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A Very Dark Horse for Johnson’s successor – politicalbetting.com
A Very Dark Horse for Johnson’s successor – politicalbetting.com
Waiting for a Tory VoNC is like waiting for bloody Godot. On and on it goes. Still, on the (questionable) assumption that there will be a vacancy before the days get shorter, it might be worth considering one MP who has not yet figured in any speculation, possibly because he has never expressed any public interest in the role. Nor has anyone else suggested him.
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He appears to be sensible and reasonably competent.
The race is on to succeed Boris Johnson – but which Tory hopeful can go the distance?
@MichaelLCrick @HCH_Hill @shadsy https://www.mailplus.co.uk/tv/the-michael-crick-report/153024/michael-crick-who-will-replace-boris-johnson-as-new-conservative-leader-and-prime-minister?utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=organic_twitter&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1644410328-2
That's the sign of excellent judgment.
Once again we spoke to 2019 Con voters who are now undecided.
❓Impact of the Savile smear?
❓Do voters trust the energy bill 'loan'?
❓Is Starmer pulling in undecided voters?
❓Is Labour lacking in substance?
🧵THREAD by @ChrisHopkins92 https://twitter.com/ChrisHopkins92/status/1491434821931122690
I fear the trustees are going to have to walk.
Capt Sir Tom Moore: Watchdog to review charity's accounts
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-60319650
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_elected_British_politicians_who_have_changed_party_affiliation
I've had a tiny bet (less than a fiver) on Steve Barclay for example. Ben Wallace has a better chance - a tenner or so on him, but his price has now rather corrected.
I generally lay these markets.
I've never heard of Julian Smith, although admittedly I was only very slightly aware of the existence of Cameron before he became leader. A similar, and in my view, total longshot is Alex Chalk.
It's actually quite interesting that I can't stump up so many likely fresh faces in a similar vein - the government has gone stale.
Harper is therefore a very dark horse indeed
Cases by specimen data
However, a bit of better news for no 10 re bullying by party whips
'The Met concluded that, at the current time, there is no evidence of any criminal offence.
As a result no further action will be taken by the MPS'
More seriously, the case against the trustees will rest on motivation and advice received, to people who may or may not have courted publicity.
Presumably the charity quickly became the full-time job of a few people who were otherwise unemployed by the pandemic (with all the furlough and recovery schemes that briefly existed) , so the case will rest on where one draws the line at expenses and salaries.
Can I bill my own charity £100 a day for my time? How’s about £300, if that’s what I was earning before I was made redundant? How’s about £500, if that’s what charities making a million a week in normal times are paying their CEOs?
But this seems to be taking the piss.
Realistically, in choosing a PM as opposed to a party leader who can grow into it, MPs just aren't going to look past the genuinely known quantities - essentially existing senior cabinet members plus Hunt on the outside.
There could be trading value in some of these fringe figures - if they actually enter the contest to strengthen their position to get into the next cabinet, they will shorten. But they just won't be there come the members' vote.
Also, on Cyclefree's point about young cardinals/olds popes... I think you'll find Smith is 50, which would be pretty much lower mid-table in age for an incoming PM (older than Blair and Cameron, and a shade older than Major, but quite a bit younger than Johnson, Brown, or May). There's no comparison with Howard, who was 62 on becoming leader and a few days short of 65 by the 2005 election. It was fair to assume, even if he'd won in 2005, he'd have retired before all that long. That's just not true for a 50 year old - Smith would want to stay as long as people would have him.
What a joke. Just the new F1 show car with the red bull livery. Booo
- Cases are going down rapidly. R is below 1. But Scotland seems to be a bit of an outlier in this... R above 1?
- Admissions down. R seems stable below 1
- MV beds down
- In hospital down
- Deaths down. The downward trend seems to be accelerating.
There is an interesting history to the following kind of structure -
A company or charity that seems to make little money. Or even a loss. But contracts chunks of work to other companies (often based in low/no tax domain). Those companies seem to do alright. And how.
A bid by a bearded ex-record company bloke to run the National Lottery was setup to use this structure, IIRC.
(I hate that expression. I hate more that it's so appropriate here that I feel forced to use it...)
No, this is not a childish conspiracy theory - have you not noticed that at a certain level in public life, abject failure of the kind that would send you and I to the ranks of the unemployable, is merely a change of job? A golden goodbye, quite often, a golden hello and a salary raise.
Cressida Dick. Joyce Thacker etc etc
The split in peoples mindset is still huge. I attended a seminar this afternoon. A colleague loudly proclaimed to me and my other colleagues that she had gone to another building to use the toilet 'because there were 20 students not wearing masks in the closer one'. So what? She's had three vaccine shots, almost certainly had it (two school age kids). I really think we are going to have yet another kind of split in the nation to add to remain vs leave, tory scum vs labour scum. radiohead vs not radiohead and pineapple on pizza...
