Well I'm no fan of the government, but I won't say no to a few hundred quid off the gas and leccy.
Obviously, it’s good to see the inevitable u-turn finally happen, but I wonder how much political salience it will have. Bills will still be a lot higher than they are now. You need a lot of benefit of the doubt to argue they would have been even higher and to reap a benefit from that. And this government has comprehensively squandered the benefit of the doubt.
Someone on the news talking about "turning the thermostat down".
Er no. It's May. Turn the heating off. It goes back on in October, or November if you can get away with it.
Turning the thermostat down is what I did last winter.
I think the thermostat is a red herring here. We have just had our May statement. No heating on, hot water on now and again, electric light in relevant rooms, TV usage, cooking at the usual times. The net effect with added standing charges was £168
For a summer month that is horrendous.
I would just comment that May has disappointed weather wise but our consumption has dropped considerably to the point that it is manageable though our home is well insulated and we have solar panels
Implementing Labour policy again. Why not just have a Labour government and cut out the middle man?
On a personal level I'll be glad for the support, but on a political and economical level its utterly pathetic. If you're going to do this, it could have been done months ago, but it wasn't and for good reason because it was a bad idea. It was a bad idea then, its still a bad idea now, but they're doing it anyway.
Pathetic. Utterly pathetic.
Doesn't seem very long ago that we were told that they couldn't possibly just cut bills because communism. So it must be a loan or else poor BP would stop investing (despite BP saying that wasn't true). Now suddenly the loan becomes a rebate and communism becomes conservatism and what a marvellous idea they'd always supported.
A note of warning. Never mind not getting the credit for being dragged kicking and screaming to intervene. What they are proposing is still not enough. Anyone want to say "thanks Rishi" for 5p a litre off duty now that fuel prices are the highest they have even been and are still rising?
Do we have to rename Captain Hindsight as Captain Foresight for predicting this at last weeks PMQs?
Opetation Reverse Ferret in full swing. Why do the Cabinet Ministers set themselves up for this humiliation so readily?
It's things like Captain Hindsight and Sir Beer Korma that Labour should and does fear with Boris. Most Brits don't take any politicians seriously and one that can make you laugh has a huge advantage. SKS is very much the Ernie Wise of these 2 and they know it.
That’s a very 2019/20 view. Partygate and the cost if living squeeze have changed outlooks. Johnson is making a few diehards laugh. No-one else.
If that was the case Labour would be 20 points ahead. They’re not
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
Someone on the news talking about "turning the thermostat down".
Er no. It's May. Turn the heating off. It goes back on in October, or November if you can get away with it.
Turning the thermostat down is what I did last winter.
I think the thermostat is a red herring here. We have just had our May statement. No heating on, hot water on now and again, electric light in relevant rooms, TV usage, cooking at the usual times. The net effect with added standing charges was £168
For a summer month that is horrendous.
Wonder if this is what is leading to the tales of people with lowish Direct debits getting v large proportionate increases. Standing charge increases should be linked to overhead, they ought to generally track CPI.
Ours is weird because we used to be billed about £100 a month.
Then the plan from our old provider (prior to them going belly up) was to keep it at £100 a month during the summer but £170 in the winter (as that covers the gas).
That meant we are now being billed £370 a month at the moment which should put as well in credit come the winter.
Meanwhile the areas that are a problem (the front room and hallway) are going to be insulated before the winter hits even if it means I'm doing it myself.
I just can't stand this attitude. It's literally no better than the Custard Conservatives who are failing to remove Boris. Country before party, people! Keeping Boris looks a lot to me like electoral seppuku for the Tories, but it's bad for the country too.
Those who want the country to suffer for relative party advantage are not the good guys whichever side they're on.
Correct. And as people keep saying he is awfully good at winning elections. The bollocks about All the better if he is still in place in 2024, is bollocks. Because the thought of him with another 5 year mandate is Hitler level frightening.
Boris Derangement Syndrome rears its ugly head.
Our Prime Minister, whose vaccine programme saved thousands of lives, is as frightening as a man who caused 30 million deaths, because he had a couple of drinks jn his own house and then shaved the truth about it. Apparently.
For those of us with Johnson Derangement Syndrome, some of whom crossed that line yesterday, there is a disbelief at the unquestioning support of this odious creature, and the acceptance that his cock and bull defence must be true, and we have to move on.
The idea that Johnson overcame the Ministerial Code with another lie, upon lie, upon lie, with the story growing more absurd with each denial is really rather frightening. It's Trumpesque, it's plain wrong! Justice has not been served.
Your assertion, that we should allow Johnson's misbehaviour and outrageous defence of it because he oversaw a (credit where it is due) successful and slightly quicker than elsewhere vaccine rollout is an odd one. It's like suggesting Harold Shipman's pleasant bedside manner made him an excellent GP, or we should mitigate Fred West's crimes because he was a first class plasterer.
Yesterday was a bad day for democracy.
Why was yesterday a “bad day for democracy”?
No vote on getting rid of Boris by the voters was suppressed or cancelled. It didn’t change the fact that at some point people will get a vote at a GE and if he’s still then then they have their democratic say on his actions.
The fact that we are in a democracy means that, unlike in an autocracy or fascist state, means that the public can make their criticisms publicly, the press can report freely and people can make up their own minds.
Do you think in a non-democracy that people would have even heard about these parties and been able to criticise publicly - especially members of the governing party?
So not sure why it’s a bad day for democracy.
Simply because the etiquettes and norms of Parliament, the checks and balances of Executive power were trashed yesterday. There was no sanction for a politician who wilfully disregarded the law on multiple occasions, and subsequently lied that he hadn't. To be overly melodramatic, that is the road to anarchy.
I am not asking for a change of party, I am not demanding a General Election. I just want an unfit head of state, who purports to represent me, removed for gross misconduct in high office.
Johnson: “How badly are you going to hurt this guy?” Guppy: “Not badly at all.” Johnson: “Really, I want to know, because if this guy is seriously hurt I will be fucking furious.” Guppy: “I guarantee you that he will not be seriously hurt.” Johnson: “How badly hurt will he be?” Guppy: “He will not have any broken limbs or a broken arm and he will not be put into intensive care or anything like that. He will probably get a couple of black eyes and a cracked rib.” ... Johnson: “OK Darry, I’ve said I’ll do it. I’ll do it, don’t worry.”
I totally agree that Johnson is unsuited to be PM. But the issue is that the above conversation was well-known before he became PM; I think it was well-known before he became Mayor of London. He as been repeatedly elected *despite* it being known.
On topic, the LibDem poster is hard-hitting and effective.
