If this proves to be the case, it looks like they were facing the mass abstention (sorry "urgent constituency business") that was mooted last night.
Labour has improved its Parliamentary tactics very markedly over the last year. Getting a major motion implicitly casting doubt on the PM's integrity through against a Tory majority of 80 (as now appears about to happen) is quite impressive. Bryant recusing himself as chair for this issue was particularly smart.
1. The government is in utter chaos, despite its large majority. 2. They're are not exactly succeeding in their goal of drawing a line under the scandal and moving on, are they?
I think so too. The comments that he intends to lead the party into the next election are waffle - it isn't up to him. The stats about him being a liar are poison for votes at the next election.
The number and identity of Tory MPs voting with the opposition today will be interesting - perhaps an approximation of those who have sent letters to Brady?
First person to notice the fundamental flaw in this Tory attack ad gets some sort of prize.
She’s no longer an MP and lost her seat at the GE in 2019.
Congratulations! I gave you a 'like' as a reward.
The Rwanda plan was always about using that for an election and not about really tackling the problem .
Normally we'd point and laugh at CCHQ's dodgy research but nowadays we must consider whether it is more Tory shitposting — a deliberate mistake to provoke comment and sharing.
Two things can be true at the same time . No 10 have shown outstanding military support for Ukraine and Johnson is a pathological liar not fit for office .
Tory MPs are currently using 1 as an excuse for 2
It would be much better for all concerned if the PM was not a pathological liar not fit for office while No 10 continue to show outstanding military support for Ukraine
Considering there is political unanimity on that, there's no reason changing PM would alter anything.
If this proves to be the case, it looks like they were facing the mass abstention (sorry "urgent constituency business") that was mooted last night.
Labour has improved its Parliamentary tactics very markedly over the last year. Getting a major motion implicitly casting doubt on the PM's integrity through against a Tory majority of 80 (as now appears about to happen) is quite impressive. Bryant recusing himself as chair for this issue was particularly smart.
I agree that was exceptionally astute. And it made JRM's comments this morning redundant even as he spoke them.
No10- scrambling to insist today's motion U-turn is NOT a shambles...
Senior govt source: “The Prime Minister has always been clear that he’s happy to face whatever inquiries Parliament sees fit and is happy for the House to decide how it wishes to proceed"
With Commons leader Mark Spencer confirming Tory MPs will have a free vote on the Labour motion (rather than the 3-line whip they were briefing last night) it means Boris Johnson will almost certainly face a privileges committee investigation into whether he misled the Commons. https://twitter.com/KevinASchofield/status/1517086619207090176
Anybody think the privileges committee won't find Boris lied to the House?
Anybody think Boris can survive that finding as PM?
Boris will not lead the Conservatives into the next election, nailed on....
1. The government is in utter chaos, despite its large majority. 2. They're are not exactly succeeding in their goal of drawing a line under the scandal and moving on, are they?
Hence why, if Tories had any sense, they’d know the scandal effectively ends Johnson
@Leon you shouldn’t take too much inspiration from my day so far! I thought I remembered that the check out time for my apartment was 11, and cretinously forgot to check that until 9:50 this morning when I realised it was a 10 o’clock limit. I hadn’t showered, packed or finished washing up.
I brushed my teeth, got everything I could see rammed into my rucksack, grabbed the last few beers from the fridge, wiped the red wine marks off the sides, got all the rubbish into the bin bag and dashed off. I haven’t really had a chance to check I packed everything yet..
I’ve come down to the bus station in Roses (sadly no bar at this bus station - I had to sneak round the corner to swig one of my San Miguels where nobody could see me!) and I’m heading to a little town call Vilajuïga, from where I’m going to walk the couple of miles to Garriguella, where I’m hoping to find the tortoise sanctuary.
Sadly the weather is awful today, grey and wet.. and apparently the tortoises only like to come out on sunny mornings. But I want to make absolutely sure it’s there (there’s been some conflicting views on where it is online - it’s own Facebook page and website link to each other but to different places on the map!) so if I don’t see them today I can come back on Monday morning (my last day), which is the next forecast sunshine..
Your drinking heroics remind me a bit of Nicholas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas.
Didn’t feel particularly heroic when I spent most of yesterday in bed, horribly hungover. I couldn’t face a beer until 5!
Desperate times, surely a frie up at breakfast and a shandy or two at lunch would have helped set you up.
I have watched, it is OK as a drama but a bit far fetched. Also out of date, the majority of Tory MPs are not Eton and Oxford educated with glamorous wives living in Belgravia.
Indeed most Tory MPs now went to state schools. As for Oxford it too has changed, the Bullingdon Club has effectively gone extinct and there about as many privately educated pupils at St Andrews, Durham and Edinburgh now as Oxford and Cambridge has more state educated pupils than all of them
I've not seen it, but I do think there's a general tendency to simplify and play up to viewers' caricatures. Bridgerton is a ridiculous pastiche of Jane Austen, but I know people who think that aristocrats really were and are like that. Political dramas portray all politicians as scheming crooks, idiots or fanatics (much like CD13's post upthread). Tories are all Eton-educated toffs. Labour MPs are either smooth careerists or horny-handed trade unionists.
It's hard to complain since these are primarily for entertainment, and really they can portray people any way they like. But it's worth being careful not to swallow the portrayals as having much to do with reality.
Indeed, it is more entertainment than reality.
In the 1950s there was certainly a big class difference between MPs, most Tory MPs were privately educated and often Oxbridge educated as well. Most Labour MPs were state school educated with many having had working class jobs down the mines or on the factory floor.
Now most Labour and Conservative MPs went to state schools, indeed there were almost as many LD MPs who went to private schools as Conservative MPs who did percentage wise after the 2019 general election.
Almost all MPs are middle class and went to university with about a third going to Oxbridge. Indeed class wise MPs of all parties now look more like each other than the rest of the population, with many having been SPADs or researchers after university and rarely stepped outside politics
My rule of thumb is that Tories went to major public schools and Labour to minor public schools.
Not true now.
Only 44% of current Conservative MPs, 38% of LD MPs and just 19% of Labour MPs went to private schools.
In 1979 by contrast 73% of Conservative MPs, 55% of Liberal MPs and 18% of Labour MPs went to private schools
But of the ones who did go to public schools, does the major/minor relationship still hold? A quick look at Wikipedia finds a lot of PPE, economists and lawyers, and that is just the Shadow Cabinet.
To some extent, the Tories still have more Etonians and Wykehamists.
Albeit Blair went to Fettes, the Eton of Scotland.
Overall however the average Tory MP is much less posh than they were 50 years ago and that is even more so post Brexit. Indeed the LD MPs are almost as posh on average as the Tory MPs now (as more of the former come from London and the South and more of the latter from the Redwall)
By coincidence, I've just been rewatching A Very English Scandal, so am reminded Jeremy Thorpe was another Old Etonian who took a hard line with opponents.
There's a fair few Labour frontbenchers who went to grammars and/or very high performing single-sex state schools that are effectively selective. So it's not clear cut. There's not many Labour high fliers who went to top public schools, admittedly, but there are equally few who went to bog-standard sink comps (Red Rayner, careful Ishmael, is the exception not the rule).
It is very easy to throw a smokescreen over private education.
E.g., in University admissions, it is easy to benefit from private education up to GCSEs, and then go to a high performing state sixth form college. If you are admitted to Oxbridge, you will then count as a state school applicant.
What is true is very few people who went to a bog-standard sink comp pull through and become an MP. Those that do (e.g., Rayner or John Prescott) must be remarkable.
Most MPs come from same-y backgrounds, whatever their party label.
Indeed so. Self-made men and women like Prezza and Ange remain rare in elite politics.
1. The government is in utter chaos, despite its large majority. 2. They're are not exactly succeeding in their goal of drawing a line under the scandal and moving on, are they?
It does seem like Boris is 'losing the dressing room' doesn't it.
"This is a courtroom drama where the defendant is an MP and minister (I assume Tory) who is accused of a rape in a lift in the House of Commons. The big question is whether the victim, a researcher, gave consent ...
An underlying theme is the power and influence of those who went to a certain school (no need to state which ONE!)"
There is something both charming & innocent about the LibDems. There really is.
Let us recollect that the most serious scandal of the last few decades ... by some very considerable stretch, as the charge was incitement to murder ... involved a Liberal leader who "went to a certain school".
Some years after the events referred to I was at a Liberal Conference and Leadership was being discussed. A very nicely spoken elderly lady got up and asked 'why couldn't we just have Jeremy back.'
To be fair, Thorpe did get off in court, therefore not guilty!
"This is a courtroom drama where the defendant is an MP and minister (I assume Tory) who is accused of a rape in a lift in the House of Commons. The big question is whether the victim, a researcher, gave consent ...
An underlying theme is the power and influence of those who went to a certain school (no need to state which ONE!)"
There is something both charming & innocent about the LibDems. There really is.
Let us recollect that the most serious scandal of the last few decades ... by some very considerable stretch, as the charge was incitement to murder ... involved a Liberal leader who "went to a certain school".
I found it more interesting that Mike needed to ascribe a party to the wrongdoer when it is not stated
With Commons leader Mark Spencer confirming Tory MPs will have a free vote on the Labour motion (rather than the 3-line whip they were briefing last night) it means Boris Johnson will almost certainly face a privileges committee investigation into whether he misled the Commons. https://twitter.com/KevinASchofield/status/1517086619207090176
Anybody think the privileges committee won't find Boris lied to the House?
Anybody think Boris can survive that finding as PM?
Boris will not lead the Conservatives into the next election, nailed on....
Surely the standard defence has been a lie requires intent, and however lacking in plausibility it might require he can always claim to have just been a fool?
I'd say people focus a bit too much on letter or spirit rather than both. If you're such a fool you can so easily mislead the House unintentionally that's not much of a defence even if it was not an intentional lie.
Controversially, Sir Humphrey was in the right and PM Hacker in the wrong on a similar issue,
@Leon you shouldn’t take too much inspiration from my day so far! I thought I remembered that the check out time for my apartment was 11, and cretinously forgot to check that until 9:50 this morning when I realised it was a 10 o’clock limit. I hadn’t showered, packed or finished washing up.
