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"Badenoch considers burka ban

Tories understood to be ‘looking closely’ at merits of veto on face coverings as part of a review of Islamism"


https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2026/03/27/kemi-badenoch-conservatives-burka-ban/

Poignantly, I saw a woman in a full burqa today, not far from my flat. I cannot know her inner state but her body language expressed great unhappiness. Weighed down by these hideous deathly black shrouds. I do not believe any woman under 60 - if any - would voluntarily wear these appalling garments, They are symbols of misogyny and TOOLS of misogyny

Kemi is right. Ban them

It would outflank Labour on closer alignment with Europe on the issues that people care about.

Kemi imputes that she knows how many thousands of people think, and evaluates them according to her personal opinions.

Kemi is a knee-jerking fool. This is no better than Farage or Anderson.

And yet this ban is what a vast majority of Brits want, according to polls. And several European countries - not notably Nazi - have banned them. And they are banned in multiple Muslim countries

So what exactly is your objection?

It would be interesting to see the left’s reaction if all Reform voters wives were suddenly dressed from head to toe in black sackcloths, except for when they were at home with the Reform male. I doubt it would be tossed aside as ‘their freedom to wear whatever they liked’

"Reform voters wives" sounds like the world's worst pornographic magazine.

Leaders' Wives...

Not the same since Sam Cam.

Certainly given that her successor was Philip May.

(It's the end of term. Some wine may have been drunk. However, in tribute to @Leon, I have just bought some vintage silk cravats, to go with my developing "increasingly aged eccentric" professional persona.)

Good evening all.
Was giving some thought earlier to the May locals, the Fisher prediction and Reforms prospects and a comment on here the other day about at what level Reforms vote starts to become inefficient.
Last year in their annus mirabilis they got 30 or 32% NEV depending if youre a Thrasher or Beeb kinda girl. Likely theyll get a bit lower this year imo for reasons discussed at length previously. I think NEV just above mid twenties (say 26 or 27) might be cut off below which they start to lose a vast number of wards narrowly when running up against stronger areas for Red or Blue (say Sandwell or Solihull as examples or Barking and Bromley)
Last night, for example, Reform hit good vote shares in Axholme and Sevenoaks but they were a long way from taking either.
If Reform are going to 'confirm' the breakthrough of 2025 they need a strong turnout of their vote and a depressed turnout of the others. Id say theyll partially get the latter (esp Labour) but have they got the ground game to fire up the former?
Maybe a lot of near misses await......

The Tories only held Axholme and Sevenoaks with heavy tactical voting for them to beat Reform from Labour and LD voters respectively.

As I said earlier only heavy tactical voting for incumbent councillors and MPs will likely enable them to hold off Reform insurgents

LDs in Sevenoaks are not voting Tory tactically to beat Reform when they would have considered themsrlves the challengers for the ward

They are, the LD vote was down 14% in that Sevenoaks ward, given Reform got 29% and the Tory vote was down 20%, without LDs tactically voting Tory it could have been a Reform gain not a Tory hold
https://x.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/2037327448862339391?s=20

@wooliedyed is far more forensic and correct on analysing these results than you will ever be

Oh dont make me blush
Soneone will be along to tell you I talk a load of old cock

I find your analysis very informative and interesting whereas I could predict @HYUFD slant on polling before he makes it

Thank you. I make plenty of errors though and i have my biases. But definitely last nights Tory holds were nothing to do with tactical voting. In both cases in 2023 voters wanting to 'stop the Tory' had on,y one option - Lab in Axholme, LD in Sevenoaks. This time they had 4 options in Ax, 3 in Seven.
4 and 5 horse races (where those horses are the recognised national thoroughbreds) are rarely won on massive vote shares of 50% plus. 2 horse races are always won on 50% plus vote shares. Theres no rocket science or mystery to it.

That is simply not the case.

The issue is no longer 'Stop the Tory' the issue is 'Stop Reform' for Lab and LD voters in Tory held seats. Hence the Labour and LD votes were down in Axholme and Sevenoaks respectively, Reform were a clear second in both seats but the Tories held both seats despite the Tory vote being down about 20% in both seats in a straight Tory to Reform shift

And that's the difficult judgement for the Conservatives.

They can only be a Stop Reform party by clearly rejecting Reform. People Like Me (a minority, sure, but potentially Conservative-curious) aren't going to back the Conservatives if they are going to enable Nigel.

But if the price of stopping Nigel is permitting Keir? Ouch.

That's the price of being third, or worse, in the polls.

Indeed, as long as Reform remain the main party of the right in polls, no longer the Conservatives, Conservative incumbent councillors and MPs can only hold on with Labour and LD tactical votes to beat Reform as you say.

