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I expect the two child benefit cap will go in November mostly funded by an increase in gambling taxes . This no 10 will hope will reduce the appeal of Your party .

An increase in gambling taxes is low hanging fruit and won’t be controversial for the vast majority of the
public .

Good morning

Another unpopular measure according to the polls, and does nothing to address Reeves 'all my very own deep hole' in the public finances

Fiddling whilst London burns.
She's crashed the economy properly. To show Liz how its done

She has not 'crashed the economy'.

Some people need to remember the mantra "you lost- get over it".

There's a degree of general anger on the right about there being a Labour government. Just the fact of it. Because it's hardly a big socialist experiment, is it.

The biggest threat to Farage is that Starmer succeeds. And Farage has very little agency in that, which I think is why his core political activities are shit-shovelling and shit-stirring - notably him and all his colleagues constantly (husk off) lying about what is happening to try and create a febrile summer. It's not a kind word, but it is what they do.

Conversely the noisier and more desperate Farage becomes, the greater risks he faces in his own political base. For example, he has weakened his vetting process, but that will let more knuckle draggers inside the sandcastle, but may cause some of the decents to exit from the other door. His support base is tribal and fissiparous, and he knows it. And he has a compliant mass media largely onside ignoring real problems, but that could change. He is walking a tightrope, or perhaps several tightropes.

Each time Starmer reduces immigration, or their policies lock up an trafficking gang, or reduce the number of hotels in use, or anything else, it washes away a bit more of Farage's sandcastle of rhetoric.

The same goes for the other areas - NHS, Local Government, Economy, Defence and so on.

I think as a society we want an inclusive, pleasant place to be rather than the hell hole Farage wants to pretend exists.

The question is how far Starmer's Govt can succeed and make progress, and how much of that will be perceived, and to what extent Farage's smokescreen can have effect.

The problem that you (and I given my antipathy towards Farage) have is that Starmer is showing no signs of 'succeeding'. His policies do not appear to be having any impact on migration nor does he appear to be making any progress in any other policy areas.

Now on one level, with my strange (by most people's standards) view of migration as a positive thing, I am not particularly sad that Starmer is not succeeding. But on another level of wanting competent Government answerable to the people - perhaps the only reason to consider Starmer as a better choice than Sunak at the last election - he is failing utterly. And that failure makes a Reform victory and its consequences all the more likely.

Morning all

Strong results for Reform in yesterday's local council by elections but August contests on often very low turnout can produce exaggerated results if a motivated minority gets out and votes.

I'm struck not by the differences between Corbyn and Farage but by the similarities. We often talk about the "horseshoe" aspect of politics and those who throw around terms like "left" and "right" do so more as a perjorative than from a sense of any real political analysis (e.g: "lefties").

In policy terms there are differences but both are offering equally ridiculous yet equally superficially attractive prospectuses and in a time of disillusion and frustration they are getting much more of a hearing than if times were good when they would be relegated to the far margins (or the same margin if you prefer).

That's the thing about Government and governing - it's not easy and simply waving around ideas isn't the same as a coherent programme. Too often, the pressure is on Government to be seen to be doing something but it ends up being the wrong thing and especially when it has consequences elsewhere.

Someone once offered the virtues of masterly inactivity - it's not the worst approach on occasion.

Government is or should be about getting the basics right which for me is or are the administration of law and the provision of public services - the old adage you know you're doing a good job when people don't think you're doing anything at all applies but it doesn't have electoral benefit.

Reform couldn't have asked for 3 much better places to fight by elections in a quiet August - they got over 25% in all 3 relevant parliamentary contests last year before their surge

I did say on the previous thread that no seat in Wales is safe for labour, and last night is just another stark reminder that labour are heading for a terrible night in Wales in May 26

Of course so are the conservatives, but with Plaid and Reform fighting for First Minister any cooperation by either party with Labour post the election would be toxic for them

Even so, all the seat projections "suggest" Plaid, Reform and Labour will end up close together, just shy of 30 seats each leaving the balance with the Conservatives, the LDs and the Greens.