I brushed my teeth, got everything I could see rammed into my rucksack, grabbed the last few beers from the fridge, wiped the red wine marks off the sides, got all the rubbish into the bin bag and dashed off. I haven’t really had a chance to check I packed everything yet..
I’ve come down to the bus station in Roses (sadly no bar at this bus station - I had to sneak round the corner to swig one of my San Miguels where nobody could see me!) and I’m heading to a little town call Vilajuïga, from where I’m going to walk the couple of miles to Garriguella, where I’m hoping to find the tortoise sanctuary.
Sadly the weather is awful today, grey and wet.. and apparently the tortoises only like to come out on sunny mornings. But I want to make absolutely sure it’s there (there’s been some conflicting views on where it is online - it’s own Facebook page and website link to each other but to different places on the map!) so if I don’t see them today I can come back on Monday morning (my last day), which is the next forecast sunshine..
Small boat arrivals have dropped from average 700 per day to about 100 per day since the announcement to 0 yesterday.
Would need to know the weather conditions to be sure of an effect, or there may be some other factor.
Surely people taking the crossing (or not) this week were already in France two weeks ago? Seems far too quick to have an effect.
It does seem quick, but its also possible that people who were fleeing France might now decide to flee and seek sanctuary from France in the Netherlands, Germany, Spain or some other country that isn't France instead of just Britain?
I have watched, it is OK as a drama but a bit far fetched. Also out of date, the majority of Tory MPs are not Eton and Oxford educated with glamorous wives living in Belgravia.
Indeed most Tory MPs now went to state schools. As for Oxford it too has changed, the Bullingdon Club has effectively gone extinct and there about as many privately educated pupils at St Andrews, Durham and Edinburgh now as Oxford and Cambridge has more state educated pupils than all of them
I've not seen it, but I do think there's a general tendency to simplify and play up to viewers' caricatures. Bridgerton is a ridiculous pastiche of Jane Austen, but I know people who think that aristocrats really were and are like that. Political dramas portray all politicians as scheming crooks, idiots or fanatics (much like CD13's post upthread). Tories are all Eton-educated toffs. Labour MPs are either smooth careerists or horny-handed trade unionists.
It's hard to complain since these are primarily for entertainment, and really they can portray people any way they like. But it's worth being careful not to swallow the portrayals as having much to do with reality.
Indeed, it is more entertainment than reality.
In the 1950s there was certainly a big class difference between MPs, most Tory MPs were privately educated and often Oxbridge educated as well. Most Labour MPs were state school educated with many having had working class jobs down the mines or on the factory floor.
Now most Labour and Conservative MPs went to state schools, indeed there were almost as many LD MPs who went to private schools as Conservative MPs who did percentage wise after the 2019 general election.
Almost all MPs are middle class and went to university with about a third going to Oxbridge. Indeed class wise MPs of all parties now look more like each other than the rest of the population, with many having been SPADs or researchers after university and rarely stepped outside politics
My rule of thumb is that Tories went to major public schools and Labour to minor public schools.
Not true now.
Only 44% of current Conservative MPs, 38% of LD MPs and just 19% of Labour MPs went to private schools.
In 1979 by contrast 73% of Conservative MPs, 55% of Liberal MPs and 18% of Labour MPs went to private schools
But of the ones who did go to public schools, does the major/minor relationship still hold? A quick look at Wikipedia finds a lot of PPE, economists and lawyers, and that is just the Shadow Cabinet.
A bit ironic that when so many of our leading politicians have studied PPE that we were so ripped off when purchasing it.
What's more worrying is that many of our leading politicians don't think we were so ripped off when purchasing it.
And the profits from supplying PPE are an example of 'trade' and 'business' working well.
Its 100% true.
There's an old saying, you can have it good, fast and cheap - but you need to pick two out of three.
During the pandemic we needed PPE fast and good. We got it, but it wasn't cheap. Considering the pandemic was costing billions, that was the right two out of three to go for and that people made a profit from that is business in action.
Without the profit motive, we would not have had the PPE.
Most of the write-down of PPE has come not from 'fraud' but from the fact that the stockpiles purchased now aren't worth what they were paid for at the time, as the price of the goods has come down since they were purchased. Again, that is how the market works.
The people making the profit weren't those producing the PPE but the middlemen, often well connected middlemen, who had been allowed to interpose themselves into the transaction.
In a well functioning market such people get told to sod off, with government procurement they make vast profits for doing sod all.
Except it was a pandemic and it was not a well functioning market.
Consumption of PPE had gone up 50x over and this was a product that was from memory 99% imported pre-pandemic. Now its from memory 70% domestically produced.
If you think that's all "middle men" then maybe those middle men were actually doing something?
It was government graft and there was no need to buy 5 years supply at the grossly inflated prices the Tories VIP chums were asking for tat.
"This is a courtroom drama where the defendant is an MP and minister (I assume Tory) who is accused of a rape in a lift in the House of Commons. The big question is whether the victim, a researcher, gave consent ...
An underlying theme is the power and influence of those who went to a certain school (no need to state which ONE!)"
There is something both charming & innocent about the LibDems. There really is.
Let us recollect that the most serious scandal of the last few decades ... by some very considerable stretch, as the charge was incitement to murder ... involved a Liberal leader who "went to a certain school".
Some years after the events referred to I was at a Liberal Conference and Leadership was being discussed. A very nicely spoken elderly lady got up and asked 'why couldn't we just have Jeremy back.'
In 1970 and 1974 of course the Eton educated Thorpe was much posher than the state educated Heath and Wilson
Lubov Chernukhin wife of ex Putin crony and who has had paid for access to our last 3 PMs with £2m donated to the Tory party turns out to have been a director of a company secretly owned by a sanctioned Russian oligarch. Of course she now can't recall being a director of said company. Her husband received $8m from the same Russian oligarch she can't remember being a director for.
I wonder if the Tory fan boys will continue to say it is racist for links between Putin and Tory funding to be highlighted.
The ridicule is directed at the idea that the Tory party has been bought or influenced by Russian oligarchs when the UK has led the charge in both supporting and training Ukrainian forces. Yesterday the UK was being specifically named as having caused the default on Russian state backed loans by its sanctions regime. Not only is there no evidence of influence but such evidence as there is points in the opposite direction.
If someone truly believes that Russia spent millions trying to get influence within the Conservative Party, then they should be congratulating the Conservative Party for having taken the money, and then done exactly the opposite of what the Kremlin desired! Indeed, doing the opposite even whilst the money was being given...
Although IMV it's probably much more complex than that. I do not think all Russian donors who gave money in any western country were doing so under Putin's orders. It's just the way things are done in Russia, and the amounts were trivial to many of them. Some would also be feeling (with good reason) uncertain about their status.
Aside from Brexit, presumably.
And the defence is that oligarchs were trying to buy influence but that is all right because it is separate from the Russian state trying to buy influence? Some neutral observers might think influence-peddling is morally suspect from the off. Notwithstanding that some might be less independent from the Kremlin than advertised.
I think any connection between Brexit and Russia is fairly minor, if it exists at all.
Brexit occurred because the people voted for it; and remain lost the vote (sadly, IMO) because they could not make a good enough case for remaining. If they had made a better case, they would have won.
The sour grapes are just because some Remainers still don't understand why they lost the vote, since they think all sensible people must have voted like them, and so therefore there must be some nefarious explanation - despite no evidence for such being found despite nearly a decade of the most ardent Remainers digging and looking for that non-existent evidence.
As often in modern times the existence of Twitter has helped to further reinforce and radicalise those with these delusions.
And how do you account for the continuing sour grapes on the part of the Brexiteers?
Speaking personally I have no sour grapes because I think Brexit is going well. I think by and large we have what I voted for now.
However there are definite elements of sour grapes within some people who voted for Brexit:
1: There is a perpetually-sour element of society (stereotypical "grumpy old man") that Brexit appealed to. These people are never happier than when complaining, so they're never going to be happy.
2: An element of society ( @RochdalePioneers may fall in this category) that voted for it because it was contrarian to the Tory government policy and they could give the government a kicking. Now the Tory government is doing Brexit, they're appalled at what the Tory government is doing (as they always are) so are unhappy.
3: People who had a specific vision in mind for Brexit and its not "this" Brexit. I personally fell under this category when Theresa May was in charge and was trying to force through the Backstop, I think but am not certain that @Richard_Tyndall may fall in this category now.
I voted for Brexit because I could see the logic that as we did not want to participate in the currency or Schengen or the Army that we would be spun to the outer edges at some point anyway so best do it ourselves than be pushed.
As for Brexit going well, clearly. M20 car park, best in the world.
Yeah its going well. The M20 has long been an on-again, off-again car park even pre-Brexit, that didn't stop the voters of Kent voting for it.
IANAE but it seems to me that the fact that it is once again a car park, not for the first time and not just post-Brexit, might just have something to do with the fact that P&O recently sacked all their staff and now all their ferries are grounded.
Question: if it was. P&O issue why did queues not build when they stopped sailing and then dissipate now whilst they are not sailing?
The queues were only there on that scale when the broken customs computer was offline
I think it was 2 weeks ago that DFDS decided they would stop honouring P&O bookings for failed bookings. That has probably added some hassle to it.
And locals are getting annoyed now - it took a friend 2 hours to get to Canterbury on Sunday when it should have taken 45 minutes because Lorry drivers are doing anything and everything to avoid the M20 and using a different route.
Kent people voted in large numbers for Brexit, then to elect intellectual giants like Natalie "this has nothing to do with Brexit" Elphicke. As I always say, you get what you vote for.
Small boat arrivals have dropped from average 700 per day to about 100 per day since the announcement to 0 yesterday.
Would need to know the weather conditions to be sure of an effect, or there may be some other factor.
Surely people taking the crossing (or not) this week were already in France two weeks ago? Seems far too quick to have an effect.
Perhaps it changes the calculus just enough to make claiming asylum on the continent the better option.
If we really can shut down the channel route for good, agreeing to take some percentage of those granted asylum by, say, France might be possible. But I don’t think that would be politically feasible until we can shut down the boats.
