Best Of

Starmer wasn't a Ming Vase, he was an Empty Vase.

And this shows just how pointless such a strategy is in politics.

A lesson for the ages.

The Ming vase strategy was an imperative so as not to scare the horses. Being a shite PM was not a great second step.

Yep. His problem was not MV. Everybody does MV when an election is in the bag bar screw ups. It's the political equivalent of closing down the game 3/0 up with 10 mins left. That was not the SKS problem. The SKS problem was an inability (and quite a special one) to connect with the public. That's why he's going and that's why Burnham is taking over. He has shown that he can. Mayor votes plus polling and now this clinching final step, thumping the populist right in a by-election.

The ghost of the Sheffield Rally looms large. Yeah, woow, yeah!

But in a Lancs accent. Totally different.

I would argue that the big problem was that they had absolutely no idea what to do once in Government. They had wasted 15 years in opposition in-fighting and complaining. They couldn't do Blair's trick of just carrying on with a competent Tory administration's policies (there wasn't one). The global conditions remained unfavourable for coasting.

So what changes when Andy Burnham takes the helm? How do they magic up a decade of intellectual effort and policy development in, say, 6 weeks?

On the other hand, the other guys clown shoes are bigger, so they have that electoral asset - which is all they seem to care about. Government is just an inconvenient distraction from campaigning.

Starmer to weigh up future over weekend, Times told

Sir Keir Starmer will weigh up his future over the weekend amid mounting pressure from his cabinet in the wake of Andy Burnham’s by-election victory, The Times has been told.

The prime minister has publicly insisted that he will not “walk away” and has said he is prepared to fight a challenge from Burnham if it comes to a leadership contest.

However, privately sources close to the prime minister said he recognises there is growing pressure from the backbenches for him to go. He is expected to take the weekend with his wife and family to consider his position before deciding whether to fight on.

https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/makerfield-by-election-results-2026-latest-news-rbfk8mn0n

He’s gone

• Please stop announcing your speculation as fact.
  
• He has a Jewish wife and Jewish kids, and Sabbath is about to start in two hours. He's not going to announce anything tonight.
  

To be honest when I read that I thought he must have resigned

Oh the irony of that statement.

His love for his wife, his family and their faith has made a significant impact on this life long atheist.

How impossibly hard it must have been for him, between a rock and a hard place.

A Party whose core plead for Palestine recognition, a family following the Jewish faith.

An impossible conundrum

Attacked from the left for being pro Israel, which he isn't, attacked by the right and Israel for being anti semitic, which he isn't. Desperate to protect his family from the media, which he has always done.

He may not be indeed he isn't a great politician but take politics out if the equation and he us an intensely decent family man.

Which makes the constant right wing media character assassination the more desperate and sickening.

What on earth are you on about this right wing media nonsense

This is Labour defenestrating their sitting PM all on their own

The right wing media set out to destroy Starmer in an orchestrated campaign from day one.

It worked.

Everybody knows it except you it seems.

Half right. They went for ridiculous hyperbole against Starmer because it sells the most advertising, not to bring him down. Same effect though.

https://x.com/GuidoFawkes/status/2068010625272340885

Some rumours in Labour circles that Streeting will be Chancellor and Miliband will go to MHCLG.

What qualifications does Streeting have to be Chancellor?

His first junior ministerial role was in the treasury, so presumably he starts with some relevant experience.

As TSE will tell us, he’s a Cambridge man so presumably well endowed with tremendous common sense, even if he spent his student days mostly politicking and occasionally studying in the Seeley library listening to the slow dripping of rainwater into the buckets spread about its floor.

He’s seen as on the pragmatic right of the Labour Party and therefore a very market friendly appointment.

And he’s as good a salesperson as Labour has, which the current occupant of number eleven certainly isn’t.

The best Chancellor of my lifetime was a Cambridge man.

The best Chancellor of your lifetime had a Scottish accent and a big clunking fist.

Of course, how could I forget the Chancellor who abolished boom and bust.

Well, we haven't had much boom since he left office, have we?

Sky suggesting many casualties

Eyewitness on FiveLive said train was going half to three quarter speed then a massive bang - lots of broken limbs. Lets hope its no more than injuries.

It's a train I regularly use.

Sheffield to London St Pancras.

St Pancras is the most beautiful and best train station in the UK.

It also has a Fortnum & Mason in it too.

`I use it often for Eurostar, great station. Bar upstairs always good for a livener before the jaunt to Paris.

Shame on Eurostar for being one of the tiny number of rail services in Europe that won’t take pets.

By contrast, here is is sleeping on the DB ICE train

It's ludicrous, I travel on the Italian intercity trains a lot and there's always a good dog or two to entertain everyone. Also go Milan - Paris and same. Eurostar is a great idea for a service put poorly executed by the operator.

Nightmare for bicycles too, despite the obvious (to me) demand for cycle touring in the Low Countries.