Quite right. It's not a conspiracy at all, but it is (corrupt - personally not sure) unfortunate, unnessaary, and lazy crap.
The clothes are bit lo-key for your style....
Another non sequitur
Wouldn't put it past them...
Do we have any testing figures yet?
Smith is older than the obvious Cabinet contenders.
A very long shot I agree. But less because of his personal qualities and more because the Tory party seems to have gone temporarily insane.
He complained that he only left Citi with a $91 million dollar payoff and was having trouble finding a job suitable for a man of his station....
Don't worry, he found one. Several in fact.
That's an extreme example, but I would say it's true between western democracies also, albeit with some confounding factors like natural resources.
Why do you think say Germany is wealthier than Italy, if it's not their domestic political choices?
Wouldn't you agree that the UK's current stagnation economically has coincided with a series of rather poor governments making some rather poor choices?
High chance of second round:
- Sunak
- Truss
Will definitely or probably stand, some chance of second round:
- Javid
- Tugendhat
- Hunt
Darkish horses:
- Harper
- Mordaunt
- Hancock?
Ultra-dark horses:
- Julian Smith and assorted remainers
- One of the ERG spartans
- Lord Frost
The Metropolitan Police said in a statement: “The MPS previously assessed this event and determined that on the basis of the evidence available at that time, it did not meet the threshold for criminal investigation.
"That assessment is now being reviewed.”
https://twitter.com/BlewettSam/status/1491457301114658816
We know David Lammy will be taking soundings too.
Is the threshold a factor how many open bottles there are in each photo?
It doesn't matter because the Speaker isn't doing anything about it and most Tory MPs don't care.
Although perhaps it should be noted that he resigned for an act that now seems positively small potatoes compared to industrial scale parties and god knows what else at No 10 all through lockdowns.
That was not the law or the rules at the time. The rules were crystal clear. It did not matter one fuck that you had worked next to the people for days on end or not. You could not meet socially and this is what they did.
But the people already in the bubble, having a social drink at their desks at the end of the day, what’s the issue?
Whether that was a sensible rule or not, it was their rule so they don't really have an excuse. If they thought it was a dumb rule they should have changed it.
"Why Twitter is so awful
Sooner or later, we all become voyeuristic caricatures"
https://unherd.com/2022/02/why-twitter-is-so-awful/
In political terms it doesn't matter. To all onlookers it seems clear that there were multiple gatherings/parties etc, that the PM was at some and then lied to the house about it. Thats enough. He should have resigned, not for the parties, but for lying to the house. But he clearly has no standards at all.
So I'm guessing it was the law.
. 21 In particular, No 10 Downing Street and the Cabinet Office were at the centre of the Government’s response to the pandemic. Tight knit groups of officials and advisers worked long hours under difficult conditions in buildings that could not be easily adapted as Covid secure workplaces. No 10 Downing Street and the Cabinet Office in 70 Whitehall are closely interconnected, with staff moving regularly between the two buildings as part of their daily work. The Prime Minister’s flat and the Downing Street garden are in close proximity to the offices and serve a dual office and private purpose. 22. Those challenges, however, also applied to key and frontline workers across the country who were working under equally, if not more, demanding conditions, often at risk to their own health. It is important to remember the stringency of the public health regulations in force in England over the relevant periods and that criminal sanctions were applied to many found to be in breach of them. The hardship under which citizens across the country worked, lived and sadly even died while observing the Government’s regulations and guidance rigorously are known only too well
Several aspects to this. First of all, let's face it, a lot of these people had they done no work at all throughout the pandemic would have been doing the rest of us a massive favour. On 12 days between March 2020 and July, the DfE issued five contradictory pieces of guidance before 9 in the morning. On average, they issued two pieces of advice a day. This did not make keeping the education system running any easier. The PM's office, we know find, set up a track and trace system as vast cost that has been worse than useless. So actually, it's hard to argue (unlike in the case of doctors, teachers or delivery drivers) that they couldn't have worked from home.
Secondly, any of those people, whether they worked together or not, couldn't socialise. No Christmas parties for me, or Foxy. Heck, we even switched staff meetings to Zoom when we were in the same building. So how come they get different treatment?
Whether this was a sensible law is beside the point. It was the law. They are claiming special exemption for reasons so specious even Dominic Cummings has seen through them (and we all know how bad his eyesight is). If they break their own laws, they deserve to get the shit kicked out of them by the law.
So if that bites them on the arse, all that proves is that they're even dumber than we thought. Which would be funny, if very improbable.
I hope he does find a place in government again. It's not as if the party is overburdened with decency or competence at the moment. And if it is to recover some sense of honour it is people like him who will help. Not the braying liars we see far too much of these days.
Her unpopularity is entirely manufactured. She does have an unfortunate resting smirk though.
It's very hard to work out if the Home Office like her or not. I'd guess they hate her less than everyone else.
I don't think she'll run, and that's a shame I think.
That, and the subsequent, blatant, piss taking lies.