The Conservatives are consigning themselves to a landslide defeat in two years.
Why do we not see that in the opinion polls?
Arguably, we are: the combined Labour + LibDem + Green number in all polls is now almost always at 55%+ and is sometimes now getting close to 60%. The Tories, meanwhile, have on occasions been as low as 31%, their 1997 election result.
The Tories polled lower than now during the 2010-2015 Parliament. Suffice it to say that they did not suffer a landslide defeat in GE2015.
The combined opposition was not polling as high, neither was the LOTO regularly leading on best PM, neither was there any doubt which party led on the economy.
All good points, and yet we see very large numbers of 2019 Tory voters saying "Don't Know" to pollsters - 28% are don't know/would not vote/refused in the latest YouGov, compared to 17% in a random May 2013 YouGov poll. I'd suggest that these voters will be easier to tempt back, as they haven't made the step of saying they will vote for another party.
There's a lot that needs to happen between now and the GE for Labour to win that election, let alone by a landslide.
And Boris is a “lucky general”, as we have seen time and again. He’s used to winning, and he’s good at winning. That is significant
You can see the terror in the eyes of Lefties, as they contemplate him. It is one reason they desperately want him gone, because he unnerves them; a lot of the hysterical hatred and moral disapproval of him is just badly-disguised fear
And even though I get some satisfaction at detecting this fear, I agree that he is a shoddy PM
I think it's quite likely with boundary changes and Boris's Heineken Effect, the Tories will scrape home next time.
What the Tories will do to rebuild support among the working age population, grads, the Tory left/Blue Wall and among rural voters (the next crack in the wall) remains to be seen.
Plus there is a mounting 'apres moi, le deluge' feeling. I don't see anyone among Tory potential successors who could keep this precarious 2016 electoral coalition together.
Well I'm no fan of the government, but I won't say no to a few hundred quid off the gas and leccy.
You won't get a few hundred quid off. Your bills will still shoot up. Just not by quite the mad amounts being warned. So EDF say 40% of customers will be in fuel poverty. This cuts it to 35% - anyone feel better off?
Same as the fuel duty cut. The reason this was always a stupid policy was that rising prices would quickly reverse it. And they have. With pump prices the highest on record you can't say "ahbut they would be 6p higher if we hadn't so please vote for us".
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
If only the media wasn’t in the Nats’ pockets, they’d be pUt uNDeR pRopEr ScRutiNy.
There is a blinkered pig-ignorance about the remaining pro-Boris advocates. Arrogance, hubris and in many MPs cases genuine stupidity allows the madness that what they think must be what all right-thinking people think because they are right-thinking.
Meanwhile, out there in the real world the normals think "are you taking the piss?". Too many of these pieces directly comparing and contrasting the "I was doing essential work" with the legal instructions not to do such things. With grieving relatives being dragged apart at a funeral for someone who had died alone. With the virtual team things they had had to do like birthdays and leaving dos.
"ah but there's all these scumbag doctors and nurses, if you investigate THEM you're bound to find bad'uns" says the generate moral vacuum that is today's Tory. The same immoral stupidity that says poor people are only hungry and in the dark because they can't cook or need to get a better job. The same sneering arrogance that will see a man who paid £10k out of his own pocket for a taxi ride to fundraiser throwing minor scraps to the plebs today then saying "why aren't you degenerates greatful"?
So yes, do keep saying how the polls are ok. How the MPs are right and their constituents are wrong. Because even if there was a change of PM tomorrow we get to ride the down slope a while before things improve. So if you really want Bonzo there saying "what crisis" and his ministers sneering at their voters then go right ahead.
On topic, the LibDem poster is hard-hitting and effective.
The Conservatives are consigning themselves to a landslide defeat in two years.
Why do we not see that in the opinion polls?
Arguably, we are: the combined Labour + LibDem + Green number in all polls is now almost always at 55%+ and is sometimes now getting close to 60%. The Tories, meanwhile, have on occasions been as low as 31%, their 1997 election result.
The Tories polled lower than now during the 2010-2015 Parliament. Suffice it to say that they did not suffer a landslide defeat in GE2015.
The combined opposition was not polling as high, neither was the LOTO regularly leading on best PM, neither was there any doubt which party led on the economy.
All good points, and yet we see very large numbers of 2019 Tory voters saying "Don't Know" to pollsters - 28% are don't know/would not vote/refused in the latest YouGov, compared to 17% in a random May 2013 YouGov poll. I'd suggest that these voters will be easier to tempt back, as they haven't made the step of saying they will vote for another party.
There's a lot that needs to happen between now and the GE for Labour to win that election, let alone by a landslide.
And Boris is a “lucky general”, as we have seen time and again. He’s used to winning, and he’s good at winning. That is significant
You can see the terror in the eyes of Lefties, as they contemplate him. It is one reason they desperately want him gone, because he unnerves them; a lot of the hysterical hatred and moral disapproval of him is just badly-disguised fear
And even though I get some satisfaction at detecting this fear, I agree that he is a shoddy PM
There it is. The sado-populism at the heart of this whole project. "I don't like him, but I like the other side suffering enough to relish it." He is Britain Trump, and you are Britain Maga Hat.
But this is not true. You’ve just proved my point. The hysteria about Boris is overdone. Earlier on this thread an apparently sane PB-er seriously compared Boris to Hitler.
Hitler? Really?? Boris has many faults, but he isn’t about to set up gas chambers
Likewise, I find Bozza alarmingly lax and depressingly bereft of good ideas, but I have no fear that he might try to overturn democracy and cancel an election (it’s the Remoaners that did that). Boris is not Trump, either
Calm the F down. This knicker-wetting will be a handicap for the Left if it continues. This is where Boris DOES use Trumpite tactics (tho many politicians use this tactic) - he does and says things which he knows will provoke his thin-skinned foes, so they lose it, and focus on the naughty words, and forget their real target
And who doesn’t enjoy the lamentations of their enemies? It is one of the modest joys of being a politics geek
The biggest problem I have with Labour at the moment (ok two problems) is: 1) lack of policy - I need to see their vision of what the country should look like in 2030 (or 2035 if they are ambitious) 2) A lack of a sense of humour. Starmer is irretrievably dour, and is molding a team around him who are the same. I get the sense of anger in the conuntry and labour is riding that too, but at some point a bit of joy must come into life too. Even in the trenches people told jokes.
Unless I missed it, nowhere in Cumbria was deemed worthy of inclusion in the list of places MPs had to visit.
Tsk .......
Well worth a visit… just impossible to get there 😂
3.5 hours by train to Kendal from central London? There are harder places to reach.
