Best Of

Looking at Starmers approval ratings they crashed straight after the WFA debacle .

I still find it astonishing that no one in No 10 and Starmer himself didn’t stop Reeves from putting through what will end up being the worst policy decision of recent times .

All that political pain for what was a paltry sum saved .

Starmer is a lawyer, not a politician, and has no discernible political judgement. As for why Number 10 generally did not act, that begs the question whether they knew about it in advance. Rachel Reeves is also a technocrat and, as with George Osborne's omnishambles budget, it is likely the Chancellor accepted the WFA cut from a list of Treasury suggestions without a great deal of thought.

It was a perfectly sensible financial decision presented badly.

There are worse crimes.

It was and sadly once they were on the back foot, it was the same with slowing the rate of growth of benefits, and their backbenchers under pressure from well organised lobbying campaigns they were always going to fold and SKS lost his authority overnight.

WFA was a ridiculous frippery from a bygone age before pensioners did not form a large part of those with the highest disposable income after housing costs in the country. It was absolutely the right thing to do, it is astonishing that this relic survived the Osborne years. We have got to get away from the situation where so much of our limited resources are given away to those not in need by way of universal benefits. Sooner or later that is going to include at least some of the pension.

Not even that, it was exceeded by the double bubble malfunction that the triple lock does when an inflation spike is followed by a pay spike the subsequent year. Something that I'm sure nobody considered at the time, but you can't help seeing once it's there.

The political problem is that there's Noone Quite Like Grandma.

The political problem is that grandma votes consistently and her grandchildren don't. So, inevitably, our political class run scared of grandma.

Good morning

Our grandchildren have learned that what goes on in grandma's house stays in grandma's house and maybe why they love visiting her

And listening to Yusaf on Kuenssberg will someone make him go away

He and Farage are simply nasty and no matter whatever happens, I do not want a reform government

And Good Morning to you nd indeed all fellow pb-ers.

You and me both, Mr G; whatever we've felt about the governments we've seen elected over the years, none of it compares with what we feel about the prospect of a Reform government.

Absolutely and it is part of why I support Kemi and wish her well as she stands for the centre right to overhaul Farage by GE29

Today’s most important question - can England finish off the Kiwis at Lord’s before the Monaco Grand Prix starts?

Last night’s football suggests it might be a tortuous affair.

What, because Scotland aren't playing?

I am damping down all triumphalism. The dildo of hubris always comes unlubed.

I just can't remember a Scotland team as free scoring as we were in that first half. Its been a very long time. Whether they can repeat anything even slightly like it next weekend is the key, of course. Haiti seem to be no mugs and our entire WC turns on that game.

Usually score less in a year, scary

A resounding win and Burnham succeeding Starmer by the end of summer would be my preferred outcome

Politics has to change and it starts with Starmer leaving office

Reeves too. We desperately need a Chancellor with a sense of purpose.

Reeves has actually done exceptionally well on the fiscal side with golden rules.

Her problem like Starmer's is they have no political nous.

Conversely a dream team of Burnham and Streeting would lack in deep thinking of policy but are outstanding communication wise and do the day to day politics very very well.

The 10 year gilt is 4.88%. The ECB 10 year bond yields 3.38%. That 1.5% differential is killing us. It makes investment and mortgages more expensive. It comes from having a less credible fiscal strategy, higher inflation, no clear path to improve things and a willingness to keep doing things that cause more harm than good.

If you honestly believe this is "exceptionally well" you need to reset your sights and aspirations.

From another point of view it also is from not being in the Euro.

Fpt:

It seems that the Hampshire plods attempted to libel a murder victim:

An initial police statement later that morning said: “It was reported two men had been assaulted by an unknown man.”

The Nowak family, raw with grief, became concerned that a false narrative was being pushed about their son. It is understood that police told the family the next update they planned to publish, which would include the Nowaks’ tribute, would again imply that he was the initial aggressor.

Officers dropped that section of the statement, which only referred to an “altercation” when published.

https://www.thetimes.com/uk/crime/article/henry-nowak-murder-trial-police-l8x990pkb

What’s happening with the Hillsborough Law? Feels like something Andy Burnham could capitalise on here.

In further echoes of Hillsborough, I see that the victims of the Nottingham attack were tested for drugs:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5ywd4gdzk1o

The father of a university student killed trying to protect her friend has told a public inquiry of his "disgust" that the stabbing victims were tested for drugs and alcohol - but their attacker was not.

The theme which runs through the Nowak murder, the Nottingham murders, the Southport murders and the Fordingbridge rapes is DEI.

With the criminals deemed to need 'equity' even if that requires demeaning the victims.

This case has SFA to do with DEI.

It has to do with a mindset of rigid compliance to rules (often self invented) to the point of near insanity.

For example, it has come out that by using a certain legalistic phrasing of reporting an alleged offence , a member of the public can weaponise the police to aggressively harass a given target.

You’d think that this would result in such complaints being dealt with using discretion.

Nope, it’s still going on. Because discretion is a dirty word.

Note the failure to follow “procedure” when not checking a victim for wounds, despite blood coming out of his mouth. The allegiance to “process” is selective - a phycologist could write reams on how such officialdom prioritises inside their heads. They claim to be bound by Process, yet strangely…

If I had to live in Germany’s I’d give Freiburg serious consideration. There’s a pleasant, relaxed, feel about it, there’s quite a lot going on, and like my own home town it has the sunniest weather in its country. And of course there is a stack of other countries just a few hours drive away, as well as Black Forest scenery and villages nearby. The old square around the cathedral is pleasant and lively, although most of the centre is relatively modern, having been rebuilt after the war - the ‘remodelling’ actually begun in 1940 when a few Germany planes got lost in the weather and dropped all their bombs on it thinking it was in France; at the time the raid was blamed on the allies and the truth only began to emerge in the mid-1950s and the full story not until the 1980s.

I’ve been there on business a couple of times in the 2010’s.

Yes, it’s a very nice part of Europe.

Southern Bavaria for me.

Bamberg in Franconia is a great little town- most unscathed by WWII, and with ten breweries for 80,000 inhabitants, including the mighty Bamberg Smoked beer, plus its really really pretty. Also the the home town of Claus Schenck Graf Von Stauffenberg (Tom Cruise in Valkyrie), and um... Willi Messerschmidt.