However, the residual 10-12 seats doesn't offer any of Plaid, Reform or Labour a path to a majority so if you want a majority Government, two of the "big three" need to co-operate.

They say supping with the Devil requires a long spoon - well, I suspect sales of long spoons are going to rise exponentially following the Senedd elections. No one will, according to you, want to deal with Labour and I suspect the same applies to Reform so you're looking at a Plaid minority which looks very unstable.

It certainly looks like Plaid/Labour will be the only option other than a minority. I guess there's a case fir allowing a 'winning' Reform to screw up for a year before collapsing it and going back to the electorate.
I don't think there's any path to RefCon having half the seats, conversely the more seats the Tories can grab at the 6th place slot away from their better areas of Monmouth and Clwyd the harder they make it for PC/Lab potentially. There will be a big difference between a Welsh Con 10% (6 or 7 seats) and a Welsh Con 14/15% (maybe 15 seats top end but probably 12 to 14)

I expect the two child benefit cap will go in November mostly funded by an increase in gambling taxes . This no 10 will hope will reduce the appeal of Your party .

An increase in gambling taxes is low hanging fruit and won’t be controversial for the vast majority of the
public .

Good morning

Another unpopular measure according to the polls, and does nothing to address Reeves 'all my very own deep hole' in the public finances

Why doesn't she focus on all the popular ways to increase taxes and cut spending? It's exasperating.

Truth is that income tax has to rise, but she cannot do that because of her idiotic pre election promises

Also you do not raise taxes to address a huge hole in the public finances and use some of that tax raising to create another spending commitment

Do you think whoever is leading the tory party at the next GE will do into it promising to raise income tax because I don't.

Labour are a high tax high spend government and it is not in their DNA to cut spending

Conservatives are low tax low spending and I would expect a conservative government to reduce corporation tax, encourage wealth creation and abolish IHT on farmers. I would also expect a review of all net zero subsidies

I expect the two child benefit cap will go in November mostly funded by an increase in gambling taxes . This no 10 will hope will reduce the appeal of Your party .

An increase in gambling taxes is low hanging fruit and won’t be controversial for the vast majority of the
public .

Good morning

Another unpopular measure according to the polls, and does nothing to address Reeves 'all my very own deep hole' in the public finances

Fiddling whilst London burns.
She's crashed the economy properly. To show Liz how its done

She has not 'crashed the economy'.

Neither, in that sense, did Truss.

Like Truss, she is causing government borrowing to get more expensive. Because the markets (and foreign buyers of UK Government bonds) do not see a commitment to anything other than eternally growing debt.

This isn't "Evul Capitalists Attack Labour Government" - if you want to borrow money, you are priced on your likelihood to default. You can either spend less or tax more.

EDIT: Construction is already in recession.

There's no comparison between this situation and Truss. That was a self-inflicted short sharp crisis caused by political hubris and recklessness.

Fact is, we've had low growth since the 08 crash and our public finances are stressed due to the cost of that, and the pandemic, and the energy crisis. Now to compound matters interest rates are back at historical norms. We're off the drug of QE and superlow gilt servicing costs.

There are no easy answers, maybe no answers at all other than to move expectations more in line with reality. But that's in nobody's short term political interest except the government. And they can't do it either because of the need to sound positive. "Going for growth" bla bla.

So there we go. The discourse is nonsense all round and it's hardcoded to stay that way.

Pretty much - expect the current government is doing slow motion Truss.

Part of it is an inability to think and act. It's all about the process. Starmer appears to be a rules engine that takes the law as input and doesn't compute that he is actually supposed to be modifying the rules....

It's hard to imagine that Churchill or Attlee would have reacted to a judge redefining "family" to mean friends and next door neighbours with a shrug. They'd have had legislation in parliament by breakfast and an interview without coffee for the judge (with the Lord Chancellor) by tea.....

I expect the two child benefit cap will go in November mostly funded by an increase in gambling taxes . This no 10 will hope will reduce the appeal of Your party .

An increase in gambling taxes is low hanging fruit and won’t be controversial for the vast majority of the
public .

Good morning

Another unpopular measure according to the polls, and does nothing to address Reeves 'all my very own deep hole' in the public finances

Why doesn't she focus on all the popular ways to increase taxes and cut spending? It's exasperating.