I am going to Kendal for a week's holiday next week. Very much looking forward to it and open to suggestions of good days out. Its about 3.5 hours drive from Dundee.
It must have been nearly a decade since I was in Kendal, but when I was, there was an Italian restaurant that did a lovely hazelnut cake.
I just can't stand this attitude. It's literally no better than the Custard Conservatives who are failing to remove Boris. Country before party, people! Keeping Boris looks a lot to me like electoral seppuku for the Tories, but it's bad for the country too.
Those who want the country to suffer for relative party advantage are not the good guys whichever side they're on.
Correct. And as people keep saying he is awfully good at winning elections. The bollocks about All the better if he is still in place in 2024, is bollocks. Because the thought of him with another 5 year mandate is Hitler level frightening.
Boris Derangement Syndrome rears its ugly head.
Our Prime Minister, whose vaccine programme saved thousands of lives, is as frightening as a man who caused 30 million deaths, because he had a couple of drinks jn his own house and then shaved the truth about it. Apparently.
For those of us with Johnson Derangement Syndrome, some of whom crossed that line yesterday, there is a disbelief at the unquestioning support of this odious creature, and the acceptance that his cock and bull defence must be true, and we have to move on.
The idea that Johnson overcame the Ministerial Code with another lie, upon lie, upon lie, with the story growing more absurd with each denial is really rather frightening. It's Trumpesque, it's plain wrong! Justice has not been served.
Your assertion, that we should allow Johnson's misbehaviour and outrageous defence of it because he oversaw a (credit where it is due) successful and slightly quicker than elsewhere vaccine rollout is an odd one. It's like suggesting Harold Shipman's pleasant bedside manner made him an excellent GP, or we should mitigate Fred West's crimes because he was a first class plasterer.
Yesterday was a bad day for democracy.
Why was yesterday a “bad day for democracy”?
No vote on getting rid of Boris by the voters was suppressed or cancelled. It didn’t change the fact that at some point people will get a vote at a GE and if he’s still then then they have their democratic say on his actions.
The fact that we are in a democracy means that, unlike in an autocracy or fascist state, means that the public can make their criticisms publicly, the press can report freely and people can make up their own minds.
Do you think in a non-democracy that people would have even heard about these parties and been able to criticise publicly - especially members of the governing party?
So not sure why it’s a bad day for democracy.
Its a bad day for democracy because our democratic system continues to weaken and get besmirched.
There is a blinkered pig-ignorance about the remaining pro-Boris advocates. Arrogance, hubris and in many MPs cases genuine stupidity allows the madness that what they think must be what all right-thinking people think because they are right-thinking.
Meanwhile, out there in the real world the normals think "are you taking the piss?". Too many of these pieces directly comparing and contrasting the "I was doing essential work" with the legal instructions not to do such things. With grieving relatives being dragged apart at a funeral for someone who had died alone. With the virtual team things they had had to do like birthdays and leaving dos.
"ah but there's all these scumbag doctors and nurses, if you investigate THEM you're bound to find bad'uns" says the generate moral vacuum that is today's Tory. The same immoral stupidity that says poor people are only hungry and in the dark because they can't cook or need to get a better job. The same sneering arrogance that will see a man who paid £10k out of his own pocket for a taxi ride to fundraiser throwing minor scraps to the plebs today then saying "why aren't you degenerates greatful"?
So yes, do keep saying how the polls are ok. How the MPs are right and their constituents are wrong. Because even if there was a change of PM tomorrow we get to ride the down slope a while before things improve. So if you really want Bonzo there saying "what crisis" and his ministers sneering at their voters then go right ahead.
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
The trains are interesting because no timetable should be built on the assumption that people will willing work overtime continually.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. £10bn on UC could have made a real difference for those suffering genuine hardship as opposed to wondering if they can afford a second ski trip.
UC receivers don't vote Tory. Pensioners do...
So? We need a government that is focused on the real needs of the country, not simply getting itself elected again. Boris is not providing it.
The Treasury don't want to add anything to UC because they don't believe it will be allowed to fall back again later.
One off grants (or better, two off grants) would be a simple way to solve that problem. It is really not hard if you want to solve it. And, frankly, UC needs a serious catch up on the unanticipated inflation anyway. It's not just fuel that is going up.
Do we have to rename Captain Hindsight as Captain Foresight for predicting this at last weeks PMQs?
Opetation Reverse Ferret in full swing. Why do the Cabinet Ministers set themselves up for this humiliation so readily?
It's things like Captain Hindsight and Sir Beer Korma that Labour should and does fear with Boris. Most Brits don't take any politicians seriously and one that can make you laugh has a huge advantage. SKS is very much the Ernie Wise of these 2 and they know it.
That’s a very 2019/20 view. Partygate and the cost if living squeeze have changed outlooks. Johnson is making a few diehards laugh. No-one else.
If that was the case Labour would be 20 points ahead. They’re not
Labour does not need to be 20 points ahead for the Tories to be battered at the next election. The Tories just need to be in the low 30s.
For first time in I don't know how long my supermarket has emailed to say that today's delivery will contain everything I ordered with no substitutions.
Just a one-off or are we seeing the end of the supply chain issues?
Fwiw there were no obvious gaps on the shelves at my local supermarket yesterday. Mask-wearing was down to about 50 per cent btw.
On topic, the LibDem poster is hard-hitting and effective.
The Conservatives are consigning themselves to a landslide defeat in two years.
Why do we not see that in the opinion polls?
Arguably, we are: the combined Labour + LibDem + Green number in all polls is now almost always at 55%+ and is sometimes now getting close to 60%. The Tories, meanwhile, have on occasions been as low as 31%, their 1997 election result.
The Tories polled lower than now during the 2010-2015 Parliament. Suffice it to say that they did not suffer a landslide defeat in GE2015.
The combined opposition was not polling as high, neither was the LOTO regularly leading on best PM, neither was there any doubt which party led on the economy.
All good points, and yet we see very large numbers of 2019 Tory voters saying "Don't Know" to pollsters - 28% are don't know/would not vote/refused in the latest YouGov, compared to 17% in a random May 2013 YouGov poll. I'd suggest that these voters will be easier to tempt back, as they haven't made the step of saying they will vote for another party.
There's a lot that needs to happen between now and the GE for Labour to win that election, let alone by a landslide.