With Commons leader Mark Spencer confirming Tory MPs will have a free vote on the Labour motion (rather than the 3-line whip they were briefing last night) it means Boris Johnson will almost certainly face a privileges committee investigation into whether he misled the Commons. https://twitter.com/KevinASchofield/status/1517086619207090176
Anybody think the privileges committee won't find Boris lied to the House?
Anybody think Boris can survive that finding as PM?
Boris will not lead the Conservatives into the next election, nailed on....
Surely the standard defence has been a lie requires intent, and however lacking in plausibility it might require he can always claim to have just been a fool?
I'd say people focus a bit too much on letter or spirit rather than both. If you're such a fool you can so easily mislead the House unintentionally that's not much of a defence even if it was not an intentional lie.
Controversially, Sir Humphrey was in the right and PM Hacker in the wrong on a similar issue,
If Boris gets another fine....the privileges committee will take the view that Lady Bracknell applies.
I have watched, it is OK as a drama but a bit far fetched. Also out of date, the majority of Tory MPs are not Eton and Oxford educated with glamorous wives living in Belgravia.
Indeed most Tory MPs now went to state schools. As for Oxford it too has changed, the Bullingdon Club has effectively gone extinct and there about as many privately educated pupils at St Andrews, Durham and Edinburgh now as Oxford and Cambridge has more state educated pupils than all of them
State school ones are just voting lobby fodder. The ones in control are toffs as you very well know.,
Toffs, liars and crooks. Vote Conservative.
The Foreign Secretary and Home Secretary and Health Secretary in Cabinet all went to state schools, as did Theresa May and Philip Hammond. The PM and Chancellor in the previous Tory government
And still a refusal to face into the issue that anyone supporting this government is personally supporting criminality and lying and impropriety.
Of course Starmer has done exactly the same. He broke the law just as seriously with photos of him drinking beer in a gathering with others. He also "inadvertently misled" Parliament yesterday it seems. Drakeford and Sturgeon also broke their own rules too.
But you don't care about any of that, do you?
If he broke the law, why do the police say that he broke the law?
As for misleading parliament by quoting the front page lead of the Daily Torygraph ...
Cops in Starmer's pocket. Reds under the bed.
Yep. The same giant Blairite conspiracy that the Strictly producers are involved in.
Oh sweet summer child.
If you think that the cops don't like investigating crimes is a conspiracy then you've been very fortunate never to have been the victim of one and I hope that never changes.
Its not my conspiracy! Thelma Walker, the Brighton-resident head of the Northern Independence Party was tweeting that Strictly is part of some Blairite mega plot to foist people like Ed Balls onto the electorate.
Did make me chuckle though! Didn't they also make Ann Widdicombe look like a cuddly warm old Grandma?
With Commons leader Mark Spencer confirming Tory MPs will have a free vote on the Labour motion (rather than the 3-line whip they were briefing last night) it means Boris Johnson will almost certainly face a privileges committee investigation into whether he misled the Commons. https://twitter.com/KevinASchofield/status/1517086619207090176
Anybody think the privileges committee won't find Boris lied to the House?
Anybody think Boris can survive that finding as PM?
Boris will not lead the Conservatives into the next election, nailed on....
Surely the standard defence has been a lie requires intent, and however lacking in plausibility it might require he can always claim to have just been a fool?
I'd say people focus a bit too much on letter or spirit rather than both. If you're such a fool you can so easily mislead the House unintentionally that's not much of a defence even if it was not an intentional lie.
Controversially, Sir Humphrey was in the right and PM Hacker in the wrong on a similar issue,
If Boris gets another fine....the privileges committee will take the view that Lady Bracknell applies.
They (i.e the four Tory members who will decide the outcome) might just take the view that a second, or a third, or a fourth fine is already in the price and doesn't add anything new.
It remains a good marker for events to come. If a minister is publicly shaming themselves on breakfast TV, the subject of their shame will almost certainly be dropped by the afternoon.
With Commons leader Mark Spencer confirming Tory MPs will have a free vote on the Labour motion (rather than the 3-line whip they were briefing last night) it means Boris Johnson will almost certainly face a privileges committee investigation into whether he misled the Commons. https://twitter.com/KevinASchofield/status/1517086619207090176
Anybody think the privileges committee won't find Boris lied to the House?
Anybody think Boris can survive that finding as PM?
Boris will not lead the Conservatives into the next election, nailed on....
First question: I don't think "lies" will be the terminology. They will rule that he misled the House. They will not add "knowingly".
Second question: Yes, he will survive unless the required number of his MPs put their letters in.
Got to the tortoise sanctuary but it’s closed! Glad I came though; I learnt from the helpfully translated into English sign that it’s closed on Monday too. I’m going to have to hope for some better than forecast weather on Sunday..
It's a common theme on here, from all sides, that Starmer is dull. I don't disagree. But is dullness actually a bar to being PM? I've been thinking about this, and I'm not so sure. Let's face it, most people are dull, and genuine charisma is a relatively rare thing. Theresa May's dullness didn't stop her getting stellar popularity ratings before it all went pear-shaped.
In a contest between a) a very dull, boring, competent and honest candidate with integrity, and b) a charismatic, exciting, hilarious pathological liar, I'm beginning to think a) may win hands down.
It remains a good marker for events to come. If a minister is publicly shaming themselves on breakfast TV, the subject of their shame will almost certainly be dropped by the afternoon.
It does seem to suggest that those who were saying Boris now had an A-team of spinners and advisors might have been a tad premature...
Whatever happens this is brilliant for Labour. The scandal will drag on for weeks if not months. The Conservatives are clearly all over the place. Even the most blinkered 2019 Tory voters have finally rumbled Boris. The up-and-coming replacement has crashed to earth. There's no other obvious or popular replacements, nor any one around whom Tory MPs could rally. By the time Tory MPs inch towards making a decision, the PM's henchmen will be arguing that it's now too close to the election to change horses. Meanwhile the economy is going to the dogs and the cost of living crisis is going to hit hard for many months.
It's a common theme on here, from all sides, that Starmer is dull. I don't disagree. But is dullness actually a bar to being PM? I've been thinking about this, and I'm not so sure. Let's face it, most people are dull, and genuine charisma is a relatively rare thing. Theresa May's dullness didn't stop her getting stellar popularity ratings before it all went pear-shaped.
In a contest between a) a very dull, boring, competent and honest candidate with integrity, and b) a charismatic, exciting, hilarious pathological liar, I'm beginning to think a) may win hands down.
Only Johnson has been "entertaining" and look where that's got us.
With Commons leader Mark Spencer confirming Tory MPs will have a free vote on the Labour motion (rather than the 3-line whip they were briefing last night) it means Boris Johnson will almost certainly face a privileges committee investigation into whether he misled the Commons. https://twitter.com/KevinASchofield/status/1517086619207090176
Anybody think the privileges committee won't find Boris lied to the House?
Anybody think Boris can survive that finding as PM?
Boris will not lead the Conservatives into the next election, nailed on....
First question: I don't think "lies" will be the terminology. They will rule that he misled the House. They will not add "knowingly".
Second question: Yes, he will survive unless the required number of his MPs put their letters in.
Why are you so confident he is toast?
I think the fact that the Government have withdrawn their amendment *because of the PCP rebellion* is a significant shift in mood. Had they *not* put down the amendment, and allowed a free vote ("confident that the PM would be cleared") that would *not* have precipitated a significant shift in mood.
I am unclear as to whether that is enough of a shift to remove the PM prior to a GE; like you, I suspect not. But it is a moment, and one that the Government could have avoided.
It's a common theme on here, from all sides, that Starmer is dull. I don't disagree. But is dullness actually a bar to being PM? I've been thinking about this, and I'm not so sure. Let's face it, most people are dull, and genuine charisma is a relatively rare thing. Theresa May's dullness didn't stop her getting stellar popularity ratings before it all went pear-shaped.
In a contest between a) a very dull, boring, competent and honest candidate with integrity, and b) a charismatic, exciting, hilarious pathological liar, I'm beginning to think a) may win hands down.
That assumes that SKS can successfully portray himself as competent, honest and with integrity in absolute rather than relative terms.
I have watched, it is OK as a drama but a bit far fetched. Also out of date, the majority of Tory MPs are not Eton and Oxford educated with glamorous wives living in Belgravia.
Indeed most Tory MPs now went to state schools. As for Oxford it too has changed, the Bullingdon Club has effectively gone extinct and there about as many privately educated pupils at St Andrews, Durham and Edinburgh now as Oxford and Cambridge has more state educated pupils than all of them
I've not seen it, but I do think there's a general tendency to simplify and play up to viewers' caricatures. Bridgerton is a ridiculous pastiche of Jane Austen, but I know people who think that aristocrats really were and are like that. Political dramas portray all politicians as scheming crooks, idiots or fanatics (much like CD13's post upthread). Tories are all Eton-educated toffs. Labour MPs are either smooth careerists or horny-handed trade unionists.
It's hard to complain since these are primarily for entertainment, and really they can portray people any way they like. But it's worth being careful not to swallow the portrayals as having much to do with reality.
Indeed, it is more entertainment than reality.
In the 1950s there was certainly a big class difference between MPs, most Tory MPs were privately educated and often Oxbridge educated as well. Most Labour MPs were state school educated with many having had working class jobs down the mines or on the factory floor.
Now most Labour and Conservative MPs went to state schools, indeed there were almost as many LD MPs who went to private schools as Conservative MPs who did percentage wise after the 2019 general election.
Almost all MPs are middle class and went to university with about a third going to Oxbridge. Indeed class wise MPs of all parties now look more like each other than the rest of the population, with many having been SPADs or researchers after university and rarely stepped outside politics
My rule of thumb is that Tories went to major public schools and Labour to minor public schools.
Not true now.
Only 44% of current Conservative MPs, 38% of LD MPs and just 19% of Labour MPs went to private schools.
In 1979 by contrast 73% of Conservative MPs, 55% of Liberal MPs and 18% of Labour MPs went to private schools
But of the ones who did go to public schools, does the major/minor relationship still hold? A quick look at Wikipedia finds a lot of PPE, economists and lawyers, and that is just the Shadow Cabinet.
