Best Of

She's doing well, but I have no idea if she really can take the bull by the horns and pre-announce the heavy revision to the state that is long overdue. I hope she can.

Kemi's big problem, apart from having the charisma of a burst pile, is that she won't square up to the Fukkers and dare not criticise them as most tories actually prefer Fukker/Restrasserite policies to their own. She keeps picking fights with Labour which is very much the tory comfort zone but not where she needs to go to move her polling from their current eschatonic levels.

It worth remembering that while the tories on here grovel at Kemi's feet as if she were Ayesha of Kor, the reality is that the tories poll 20% on a good day. Abject.

Reflecting on the Makerfield byelection result, I think (as I said) that Burnham was the favourite going in, and never really looked troubled.

Reform would always have struggled, but I think could have performed better if they had developed an effective counternarrative against Burnham, beyond their charge that he was using Makerfield as a stepping stone. That was clearly believed by a lot of people, but it couldn't really go anywhere. I felt where Burnham was weakest was at the point of WASPI - it was an embarrassing f U-turn in real time. But for whatever reason it didn't seem that this was capitalised on.

They also had a problem with the plumber, who I don't think was a terrible candidate, but was undoubtedly damaged, particularly by the Vorderman letter to the women of Makerfield. The letter was an utterly cynical piece of confected outrage, and I think in response I would have issued an utterly cynical confected apology, and gone the 'bad boy forgiven' route. I also might have been tempted to put Kenyon up for an interrogation with someone like Kuensberg so the public could see him sweat it out. High risk, but I think many women might have seen it and ended up with some sneaking sympathy. His line would have been - 'sorry, regret my comments, however do we want a society where the only people who are allowed to hold office are people who have never said anything regrettable on social media?'.

Even with all that, I think Reform's best result would have been to be 'robbed' by Restore. That would have fit their narrative nicely. Sadly they just missed out.

My advice to Starmer's wife is to gently tell him it's over and to resign on Monday but offer to stay in office until his successor is appointed

Anything else is frankly cruel and whilst not quite the same, can anyone imagine what would have happened if Jill Biden had taken Joe's hand and quietly said time to pass on the batton Joe

To expose Labour to a very public and probably quite demeaning battle to hold on Starmer would be vilified

I rather disagree. Starmer has a very strong case. If the rabble seek Burnham like change then they should resign as MPs and seek re-election on an Andy-isn't-he-lovely mandate.

Starmer is toxic to the electorate and that was evidenced in spades in Makerfield

His race is over

I shall mark your card as a rabble-rouser

I'm sure you're mostly of Tory blood, as am I. So we're perhaps not the best to comment. Nonetheless Starmer has delivered broadly stable government and Reeves has delivered a broadly stable financial background. I think that in both cases this represents hat-tip like achievement.

The background they had to deal with was shameful. Several Tory PMs really let themselves down.

And so Kemi.

She's doing well, but I have no idea if she really can take the bull by the horns and pre-announce the heavy revision to the state that is long overdue. I hope she can.

Kemi will fancy herself as Maggie Thatcher to Burnham’s Harold Wilson and Starmer’s Jim Callaghan and Sunak’s Ted Heath

That's not bad

It means nothing of course but I have been quite surprised two friends who historically would be solid Labour expressing some enthusiasm for Kemi. (As I only have two friends this is powerful evidence!)

Kemi is the ANTI THATCHER

The Lady was NOT FOR TURNING

FFS Kemi turns 4 or 5 times a week

My advice to Starmer's wife is to gently tell him it's over and to resign on Monday but offer to stay in office until his successor is appointed

Anything else is frankly cruel and whilst not quite the same, can anyone imagine what would have happened if Jill Biden had taken Joe's hand and quietly said time to pass on the batton Joe

To expose Labour to a very public and probably quite demeaning battle to hold on Starmer would be vilified

I rather disagree. Starmer has a very strong case. If the rabble seek Burnham like change then they should resign as MPs and seek re-election on an Andy-isn't-he-lovely mandate.