And Boris is a “lucky general”, as we have seen time and again. He’s used to winning, and he’s good at winning. That is significant
You can see the terror in the eyes of Lefties, as they contemplate him. It is one reason they desperately want him gone, because he unnerves them; a lot of the hysterical hatred and moral disapproval of him is just badly-disguised fear
And even though I get some satisfaction at detecting this fear, I agree that he is a shoddy PM
There it is. The sado-populism at the heart of this whole project. "I don't like him, but I like the other side suffering enough to relish it." He is Britain Trump, and you are Britain Maga Hat.
But this is not true. You’ve just proved my point. The hysteria about Boris is overdone. Earlier on this thread an apparently sane PB-er seriously compared Boris to Hitler.
Hitler? Really?? Boris has many faults, but he isn’t about to set up gas chambers
Likewise, I find Bozza alarmingly lax and depressingly bereft of good ideas, but I have no fear that he might try to overturn democracy and cancel an election (it’s the Remoaners that did that). Boris is not Trump, either
Calm the F down. This knicker-wetting will be a handicap for the Left if it continues. This is where Boris DOES use Trumpite tactics (tho many politicians use this tactic) - he does and says things which he knows will provoke his thin-skinned foes, so they lose it, and focus on the naughty words, and forget their real target
And who doesn’t enjoy the lamentations of their enemies? It is one of the modest joys of being a politics geek
The biggest problem I have with Labour at the moment (ok two problems) is: 1) lack of policy - I need to see their vision of what the country should look like in 2030 (or 2035 if they are ambitious) 2) A lack of a sense of humour. Starmer is irretrievably dour, and is molding a team around him who are the same. I get the sense of anger in the conuntry and labour is riding that too, but at some point a bit of joy must come into life too. Even in the trenches people told jokes.
Absolutely. This is one reason I think Rayner would be an excellent Labour leader. She has a sense of humour, and she has a kind of chirpy working class optimism (apologies if that sounds snobbish, I don’t know how else to phrase it)
Late 2024 could be a depressing place in time. The leader that offers a cheerful road out could win on optimism alone. Starmer doesn’t do cheerfulness
Wrong, wrong, wrong. £10bn on UC could have made a real difference for those suffering genuine hardship as opposed to wondering if they can afford a second ski trip.
UC receivers don't vote Tory. Pensioners do...
So? We need a government that is focused on the real needs of the country, not simply getting itself elected again. Boris is not providing it.
The Treasury don't want to add anything to UC because they don't believe it will be allowed to fall back again later.
One off grants (or better, two off grants) would be a simple way to solve that problem. It is really not hard if you want to solve it. And, frankly, UC needs a serious catch up on the unanticipated inflation anyway. It's not just fuel that is going up.
One thing about inflation, won't it will have reduced the national debt in real terms ?
Well I'm no fan of the government, but I won't say no to a few hundred quid off the gas and leccy.
You won't get a few hundred quid off. Your bills will still shoot up. Just not by quite the mad amounts being warned. So EDF say 40% of customers will be in fuel poverty. This cuts it to 35% - anyone feel better off?
Same as the fuel duty cut. The reason this was always a stupid policy was that rising prices would quickly reverse it. And they have. With pump prices the highest on record you can't say "ahbut they would be 6p higher if we hadn't so please vote for us".
Good morning
It is clear that nothing would assuage your criticism, and to be fair it does seem many think that any support package will not be sufficient which to be fair it won't
However, today's support package is likely to be as generous or even more so than labour maybe those critics need to come up with their own remedy on how they would square this impossible conundrum
To me it is those on the lowest incomes must be supported, but many millions will have to review their lifestyles as no political party can sustain it for them
Do we have to rename Captain Hindsight as Captain Foresight for predicting this at last weeks PMQs?
Opetation Reverse Ferret in full swing. Why do the Cabinet Ministers set themselves up for this humiliation so readily?
It's things like Captain Hindsight and Sir Beer Korma that Labour should and does fear with Boris. Most Brits don't take any politicians seriously and one that can make you laugh has a huge advantage. SKS is very much the Ernie Wise of these 2 and they know it.
If you are intimating that Johnson is a music hall clown (clown versus straight man) which essentially was Eric Morecambe's schtick, I can't disagree.
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
The trains are interesting because no timetable should be built on the assumption that people will willing work overtime continually.
Absolutely. We have had a baleful conspiracy here between franchises who were not interested in training new drivers and unions who saw that the shortage put another £20k a year on their members already considerable wage packets. It absolutely should have been a requirement of all franchises that they trained at least as many drivers as they lost through wastage and it doesn't seem to have been. But its the Scottish government's problem now.
On topic, the LibDem poster is hard-hitting and effective.
The Conservatives are consigning themselves to a landslide defeat in two years.
Why do we not see that in the opinion polls?
Arguably, we are: the combined Labour + LibDem + Green number in all polls is now almost always at 55%+ and is sometimes now getting close to 60%. The Tories, meanwhile, have on occasions been as low as 31%, their 1997 election result.
The Tories polled lower than now during the 2010-2015 Parliament. Suffice it to say that they did not suffer a landslide defeat in GE2015.
The combined opposition was not polling as high, neither was the LOTO regularly leading on best PM, neither was there any doubt which party led on the economy.
All good points, and yet we see very large numbers of 2019 Tory voters saying "Don't Know" to pollsters - 28% are don't know/would not vote/refused in the latest YouGov, compared to 17% in a random May 2013 YouGov poll. I'd suggest that these voters will be easier to tempt back, as they haven't made the step of saying they will vote for another party.
There's a lot that needs to happen between now and the GE for Labour to win that election, let alone by a landslide.
And Boris is a “lucky general”, as we have seen time and again. He’s used to winning, and he’s good at winning. That is significant
You can see the terror in the eyes of Lefties, as they contemplate him. It is one reason they desperately want him gone, because he unnerves them; a lot of the hysterical hatred and moral disapproval of him is just badly-disguised fear
And even though I get some satisfaction at detecting this fear, I agree that he is a shoddy PM
Surely it is Conservatives who credit Boris with magic powers, which is why they are afraid to depose him. It is not as if they think he is doing a good job as Prime Minister.
There is a blinkered pig-ignorance about the remaining pro-Boris advocates. Arrogance, hubris and in many MPs cases genuine stupidity allows the madness that what they think must be what all right-thinking people think because they are right-thinking.
Meanwhile, out there in the real world the normals think "are you taking the piss?". Too many of these pieces directly comparing and contrasting the "I was doing essential work" with the legal instructions not to do such things. With grieving relatives being dragged apart at a funeral for someone who had died alone. With the virtual team things they had had to do like birthdays and leaving dos.
