Thank you for your kind comment but I started work at 16 as I wasn't very academic and anyway my dad had MS and was unable to continue working so I was keen to bring in a wage.

I don't know about when the NHS was set up but it is fair to say the Tories have supported it since those days and are certainly committed to it now. This doesn't mean it cannot be improved as it has become top heavy with management. Even Labour agree it needs some reform.

Capitalism certainly has its flaws and globalisation has created many new problems and to be fair it had some pluses as well. But what do you propose to have in its place? Most of the alternatives have failed.

I do agree with you about the key utilities though.

The NHS was started in 1948 after the Labour govt was elected in 1945 and the greatest prime minister of the 20th century Clement Attlee and Nye Bevan who was the minister of health at the time put it in place.It was however inspired by the beverage plan in the 1930s.Beverage was a liberal ,and make no mistake the creation of the NHS was oppsed by the TORY'S and the institution who would have had the most to lose ,the INSURANCE COMPANY'S .Attlee was our greatest PM ,Churchill as well for his early ww11 inspiration ,but He was an aristocrat and had know knowledge of the home front.He was wonderful on the foreign front and while he was running the war Attlee was looking round the country and studying the American Presidents FDr ,Roosevelt's policies and his new deal.FDR did not have time to put in place a NHS in the USA which is basically a left wing ideal a little bit liberal ,and definately socialist.. but make no mistake it was opposed by the Tories.You said you was brought up a catholic ,which indicates you come from Irish and came over in the 19th century in the famine .

There have been catholics in this country since long. long before the 19th century, indeed we used to be ruled by them.

THe Genesis of the idea for the NHS came from the miners in South Wales who all paid into a fund so that all the people of lived in their village/town had access to the best medical care. Bevan saw how well it worked and took the idea to a bigger stage.

Atlee is that the same guy who came back from Hitler with his white hankie?

many working class catholics!if there was they must have had a very good underground system.the only practicing catholics around say 100 years after the reformation are the aristocratic families who had the means in their mansions to resist the police state that was in place ,similar to another period of the 20th century.There are a few aristocratic English families who resisted the reformation who remained catholic still with us now,but all in all the catholic population of England ,Scotland and Wales are mostly of Irish descent who came over here to escape the potatoe famine

Thankyou for the contribution about Nye Bevan ,but Please do not ever confuse the Tory Neville Chamberlain, with the finest PM of the 20th century who presided over the creation of the welfare state which you are in benifit of today, Clement Attlee

So none of us are descended from the mainly catholic population of this country in the 16th century then ?

Yes we are MAC! I was merely pointing out that a person who has a catholic background there is a good chance his/her forefathers were Irish and must have face a fair amount of prejudice when they came over here , even as recent as the 1960s there was "no Irish,no blacks and no dogs"and these with that sort of ancestry are of a left leaning politically pursuasion

Oooh Oooh are we now playing when is a Catholic, not a Catholic? Can I go first? Is the answer Henry VIII?

Sorry it was late and a few glasses of wine

Well actually Henry V111 still considered himself right up to his death a catholic .It was the reign of his daughter and James v1 maybe

Me too I had just got back from the Mall and had 4 tall Samuel Adams Boston Lager.Come to think of it didn't Sam Adams have something to do with civil dissobedience against the ruling classes?

Do I?

The accuracy or otherwise of a prediction is the relevant part, not whether a view taken is perceived as coming from a negative or positive perspective.

I presume it's all contained within that thread I no longer visit.

If your prediction has almost come true but only because of 3 new major outside occurances, that have had a negative effect on all the world's economies and without which your prediction would not have come true, then I would say your self congratulation is inaccurate, shallow and boastful. For without these three negative economic occurrances your prediction would have been wrong. To now try to claim some credit as though you are some kind of visionary is worthy of one of the main authors of our woes Ed "borrow n' spend" Balls

As usual you didn't answer questions which were part of the context:

I said in one paragraph: "You flatter yourself, as usual, with your negative predictions.
Did you also predict the disaster of the Euro and it’s effect on the world economy?
Did you predict the disaster of the Tsunami in Japan and its effect on the world economy?
Did you predict the huge rise in fuel and commodity prices and the effect on the world economy?"

I do like potatos if that means anything .....but I have always had a feeling deep down that we were the rightful owners of a big mansion somwhere around Arthington perhaps?