All these damn rules controlling every aspect of life!

[Brian Sharrock]

Hmmm, you seem to have elided many of the points I made .... could you not _clearly_ see all of my post? Is this failure an artefact/defect of your browser/news-reader/OS (Risc

4.2(?))?

[John Cartmell]

I removed the stream of consciousness and spelling errors that you had left [didn't appreciate that a SNIP would be required for that] - along with my sig. that your software failed to deal with correctly. If you must use Microsoft products you do really need to add those extra bits to bring them up to basic competency.

My mail & news reader software (Pluto 3.04c) does meet the GNKSA standards (unlike Microsoft OE) and the decision not to take you to task for misspelling Qercus and everything was entirely mine and nothing to do with RISC OS 4.02. ;-)

[Brian Sharrock]

Erm, _quercus_ is an oak/acorn reference. Quercus is not a misspelling of a botanical name. Granted it's not the particular misspelling that you've apparently adopted adopted for commercial purposes.. I routinely snip blatant commercial touting 'signature'.

Now can you address how you _clearly_ knew that I'd never paid Rates?

[Dave Plowman (News)]

My mother - who was the typical widow living on her own in the family house that it was said to help - ended up paying more with the poll tax than rates. The rating system being an old and refined tax had more sophisticated rebates for those of low income. Even as a lifelong Tory she wasn't impressed.

[Capitol]

Your poll tax was much lower than your rates, because you were paying only for the services which you utilised. Central government was finding the rest of the money by controlling public expenditure. At the present time, Central government is pushing government expenditure onto the local authorities, hence causing the massive (66% IIRC) increases in council tax. The proposed revaluation exercise now mooted is purely another way of increasing tax revenue(20% AIUI) without raising income tax. However, with the slow down in high street spending( Down again in today's report) and real unemployment now rising as a result of high oil prices, the chickens are coming home to roost. Tax revenue may actually be still rising in the retail sector as say 60% of petrol costs are tax compared to 17.5% on the high street. However when people have no job, they, to a first approximation, don't buy petrol!

Regards Capitol

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember andymason79 saying something like:

That dangerous old hag? No thanks.

[:::Jerry::::]

Stop talking about yourself, cretin.

[:::Jerry::::]

True to a point. One thing though, are you talking about just one big private 'British Railways Ltd.' or BR being split up, the former would have caused more problems than it would have solved, the latter would have worked if the railways had gone back to regional companies (with running powers over shared lines and for running block trains etc.) - much of the problem with the railways system as privatise is due to fragmentation of income sources.

Airlines etc don't need subsidies(unless

efficiency due

capital,

Would that not have an effect on the use of the railways system? Public Transport needs to be accessible for to be used (rather than people just using their own cars etc.), some services need to be subsidised - not for the benefit of the company or share holders but for the benefit of those who use the system.

[:::Jerry::::]

liquidation. A

finally

turn it

BMW had no intention to even try, it was a 'Cherry Picking' exercise, they wanted certain parts of the company only.

[Mr Fuxit]

Well, when all's said and done, you know where you are with the Tories------------it's just that it's no fun being there without a paddle!

[:::Jerry::::]

Well yes, but at least one was left with the boat...