"ah but there's all these scumbag doctors and nurses, if you investigate THEM you're bound to find bad'uns" says the generate moral vacuum that is today's Tory. The same immoral stupidity that says poor people are only hungry and in the dark because they can't cook or need to get a better job. The same sneering arrogance that will see a man who paid £10k out of his own pocket for a taxi ride to fundraiser throwing minor scraps to the plebs today then saying "why aren't you degenerates greatful"?
So yes, do keep saying how the polls are ok. How the MPs are right and their constituents are wrong. Because even if there was a change of PM tomorrow we get to ride the down slope a while before things improve. So if you really want Bonzo there saying "what crisis" and his ministers sneering at their voters then go right ahead.
With monster donations & powerful media allies he told the most brazen lie (oven ready/no Irish Sea border) in recent history to win a majority against a weak Labour leader, gaining a whole 1.2% on the share of vote won by Theresa May
Wrong, wrong, wrong. £10bn on UC could have made a real difference for those suffering genuine hardship as opposed to wondering if they can afford a second ski trip.
UC receivers don't vote Tory. Pensioners do...
So? We need a government that is focused on the real needs of the country, not simply getting itself elected again. Boris is not providing it.
The Treasury don't want to add anything to UC because they don't believe it will be allowed to fall back again later.
One off grants (or better, two off grants) would be a simple way to solve that problem. It is really not hard if you want to solve it. And, frankly, UC needs a serious catch up on the unanticipated inflation anyway. It's not just fuel that is going up.
One thing about inflation, won't it will have reduced the national debt in real terms ?
Debt is currently falling as a percentage of GDP, yes.
On topic, the LibDem poster is hard-hitting and effective.
The Conservatives are consigning themselves to a landslide defeat in two years.
Why do we not see that in the opinion polls?
Arguably, we are: the combined Labour + LibDem + Green number in all polls is now almost always at 55%+ and is sometimes now getting close to 60%. The Tories, meanwhile, have on occasions been as low as 31%, their 1997 election result.
The Tories polled lower than now during the 2010-2015 Parliament. Suffice it to say that they did not suffer a landslide defeat in GE2015.
The combined opposition was not polling as high, neither was the LOTO regularly leading on best PM, neither was there any doubt which party led on the economy.
All good points, and yet we see very large numbers of 2019 Tory voters saying "Don't Know" to pollsters - 28% are don't know/would not vote/refused in the latest YouGov, compared to 17% in a random May 2013 YouGov poll. I'd suggest that these voters will be easier to tempt back, as they haven't made the step of saying they will vote for another party.
There's a lot that needs to happen between now and the GE for Labour to win that election, let alone by a landslide.
And Boris is a “lucky general”, as we have seen time and again. He’s used to winning, and he’s good at winning. That is significant
You can see the terror in the eyes of Lefties, as they contemplate him. It is one reason they desperately want him gone, because he unnerves them; a lot of the hysterical hatred and moral disapproval of him is just badly-disguised fear
And even though I get some satisfaction at detecting this fear, I agree that he is a shoddy PM
There it is. The sado-populism at the heart of this whole project. "I don't like him, but I like the other side suffering enough to relish it." He is Britain Trump, and you are Britain Maga Hat.
But this is not true. You’ve just proved my point. The hysteria about Boris is overdone. Earlier on this thread an apparently sane PB-er seriously compared Boris to Hitler.
Hitler? Really?? Boris has many faults, but he isn’t about to set up gas chambers
Likewise, I find Bozza alarmingly lax and depressingly bereft of good ideas, but I have no fear that he might try to overturn democracy and cancel an election (it’s the Remoaners that did that). Boris is not Trump, either
Calm the F down. This knicker-wetting will be a handicap for the Left if it continues. This is where Boris DOES use Trumpite tactics (tho many politicians use this tactic) - he does and says things which he knows will provoke his thin-skinned foes, so they lose it, and focus on the naughty words, and forget their real target
And who doesn’t enjoy the lamentations of their enemies? It is one of the modest joys of being a politics geek
The biggest problem I have with Labour at the moment (ok two problems) is: 1) lack of policy - I need to see their vision of what the country should look like in 2030 (or 2035 if they are ambitious) 2) A lack of a sense of humour. Starmer is irretrievably dour, and is molding a team around him who are the same. I get the sense of anger in the conuntry and labour is riding that too, but at some point a bit of joy must come into life too. Even in the trenches people told jokes.
Absolutely. This is one reason I think Rayner would be an excellent Labour leader. She has a sense of humour, and she has a kind of chirpy working class optimism (apologies if that sounds snobbish, I don’t know how else to phrase it)
Late 2024 could be a depressing place in time. The leader that offers a cheerful road out could win on optimism alone. Starmer doesn’t do cheerfulness
I'd go with that. Rayner is far more of a threat to the Tories, especially in the Red Wall. The flip side is that, for many of the Home Counties' seats, many middle class voters may be wary of having her as PM, so may stick with the Tories rather than LDs who would side with Labour.
Do we have to rename Captain Hindsight as Captain Foresight for predicting this at last weeks PMQs?
Opetation Reverse Ferret in full swing. Why do the Cabinet Ministers set themselves up for this humiliation so readily?
It's things like Captain Hindsight and Sir Beer Korma that Labour should and does fear with Boris. Most Brits don't take any politicians seriously and one that can make you laugh has a huge advantage. SKS is very much the Ernie Wise of these 2 and they know it.
That’s a very 2019/20 view. Partygate and the cost if living squeeze have changed outlooks. Johnson is making a few diehards laugh. No-one else.
If that was the case Labour would be 20 points ahead. They’re not
The Tories have a rock solid floor with hardcore brexiteers. I think it's that rather than anything in particular about Starmer which is why Labour can't really get 20 pts ahead.
Well I'm no fan of the government, but I won't say no to a few hundred quid off the gas and leccy.
You won't get a few hundred quid off. Your bills will still shoot up. Just not by quite the mad amounts being warned. So EDF say 40% of customers will be in fuel poverty. This cuts it to 35% - anyone feel better off?
Same as the fuel duty cut. The reason this was always a stupid policy was that rising prices would quickly reverse it. And they have. With pump prices the highest on record you can't say "ahbut they would be 6p higher if we hadn't so please vote for us".
Yes, I said at the time it was stupid, because it meant they were taking responsibility for future increases. They would have done better to go down the sackcloth and ashes route and appeal to everyone to pull together for the good of the country to get through these difficult times, while providing targeted help to those worst affected - but they apparently weren't paying attention to how Cameron and Osborne managed to get people to vote for austerity.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. £10bn on UC could have made a real difference for those suffering genuine hardship as opposed to wondering if they can afford a second ski trip.