To some extent, the Tories still have more Etonians and Wykehamists.
Albeit Blair went to Fettes, the Eton of Scotland.
Overall however the average Tory MP is much less posh than they were 50 years ago and that is even more so post Brexit. Indeed the LD MPs are almost as posh on average as the Tory MPs now (as more of the former come from London and the South and more of the latter from the Redwall)
Hang on, young HY!!! Remind us, if you would be so kind, who are these Lib Dems MPs who come from London and the South? Then add them up, divide by thirteen and express the result as a percentage......
Now, what were you saying?
It may be as you say after the next election, of course.
IIf you think that Boris Johnson’s parties in Downing Street constitute a serious matter of state, you might want to take a look at what is happening in Germany right now. Olaf Scholz has been caught red-handed misrepresenting facts about weapons deliveries to Ukraine. Behind the scenes, he is busy frustrating efforts to help the country, while pretending to be outraged about Vladimir Putin’s aggression. Double games work until they don’t. His policies are now being exposed by the media. Scholz said on Tuesday that Germany and Ukraine went through a list of weapons deliveries, and that Germany planned to pay for them. Ukraine denied this. It said that there were no weapons on the list that it needed right now. Bild managed to get hold of the list, and was shocked to find that the original list of 48 pages had been shrunk in half. The German defence ministries, on orders from Scholz, had removed all the heavy weapons. … https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/olaf-scholz-is-becoming-putin-s-most-valuable-ally
That's disgraceful! Anyone on here voting for Olaf Scholz shoud take a serious look at themselves in the mirror.
I think the problem, for some in Germany, is that East Politics has been part of their political persona.
That they defined themselves as good, peaceful, humane, internationalist New Germans (in part), from their absolute belief in peaceful and deeper relations with Russia.
So half going to war with Russia is a cognitive break for some. Bit like BREXIT...
It's Ostpolitik, but also Wandel durch Handel - Change through Trade.
It remains a good marker for events to come. If a minister is publicly shaming themselves on breakfast TV, the subject of their shame will almost certainly be dropped by the afternoon.
It does seem to suggest that those who were saying Boris now had an A-team of spinners and advisors might have been a tad premature...
He does have some great spinners, but not advisors. Having great spinners does not guarantee you can always sell shit.
I am shocked by these developments. I genuinely thought Partygate had run its course. Clearly there are more cojones behind the scenes than have been on public display.
It's a common theme on here, from all sides, that Starmer is dull. I don't disagree. But is dullness actually a bar to being PM? I've been thinking about this, and I'm not so sure. Let's face it, most people are dull, and genuine charisma is a relatively rare thing. Theresa May's dullness didn't stop her getting stellar popularity ratings before it all went pear-shaped.
In a contest between a) a very dull, boring, competent and honest candidate with integrity, and b) a charismatic, exciting, hilarious pathological liar, I'm beginning to think a) may win hands down.
That assumes that SKS can successfully portray himself as competent, honest and with integrity in absolute rather than relative terms.
Well, in the last two years the Tories haven't been able to find anything substantive to suggest he isn't. If the best they can do is 'he didn't prosecute Jimmy Saville', it suggests the smear bucket is pretty empty.
IIf you think that Boris Johnson’s parties in Downing Street constitute a serious matter of state, you might want to take a look at what is happening in Germany right now. Olaf Scholz has been caught red-handed misrepresenting facts about weapons deliveries to Ukraine. Behind the scenes, he is busy frustrating efforts to help the country, while pretending to be outraged about Vladimir Putin’s aggression. Double games work until they don’t. His policies are now being exposed by the media. Scholz said on Tuesday that Germany and Ukraine went through a list of weapons deliveries, and that Germany planned to pay for them. Ukraine denied this. It said that there were no weapons on the list that it needed right now. Bild managed to get hold of the list, and was shocked to find that the original list of 48 pages had been shrunk in half. The German defence ministries, on orders from Scholz, had removed all the heavy weapons. … https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/olaf-scholz-is-becoming-putin-s-most-valuable-ally
That's disgraceful! Anyone on here voting for Olaf Scholz shoud take a serious look at themselves in the mirror.
I think the problem, for some in Germany, is that East Politics has been part of their political persona.
That they defined themselves as good, peaceful, humane, internationalist New Germans (in part), from their absolute belief in peaceful and deeper relations with Russia.
So half going to war with Russia is a cognitive break for some. Bit like BREXIT...
It's Ostpolitik, but also Wandel durch Handel - Change through Trade.
Which was a part of East Politics- the theory that since everything is better in Europe with more economic integration, do the same with Russia. One big, happy, family.
I am shocked by these developments. I genuinely thought Partygate had run its course. Clearly there are more cojones behind the scenes than have been on public display.
I suspect Tory MPs can't wish it away because they know there's more to come out - in the way of fines, and the Sue Gray report. So they can't just draw a line under it, however much they wish they could.
It remains a good marker for events to come. If a minister is publicly shaming themselves on breakfast TV, the subject of their shame will almost certainly be dropped by the afternoon.
It does seem to suggest that those who were saying Boris now had an A-team of spinners and advisors might have been a tad premature...
I completely understand the "just brazen it out" approach - it can work. You could argue that it *has* worked but note that the PM's room to manoeuvre keeps shrinking. Even "we'll just vote down the investigation" wasn't remotely politically viable.
When it gets to committee the plan will be "just don't request the evidence, say nothing see, slap on the wrists and its over". Which again isn't remotely politically viable. Chris Bryant removing himself from the chair - but not the investigation - was an inspired play. He remains a key member of the committee and the chair for this investigation can hardly ignore him and the reams of stuff he will put on the table to be looked at. But not being in the chair meant that the "must be chaired by an opposition MP" committee couldn't be ignored as partisan.
At the committee we get warts and all. Which makes the PM's room to manoeuvre narrower and narrower until he is faced with two choices. "You fucking people, you have no idea how to defend a nation" or writing a letter to Rishi Sunak.
1. The government is in utter chaos, despite its large majority. 2. They're are not exactly succeeding in their goal of drawing a line under the scandal and moving on, are they?
It was predictable that those Tory MPs who elected Boris and claimed he would change his spots would end up looking like chumps.
Ian Blackford seems to be unaware that this is about referring the issue to the committee to investigate, not to determine the outcome of that investigation.
Lubov Chernukhin wife of ex Putin crony and who has had paid for access to our last 3 PMs with £2m donated to the Tory party turns out to have been a director of a company secretly owned by a sanctioned Russian oligarch. Of course she now can't recall being a director of said company. Her husband received $8m from the same Russian oligarch she can't remember being a director for.
I wonder if the Tory fan boys will continue to say it is racist for links between Putin and Tory funding to be highlighted.
The ridicule is directed at the idea that the Tory party has been bought or influenced by Russian oligarchs when the UK has led the charge in both supporting and training Ukrainian forces. Yesterday the UK was being specifically named as having caused the default on Russian state backed loans by its sanctions regime. Not only is there no evidence of influence but such evidence as there is points in the opposite direction.
If someone truly believes that Russia spent millions trying to get influence within the Conservative Party, then they should be congratulating the Conservative Party for having taken the money, and then done exactly the opposite of what the Kremlin desired! Indeed, doing the opposite even whilst the money was being given...
Although IMV it's probably much more complex than that. I do not think all Russian donors who gave money in any western country were doing so under Putin's orders. It's just the way things are done in Russia, and the amounts were trivial to many of them. Some would also be feeling (with good reason) uncertain about their status.
Aside from Brexit, presumably.
And the defence is that oligarchs were trying to buy influence but that is all right because it is separate from the Russian state trying to buy influence? Some neutral observers might think influence-peddling is morally suspect from the off. Notwithstanding that some might be less independent from the Kremlin than advertised.
I think any connection between Brexit and Russia is fairly minor, if it exists at all.
Brexit occurred because the people voted for it; and remain lost the vote (sadly, IMO) because they could not make a good enough case for remaining. If they had made a better case, they would have won.
The sour grapes are just because some Remainers still don't understand why they lost the vote, since they think all sensible people must have voted like them, and so therefore there must be some nefarious explanation - despite no evidence for such being found despite nearly a decade of the most ardent Remainers digging and looking for that non-existent evidence.
As often in modern times the existence of Twitter has helped to further reinforce and radicalise those with these delusions.
And how do you account for the continuing sour grapes on the part of the Brexiteers?
Speaking personally I have no sour grapes because I think Brexit is going well. I think by and large we have what I voted for now.
However there are definite elements of sour grapes within some people who voted for Brexit:
1: There is a perpetually-sour element of society (stereotypical "grumpy old man") that Brexit appealed to. These people are never happier than when complaining, so they're never going to be happy.
2: An element of society ( @RochdalePioneers may fall in this category) that voted for it because it was contrarian to the Tory government policy and they could give the government a kicking. Now the Tory government is doing Brexit, they're appalled at what the Tory government is doing (as they always are) so are unhappy.
3: People who had a specific vision in mind for Brexit and its not "this" Brexit. I personally fell under this category when Theresa May was in charge and was trying to force through the Backstop, I think but am not certain that @Richard_Tyndall may fall in this category now.
I voted for Brexit because I could see the logic that as we did not want to participate in the currency or Schengen or the Army that we would be spun to the outer edges at some point anyway so best do it ourselves than be pushed.
As for Brexit going well, clearly. M20 car park, best in the world.
Yeah its going well. The M20 has long been an on-again, off-again car park even pre-Brexit, that didn't stop the voters of Kent voting for it.
IANAE but it seems to me that the fact that it is once again a car park, not for the first time and not just post-Brexit, might just have something to do with the fact that P&O recently sacked all their staff and now all their ferries are grounded.
Question: if it was. P&O issue why did queues not build when they stopped sailing and then dissipate now whilst they are not sailing?
The queues were only there on that scale when the broken customs computer was offline
I think it was 2 weeks ago that DFDS decided they would stop honouring P&O bookings for failed bookings. That has probably added some hassle to it.
