was poor and/or northern maybe, or expect the state to support me, but im none of these. Boris it is 🙂
Wipe yer tears haters!!
Wipe yer tears haters!!
50 years old, and using words expected out of the mouths from spoiled amarican teenage brats, definitely a tory.
No movement at all for any party in well over a week?
Balls I say.
The polls mean nothing this time. There's no accurate way to deduce seats from the numbers.
We'll find out next Friday and not before.
Let’s hope daveylad’s luck doesn’t change, and he never expects the state to support him. Don’t one in three of us get cancer though? I wouldn’t take the risk and vote assuming that it would never be me that misfortune would fall upon. The tears may yet come for you daveylad, and we would genuinely feel for you, and be happy to pay our share for the NHS to be there for you.
We're 99% certain to sell-up and move to Scotland in the new year - even my wife who is English wants to see the back of this shit-show. She's spent 15 years as carer for her disabled mother and has got nothing to show for it - no money, no pension. I'm 55, spent the last 18 months trying to get a business off the ground, spent a fair chunk of my redundancy and its dire - nobody is spending any money and that isn't going to change soon. We can release enough equity from our house sale to buy a cheaper house, top-up my pension and at least move somewhere nice where half the population aren't small-minded, self-entitled dicks.
Mrs Binners is very proud today. She’s a Wigan Lass and this is where she’s from ‘welcoming’ Joris Bohnson
Boris Johnson abandons Lancashire visit after protesters take over towns high street
Scuttling off back to London with his tail between his legs 😂
we would genuinely feel for you, and be happy to pay our share for the NHS to be there for you.
So would a Tory voter, so would a Tory Government. So would someone voting for pretty much any other party in the UK.
The Conservatives have been running the NHS for ~44 years of its ~71 year of History. (Labour have been running it for ~27 years.) Every time there's an election we're been told the Torys will sell of the NHS and every time they don't.
Labour are spending a pittance on the NHS - 3bn more than is already planned when they had 58bn spare! (We know they had 58bn spare because they were later able to allocate it to WASPI women.) So with 61bn sitting about un-allocated they chose to spend only 3bn on the NHS:
https://www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/factcheck-labours-nhs-rescue-plan
Crying wolf doesn't even work - as things stand 36pc of people think the Torys have the best HS policy against 34pc who think Labour do.
Mrs Binners is very proud today. She’s a Wigan Lass and this is where she’s from ‘welcoming’ Joris Bohnson
"Cakes now being packed away"
🙂
Labour are spending a pittance on the NHS – 3bn more than is already planned
The issue is that Johnson is lying he won't spend that money
And labours money back to councils could ease the burden on the nhs
somewhere nice where half the population aren’t small-minded, self-entitled dicks.
Whereas in Scotland 38% are small-minded, self-entitled dicks. If avoiding Leavers is the objective move to Cambridge.
...and since the vast majority of Scottish seats have gone to no-deal Leavers (of the UK) aren't you just going somewhere with even more Nationalist small-minded, self-entitled dicks?
If you'd said were going for the scenery and the lower population density I'd agree with you.
The issue is that Johnson is lying he won’t spend that money
If my reading of the link is correct that isn't relative to Johnson's promise, that's relative to
the current planned spending.
Either way Labour are promising a pittance on the NHS - unless you think the current funding is pretty must adequate it's fairly obvious that 3bn is not enough - healthcare inflation is brutal and we know Labour tens of billions up their sleeve which they chose to leave unspent rather than give to the NHS.
So would a Tory voter,
True.
so would a Tory Government.
Have you read anything written by any of the current government about how provision of, and payment for, healthcare should be transformed in future. Go do so now. This is not just another Tory Government about to be elected, and people who have voted Tory in the past only have a few days to wake the **** up and realise that.
Holy shit. Just got word from MIL! She’s ****ing livid. And so am I. She was canvassed at her door by someone (after talking) claiming to be (or represent) her local ‘LibDem’ candidate. Left a card with a name. MIL looked them up, turns out they are the Brexit candidate (or at least the name on the card is)
Dirty pool.
Ask a previous Tory Prime Minister…
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jun/05/john-major-nhs-risk-brexit-pythons-johnson-and-gove
However, he went on to claim Gove had wanted to privatise the NHS, Johnson wished to charge people for health services and Duncan Smith advocated moving to a social insurance system.
“The NHS is about as safe with them as a pet hamster would be with a hungry python”
daveylad :Near 50 and never more anti labour. If I was poor and/or northern maybe, or expect the state to support me, but im none of these. Boris it is 🙂
Wipe yer tears haters!!
47 here, spent the past 26 years of my life scrimping and living on disability benefits due to severe spinal injury back in 1991 but i have always worked as much as possible despite a multitude of problems over the years, for the past 3 years i have been going downhill very fast with secondary progressive multiple sclerosis, which was undiagnosed till i demanded a second opinion, then a final third opinion back in 2017 where i was told i most likely have have had MS undiagnosed/untreated for the past 20+ years...There was a possibility of getting onto a genetic modification study to alter the gut microbiome/immune system to slow down the progression and isolate the damage in my brain but thanks to the brexit vote that was cancelled. I guess I'm being honest when i say i have not got too long to go before i decide to pull the plug, got my exit plan in place long ago, my family/close friends understand my reasoning for this. Im fiercely independent and absolutely hate the fact that i need help for pretty much everything these days and whilst i still have use of my hands that is fading fast, numbness/ tingling/ feeling like my body is on fire one minute then freezing cold the next minute, muscle spasms that lock me rigid yet all they can offer is heavy sedation so whats the point?.
You sound like a good candidate for testing my exit procedure, care to offer me your address so i can end your ****ing selfish life you utter ****ing prick, you are playing with peoples lives, this is not merely a game to those you look down upon.
Near 50 and never more anti labour. If I was poor and/or northern maybe,
Some people are poor though. Don't you care about what happens to them? Don't you want to help them improve their lives?
So would a Tory voter, so would a Tory Government
You do realise that the NHS funding has risen an average of 4% pa since it's inception. This Tory government has averaged .5% pa. That is not a Tory government willing to spend on the NHS. Except during election campaigns. Never when they are actually government.
we’re been told the Torys will sell of the NHS and every time they don’t.
They sold off the blood plasma unit to an offshoot of Mitt Romney's empire. The unit that had remained in govt hands precisely because of fears over the safety of the supply in private hands. Bain capital bought it for 200 million, held for a couple of years and then sold it for 800 million. Know who owns it now? The Chinese.
NHS spending on private providers has doubled since 2010. It's their 2012 Care act that makes it possible for private companies to sue the NHS if they are prevented from bidding to run profitable bits.
Wouldn't sell it off my left bollock. Do you get this stuff straight from Dom Cummings email blasts?
Huge chunks of NHS service delivery have been sold off, that has been the major contributor to inefficiency in the past 10 years, not the fabled army of bureaucracy. For the tories the NHS has become a major tool for syphoning tax payers money into private hands.
The demographic thing is interesting to me and I have an obvious theory.
I'm 49 and have never voted any further right-wing than lib dem (back when there was still a glint of actual liberal in them). Those of us my age and fiercely anti-tory will have grown up during the 80s and will have come of voting age at the heights of Maggie's power.
Anyone with even a smudge of humanity will have seen what that government did to the working class I grew up as part of, even if they weren't directly affected by it. I have no idea how you could live through that and still think a Tory government has any empathy for the 99% at all.
I think (hope) that the boomers may well be the last majority 'automatic' Tory voters we see for a while until the circle turns again. Gen X and onwards will hopefully be increasingly empathetic and community-minded in their political choices...