UC receivers don't vote Tory. Pensioners do...
So? We need a government that is focused on the real needs of the country, not simply getting itself elected again. Boris is not providing it.
The Treasury don't want to add anything to UC because they don't believe it will be allowed to fall back again later.
One off grants (or better, two off grants) would be a simple way to solve that problem. It is really not hard if you want to solve it. And, frankly, UC needs a serious catch up on the unanticipated inflation anyway. It's not just fuel that is going up.
One thing about inflation, won't it will have reduced the national debt in real terms ?
Yes - plus also helps because tax receipts are higher (higher wages, higher VAT receipts etc)
Wrong, wrong, wrong. £10bn on UC could have made a real difference for those suffering genuine hardship as opposed to wondering if they can afford a second ski trip.
UC receivers don't vote Tory. Pensioners do...
So? We need a government that is focused on the real needs of the country, not simply getting itself elected again. Boris is not providing it.
The Treasury don't want to add anything to UC because they don't believe it will be allowed to fall back again later.
One off grants (or better, two off grants) would be a simple way to solve that problem. It is really not hard if you want to solve it. And, frankly, UC needs a serious catch up on the unanticipated inflation anyway. It's not just fuel that is going up.
Why would they care about that? UC claimants don't vote Tory, and leading moral vacuum and plank enthusiast HY says only Tory voters matter.
That's the genius of proffering money off bills to people who can now afford a second skiing holiday - its an ideologically Conservative policy unlike the woke communism of not letting people starve.
For first time in I don't know how long my supermarket has emailed to say that today's delivery will contain everything I ordered with no substitutions.
Just a one-off or are we seeing the end of the supply chain issues?
Fwiw there were no obvious gaps on the shelves at my local supermarket yesterday. Mask-wearing was down to about 50 per cent btw.
I cannot find ginger beer anywhere - and I need it!!!
I just can't stand this attitude. It's literally no better than the Custard Conservatives who are failing to remove Boris. Country before party, people! Keeping Boris looks a lot to me like electoral seppuku for the Tories, but it's bad for the country too.
Those who want the country to suffer for relative party advantage are not the good guys whichever side they're on.
Correct. And as people keep saying he is awfully good at winning elections. The bollocks about All the better if he is still in place in 2024, is bollocks. Because the thought of him with another 5 year mandate is Hitler level frightening.
Boris Derangement Syndrome rears its ugly head.
Our Prime Minister, whose vaccine programme saved thousands of lives, is as frightening as a man who caused 30 million deaths, because he had a couple of drinks jn his own house and then shaved the truth about it. Apparently.
For those of us with Johnson Derangement Syndrome, some of whom crossed that line yesterday, there is a disbelief at the unquestioning support of this odious creature, and the acceptance that his cock and bull defence must be true, and we have to move on.
The idea that Johnson overcame the Ministerial Code with another lie, upon lie, upon lie, with the story growing more absurd with each denial is really rather frightening. It's Trumpesque, it's plain wrong! Justice has not been served.
Your assertion, that we should allow Johnson's misbehaviour and outrageous defence of it because he oversaw a (credit where it is due) successful and slightly quicker than elsewhere vaccine rollout is an odd one. It's like suggesting Harold Shipman's pleasant bedside manner made him an excellent GP, or we should mitigate Fred West's crimes because he was a first class plasterer.
Yesterday was a bad day for democracy.
Why was yesterday a “bad day for democracy”?
No vote on getting rid of Boris by the voters was suppressed or cancelled. It didn’t change the fact that at some point people will get a vote at a GE and if he’s still then then they have their democratic say on his actions.
The fact that we are in a democracy means that, unlike in an autocracy or fascist state, means that the public can make their criticisms publicly, the press can report freely and people can make up their own minds.
Do you think in a non-democracy that people would have even heard about these parties and been able to criticise publicly - especially members of the governing party?
So not sure why it’s a bad day for democracy.
Simply because the etiquettes and norms of Parliament, the checks and balances of Executive power were trashed yesterday. There was no sanction for a politician who wilfully disregarded the law on multiple occasions, and subsequently lied that he hadn't. To be overly melodramatic, that is the road to anarchy.
I am not asking for a change of party, I am not demanding a General Election. I just want an unfit head of state, who purports to represent me, removed for gross misconduct in high office.
I would love him to be removed too however I don’t understand why you think that the checks and balances were trashed yesterday? He’s under investigation for “misleading parliament” so a check and balance is in action, the Tory MPs have the power to remove him - that hasn’t been removed by him yesterday - whether they do is a different matter but it’s not going to not happen because they are worried the secret police will drag them off for standing up to him.
So effectively the processes are still there, haven’t been squashed by some dictator and ultimately he can be voted out if people think he has been guilty of “gross misconduct in public office”.
You also are sure he’s guilty of gross misconduct in public office - the mere fact that he has to survive certain investigations and potential rebellion show that we still do absolutely have a system of checks and balances thankfully and aren’t ruled by “feels”.
And he isn’t out “head of state” - that’s the one having a big party (legally) next weekend.
Again however I think he’s totally unsuitable as PM - lazy, arrogant, probably vindictive, and actually more importantly he has no vision and no application to make the country better which should be the absolute reason to be PM whatever colour rosette they wear. He’s become “world king” and has absolutely no idea what to do with it.
Well I'm no fan of the government, but I won't say no to a few hundred quid off the gas and leccy.
You won't get a few hundred quid off. Your bills will still shoot up. Just not by quite the mad amounts being warned. So EDF say 40% of customers will be in fuel poverty. This cuts it to 35% - anyone feel better off?
Same as the fuel duty cut. The reason this was always a stupid policy was that rising prices would quickly reverse it. And they have. With pump prices the highest on record you can't say "ahbut they would be 6p higher if we hadn't so please vote for us".
Yes, I said at the time it was stupid, because it meant they were taking responsibility for future increases. They would have done better to go down the sackcloth and ashes route and appeal to everyone to pull together for the good of the country to get through these difficult times, while providing targeted help to those worst affected - but they apparently weren't paying attention to how Cameron and Osborne managed to get people to vote for austerity.
It is more difficult than that. For the past two years, voters have become used to Governments bailing them out when tough times come. No Government could get away with what Cameron and Osborne did - the voters would just say "yes but you give us cash 2 years ago, why not now?"
I just can't stand this attitude. It's literally no better than the Custard Conservatives who are failing to remove Boris. Country before party, people! Keeping Boris looks a lot to me like electoral seppuku for the Tories, but it's bad for the country too.
Those who want the country to suffer for relative party advantage are not the good guys whichever side they're on.
