Oh Dear, Looks Like New Voters Can't Be Bothered.....

[ToraToraTora]

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cl775w11nr1o

Apparently 4.5 million first time voters have yet to register. Most of them will not vote Tory so a worry for The Knights of the Lib Non dems and Labour.

The number is not in the link butit was mentioned on the 6 oclock news on the BBC.

[ToraToraTora]

untitled: "yes she did. she got as many of you as possible to buy houses as easily as possible and then threw everything but the kitchen sink at ensuring the value of those houses would increase explosively." - well she wanted to create home owners because they tend to be better wealth creators for the country. For what it's worth we were lucky not to get thrown out, let alone get a mortgage to buy the place. I never bought a council house, my first place was a 2 bed flat bought at market value.

"you don't think of it as an advantage because you prefer to pat yourself on the back for a job well done." - I did not buy a council house.

"but the reason they introduced this change was to create a generation of loyal tories... and here you all are".

OK but I am not a tory because of her, I'm a tory because of your hard line socialist mates. They were the disease, she was the cure. They created the conditions for her to exist.

"that same cohort who got a massive shot in the arm from thatcher are now 40 years older and they are pretty much the last tories standing. "

Well we'll lose this election but out of 124 years of Labour they have ben in power for less than 24 of them. So I would not write us off.

You seem obssessed with the council house policy but TGL did much much more to create the "cohort" you refer to. She showed us that no matter how lowly you can use your skills to make a better life for yourself and at the same time help the country. I may technically be a BB but in my heart and head I'm Gen X and I am proud of the advances we made. I'm from the lowest form of "family" and I am a self made millionaire from less than zero,  so forgive me if I laud the woman that inspired me to do all that.

[naomi24]

You're right. Destructive idealism such as yours is pathetic, untitled.

[10ClarionSt]

Thatchers' legacies, among others, are the housing crisis and the greedy utility companies. Stop telling lies about her and we'll stop telling the truth about her. Tear that statue down and turn it into urinals. 😄

[jno]

She did not give us advantages as you put it

She gave you the right to buy someone else's home cheap. I believe your parents did so? That's quite an advantage.

[douglas9401]

And those views...

[New Judge]

“Nothing great about her. She ruined the industrial base of this country.”

The “industrial base” of this country was never going to endure. As well as that, more coalmines were closed under Labour than under the Tories and in case because of the country’s ridiculous energy policies (supported by both sides of the House in principle, with only minor difference in practice) the coal industry would not have lasted very much longer anyway. She recognised that.

“yes she did. she got as many of you as possible to buy houses as easily as possible…”

That’s news to me. One or other of us obviously wasn't there. I know I was because on buying our first property Mrs NJ and I had to pay a mortgage broker a month’s salary (each) to get a loan. And after we’d got it the interest rate was rarely lower than 10% and at one point hit 15%. An extract from a report by Hargreaves Lansdown:

“In 1980, UK interest rates were 14% by year end, this dropped to 10% by 1982. The lowest rate of interest over the entire decade was 7.38% in 1988.”

Contrast this with the last fifteen years. Ten year fixed rate mortgages have averaged just over 3.00%, with a high of 4.6% in 2023. It is only in this year and last that rates have exceed 4%. One of the reasons that house prices are so high is the ridiculously cheap mortgage rates that have endured over the last decade and a half.

All I can say that if TGL “made it as easy as possible” I’d hate to think what it would have been like had she not done so. Both Mrs NJ and I worked six days a week in the first two years after we had bought our house. Nobody made it easy at all. We needed no encouragement from TGL or anybody else to buy property. We would have done so whatever the difficulties. We just got on and did it.

“She gave you the right to buy someone else's home cheap.”

No she didn’t. She gave the occupier the right to buy their home at a discount. Quite a difference.

“…but the reason they introduced this change was to create a generation of loyal tories...”

All political parties try to encourage a particular cohort to become followers. Mr Blair invited untold numbers of migrants to the country, knowing full well they would predominantly vote Labour. Mr Starmer is now planning to give votes to 16 year olds for the same reason. It’s called politics.

[ToraToraTora]

bang on as usual judge. Demolishing the lefty BS is simple when you give them the facts.

[Untitled]

house prices were about 3 times average income in 1982... 40 years later it was about 8 times. interest rates were higher but housing was objectively more affordable so you could pay it off quicker and would benefit from a dramatic increase in value. 

i am not criticising anyone for taking advantage of this. i do however find it frustrating that people wilfully ignore that this situation was deliberately created by government policy as a strategy for winning elections, and it worked. the people who benefited from this are pretty much the last bastion of tory voters. i do not understand why some of you are reacting so negatively to this. it strikes me as plainly and obviously true.