If the Tories are only third or worse in May on seats won and behind Labour as well as Reform mutterings will start again over whether Cleverly would be a better bet to win those tactical votes than Kemi is

Seats won now is it? I thought it was NEV
Goalposts being moved

He cannot move his bet which he will lose

What's the bet?

NEV leading to a VONC on Kemi and Cleverly taking over

"Badenoch considers burka ban

Tories understood to be ‘looking closely’ at merits of veto on face coverings as part of a review of Islamism"


https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2026/03/27/kemi-badenoch-conservatives-burka-ban/

Poignantly, I saw a woman in a full burqa today, not far from my flat. I cannot know her inner state but her body language expressed great unhappiness. Weighed down by these hideous deathly black shrouds. I do not believe any woman under 60 - if any - would voluntarily wear these appalling garments, They are symbols of misogyny and TOOLS of misogyny

Kemi is right. Ban them

It would outflank Labour on closer alignment with Europe on the issues that people care about.

Kemi imputes that she knows how many thousands of people think, and evaluates them according to her personal opinions.

Kemi is a knee-jerking fool. This is no better than Farage or Anderson.

And yet this ban is what a vast majority of Brits want, according to polls. And several European countries - not notably Nazi - have banned them. And they are banned in multiple Muslim countries

So what exactly is your objection?

It would be interesting to see the left’s reaction if all Reform voters wives were suddenly dressed from head to toe in black sackcloths, except for when they were at home with the Reform male. I doubt it would be tossed aside as ‘their freedom to wear whatever they liked’

"Reform voters wives" sounds like the world's worst pornographic magazine.

Leaders' Wives...

Not the same since Sam Cam.

Certainly given that her successor was Philip May.

(It's the end of term. Some wine may have been drunk. However, in tribute to @Leon, I have just bought some vintage silk cravats, to go with my developing "increasingly aged eccentric" professional persona.)

I shall imagine you this way henceforth.

Good evening all.
Was giving some thought earlier to the May locals, the Fisher prediction and Reforms prospects and a comment on here the other day about at what level Reforms vote starts to become inefficient.
Last year in their annus mirabilis they got 30 or 32% NEV depending if youre a Thrasher or Beeb kinda girl. Likely theyll get a bit lower this year imo for reasons discussed at length previously. I think NEV just above mid twenties (say 26 or 27) might be cut off below which they start to lose a vast number of wards narrowly when running up against stronger areas for Red or Blue (say Sandwell or Solihull as examples or Barking and Bromley)
Last night, for example, Reform hit good vote shares in Axholme and Sevenoaks but they were a long way from taking either.
If Reform are going to 'confirm' the breakthrough of 2025 they need a strong turnout of their vote and a depressed turnout of the others. Id say theyll partially get the latter (esp Labour) but have they got the ground game to fire up the former?
Maybe a lot of near misses await......

The Tories only held Axholme and Sevenoaks with heavy tactical voting for them to beat Reform from Labour and LD voters respectively.

As I said earlier only heavy tactical voting for incumbent councillors and MPs will likely enable them to hold off Reform insurgents

LDs in Sevenoaks are not voting Tory tactically to beat Reform when they would have considered themsrlves the challengers for the ward

They are, the LD vote was down 14% in that Sevenoaks ward, given Reform got 29% and the Tory vote was down 20%, without LDs tactically voting Tory it could have been a Reform gain not a Tory hold
https://x.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/2037327448862339391?s=20

@wooliedyed is far more forensic and correct on analysing these results than you will ever be

Oh dont make me blush
Soneone will be along to tell you I talk a load of old cock

I find your analysis very informative and interesting whereas I could predict @HYUFD slant on polling before he makes it

Thank you. I make plenty of errors though and i have my biases. But definitely last nights Tory holds were nothing to do with tactical voting. In both cases in 2023 voters wanting to 'stop the Tory' had on,y one option - Lab in Axholme, LD in Sevenoaks. This time they had 4 options in Ax, 3 in Seven.
4 and 5 horse races (where those horses are the recognised national thoroughbreds) are rarely won on massive vote shares of 50% plus. 2 horse races are always won on 50% plus vote shares. Theres no rocket science or mystery to it.

That is simply not the case.

The issue is no longer 'Stop the Tory' the issue is 'Stop Reform' for Lab and LD voters in Tory held seats. Hence the Labour and LD votes were down in Axholme and Sevenoaks respectively, Reform were a clear second in both seats but the Tories held both seats despite the Tory vote being down about 20% in both seats in a straight Tory to Reform shift

And that's the difficult judgement for the Conservatives.