Truth is that income tax has to rise, but she cannot do that because of her idiotic pre election promises

Also you do not raise taxes to address a huge hole in the public finances and use some of that tax raising to create another spending commitment

Do you think whoever is leading the tory party at the next GE will do into it promising to raise income tax because I don't.

Labour are a high tax high spend government and it is not in their DNA to cut spending

Conservatives are low tax low spending and I would expect a conservative government to reduce corporation tax, encourage wealth creation and abolish IHT on farmers. I would also expect a review of all net zero subsidies

“Conservatives are low tax low spending” lol sure. Maybe in your dreams

'Lower' not low. Whatever Cons would spend Lab would spend more. Whatever Cons would tax Lab would tax more.

I expect the two child benefit cap will go in November mostly funded by an increase in gambling taxes . This no 10 will hope will reduce the appeal of Your party .

An increase in gambling taxes is low hanging fruit and won’t be controversial for the vast majority of the
public .

Good morning

Another unpopular measure according to the polls, and does nothing to address Reeves 'all my very own deep hole' in the public finances

Why doesn't she focus on all the popular ways to increase taxes and cut spending? It's exasperating.

Truth is that income tax has to rise, but she cannot do that because of her idiotic pre election promises

Also you do not raise taxes to address a huge hole in the public finances and use some of that tax raising to create another spending commitment

Do you think whoever is leading the tory party at the next GE will do into it promising to raise income tax because I don't.

Labour are a high tax high spend government and it is not in their DNA to cut spending

Conservatives are low tax low spending and I would expect a conservative government to reduce corporation tax, encourage wealth creation and abolish IHT on farmers. I would also expect a review of all net zero subsidies

“Conservatives are low tax low spending” lol sure. Maybe in your dreams

That’s why they lost the last election.

They’d turned into Blairites, owned by the civil service and with little conviction in anything they did.

I expect the two child benefit cap will go in November mostly funded by an increase in gambling taxes . This no 10 will hope will reduce the appeal of Your party .

An increase in gambling taxes is low hanging fruit and won’t be controversial for the vast majority of the
public .

Good morning

Another unpopular measure according to the polls, and does nothing to address Reeves 'all my very own deep hole' in the public finances

Why doesn't she focus on all the popular ways to increase taxes and cut spending? It's exasperating.

Truth is that income tax has to rise, but she cannot do that because of her idiotic pre election promises

Also you do not raise taxes to address a huge hole in the public finances and use some of that tax raising to create another spending commitment

Do you think whoever is leading the tory party at the next GE will do into it promising to raise income tax because I don't.

Labour are a high tax high spend government and it is not in their DNA to cut spending

Conservatives are low tax low spending and I would expect a conservative government to reduce corporation tax, encourage wealth creation and abolish IHT on farmers. I would also expect a review of all net zero subsidies

Why on earth would you expect them to do that? Most of that is at odds with their time in office - particularly on renewables and farmers.

Any party that is focussed on a pensioner voting cohort like the Conservatives is going to high tax, high spend.

IIRC among the first acts of the Conservatives in 1979 were to increase VAT considerably and reduce the top rate of income tax.
So "ordinary folk" paid more and wealthier people had more to spend.

I expect the two child benefit cap will go in November mostly funded by an increase in gambling taxes . This no 10 will hope will reduce the appeal of Your party .

An increase in gambling taxes is low hanging fruit and won’t be controversial for the vast majority of the
public .

Good morning

Another unpopular measure according to the polls, and does nothing to address Reeves 'all my very own deep hole' in the public finances

Yes much of the public think if you can’t afford to have more than two kids then don’t have them . What helps Labour though is Farage supports lifting the cap.

Sometimes the public are stupid. Look at their track record in voting for governments.

The Tories promise to cut taxes without detriment to services, and the public are annoyed when this proves to be impossible. Labour promise to improve services without raising taxes and, again, the public are annoyed when this proves to be impossible. So now the public, in their wisdom, are going to elect Reform, who promise to both cut taxes and improve services. The public are indeed stupid.