And locals are getting annoyed now - it took a friend 2 hours to get to Canterbury on Sunday when it should have taken 45 minutes because Lorry drivers are doing anything and everything to avoid the M20 and using a different route.
Kent people voted in large numbers for Brexit, then to elect intellectual giants like Natalie "this has nothing to do with Brexit" Elphicke. As I always say, you get what you vote for.
This is all such total bollocks. As PB's East Kent correspondent I hear so many anecdotes from people as far away as Scotland (looking at you @RochdalePioneers and @eek ) about how bad things in East Kent are. It's like you're descrbing another planet.
I live in Wye, between Canterbury and Ashford, closer to Ashford, use the M20 all the time. On Saturday I had to drive to Heathrow twice. The Covid test the wife took the previous day was faulty so I had to get there early enough for her to take one at the airport, where she failed the rapid antigen test and I had to go back to get her. It was Easter but the M20 was empty, no lorries whatsoever, M25 fine. Made it Wye TN25 to Terminal 3 in 1 hour 20 minutes and back in about the same. Twice.
I'm as anti-Brexit as they come but reports of the roads round here are completely off the scale wrong. The reason it would take 2 hours to get to Canterbury from London on the M2 is (a) it was a sunny Easter weekend and people were trying to get to the coast and (b) the roadworks at Brenley Corner, where you turn off to get on the A2 for Canterbury, have screwed the whole thing up.
All the sneering "look at stupid people from Kent" is wish fulfilment. The roads here are not noticably worse than they were during a French dockers strike or bad weather before Brexit.
It's a common theme on here, from all sides, that Starmer is dull. I don't disagree. But is dullness actually a bar to being PM? I've been thinking about this, and I'm not so sure. Let's face it, most people are dull, and genuine charisma is a relatively rare thing. Theresa May's dullness didn't stop her getting stellar popularity ratings before it all went pear-shaped.
In a contest between a) a very dull, boring, competent and honest candidate with integrity, and b) a charismatic, exciting, hilarious pathological liar, I'm beginning to think a) may win hands down.
That assumes that SKS can successfully portray himself as competent, honest and with integrity in absolute rather than relative terms.
Well, in the last two years the Tories haven't been able to find anything substantive to suggest he isn't. If the best they can do is 'he didn't prosecute Jimmy Saville', it suggests the smear bucket is pretty empty.
Yes, he does seem Mr Clean. Even down to the point where he is seen having a beer while meeting workers on the campaign trail is seen as a gotcha.
I am no Starmer fan, and won't be voting Labour at the next GE, but He will be a far more dignified PM than Johnson, or any of the current cabinet gimps.
IIf you think that Boris Johnson’s parties in Downing Street constitute a serious matter of state, you might want to take a look at what is happening in Germany right now. Olaf Scholz has been caught red-handed misrepresenting facts about weapons deliveries to Ukraine. Behind the scenes, he is busy frustrating efforts to help the country, while pretending to be outraged about Vladimir Putin’s aggression. Double games work until they don’t. His policies are now being exposed by the media. Scholz said on Tuesday that Germany and Ukraine went through a list of weapons deliveries, and that Germany planned to pay for them. Ukraine denied this. It said that there were no weapons on the list that it needed right now. Bild managed to get hold of the list, and was shocked to find that the original list of 48 pages had been shrunk in half. The German defence ministries, on orders from Scholz, had removed all the heavy weapons. … https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/olaf-scholz-is-becoming-putin-s-most-valuable-ally
That's disgraceful! Anyone on here voting for Olaf Scholz shoud take a serious look at themselves in the mirror.
I think the problem, for some in Germany, is that East Politics has been part of their political persona.
That they defined themselves as good, peaceful, humane, internationalist New Germans (in part), from their absolute belief in peaceful and deeper relations with Russia.
So half going to war with Russia is a cognitive break for some. Bit like BREXIT...
It's Ostpolitik, but also Wandel durch Handel - Change through Trade.
Which was a part of East Politics- the theory that since everything is better in Europe with more economic integration, do the same with Russia. One big, happy, family.
That's a view I guess, not one I'd share. If you let the fox into the henhouse will he start laying eggs?
It's a common theme on here, from all sides, that Starmer is dull. I don't disagree. But is dullness actually a bar to being PM? I've been thinking about this, and I'm not so sure. Let's face it, most people are dull, and genuine charisma is a relatively rare thing. Theresa May's dullness didn't stop her getting stellar popularity ratings before it all went pear-shaped.
In a contest between a) a very dull, boring, competent and honest candidate with integrity, and b) a charismatic, exciting, hilarious pathological liar, I'm beginning to think a) may win hands down.
I'm not sure it can be proven one way or another, though some have suggested the duller candidate does indeed always lose (or rather, goes backwards). As you say it wasn't the dullness that undid May though.
Personally I think accusations of dullness are a bit overdone. Keir isn't that boring, even if admittedly he is definitely not very dynamic or obviously charismatic, which as you note is pretty darn rare. He's normal more than dull. (not that normality is itself a positive - nothing wrong with extraordinary individuals for extraordinary roles)
People knew Boris's flaws and either thought them worth the risk at the time, or his positives simply outweighed the negatives. The weight of office and changed circumstances may alter that calculation in a duller candidates' favour - let's face it, at the 5th election since 2010 one would assume a move away from the governing party anyway - though I am far from sure it will be by enough. They are honing in on some effective lines.
I have watched, it is OK as a drama but a bit far fetched. Also out of date, the majority of Tory MPs are not Eton and Oxford educated with glamorous wives living in Belgravia.
Indeed most Tory MPs now went to state schools. As for Oxford it too has changed, the Bullingdon Club has effectively gone extinct and there about as many privately educated pupils at St Andrews, Durham and Edinburgh now as Oxford and Cambridge has more state educated pupils than all of them
I've not seen it, but I do think there's a general tendency to simplify and play up to viewers' caricatures. Bridgerton is a ridiculous pastiche of Jane Austen, but I know people who think that aristocrats really were and are like that. Political dramas portray all politicians as scheming crooks, idiots or fanatics (much like CD13's post upthread). Tories are all Eton-educated toffs. Labour MPs are either smooth careerists or horny-handed trade unionists.
It's hard to complain since these are primarily for entertainment, and really they can portray people any way they like. But it's worth being careful not to swallow the portrayals as having much to do with reality.
Indeed, it is more entertainment than reality.
In the 1950s there was certainly a big class difference between MPs, most Tory MPs were privately educated and often Oxbridge educated as well. Most Labour MPs were state school educated with many having had working class jobs down the mines or on the factory floor.
Now most Labour and Conservative MPs went to state schools, indeed there were almost as many LD MPs who went to private schools as Conservative MPs who did percentage wise after the 2019 general election.
Almost all MPs are middle class and went to university with about a third going to Oxbridge. Indeed class wise MPs of all parties now look more like each other than the rest of the population, with many having been SPADs or researchers after university and rarely stepped outside politics
Ray Mawby, an electrician and TU officer, wasTory MP for Totnes from the mid 50's to the 80's and was regularly trotted out as an example of the wide range of people who supported the Conservative party. IIRC he later got into trouble for working for Czech Communist Government.
He passed on nuggets to the Czech military security through the Cold War.
The only Conservative MP known to have spied on behalf of a Communist Govt.
So somewhat atypical!
Atypical because the others were too clever to get caught?
Whatever happens this is brilliant for Labour. The scandal will drag on for weeks if not months. The Conservatives are clearly all over the place. Even the most blinkered 2019 Tory voters have finally rumbled Boris. The up-and-coming replacement has crashed to earth. There's no other obvious or popular replacements, nor any one around whom Tory MPs could rally. By the time Tory MPs inch towards making a decision, the PM's henchmen will be arguing that it's now too close to the election to change horses. Meanwhile the economy is going to the dogs and the cost of living crisis is going to hit hard for many months.
Why does everyone keep saying the economy is going to the dogs?
How do the Tories go into another GE with someone who the public think by a vast majority is a liar .
You will get people who vote Tory inspite of that but the opposition have an open goal . “He lied to you and why would you believe any manifesto pledges or a word he says “.
The Tories don’t have a Corbyn this time to use as a voter repellant .
All this talk of Starmer being dull and lacking charisma . The message to voters by Labour should be yes he’s dull but not a pathological liar !
Couldnt put it better, who would you rather vote for, Starmer dull but honest and competent, or Johnson, incompetent, workshy, liar, tricky one
8% of people think Johnson hasn't lied. 27% of people think he would make the best Prime Minister.
Understand why that is and you might just work out how to beat him.
It needn't be that the 19% are stupid or evil, in fact it probably isn't. But it's a slice of the population that winning oppositions need to understand so they can speak to them.
I suspect it's a perception that all pols lie, which had some truth in it- but it ignores how much BoJo is far far worse...
Whatever happens this is brilliant for Labour. The scandal will drag on for weeks if not months. The Conservatives are clearly all over the place. Even the most blinkered 2019 Tory voters have finally rumbled Boris. The up-and-coming replacement has crashed to earth. There's no other obvious or popular replacements, nor any one around whom Tory MPs could rally. By the time Tory MPs inch towards making a decision, the PM's henchmen will be arguing that it's now too close to the election to change horses. Meanwhile the economy is going to the dogs and the cost of living crisis is going to hit hard for many months.
Why does everyone keep saying the economy is going to the dogs?
I have watched, it is OK as a drama but a bit far fetched. Also out of date, the majority of Tory MPs are not Eton and Oxford educated with glamorous wives living in Belgravia.
Indeed most Tory MPs now went to state schools. As for Oxford it too has changed, the Bullingdon Club has effectively gone extinct and there about as many privately educated pupils at St Andrews, Durham and Edinburgh now as Oxford and Cambridge has more state educated pupils than all of them
I've not seen it, but I do think there's a general tendency to simplify and play up to viewers' caricatures. Bridgerton is a ridiculous pastiche of Jane Austen, but I know people who think that aristocrats really were and are like that. Political dramas portray all politicians as scheming crooks, idiots or fanatics (much like CD13's post upthread). Tories are all Eton-educated toffs. Labour MPs are either smooth careerists or horny-handed trade unionists.