Correct. And as people keep saying he is awfully good at winning elections. The bollocks about All the better if he is still in place in 2024, is bollocks. Because the thought of him with another 5 year mandate is Hitler level frightening.
Boris Derangement Syndrome rears its ugly head.
Our Prime Minister, whose vaccine programme saved thousands of lives, is as frightening as a man who caused 30 million deaths, because he had a couple of drinks jn his own house and then shaved the truth about it. Apparently.
For those of us with Johnson Derangement Syndrome, some of whom crossed that line yesterday, there is a disbelief at the unquestioning support of this odious creature, and the acceptance that his cock and bull defence must be true, and we have to move on.
The idea that Johnson overcame the Ministerial Code with another lie, upon lie, upon lie, with the story growing more absurd with each denial is really rather frightening. It's Trumpesque, it's plain wrong! Justice has not been served.
Your assertion, that we should allow Johnson's misbehaviour and outrageous defence of it because he oversaw a (credit where it is due) successful and slightly quicker than elsewhere vaccine rollout is an odd one. It's like suggesting Harold Shipman's pleasant bedside manner made him an excellent GP, or we should mitigate Fred West's crimes because he was a first class plasterer.
Yesterday was a bad day for democracy.
Why was yesterday a “bad day for democracy”?
No vote on getting rid of Boris by the voters was suppressed or cancelled. It didn’t change the fact that at some point people will get a vote at a GE and if he’s still then then they have their democratic say on his actions.
The fact that we are in a democracy means that, unlike in an autocracy or fascist state, means that the public can make their criticisms publicly, the press can report freely and people can make up their own minds.
Do you think in a non-democracy that people would have even heard about these parties and been able to criticise publicly - especially members of the governing party?
So not sure why it’s a bad day for democracy.
Simply because the etiquettes and norms of Parliament, the checks and balances of Executive power were trashed yesterday. There was no sanction for a politician who wilfully disregarded the law on multiple occasions, and subsequently lied that he hadn't. To be overly melodramatic, that is the road to anarchy.
I am not asking for a change of party, I am not demanding a General Election. I just want an unfit head of state, who purports to represent me, removed for gross misconduct in high office.
That goes back to the Decent Chap theory of British government. You don't need many formal rules, because a Decent Chap will never do the wrong thing. And if they are tempted down the wrong path, a stiff report from a senior civil servant will create enough shame for them to resign. And if they try to style it out, their own MPs will forcibly show them the error if their ways by showing them the door.
What Johnson worked out was that all those checks and balances are phoney- they may look impressive, but they are elaborately-painted cardboard cutouts. If you are shameless enough, and you nobble your party rivals, there's not much to restrain the actions of a PM from one general election to the next.
Fine if you are confident that the PM will always be a Decent Chap(ette). Not fine if an Indecent Chap with a genius intuitive understanding of power gets past all the barriers which are meant to keep them away from the apex.
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
The trains are interesting because no timetable should be built on the assumption that people will willing work overtime continually.
Oh come one, the workers love the overtime and like to be able to use the threat of withdrawing it. Perhaps the bosses/politicians shouldn't allow that situation to develop, but I guess it's cheaper than employing more staff.
Well I'm no fan of the government, but I won't say no to a few hundred quid off the gas and leccy.
You won't get a few hundred quid off. Your bills will still shoot up. Just not by quite the mad amounts being warned. So EDF say 40% of customers will be in fuel poverty. This cuts it to 35% - anyone feel better off?
Same as the fuel duty cut. The reason this was always a stupid policy was that rising prices would quickly reverse it. And they have. With pump prices the highest on record you can't say "ahbut they would be 6p higher if we hadn't so please vote for us".
I'm fixed till October 2023. The little one has meant my consumption has gone up, but it's still a saving.
Do we have to rename Captain Hindsight as Captain Foresight for predicting this at last weeks PMQs?
Opetation Reverse Ferret in full swing. Why do the Cabinet Ministers set themselves up for this humiliation so readily?
It's things like Captain Hindsight and Sir Beer Korma that Labour should and does fear with Boris. Most Brits don't take any politicians seriously and one that can make you laugh has a huge advantage. SKS is very much the Ernie Wise of these 2 and they know it.
I think being associated with beer and takeaway curry has actually improved Starmers image. Not so stuffy, and more normal.
Quite a lot of obvious difference to the bacchanalia that was Downing St over lockdown.
I honestly believe that Keir Starmer is taking his lessons from 2017. Corbyn was pilloried in the press prior to the Campaign but, when he had his chance he was able to fight the Tories to an inconclusive result. That's because most people are disengaged in politics and the Campaign was Corbyn's first outing to the electorate at large on a (mostly) sensible manifesto. Starmer is betting the house on the Campaign. I've heard him in interviews, and he can be charismatic (in a different way from Boris).
His political instincts are also good. In Left Out, an account of the later Corbyn years, the authors report that while Starmer was pushing for a 2nd Referendum he was privately telling allies that it was a lost cause. I believe he did it because he needed to do it. The membership would never elect another leader ambivalent about Brexit, nevermind a Lexiteer, and the costs of alienating the Remainer base outweighed the costs of alienating the Leaver base. To win the leadership and to firm up Labour's floor, Starmer needed to advocate for a 2nd referendum. That he's personally a Remainer presumably helped that position. Now that he needs to win in the country at large, he's happy to repudiate rejoin for the moment. The Brexit question is just one example. He has transformed the Labour Party, though there is still work to do there.
On policy, I'm sure he has his own ideas but he also has a good team around him. Ed Miliband is a policy wonk like no other, and I believe the Tories have pretty much implemented his manifesto already. Boris will just nick the best bits, so he needs to keep his powder dry.
In conclusion, I think we'll see a different Starmer come the election. Less of the priggish LOTO and a more relaxed, approachable PM-in-Waiting. I'm expecting big things, presuming Durham don't issue an FPN...
In other words, 'Dear Keir, I wrote but you ain't callin...'
@Leon in just two posts you have said the following to posters:
Get a grip Stop overreacting Calm the F down
Really? The person who panics and overreacts at absolutely everything is posting this?
Yes, that’s how bad the anti-Boris hysteria has got, across the political aisle. PB’s Champion Over-reacter is telling them to calm down
I’m sensing that the latest failure to eject Boris has tipped many over the edge. They really thought they had him, this time. Yet not. The anger and frustration BURNS
There is a blinkered pig-ignorance about the remaining pro-Boris advocates. Arrogance, hubris and in many MPs cases genuine stupidity allows the madness that what they think must be what all right-thinking people think because they are right-thinking.