Starmer is toxic to the electorate and that was evidenced in spades in Makerfield

His race is over

I shall mark your card as a rabble-rouser

I'm sure you're mostly of Tory blood, as am I. So we're perhaps not the best to comment. Nonetheless Starmer has delivered broadly stable government and Reeves has delivered a broadly stable financial background. I think that in both cases this represents hat-tip like achievement.

The background they had to deal with was shameful. Several Tory PMs really let themselves down.

And so Kemi.

She's doing well, but I have no idea if she really can take the bull by the horns and pre-announce the heavy revision to the state that is long overdue. I hope she can.

Kemi will fancy herself as Maggie Thatcher to Burnham’s Harold Wilson and Starmer’s Jim Callaghan and Sunak’s Ted Heath

That's not bad

It means nothing of course but I have been quite surprised two friends who historically would be solid Labour expressing some enthusiasm for Kemi. (As I only have two friends this is powerful evidence!)

Interesting, Farage and Lowe competing to be Enoch Powell of course

Anyway... you didn't answer my question (albeit hidden in a longer reply to someone else so you probably missed it) why Reform got trashed in Rayleigh. Which piqued my interest as I used to live there. Or do you not have any local knowledge of the far side of the county?

As Reform are now in power in Essex county council and Rochford district council so the Tories can now be a local as well as national protest vote

Taking back control...

Jacinda Ardern: ‘New Zealand will become a republic in my lifetime’

https://www.thetimes.com/world/australasia/article/jacinda-ardern-new-zealand-interview-kkppf03f9

So she says but she never pushed it as PM for a reason nor are the current NZ PM or LOTO

Plenty of New Zealand polls for keeping a constitutional monarch over a politician head of state too

https://newsroom.co.nz/2024/10/22/nz-citizens-keen-to-stay-wedded-to-the-monarchy/

Why anyone would want a professional politician with all the grubbiness and politics that causes (look at burnham and his bothering of an electorate to gain personal power) over a constitutional monarch is beyond me

People in Ireland are genuinely delighted with their new President and her ball-playing skills, and when you have a President with extremely limited constitutional power, as in Ireland, it isn't really that contentious.

I find it odd to elect a head of state if they have very limited powers - why bother then? - but clearly it does work.

I'm happy to stick with constitutional monarchy as i think it too works.

Isn't the common factor very limited powers?
The advantage with an elected one is it's much cheaper and it doesn't sit at the heart of a hierarchy designed to reinforce a backward-looking, sclerotic class system

Yes, that's my view.

A strong executive Presidency is probably an inferior form of government to a constitutional monarchy, but I'd prefer an elected President to act as a national figurehead.

Trump is such a unifying figure in the US as an elected President, as was Biden as a national figurehead

Burnham is now clearly the leftwing candidate in any Labour leadership election against Starmer and New Labour Streeting. Whereas he wasn’t in 2015 with Corbyn taking that role nor in 2010 when Ed Miliband and Abbott were the leftist candidates and he was still relatively New Labour.

Burnham might take some encouragement from Ronald Reagan who was beaten by Nixon in the 1968 Republican primaries and narrowly by Ford in the 1976 Republican primaries. As we all remember though Reagan won the 1980 Republican primaries and then the 1980 and 1984 presidential elections. Biden also ran for the Democrats nomination in 1988 and 2008 losing to Dukakis and Obama before finally winning in 2020 the nomination and presidential election

In this particular context what would 'leftwing' mean? Does it mean significantly more than having a particular rhetoric about how you talk politics? How does it relate policy and practicewise to: private enterprise, debt to GDP ratios, deficit, benefits, growth, NATO, overall tax levels, interest rates, migration, student loans, and so on? Unless it means different from Starmer, Tories, LDs, etc in ways that can be articulated, how are we to evaluate?