It's hard to complain since these are primarily for entertainment, and really they can portray people any way they like. But it's worth being careful not to swallow the portrayals as having much to do with reality.
Indeed, it is more entertainment than reality.
In the 1950s there was certainly a big class difference between MPs, most Tory MPs were privately educated and often Oxbridge educated as well. Most Labour MPs were state school educated with many having had working class jobs down the mines or on the factory floor.
Now most Labour and Conservative MPs went to state schools, indeed there were almost as many LD MPs who went to private schools as Conservative MPs who did percentage wise after the 2019 general election.
Almost all MPs are middle class and went to university with about a third going to Oxbridge. Indeed class wise MPs of all parties now look more like each other than the rest of the population, with many having been SPADs or researchers after university and rarely stepped outside politics
My rule of thumb is that Tories went to major public schools and Labour to minor public schools.
Not true now.
Only 44% of current Conservative MPs, 38% of LD MPs and just 19% of Labour MPs went to private schools.
In 1979 by contrast 73% of Conservative MPs, 55% of Liberal MPs and 18% of Labour MPs went to private schools
But of the ones who did go to public schools, does the major/minor relationship still hold? A quick look at Wikipedia finds a lot of PPE, economists and lawyers, and that is just the Shadow Cabinet.
A bit ironic that when so many of our leading politicians have studied PPE that we were so ripped off when purchasing it.
What's more worrying is that many of our leading politicians don't think we were so ripped off when purchasing it.
And the profits from supplying PPE are an example of 'trade' and 'business' working well.
Its 100% true.
There's an old saying, you can have it good, fast and cheap - but you need to pick two out of three.
During the pandemic we needed PPE fast and good. We got it, but it wasn't cheap. Considering the pandemic was costing billions, that was the right two out of three to go for and that people made a profit from that is business in action.
Without the profit motive, we would not have had the PPE.
Most of the write-down of PPE has come not from 'fraud' but from the fact that the stockpiles purchased now aren't worth what they were paid for at the time, as the price of the goods has come down since they were purchased. Again, that is how the market works.
We spent something more than £500m on PPE that was unusable. I suppose it was fast, but it certainly wasn't cheap or even good enough.
A lot wasn't that fast either. Sweetheart contacts were being given out to mates of the government in summer 2020
Of course, Labour were demanding to know why we weren't doing deals with people who, er, had no PPE.
We ended up with enough PPE. The Govt. did its job. The same people saying we spent too much on dodgy PPE would have been demanding the Government fall if we had actually, you know, run out of PPE. On this aspect of Covid at least, Labour deserve to be called out as shameless political hypocrites.
Come on Mark, they filled their chums pockets big time, it was graft pure and simple and you know it.
Ian Blackford seems to be unaware that this is about referring the issue to the committee to investigate, not to determine the outcome of that investigation.
A common problem for politicians and the public - see pretty much any call for a public inquiry, and immediate reactions if the Chair once shared a lift with the cousin twice removed of a junior minister 35 years ago, on the basis it means they won't come to a view they want.
IIf you think that Boris Johnson’s parties in Downing Street constitute a serious matter of state, you might want to take a look at what is happening in Germany right now. Olaf Scholz has been caught red-handed misrepresenting facts about weapons deliveries to Ukraine. Behind the scenes, he is busy frustrating efforts to help the country, while pretending to be outraged about Vladimir Putin’s aggression. Double games work until they don’t. His policies are now being exposed by the media. Scholz said on Tuesday that Germany and Ukraine went through a list of weapons deliveries, and that Germany planned to pay for them. Ukraine denied this. It said that there were no weapons on the list that it needed right now. Bild managed to get hold of the list, and was shocked to find that the original list of 48 pages had been shrunk in half. The German defence ministries, on orders from Scholz, had removed all the heavy weapons. … https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/olaf-scholz-is-becoming-putin-s-most-valuable-ally
That's disgraceful! Anyone on here voting for Olaf Scholz shoud take a serious look at themselves in the mirror.
I think the problem, for some in Germany, is that East Politics has been part of their political persona.
That they defined themselves as good, peaceful, humane, internationalist New Germans (in part), from their absolute belief in peaceful and deeper relations with Russia.
So half going to war with Russia is a cognitive break for some. Bit like BREXIT...
It's Ostpolitik, but also Wandel durch Handel - Change through Trade.
Which was a part of East Politics- the theory that since everything is better in Europe with more economic integration, do the same with Russia. One big, happy, family.
I dont think it possible to ignore the German reluctance for war with Russia. The legacy of WW1 of the Bolsheveik Revolution and then the genocide of both Jews and Slavs in WW2 carries a tremendous amount of baggage.
The Germans have history that other NATO countries do not.
If Johnson does go prior to the next GE, I'd make Ben Wallace favourite I think. Had another tenner on him this morning at 10/1 for next tory leader.
(I have a bet on him from last year at 100/1 (for next PM).)
MPs don't want Truss and I can see Wallace developing as the best protection against that, given that he is even more popular that Truss in the ConHome survey.
IIf you think that Boris Johnson’s parties in Downing Street constitute a serious matter of state, you might want to take a look at what is happening in Germany right now. Olaf Scholz has been caught red-handed misrepresenting facts about weapons deliveries to Ukraine. Behind the scenes, he is busy frustrating efforts to help the country, while pretending to be outraged about Vladimir Putin’s aggression. Double games work until they don’t. His policies are now being exposed by the media. Scholz said on Tuesday that Germany and Ukraine went through a list of weapons deliveries, and that Germany planned to pay for them. Ukraine denied this. It said that there were no weapons on the list that it needed right now. Bild managed to get hold of the list, and was shocked to find that the original list of 48 pages had been shrunk in half. The German defence ministries, on orders from Scholz, had removed all the heavy weapons. … https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/olaf-scholz-is-becoming-putin-s-most-valuable-ally
That's disgraceful! Anyone on here voting for Olaf Scholz shoud take a serious look at themselves in the mirror.
I think the problem, for some in Germany, is that East Politics has been part of their political persona.
That they defined themselves as good, peaceful, humane, internationalist New Germans (in part), from their absolute belief in peaceful and deeper relations with Russia.
So half going to war with Russia is a cognitive break for some. Bit like BREXIT...
It's Ostpolitik, but also Wandel durch Handel - Change through Trade.
Which was a part of East Politics- the theory that since everything is better in Europe with more economic integration, do the same with Russia. One big, happy, family.
I dont think it possible to ignore the German reluctance for war with Russia. The legacy of WW1 of the Bolsheveik Revolution and then the genocide of both Jews and Slavs in WW2 carries a tremendous amount of baggage.
The Germans have history that other NATO countries do not.
That's taken way too far. No one forgets the history, but as they themselves have acknowledged in seeking to alter many of their positions, that history should not mean never being willing to take robust action. Yes, war is a step well beyond that, but the principal is the same - awareness of and consideration of the history does not bind their hands forevermore, as their own shifts have demonstrated they accept.
With Commons leader Mark Spencer confirming Tory MPs will have a free vote on the Labour motion (rather than the 3-line whip they were briefing last night) it means Boris Johnson will almost certainly face a privileges committee investigation into whether he misled the Commons. https://twitter.com/KevinASchofield/status/1517086619207090176
Anybody think the privileges committee won't find Boris lied to the House?
Anybody think Boris can survive that finding as PM?
Boris will not lead the Conservatives into the next election, nailed on....
It does have 4 Tories on 7 man panel, will any of them have a backbone.
It's a common theme on here, from all sides, that Starmer is dull. I don't disagree. But is dullness actually a bar to being PM? I've been thinking about this, and I'm not so sure. Let's face it, most people are dull, and genuine charisma is a relatively rare thing. Theresa May's dullness didn't stop her getting stellar popularity ratings before it all went pear-shaped.
In a contest between a) a very dull, boring, competent and honest candidate with integrity, and b) a charismatic, exciting, hilarious pathological liar, I'm beginning to think a) may win hands down.
That assumes that SKS can successfully portray himself as competent, honest and with integrity in absolute rather than relative terms.
Well, in the last two years the Tories haven't been able to find anything substantive to suggest he isn't. If the best they can do is 'he didn't prosecute Jimmy Saville', it suggests the smear bucket is pretty empty.
Yes, he does seem Mr Clean. Even down to the point where he is seen having a beer while meeting workers on the campaign trail is seen as a gotcha.
I am no Starmer fan, and won't be voting Labour at the next GE, but He will be a far more dignified PM than Johnson, or any of the current cabinet gimps.
Remember the donkey field? Now that was scraping the barrel.
If Johnson does go prior to the next GE, I'd make Ben Wallace favourite I think. Had another tenner on him this morning at 10/1 for next tory leader.
(I have a bet on him from last year at 100/1 (for next PM).)
MPs don't want Truss and I can see Wallace developing as the best protection against that, given that he is even more popular that Truss in the ConHome survey.
Yes, Being dull and competent could well be the Tory choice, as leaders do tend to be replaced by those who seem to remedy the existing ones faults.
Lubov Chernukhin wife of ex Putin crony and who has had paid for access to our last 3 PMs with £2m donated to the Tory party turns out to have been a director of a company secretly owned by a sanctioned Russian oligarch. Of course she now can't recall being a director of said company. Her husband received $8m from the same Russian oligarch she can't remember being a director for.
I wonder if the Tory fan boys will continue to say it is racist for links between Putin and Tory funding to be highlighted.
The ridicule is directed at the idea that the Tory party has been bought or influenced by Russian oligarchs when the UK has led the charge in both supporting and training Ukrainian forces. Yesterday the UK was being specifically named as having caused the default on Russian state backed loans by its sanctions regime. Not only is there no evidence of influence but such evidence as there is points in the opposite direction.
