wild card

Scrounger prize goes to IDS whose family estate has had 1.5 million E in handouts in last 10 yrs old article http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/jul/01/farm-subsidies-blatant-transfer-of-cash-to-rich … …

So the government is still trying to shift the mindset of the public to blame the poorest people in society for the lack of resources? Not a tactic that should be encouraged by their spin doctors as more are becoming wise to the propaganda. If punishment and/or recouping funds is a government objective, surely they should start where the biggest monetary fraud is? Also where there is a more realistic chance of actually getting funds back. http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2013/09/16/10-years-for-benefit-fraud-is-absurd-when-99-of-tax-fraudsters-walk-away-with-their-anonymity-intact/

http://www.sourcewire.com/news/79300/how-long-will-england-hold-out-against-a-carrier-bag http://www.rethinkwasteni.org/at-home/reduce/carrierbaglevy/ Previous to the charge in NI, I would have taken a bag if visiting local shops on foot, but rarely would I have brought bags when doing a big shop. Of course, I do now. Habits change quickly when there's little choice. There are noticeably fewer bag decorated hedges and trees, where I am, anyway. .

This thread needs to be pinned. It's taking me forever and a day to get through it all, but well worth the time. idiot edit it is pinned now!

Saw on a previous page that the 5p from plastic bag sale in NI is apparently given to charity - in reality it goes to the Department of the Environment. It will be interesting next April to see the break down of how this money was divided. Also keen to see how much the running and administration costs are. http://www.nidirect.gov.uk/carrier-bag-levy

Hard to find a stick big enough for such an enormous job. My guess is that the method of discrediting him will be child pornography.

Some interesting business customer comments on the RBS site regarding borrowing. http://www.rbs.com/news/2013/07/independent-lending-review.html

Been a long time since I looked at the prices in Carrick so I can't really comment on the value for £'s. I did live there for a while and had the same concerns as you re: paramilitary issues. There are a couple of estates in Carrick which are 'known' for activity, however we never encountered any problems or concerns at all. Unless you plan to live in sunnylands I would not envisage any reason for concern at all. It used to take a mind blowing 70 minutes to travel the 12 miles into Belfast for a 9am start. That was the reason for leaving. The new road should lower this considerably. There are practically no shops, barr Tesco with the town centre looking fairly empty at the minute - but you have the Abbey Centre just a few miles down the road. The restaurants are good and always busy. There are some good schools also, not just the grammar but the integrated school Ulidia is very popular. I quite liked Carrick, and can think of a whole lot of worse places in which to live.

"The stabilisation in prices is encouraging greater activity, albeit we are still some way off what would be considered healthy transaction volumes. Trading up is still constrained as people who bought in the last 10 years have not been able to build inflation equity." Trading up may be somewhat constrained by the lack of 'inflation equity' - perhaps - but the Buy to Let brigade don't trade up,and they have bought a substantial amount of what would otherwise have been starter houses - the bottom rung of the ladder (hateful metaphor - apologies) is getting smaller. \ / the ladder is broken... and no-one saw it coming edited as my ladder looked like a two fingered salute - or perhaps that the way it should remain?

"The Canadian watchdog said lawyers acting for the cooperating bank had told it that traders at six banks on the yen Libor panel—Citigroup Inc., Deutsche Bank AG, HSBC Holdings PLC, J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., Royal Bank of Scotland Group PLC and UBS—"entered into agreements to submit artificially high or artificially low" quotes, according to the court documents" Old but interesting read from Wall Street Journal in February which names some of the traders involved. Its pay wall but I think if you copy and paste this link you should get it. http://74.6.117.48/search/srpcache?ei=UTF-8&p=wall+street+journal+Traders+Manipulated+Key+Rate,+Bank+Says&fr=aaplw&u=http://cc.bingj.com/cache.aspx?q=wall+street+journal+Traders+Manipulated+Key+Rate,+Bank+Says&d=4957522444487585&mkt=en-US&setlang=en-US&w=1f3ed642,cdceb1df&icp=1&.intl=us&sig=IF.YUSA5Tns4zweu2cHihw-- I doubt this will go away.

I went into full time education 3 years ago and university 2 years ago aged 46. Really don't see what the problem is. Tax man has had 25 years of NI + tax from me already and will get the student loan repaid too. Student loan applicable as this is my first degree. If you already have a degree you don't get SL for a second one and have to pay full price. Tutors are very open about liking mature students as we seem to attend all lectures, less likely to drop out and engage fully with the course. Reckon I have a good 20 years of working ahead of me so why shouldn't I do something that will provide me with some satisfaction and employment too? I went to the same university at the same time as my son which he found hilarious. I would thoroughly recommend it.

It will put off some landlords but only the ones who shouldn't be or don't want to be landlords anyway. All 'occupations' and 'investment' opportunities are subject to change. Such is life. Any decent landlord with a long term plan will not be put off by sensible regulation. Providing decent housing is a responsible position and should only be done by those who understand this and are willing to comply with set procedures. And for the landlords who say they will simply refuse HB tenants, well, when faced with a HB tenant or no tenant I have no doubt which they will choose. Although a lot of landlords state no HB, the reality is, that they do accept it. During 2010/2011 £361.4m was paid to the private sector for HB claims in NI. This does include housing association rent too but a substantial amount of this is paid to private landlords. http://www.nihe.gov.uk/housing_benefit/ That's too big a pot for landlords to lose or ignore. So regardless of whether LL's want HB tenants or not they may be financially forced to comply with regulation and accept HB tenants. So BTL will be less appealing for new comers but LL's already in the market may just find themselves stuck with it. Of course the LL's will try to pass on the increase cost of regulation to tenants. But if rents are unaffordable, then no amount of wishful thinking by the LL's will change that. They will be forced to accept what they can get, have empty properties or get out. Nobody ever forced anybody to become a LL so if they don't like it they can always sell up That would also provide more houses for sale. We should also have a Tenants Ombudsman, deposit protection and landlords should be licensed. Nobody ever asks for working peoples rent to be paid directly from employer to landlord. I wonder is there any evidence that HB tenants are more likely to not pay their rent or is the perception based on stereotypes media whipped into our society to hide the cesspit of tax avoidance and large scale fraud at the top.

Slightly off topic - one person in my class left his flat last week as the house was repossessed. Another one leaving at the end of May - same reason. Different landlords. The guy who has left had planned to keep the tenancy during the summer and for the next year. Got a letter from the court which was addressed to the occupier, when he went to the letting agent, the agent knew nothing about it.

I had to park in Palestine Street yesterday morning. The street was disgusting. Rubbish all over it. Bins overflowing and open. Bags of rubbish scattered outside the houses. Boarded up houses decorated with graffiti, beer tins and vodka bottles on the street - numerous to let signs! I was a bit worried leaving my car there. Walking up to Queens two very drunk girls bumped into me and laughed. Saw a black bra and some other pieces of underwear swinging from a tree. It was 9.20am. Lived in this area 24/25 years ago - we might have occasionally been a bit loud but it was not like this.

The auctions closed now. Would be interested to know who she was a BDM for? Was it one of the mortgage lenders? Any body know?