Burnham’s camp has said he will restore the 50% additional rate of income tax, introduce a land tax, a social care levy etc. It is not just he will renationalise utilities

Policies for which there is no mandate.

Mandates in manifestos don't matter in practice, except that the HOC can't oppose legislation that is in the manifesto.

However the House of Lords cannot block or amend taxation legislation. So a mandate is irrelevant for these measures.

Which gives Kemi an opportunity, as Reform falters after these by election defeats Labour are about to elect a leader committed to tax rises and nationalisations and taking Labour left which it had no mandate for when it won the 2024 general election with Starmer

If Burnham promotes policies that are generally popular then Kemi saying "He doesn't have a mandate" will fall on deaf ears, except for the Tory faithful.

Burnham restoring the 50% additional rate of income tax certainly won’t be popular with the City. A land tax won’t be popular with landowners and developers. His proposal to increase business rates on out of town warehouses won’t be popular with Amazon. While if a rumoured Burnham social care levy hits average home owners that would destroy Burnham’s popularity as badly as the dementia tax did for May’s

The City doesn't vote Labour. Landowners and Developers don't vote Labour (and it seems fair for them them to pay council tax on development land at the rate the finished properties will pay). Out of town warehouse owners and renters don't vote Labour.

Quite apart from addressing inefficiencies which seem built into the system, we just don't seem to be raising enough tax to fund the state we want. Rearmament? We can't even fix potholes.

A land value tax replacing both council tax and stamp duty would seem reasonable to me, levied on all land regardless of owner.

One problem us, of course, is that Burnham will have a maximum of 3 years to do unpopular stuff and wait for the memory to fade, or put anything complex in place, rather the normal 4-5

The City determines business confidence in the country though as New Labour and Thatcher and Cameron and Sunak and even Starmer and Reeves to an extent understood. Amazon is one of the biggest employers in the country and can move their warehouses abroad if the tax they pay in the UK gets too high.

I don't think Amazon can easily move abroad since Brexit, they would have to pay duty on all imports

The words

Amazon

Tax

High

Are vomit inducing, since Amazon pay minimal tax anywhere.

Tax the fuckers what any UK Company in the same Sector would pay.

Then use the proceeds to Cut Employers NI in certain sectors.

The fact there has been virtually no change in Makerfield between 2024 and now suggests that it isn’t Labour that’s the problem, it’s Keir Starmer.

The underlying problem is the country wants changes that are 1) too expensive for our budget and/or 2) implausible. So any candidate representing the status quo is going to lose to a change candidate for the next decade at least. Policies, values etc are not that important, if we had a Conservative or Reform govt they would be extremely unpopular too.

Burnham has gone too early - he should have taken over in 2027 and portrayed himself as a change candidate in 2028. It will be very difficult to portray himself as a change candidate when he has been there for a couple of years.

I think Starmer would have worked as a change candidate were it not for winter fuel. Everything that came after was downhill but that was the initial destructive act. I supported the policy but it was utterly toxic against the new Labour coalition as to be fair many Labour MPs said at the time.

Mandelson would have been easily survivable by somebody with more popularity.

From a party POV, he should have made benefit reform a confidence issue and then quit then if it hadn’t passed. Letting that go just gave the PLP the magic money tree. Burnham will have to grapple with that too but he will start with goodwill.

Surely the point of the Labour Party is to attempt to solve national problems with policies that match the culture of the Labour Party?

The WFA cut seemed like an attempt of cod-Thatcherism. No Labour MP went into politics to cheer cutting benefits.

You want to reduce the welfare bill, but are a Labour PM? What do Labour MPs like? Benefits targeted to the poorest, perhaps?

So announce all the old age extras are going in a blender. The result will be means tests/taxed, so as to target the poorest pensioners.

Then you sell that to the MPs as a reform that makes the poor better off, while being fiscally prudent.