I agree the government has been solidly supportive of Ukraine during the current offensive. It wasn't always the case before this year. Including after Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2014 when Boris Johnson wrote an article criticising the EU and indirectly Ukraine for provoking Russia. The Conservative Party has certainly received a lot of Russian money. This money may not have directly come from Putin, but it never does. The Government tried to suppress a Russia Report that said while there is no identified Russian influence on the 2016 Brexit vote, it was because the government deliberately chose not to investigate (presumably in case someone found something). The UK has a flourishing money laundering business that was (still is?) targeted at Russian oligarchs who have established themselves in all parts of UK society including parliament.
So if there is evidence they are guilty and if there is no evidence they are guilty. Ok then
Russia and the Conservative Party are associated. How much effective influence the first have on the second is unknown because governance is weak and the current government is undermining it further. If they had proper governance in place these Russian actors would be not be close to the Conservative Party as now.
Russians by birth now UK citizens.
But you would exclude them from the full rights and privileges of a British citizen.
How very progressive of you
Russian by money, is the key point, I think. What are they getting for it?
If Johnson does go prior to the next GE, I'd make Ben Wallace favourite I think. Had another tenner on him this morning at 10/1 for next tory leader.
(I have a bet on him from last year at 100/1 (for next PM).)
MPs don't want Truss and I can see Wallace developing as the best protection against that, given that he is even more popular that Truss in the ConHome survey.
I do not see Boris lasting the summer and expect quite a few conservative mps will stand
I have watched, it is OK as a drama but a bit far fetched. Also out of date, the majority of Tory MPs are not Eton and Oxford educated with glamorous wives living in Belgravia.
Indeed most Tory MPs now went to state schools. As for Oxford it too has changed, the Bullingdon Club has effectively gone extinct and there about as many privately educated pupils at St Andrews, Durham and Edinburgh now as Oxford and Cambridge has more state educated pupils than all of them
I've not seen it, but I do think there's a general tendency to simplify and play up to viewers' caricatures. Bridgerton is a ridiculous pastiche of Jane Austen, but I know people who think that aristocrats really were and are like that. Political dramas portray all politicians as scheming crooks, idiots or fanatics (much like CD13's post upthread). Tories are all Eton-educated toffs. Labour MPs are either smooth careerists or horny-handed trade unionists.
It's hard to complain since these are primarily for entertainment, and really they can portray people any way they like. But it's worth being careful not to swallow the portrayals as having much to do with reality.
Indeed, it is more entertainment than reality.
In the 1950s there was certainly a big class difference between MPs, most Tory MPs were privately educated and often Oxbridge educated as well. Most Labour MPs were state school educated with many having had working class jobs down the mines or on the factory floor.
Now most Labour and Conservative MPs went to state schools, indeed there were almost as many LD MPs who went to private schools as Conservative MPs who did percentage wise after the 2019 general election.
Almost all MPs are middle class and went to university with about a third going to Oxbridge. Indeed class wise MPs of all parties now look more like each other than the rest of the population, with many having been SPADs or researchers after university and rarely stepped outside politics
My rule of thumb is that Tories went to major public schools and Labour to minor public schools.
Not true now.
Only 44% of current Conservative MPs, 38% of LD MPs and just 19% of Labour MPs went to private schools.
In 1979 by contrast 73% of Conservative MPs, 55% of Liberal MPs and 18% of Labour MPs went to private schools
But of the ones who did go to public schools, does the major/minor relationship still hold? A quick look at Wikipedia finds a lot of PPE, economists and lawyers, and that is just the Shadow Cabinet.
A bit ironic that when so many of our leading politicians have studied PPE that we were so ripped off when purchasing it.
What's more worrying is that many of our leading politicians don't think we were so ripped off when purchasing it.
And the profits from supplying PPE are an example of 'trade' and 'business' working well.
Its 100% true.
There's an old saying, you can have it good, fast and cheap - but you need to pick two out of three.
During the pandemic we needed PPE fast and good. We got it, but it wasn't cheap. Considering the pandemic was costing billions, that was the right two out of three to go for and that people made a profit from that is business in action.
Without the profit motive, we would not have had the PPE.
Most of the write-down of PPE has come not from 'fraud' but from the fact that the stockpiles purchased now aren't worth what they were paid for at the time, as the price of the goods has come down since they were purchased. Again, that is how the market works.
We spent something more than £500m on PPE that was unusable. I suppose it was fast, but it certainly wasn't cheap or even good enough.
A lot wasn't that fast either. Sweetheart contacts were being given out to mates of the government in summer 2020
Of course, Labour were demanding to know why we weren't doing deals with people who, er, had no PPE.
We ended up with enough PPE. The Govt. did its job. The same people saying we spent too much on dodgy PPE would have been demanding the Government fall if we had actually, you know, run out of PPE. On this aspect of Covid at least, Labour deserve to be called out as shameless political hypocrites.
Come on Mark, they filled their chums pockets big time, it was graft pure and simple and you know it.
malcy, you don't HAVE to be such a one-trick pony!
Every country was doing what it could to get PPE. We got PPE. Some people in the supply chain got rich. Might be shameful, but hardly shocking. Shocking would have been Germany, France, Spain, Italy having PPE - and us none.
Slight sense today that things are beginning to slip away from the PM don't you think?
It's the midweek phenomenom. Stories and scandals build, there is attention peaking just after PMQ day if the LoTo has hit home and backbenchers get nervous or outraged enough, sparking a reaction by the end of the week by the government, then over the weekend backbenchers mostly cool off or are brought to heel, and a messy compromise position is reached to kick off the next week.
It's a common theme on here, from all sides, that Starmer is dull. I don't disagree. But is dullness actually a bar to being PM? I've been thinking about this, and I'm not so sure. Let's face it, most people are dull, and genuine charisma is a relatively rare thing. Theresa May's dullness didn't stop her getting stellar popularity ratings before it all went pear-shaped.
In a contest between a) a very dull, boring, competent and honest candidate with integrity, and b) a charismatic, exciting, hilarious pathological liar, I'm beginning to think a) may win hands down.
That assumes that SKS can successfully portray himself as competent, honest and with integrity in absolute rather than relative terms.
Well, in the last two years the Tories haven't been able to find anything substantive to suggest he isn't. If the best they can do is 'he didn't prosecute Jimmy Saville', it suggests the smear bucket is pretty empty.
Who knows when another field for rescue donkeys might crop up.
IIf you think that Boris Johnson’s parties in Downing Street constitute a serious matter of state, you might want to take a look at what is happening in Germany right now. Olaf Scholz has been caught red-handed misrepresenting facts about weapons deliveries to Ukraine. Behind the scenes, he is busy frustrating efforts to help the country, while pretending to be outraged about Vladimir Putin’s aggression. Double games work until they don’t. His policies are now being exposed by the media. Scholz said on Tuesday that Germany and Ukraine went through a list of weapons deliveries, and that Germany planned to pay for them. Ukraine denied this. It said that there were no weapons on the list that it needed right now. Bild managed to get hold of the list, and was shocked to find that the original list of 48 pages had been shrunk in half. The German defence ministries, on orders from Scholz, had removed all the heavy weapons. … https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/olaf-scholz-is-becoming-putin-s-most-valuable-ally
That's disgraceful! Anyone on here voting for Olaf Scholz shoud take a serious look at themselves in the mirror.
I think the problem, for some in Germany, is that East Politics has been part of their political persona.
That they defined themselves as good, peaceful, humane, internationalist New Germans (in part), from their absolute belief in peaceful and deeper relations with Russia.
So half going to war with Russia is a cognitive break for some. Bit like BREXIT...
It's Ostpolitik, but also Wandel durch Handel - Change through Trade.
Which was a part of East Politics- the theory that since everything is better in Europe with more economic integration, do the same with Russia. One big, happy, family.
I dont think it possible to ignore the German reluctance for war with Russia. The legacy of WW1 of the Bolsheveik Revolution and then the genocide of both Jews and Slavs in WW2 carries a tremendous amount of baggage.
The Germans have history that other NATO countries do not.
That's taken way too far. No one forgets the history, but as they themselves have acknowledged in seeking to alter many of their positions, that history should not mean never being willing to take robust action. Yes, war is a step well beyond that, but the principal is the same - awareness of and consideration of the history does not bind their hands forevermore, as their own shifts have demonstrated they accept.
Its the same kind of nonsense that has some leftwing type reluctant to criticise Russia - because they used to be Communist.
Putin & Co are Blood and Soil, Iridentist, Nationalists, running a murderous kleptocracy.
Whatever happens this is brilliant for Labour. The scandal will drag on for weeks if not months. The Conservatives are clearly all over the place. Even the most blinkered 2019 Tory voters have finally rumbled Boris. The up-and-coming replacement has crashed to earth. There's no other obvious or popular replacements, nor any one around whom Tory MPs could rally. By the time Tory MPs inch towards making a decision, the PM's henchmen will be arguing that it's now too close to the election to change horses. Meanwhile the economy is going to the dogs and the cost of living crisis is going to hit hard for many months.
Why does everyone keep saying the economy is going to the dogs?
IIf you think that Boris Johnson’s parties in Downing Street constitute a serious matter of state, you might want to take a look at what is happening in Germany right now. Olaf Scholz has been caught red-handed misrepresenting facts about weapons deliveries to Ukraine. Behind the scenes, he is busy frustrating efforts to help the country, while pretending to be outraged about Vladimir Putin’s aggression. Double games work until they don’t. His policies are now being exposed by the media. Scholz said on Tuesday that Germany and Ukraine went through a list of weapons deliveries, and that Germany planned to pay for them. Ukraine denied this. It said that there were no weapons on the list that it needed right now. Bild managed to get hold of the list, and was shocked to find that the original list of 48 pages had been shrunk in half. The German defence ministries, on orders from Scholz, had removed all the heavy weapons. … https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/olaf-scholz-is-becoming-putin-s-most-valuable-ally
That's disgraceful! Anyone on here voting for Olaf Scholz shoud take a serious look at themselves in the mirror.
I think the problem, for some in Germany, is that East Politics has been part of their political persona.
That they defined themselves as good, peaceful, humane, internationalist New Germans (in part), from their absolute belief in peaceful and deeper relations with Russia.
So half going to war with Russia is a cognitive break for some. Bit like BREXIT...
It's Ostpolitik, but also Wandel durch Handel - Change through Trade.
