ITH Poker Forum

[CroMagnon]

This group has put out a list of demands/ideas.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/oct/28/occupy-london-city-st-pauls

What the hell is this?

• An end to business and corporate block-votes in all council elections, which can be used to outvote local residents.

Sounds worse than the recent US Supreme court decision to treat corporations as people.

Most of what they want seems geared to local politics. How whacked are they?

Cro

[the_hawk]

Wankers.

[darvon]

• An end to business and corporate block-votes in all council elections, which can be used to outvote local residents.

• Abolition of existing "secrecy practices" within the City, and total and transparent reform of its institutions to end corporate tax evasion.

• The decommissioning of the City of London police with officers being brought under the jurisdiction of the Metropolitan police force.

• Abolition of the offices of Lord Mayor of London, the Sheriffs and the Aldermen.

• And a truth and reconciliation commission to examine corruption within the City and its institutions.


None of these are understandable to me. Can someone translate?

[darvon]

C'mon. Can't anyone translate the demands and put them in context?

I will if any American OCCUPY site demands anything other than Pizzas and 2 liter Cokes.

[PauliF]

the whole system is broken... we must fix it....

dont hesitate to ask for any more translations

[Fenris78]

These are the same demands as for every Occupy-Movement everywhere:

Corporations/banks buy political decisions. This must be stopped /translation

[the_hawk]

Fenris is broadly right, although the situation is a little strange / different here.

"City of London" refers to a specific region rather than the broader metropolitan area. It´s the original heart of the city that now houses the financial district (the "Square Mile"). It has some strange and in some ways anachronistic local political structure.

• An end to business and corporate block-votes in all council elections, which can be used to outvote local residents.

• Abolition of existing "secrecy practices" within the City, and total and transparent reform of its institutions to end corporate tax evasion.

• The decommissioning of the City of London police with officers being brought under the jurisdiction of the Metropolitan police force.

• Abolition of the offices of Lord Mayor of London, the Sheriffs and the Aldermen.

• And a truth and reconciliation commission to examine corruption within the City and its institutions.


None of these are understandable to me. Can someone translate?

The local authority governing the City (effectively the local council) is the Corporation of London. Its election is unique in UK local politics in that the electorate is not simply composed of the residents of the area. The City has about 10,000 residents but approximately 500k people who work in the area each day. This unique balance is reflected in the local election system. Effectively, the "wants" of the working but non-residential population are represented through block votes held by representatives nominated by employers.

The Corporation is headed by the Lord Mayor and the Sheriffs / Aldermen are effectively the council officials. Amongst other things, the Corporation (and the City) has its own police force - the City of London Police - which is a completely separate force from the Metropolitan Police which polices the rest of the London metropolitan area.

Not least owing to where it is located, the City of London Police has a particular speciality in "economic crime" and is generally regarded as the primary police force in the country (world?) for the policing of financial and economic matters. The protestors are effectively suggesting that the local business interests (through their effective control of the Corporation) are ultimately self-policing. The implication seems to be that were there "independent" control of the Corporation and hence the police that the "financial crimes" that have led to the current economic situation would somehow not have happened.

[Fenris78]

Good detailed explanation, hawk.

[Piemaster]

What a load of meaningless shite. That applies equally to the list of demands and the article itself which is biased beyond belief, even for the Guardian. Do any of those list of demands even mean anything?

• Abolition of existing "secrecy practices" within the City, and total and transparent reform of its institutions to end corporate tax evasion.

I mean seriously WTF? End corporate tax evasion! Like, make everyone (as an aside, is it everyone or just 'corporations' that have to pay the right tax?) pay the tax they are supposed to... yay! Let's just send a group of brave adventurers into the castle of the evil overlord (who probably works in a bank during the day, ldo) who guards the magic wand that you wave which makes everybody magically pay the correct tax. Seriously, WTF do they think every government in the entire world has been trying to do for the last two thousand years? Yep, it's taken a while, but we've finally worked out way to completely end tax evasion, and all it took was a couple of hundred retards sitting on the steps of a building waving placards and submitting a badly worded petition.

Wankers.

Hmmm, that serves me right for grunching, it turned out Hawk had it summed up in seven letters in the first reply.

[darvon]

How is that Occupy London working out?

I can't wait until it gets cold. I want to see how the Occupy Wall Street does below 0. I think it might move to Occupy Starbucks.

[darvon]

If they Occupy Wall Street through the end of the end, do they owe Property Taxes?