England's swimming pools could be free by the time of the London 2012 Olympics, the government has signalled.
Over-60s are to be given free admission to public swimming pools in an £80m first stage of the initiative.
The move will be outlined by Gordon Brown as part of a bid to encourage greater participation in sport ahead of the Games.
Sport minister Andy Burnham indicated future funding would allow free entry to under-16s, then to everyone by 2012.
There now, that will compensate for all the discrimination they’ve suffered in health and education provision surely?
9 comments:
I cannot for the life of me fathom your last sentence. Was it jest?
Anyhow, I am not happy that myself and other Scottish tax payers will be called on to pay for the cleansing of the English masses.
Health -Prescription charges are applied in England not in Wales and various drugs are available in Scotland and not England. English taxpayers are paying exactly the same amount of tax and social security into exactly the same Exchequer
Education; Tuition fees? The only areas of the EU from where students still have to pay these at Scottish universities are England, N.Ireland and Wales.
And if the free swimming in England is dependent on Labour remaining in power until 2012, then I don't think it's very likely that your hard-earned taxes are going to be paying for cleaning of your brothers from south of Hadrians. In other words, it's yet more Labour populism attempting to keep voters in their English heartlands happy.
"English taxpayers are paying exactly the same amount of tax and social security into exactly the same Exchequer"
But no less % of money is spent on English services now than was pre-1997. Whatever money the Scots or Welsh spend on their free prescriptions, University fes etc they have had to find by spending less in other places.
England is at no less disadvantage to us today than they were 12 years ago. The fact that so many people believe otherwise shows that the devolved government have managed to cut back spending elsewhere without having a big negative effect on services (otherwise people would have noticed and would be complaining).
Welsh and Scottish citizens arn't getting a single penny more in comparison to English citizens than they wee pre-devolution.
You both may find this link interesting:
http://www.thecep.org.uk/wordpress/
Show me the exact same table pre-devolution - it would be exactly the same. Devolution has not changed the percentage amount soent in the Celtic countries compared to England one little bit. pre-devo it was the Barnett Forumla, post-devo it is the Barnett Forumla.
Also what the table shows is "identifiable" spending. Now the CEP would obviously only identify the figures they like. What isn't counted in that is the "british Spend" that is actually "English spend".
Examples being the Eden Project gets British money (since it supposedly benefits all of UK), while the National Gardens of Wales get Welsh money. The Millenium Dome got British Money, the Wales Millenium Centre got Welsh Money. The London Olympics spend is British money etc etc.
Quick note from that article:
Europe of the Regions produced a map of England that famously omitted England yet included the other nations of the UK.
How can a map of England not have England in it? Or is the CEP confusing England with UK again! Also, if I remember right it was a map of the UK without Wales on it, not without England!
Quite simply - they produced a map of the UK that named Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland but failed to mention the dread word "England" even once.
Just the name? Pah that's nothing! Once they actually took the time to cut Wales off a map of the UK
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/3715512.stm
:-D
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