Which was a part of East Politics- the theory that since everything is better in Europe with more economic integration, do the same with Russia. One big, happy, family.
I dont think it possible to ignore the German reluctance for war with Russia. The legacy of WW1 of the Bolsheveik Revolution and then the genocide of both Jews and Slavs in WW2 carries a tremendous amount of baggage.
The Germans have history that other NATO countries do not.
That's taken way too far. No one forgets the history, but as they themselves have acknowledged in seeking to alter many of their positions, that history should not mean never being willing to take robust action. Yes, war is a step well beyond that, but the principal is the same - awareness of and consideration of the history does not bind their hands forevermore, as their own shifts have demonstrated they accept.
Yes, but a distaste of militarism in general and in Eastern Europe in particular has been very ingrained in Germany over the postwar decades. Their culture has changed, and this is something that the rest of Europe has encouraged.
Indeed it is part of the reason that Germans think Russia can also be changed away from militarism.
@Leon you shouldn’t take too much inspiration from my day so far! I thought I remembered that the check out time for my apartment was 11, and cretinously forgot to check that until 9:50 this morning when I realised it was a 10 o’clock limit. I hadn’t showered, packed or finished washing up.
I brushed my teeth, got everything I could see rammed into my rucksack, grabbed the last few beers from the fridge, wiped the red wine marks off the sides, got all the rubbish into the bin bag and dashed off. I haven’t really had a chance to check I packed everything yet..
I’ve come down to the bus station in Roses (sadly no bar at this bus station - I had to sneak round the corner to swig one of my San Miguels where nobody could see me!) and I’m heading to a little town call Vilajuïga, from where I’m going to walk the couple of miles to Garriguella, where I’m hoping to find the tortoise sanctuary.
Sadly the weather is awful today, grey and wet.. and apparently the tortoises only like to come out on sunny mornings. But I want to make absolutely sure it’s there (there’s been some conflicting views on where it is online - it’s own Facebook page and website link to each other but to different places on the map!) so if I don’t see them today I can come back on Monday morning (my last day), which is the next forecast sunshine..
Your drinking heroics remind me a bit of Nicholas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas.
Didn’t feel particularly heroic when I spent most of yesterday in bed, horribly hungover. I couldn’t face a beer until 5!
Desperate times, surely a frie up at breakfast and a shandy or two at lunch would have helped set you up.
I did try to have some breakfast but it wouldn’t stay down.. I also couldn’t go out as I’d washed all my clothes again and they were drying rather slowly due to the filthy weather. I might have braved a beer a little earlier if I’d had any in the fridge!
It's a common theme on here, from all sides, that Starmer is dull. I don't disagree. But is dullness actually a bar to being PM? I've been thinking about this, and I'm not so sure. Let's face it, most people are dull, and genuine charisma is a relatively rare thing. Theresa May's dullness didn't stop her getting stellar popularity ratings before it all went pear-shaped.
In a contest between a) a very dull, boring, competent and honest candidate with integrity, and b) a charismatic, exciting, hilarious pathological liar, I'm beginning to think a) may win hands down.
I'm not sure it can be proven one way or another, though some have suggested the duller candidate does indeed always lose (or rather, goes backwards). As you say it wasn't the dullness that undid May though.
Personally I think accusations of dullness are a bit overdone. Keir isn't that boring, even if admittedly he is definitely not very dynamic or obviously charismatic, which as you note is pretty darn rare. He's normal more than dull. (not that normality is itself a positive - nothing wrong with extraordinary individuals for extraordinary roles)
People knew Boris's flaws and either thought them worth the risk at the time, or his positives simply outweighed the negatives. The weight of office and changed circumstances may alter that calculation in a duller candidates' favour - let's face it, at the 5th election since 2010 one would assume a move away from the governing party anyway - though I am far from sure it will be by enough. They are honing in on some effective lines.
In summary. People liked Johnson because Boris was being Boris. The Tories are in a pickle because Boris hasn't stopped being Boris.
John Rentoul @JohnRentoul · 16m Wonderful case study in effective parliamentary opposition: Starmer secures huge govt U-turn by drafting mildly worded motion; Blackford howls at clouds
Comments
1. The government is in utter chaos, despite its large majority.
2. They're are not exactly succeeding in their goal of drawing a line under the scandal and moving on, are they?
Small boat arrivals have dropped from average 700 per day to about 100 per day since the announcement to 0 yesterday.
Would need to know the weather conditions to be sure of an effect, or there may be some other factor.
Anybody think Boris can survive that finding as PM?
Boris will not lead the Conservatives into the next election, nailed on....
I'd say people focus a bit too much on letter or spirit rather than both. If you're such a fool you can so easily mislead the House unintentionally that's not much of a defence even if it was not an intentional lie.
Controversially, Sir Humphrey was in the right and PM Hacker in the wrong on a similar issue,
Or France is no longer a failed state with oil.
https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-equipment.html
Experience has hope on the ropes but perhaps hope will rally in the 12th round.
If we really can shut down the channel route for good, agreeing to take some percentage of those granted asylum by, say, France might be possible. But I don’t think that would be politically feasible until we can shut down the boats.
Did make me chuckle though! Didn't they also make Ann Widdicombe look like a cuddly warm old Grandma?
Many Ukrianian farmers know exactly where they are. And Ukrainian farmer's mums.
Second question: Yes, he will survive unless the required number of his MPs put their letters in.
Why are you so confident he is toast?
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/04/20/bernie-sanders-2024-presidential-election-00026733
Presumably in the same way that I haven't ruled out driving for Porsche in the LMGTE Pro class at Le Mans this year.
In a contest between a) a very dull, boring, competent and honest candidate with integrity, and b) a charismatic, exciting, hilarious pathological liar, I'm beginning to think a) may win hands down.
I am unclear as to whether that is enough of a shift to remove the PM prior to a GE; like you, I suspect not. But it is a moment, and one that the Government could have avoided.
Now, what were you saying?
It may be as you say after the next election, of course.
Clearly there are more cojones behind the scenes than have been on public display.
Mahathir Mohamad was PM of Malalysia when he was 95, and was politically ousted rather than choosing to strep down.
When it gets to committee the plan will be "just don't request the evidence, say nothing see, slap on the wrists and its over". Which again isn't remotely politically viable. Chris Bryant removing himself from the chair - but not the investigation - was an inspired play. He remains a key member of the committee and the chair for this investigation can hardly ignore him and the reams of stuff he will put on the table to be looked at. But not being in the chair meant that the "must be chaired by an opposition MP" committee couldn't be ignored as partisan.
At the committee we get warts and all. Which makes the PM's room to manoeuvre narrower and narrower until he is faced with two choices. "You fucking people, you have no idea how to defend a nation" or writing a letter to Rishi Sunak.
China / Xi vs. COVID.
Supply chains fucked.
Which means more shortages and inflation for quite some time to come.
Cost of living will sink this government and there’s fuck all they can do about it.
I live in Wye, between Canterbury and Ashford, closer to Ashford, use the M20 all the time. On Saturday I had to drive to Heathrow twice. The Covid test the wife took the previous day was faulty so I had to get there early enough for her to take one at the airport, where she failed the rapid antigen test and I had to go back to get her. It was Easter but the M20 was empty, no lorries whatsoever, M25 fine. Made it Wye TN25 to Terminal 3 in 1 hour 20 minutes and back in about the same. Twice.
I'm as anti-Brexit as they come but reports of the roads round here are completely off the scale wrong. The reason it would take 2 hours to get to Canterbury from London on the M2 is (a) it was a sunny Easter weekend and people were trying to get to the coast and (b) the roadworks at Brenley Corner, where you turn off to get on the A2 for Canterbury, have screwed the whole thing up.
All the sneering "look at stupid people from Kent" is wish fulfilment. The roads here are not noticably worse than they were during a French dockers strike or bad weather before Brexit.
Those who saw the debate had Macron winning 41% Le Pen 31% and 28% undecided . So not the 20 point lead of last nights Elabe poll.
The voting intention remains unchanged Macron 56% Le Pen 44%.
I am no Starmer fan, and won't be voting Labour at the next GE, but He will be a far more dignified PM than Johnson, or any of the current cabinet gimps.
Personally I think accusations of dullness are a bit overdone. Keir isn't that boring, even if admittedly he is definitely not very dynamic or obviously charismatic, which as you note is pretty darn rare. He's normal more than dull. (not that normality is itself a positive - nothing wrong with extraordinary individuals for extraordinary roles)
People knew Boris's flaws and either thought them worth the risk at the time, or his positives simply outweighed the negatives. The weight of office and changed circumstances may alter that calculation in a duller candidates' favour - let's face it, at the 5th election since 2010 one would assume a move away from the governing party anyway - though I am far from sure it will be by enough. They are honing in on some effective lines.
The Germans have history that other NATO countries do not.
(I have a bet on him from last year at 100/1 (for next PM).)
MPs don't want Truss and I can see Wallace developing as the best protection against that, given that he is even more popular that Truss in the ConHome survey.
BOJO India trip just made France 24.
@SamCoatesSky
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17m
Tory MPs are now being sent home
Analysis shortly
It cannot come soon enough to be honest
Every country was doing what it could to get PPE. We got PPE. Some people in the supply chain got rich. Might be shameful, but hardly shocking. Shocking would have been Germany, France, Spain, Italy having PPE - and us none.
My official prediction, Boris Johnson will be gone this year.
He’ll get suspended by the standards committee or get exposed for trying to nobble them.
Both are resigning matters.
Putin & Co are Blood and Soil, Iridentist, Nationalists, running a murderous kleptocracy.
Tempted to ask Shadsy if I can pay Smarkets for new time, like one could with shares in the days before rolling settlements.
What is the employment situation in the UK?
Indeed it is part of the reason that Germans think Russia can also be changed away from militarism.
Not happening and Johnson will use that to suggest he’s innocent .
@JohnRentoul
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16m
Wonderful case study in effective parliamentary opposition: Starmer secures huge govt U-turn by drafting mildly worded motion; Blackford howls at clouds
https://twitter.com/JohnRentoul/status/1517098172572704775