They can only be a Stop Reform party by clearly rejecting Reform. People Like Me (a minority, sure, but potentially Conservative-curious) aren't going to back the Conservatives if they are going to enable Nigel.

But if the price of stopping Nigel is permitting Keir? Ouch.

That's the price of being third, or worse, in the polls.

Indeed, as long as Reform remain the main party of the right in polls, no longer the Conservatives, Conservative incumbent councillors and MPs can only hold on with Labour and LD tactical votes to beat Reform as you say.

If the Tories are only third or worse in May on seats won and behind Labour as well as Reform mutterings will start again over whether Cleverly would be a better bet to win those tactical votes than Kemi is

Seats won now is it? I thought it was NEV
Goalposts being moved

"Badenoch considers burka ban

Tories understood to be ‘looking closely’ at merits of veto on face coverings as part of a review of Islamism"


https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2026/03/27/kemi-badenoch-conservatives-burka-ban/

Poignantly, I saw a woman in a full burqa today, not far from my flat. I cannot know her inner state but her body language expressed great unhappiness. Weighed down by these hideous deathly black shrouds. I do not believe any woman under 60 - if any - would voluntarily wear these appalling garments, They are symbols of misogyny and TOOLS of misogyny

Kemi is right. Ban them

Ban all symbols of religion, the burqa, the crucifix, the dog collar, etc. Then ban all religion. Give peace a chance.

I'm intrigued by nuns' habits.

Smoking, drinking and swearing?

When it comes to Trump, there really is no floor of awful.

There has to come a point, surely, when the US Military acts to remove a traitor as President.

Your accusations that he is a traitor are based on the mistaken idea that he is president of "the West" rather than president of the United States.

No man has done more to destroy US credibility and power, in the course of 14 months.

No author could have written the last 14 months as no one would have believed it

As I've said before, if Trump was a Russian asset what would he have done differently?

Be more discrete.

Discreet. Sorry.

Good evening all.
Was giving some thought earlier to the May locals, the Fisher prediction and Reforms prospects and a comment on here the other day about at what level Reforms vote starts to become inefficient.
Last year in their annus mirabilis they got 30 or 32% NEV depending if youre a Thrasher or Beeb kinda girl. Likely theyll get a bit lower this year imo for reasons discussed at length previously. I think NEV just above mid twenties (say 26 or 27) might be cut off below which they start to lose a vast number of wards narrowly when running up against stronger areas for Red or Blue (say Sandwell or Solihull as examples or Barking and Bromley)
Last night, for example, Reform hit good vote shares in Axholme and Sevenoaks but they were a long way from taking either.
If Reform are going to 'confirm' the breakthrough of 2025 they need a strong turnout of their vote and a depressed turnout of the others. Id say theyll partially get the latter (esp Labour) but have they got the ground game to fire up the former?
Maybe a lot of near misses await......

The Tories only held Axholme and Sevenoaks with heavy tactical voting for them to beat Reform from Labour and LD voters respectively.

As I said earlier only heavy tactical voting for incumbent councillors and MPs will likely enable them to hold off Reform insurgents

LDs in Sevenoaks are not voting Tory tactically to beat Reform when they would have considered themsrlves the challengers for the ward

They are, the LD vote was down 14% in that Sevenoaks ward, given Reform got 29% and the Tory vote was down 20%, without LDs tactically voting Tory it could have been a Reform gain not a Tory hold
https://x.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/2037327448862339391?s=20

@wooliedyed is far more forensic and correct on analysing these results than you will ever be

Oh dont make me blush
Soneone will be along to tell you I talk a load of old cock

I find your analysis very informative and interesting whereas I could predict @HYUFD slant on polling before he makes it

Thank you. I make plenty of errors though and i have my biases. But definitely last nights Tory holds were nothing to do with tactical voting. In both cases in 2023 voters wanting to 'stop the Tory' had on,y one option - Lab in Axholme, LD in Sevenoaks. This time they had 4 options in Ax, 3 in Seven.
4 and 5 horse races (where those horses are the recognised national thoroughbreds) are rarely won on massive vote shares of 50% plus. 2 horse races are always won on 50% plus vote shares. Theres no rocket science or mystery to it.

That is simply not the case.

The issue is no longer 'Stop the Tory' the issue is 'Stop Reform' for Lab and LD voters in Tory held seats. Hence the Labour and LD votes were down in Axholme and Sevenoaks respectively, Reform were a clear second in both seats but the Tories held both seats despite the Tory vote being down about 20% in both seats in a straight Tory to Reform shift

Its always possible the Tories are just more popular than Reform in Axholme and Halstead of course. But you do you