Best Of

I don’t think squeezing Restore is going to work. There were always a bunch of Reform supporters who thought Farage was a wet. Now they have a home.

If the Reform candidate was a firebrand, maybe. But he’s a damp squib.

When Reform lose, the autopsy will be down to a shite candidate.

He inspires GOTV - for his opponents.

Reform seem to have a lot of problem with shite candidates.

As does the Greens. Both their candidates for Makerfield were inept as was their local election candidates (again, same for Reform)

The insurgent parties need to professionalise its candidate selection and vetting ASAP

That's the problem though with being "insurgent" - you attract people who, apart from believing (supposedly) in your core values, have no political experience at all.

I was politically active when the SDP came into being - two thirds of the new SDP members had never been in any political party at all. Inevitably, it was left to the ex-Labour and ex-Conservative members to show them what to do and how it worked. The came the Alliance and the Liberals worked with the SDP.

This was all before the days of social media of course.

Even after that. In 2014 I heard several Labour activists observe that Better Together was a means by which Labour taught the Tories how to fight elections. A refresher might be helpful but I'm not sure who would be giving it these days.

Bit presumptuous of Labour to claim to have schooled the most successful election winning machine in the UK's history...

In fairness that successful election winning machine had made very little dent in Scotland for about 60 years. So, before the collapse of Scottish Labour, they had a point.

So I'm avoiding marking exams and did some research... Here is the Conservative vote share in Scotland in General Elections back to 1950...



You can see an uptick after 2014 for sure, but that would be against a backdrop of a bit national return too?

It would be better to have the SNP share alongside. Labour used to call SNP 'Tartan Tories'. Then SNP ate Labour's lunch in the central belt.


https://scottishelections.ac.uk/2024/10/01/ge2024-in-scotland-are-there-really-so-called-tartan-tories-out-there/

Zack Polanski complains that food is too cheap

https://x.com/PolitlcsUK/status/2064014185776705584

Zack Polanski has criticised supermarkets for selling vegetables for as little as 7p

“This isn’t a sign of a healthy system… someone is being exploited somewhere”

Eat your Greens.

I suppose his argument is if you want healthy sustainable agriculture you can’t impoverish farmers or make them debt slaves that need to cut corners and use expensive fertilisers and herbicides to excess!

Hard to argue against that, unless your trying to appeal to Telegraph readers by deliberately portraying him as an Eco Lunatic.

Peter.

Zack Polanski complains that food is too cheap

https://x.com/PolitlcsUK/status/2064014185776705584

Zack Polanski has criticised supermarkets for selling vegetables for as little as 7p

“This isn’t a sign of a healthy system… someone is being exploited somewhere”

Eat your Greens.

I suppose his argument is if you want healthy sustainable agriculture you can’t impoverish farmers or make them debt slaves that need to cut corners and use expensive fertilisers and herbicides to excess!

Hard to argue against that, unless your trying to appeal to Telegraph readers by deliberately portraying him as an Eco Lunatic.

Peter.

No doubt that supermarkets negotiate hard with suppliers, but I suspect the Christmas and Easter cheap veg is a simple loss leader.

Though that's another version of the same question. Supermarkets are like any other business- they might do good so they can do well, but it's rare that they do so through the goodness of their hearts.

So- if they idea is to get people through the doors with insanely low prices on X, what is the Y they are making it back on?

Zack Polanski complains that food is too cheap

https://x.com/PolitlcsUK/status/2064014185776705584

Zack Polanski has criticised supermarkets for selling vegetables for as little as 7p

“This isn’t a sign of a healthy system… someone is being exploited somewhere”

Out of touch eco-warrior.

No, Zack may have a point, whether you view too-low prices as a sign of exploitation or low quality. I've been of this view since one place was maintaining its low prices by turning its freezers off at night.

(Hmm. Wasn't there a food poisoning story recently?)

More than 80 struck down in major UK and Europe salmonella outbreak linked to instant noodles
https://www.thesun.co.uk/health/39339109/uk-europe-salmonella-instant-noodles/

NHS England figures do show that more people are seeking hospital treatment for more serious food poisoning symptoms.
https://www.dailymail.com/health/article-15879505/sickening-truth-Britain-food-poisoning-epidemic-surging-reveal.html

Salmonella cases in England at a decade high
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/salmonella-cases-in-england-at-a-decade-high

Quite good really - those people will have guts of steel for life after that.