No labour MP went into parliament wanting to make a difficult decision. They want to open fetes, garden centres, shops, and do lots of feel good social work while not upsetting anyone.

Taz, and make plenty of cash, expenses, second houses. A lucrative business for useless donkeys.

I saw recently that Glenys Kinnock's estate was valued at about £1.5million. Now she was an MEP for 15 years rather than an MP. But given that she was a teacher before entering politics, it is hard to see how she could have amassed such a fortune.

Politics is clearly about money for the politicians.

Have you seen the price of houses these days?

In the Kinnocks Wales?

We have several homes by us in the 1 million region with one seafront home within 400 yards being fully restored and going on the market for 3 million

The Kinnocks represented South Wales as MPs and MEPs and not even Cardiff

But they lived in London. The family home was in Ealing when Neil became LotO. House prices in Ealing from 1983 to today are up approximately 1700%! You want to make money, invent a Time Machine and buy in London in the ‘70s or early ‘80s.

Buying the house would be too hard work.

Better to head to the bookies and use your knowledge of future sporting and political events.

And then go to a stockbroker.

The fact there has been virtually no change in Makerfield between 2024 and now suggests that it isn’t Labour that’s the problem, it’s Keir Starmer.

The underlying problem is the country wants changes that are 1) too expensive for our budget and/or 2) implausible. So any candidate representing the status quo is going to lose to a change candidate for the next decade at least. Policies, values etc are not that important, if we had a Conservative or Reform govt they would be extremely unpopular too.

Burnham has gone too early - he should have taken over in 2027 and portrayed himself as a change candidate in 2028. It will be very difficult to portray himself as a change candidate when he has been there for a couple of years.

I think Starmer would have worked as a change candidate were it not for winter fuel. Everything that came after was downhill but that was the initial destructive act. I supported the policy but it was utterly toxic against the new Labour coalition as to be fair many Labour MPs said at the time.

Mandelson would have been easily survivable by somebody with more popularity.

From a party POV, he should have made benefit reform a confidence issue and then quit then if it hadn’t passed. Letting that go just gave the PLP the magic money tree. Burnham will have to grapple with that too but he will start with goodwill.

Surely the point of the Labour Party is to attempt to solve national problems with policies that match the culture of the Labour Party?

The WFA cut seemed like an attempt of cod-Thatcherism. No Labour MP went into politics to cheer cutting benefits.

You want to reduce the welfare bill, but are a Labour PM? What do Labour MPs like? Benefits targeted to the poorest, perhaps?

So announce all the old age extras are going in a blender. The result will be means tests/taxed, so as to target the poorest pensioners.

Then you sell that to the MPs as a reform that makes the poor better off, while being fiscally prudent.

No labour MP went into parliament wanting to make a difficult decision. They want to open fetes, garden centres, shops, and do lots of feel good social work while not upsetting anyone.

Taz, and make plenty of cash, expenses, second houses. A lucrative business for useless donkeys.

I saw recently that Glenys Kinnock's estate was valued at about £1.5million. Now she was an MEP for 15 years rather than an MP. But given that she was a teacher before entering politics, it is hard to see how she could have amassed such a fortune.

Politics is clearly about money for the politicians.

Have you seen the price of houses these days?

In the Kinnocks Wales?

We have several homes by us in the 1 million region with one seafront home within 400 yards being fully restored and going on the market for 3 million

Even in our corner of West Yorkshire there are £1m+ properties.

I just think @HYUFD demeaned Wales by his comment as there are million pound plus homes across the country as across England and Scotland

The majority of million pound homes are in London and the Home Counties and those who own them elsewhere are largely corporate executives and lawyers etc not Labour politicians and ex teachers

There are million pound homes in DONCASTER. I passed one for sale only yesterday.

Admittedly rather more house than you'd get in Surrey.

£1m is not a fortune these days. Public sector pensions for anyone in a vaguely professional role must be getting close to being worth £1m.