http://www.theguardian.com/politics/201 ... tus-labour

Another headline-grabber of little real significance then.

If they've paid tax abroad it would have to be offset against any UK anyway.
Eg. If I'm paying 25% abroad, then I just pay the extra 15% here to get to the UK's 40%, rather than paying both and paying 65% Tax.

Like you said, no real significance. So if he's resorting to sound bite announcements this early in the campaign......

They all are. This is the longest, most tedious and pointless campaign I can remember. It's all about personality and it stinks.

My timeline on Twitter is crammed daily by the Tories going "waahhh waahhh Labour waahhh waahhh" and sometime "long term economic plan". I follow the PM and and the Conservatives account which retweets just about anyone who fits that pattern. I find it very hard to believe that Cameron and Osbourne actually spend the amount of time on Twitter that they appear to now.

It's all handled by their minions in a press office somewhere, but bloody hell, the volume and repetitiveness of it all is dreadful.

I asked all three main parties on Tuesday when I can read their manifesto. Labour and the Conservatives did not reply. The LibDems said "soon" and told me where I can read their main points. I didn't ask UKIP. I think they’ve been having problems finding the word "manifesto" in their 1945 edition of the Junior Oxford English Dictionary for some time now.

The big problem here is that they regard Twitter and other social media as a one way street for information - they are going to pump their carefully honed sound bites at you, and ignore anything you may ask, even when it's on message (though the Tories may retweet it if it fits with the pattern mentioned above). It's dreadful.

What's worse, is it's a battle about personality between a bunch of people with no personality. Farage seems to be the only one with any personality at all, but that's best described as "raging [LIFTED]"

The thing that's wearing me down is this. Look at the percentage of time the talk about their own policies compared to the amount of time they talk about other parties policies. It's all horrendously negative and shallow.

"Yes, I know you've just given a me a list of ten reason why I shouldn't vote for the other guy. But you haven't yet given me a single valid reason why I should vote for you."

There was a back bench tory on the radio this morning while I was having a shower. He was supposedly on to talk about.. god, I can't even remember what, maybe the change to checking documentation on people leaving the country, and he spent the whole interview talking about the labour party. The interviewer tried to bring him back to talking about the tories twice and he ignored it both times and just gabbled on about how bad things would be if labour got back in.

Why on earth should I consider voting for someone who has so little confidence in their own offering that they overtly choose not to talk about it when given the opportunity? And frankly, labour are just as bad. Ed Balls should be locked in a cupboard until after polling day. I suppose to some degree they're allowed to talk about the government's record being the opposition but still, less about what they are going to do and more about what YOU are going to do.

A plague on all their houses, as the saying goes.

Yep, it seems so. I'm fast losing interest.