Meanwhile, out there in the real world the normals think "are you taking the piss?". Too many of these pieces directly comparing and contrasting the "I was doing essential work" with the legal instructions not to do such things. With grieving relatives being dragged apart at a funeral for someone who had died alone. With the virtual team things they had had to do like birthdays and leaving dos.
"ah but there's all these scumbag doctors and nurses, if you investigate THEM you're bound to find bad'uns" says the generate moral vacuum that is today's Tory. The same immoral stupidity that says poor people are only hungry and in the dark because they can't cook or need to get a better job. The same sneering arrogance that will see a man who paid £10k out of his own pocket for a taxi ride to fundraiser throwing minor scraps to the plebs today then saying "why aren't you degenerates greatful"?
So yes, do keep saying how the polls are ok. How the MPs are right and their constituents are wrong. Because even if there was a change of PM tomorrow we get to ride the down slope a while before things improve. So if you really want Bonzo there saying "what crisis" and his ministers sneering at their voters then go right ahead.
With monster donations & powerful media allies he told the most brazen lie (oven ready/no Irish Sea border) in recent history to win a majority against a weak Labour leader, gaining a whole 1.2% on the share of vote won by Theresa May
In fairness to increase the Tory vote after already being in power for 9 years was quite an achievement. Blair certainly didn't. Or Maggie.
Well I'm no fan of the government, but I won't say no to a few hundred quid off the gas and leccy.
You won't get a few hundred quid off. Your bills will still shoot up. Just not by quite the mad amounts being warned. So EDF say 40% of customers will be in fuel poverty. This cuts it to 35% - anyone feel better off?
Same as the fuel duty cut. The reason this was always a stupid policy was that rising prices would quickly reverse it. And they have. With pump prices the highest on record you can't say "ahbut they would be 6p higher if we hadn't so please vote for us".
Good morning
It is clear that nothing would assuage your criticism, and to be fair it does seem many think that any support package will not be sufficient which to be fair it won't
However, today's support package is likely to be as generous or even more so than labour maybe those critics need to come up with their own remedy on how they would square this impossible conundrum
To me it is those on the lowest incomes must be supported, but many millions will have to review their lifestyles as no political party can sustain it for them
Morning Big_G! Do I think they should be doing *something*? Yes. Will this make a difference as billed? No.
As I keep pointing out, whilst there are few solutions to the crisis there is a very real solution to the political issue of managing the crisis.
The Tories give the very clear impression of not caring that people are suffering. They're blaming the poor for being hungry, blaming working people for being scared of energy bills because they should have got a better job, blaming UC claimants smashed by the £20 a week cut because why are they on "benefits" like a scrounger?
Humility and honesty would go a long way. The coalition got it - "we're all in this together" despite some horrible cuts that really bit hard after 2015. But they *looked* like they understood and were concerned. This lot? We know they don't care.
People vote on emotional triggers as well as financial - we know that. How much reportage is there at the moment quoting voters from polling groups where 2019 Tories and swing voters are saying this lot don't care about us? A lack of policy ideas is one thing, sneering arrogance is quite another.
There is a blinkered pig-ignorance about the remaining pro-Boris advocates. Arrogance, hubris and in many MPs cases genuine stupidity allows the madness that what they think must be what all right-thinking people think because they are right-thinking.
Meanwhile, out there in the real world the normals think "are you taking the piss?". Too many of these pieces directly comparing and contrasting the "I was doing essential work" with the legal instructions not to do such things. With grieving relatives being dragged apart at a funeral for someone who had died alone. With the virtual team things they had had to do like birthdays and leaving dos.
"ah but there's all these scumbag doctors and nurses, if you investigate THEM you're bound to find bad'uns" says the generate moral vacuum that is today's Tory. The same immoral stupidity that says poor people are only hungry and in the dark because they can't cook or need to get a better job. The same sneering arrogance that will see a man who paid £10k out of his own pocket for a taxi ride to fundraiser throwing minor scraps to the plebs today then saying "why aren't you degenerates greatful"?
So yes, do keep saying how the polls are ok. How the MPs are right and their constituents are wrong. Because even if there was a change of PM tomorrow we get to ride the down slope a while before things improve. So if you really want Bonzo there saying "what crisis" and his ministers sneering at their voters then go right ahead.
With monster donations & powerful media allies he told the most brazen lie (oven ready/no Irish Sea border) in recent history to win a majority against a weak Labour leader, gaining a whole 1.2% on the share of vote won by Theresa May
A complete fallacy in an FPTP system to suggest that change in vote share solely determines the level of success.
There is a blinkered pig-ignorance about the remaining pro-Boris advocates. Arrogance, hubris and in many MPs cases genuine stupidity allows the madness that what they think must be what all right-thinking people think because they are right-thinking.
Meanwhile, out there in the real world the normals think "are you taking the piss?". Too many of these pieces directly comparing and contrasting the "I was doing essential work" with the legal instructions not to do such things. With grieving relatives being dragged apart at a funeral for someone who had died alone. With the virtual team things they had had to do like birthdays and leaving dos.
"ah but there's all these scumbag doctors and nurses, if you investigate THEM you're bound to find bad'uns" says the generate moral vacuum that is today's Tory. The same immoral stupidity that says poor people are only hungry and in the dark because they can't cook or need to get a better job. The same sneering arrogance that will see a man who paid £10k out of his own pocket for a taxi ride to fundraiser throwing minor scraps to the plebs today then saying "why aren't you degenerates greatful"?
So yes, do keep saying how the polls are ok. How the MPs are right and their constituents are wrong. Because even if there was a change of PM tomorrow we get to ride the down slope a while before things improve. So if you really want Bonzo there saying "what crisis" and his ministers sneering at their voters then go right ahead.
So you've moved on from undecided then?
As have quite a lot of voters.
I have disliked Johnson since the two letter Brexit stunt, but despite his outrageous public and private behaviour, I have been keen to keep outside the "Johnson hater" circle. I don't know the man, but after yesterday, the lies, the subterfuge, the "rubbish" comment to Nick Watt, and the deeply ironic Sir Beer Korma gag, I crossed that line.
There is a blinkered pig-ignorance about the remaining pro-Boris advocates. Arrogance, hubris and in many MPs cases genuine stupidity allows the madness that what they think must be what all right-thinking people think because they are right-thinking.
Meanwhile, out there in the real world the normals think "are you taking the piss?". Too many of these pieces directly comparing and contrasting the "I was doing essential work" with the legal instructions not to do such things. With grieving relatives being dragged apart at a funeral for someone who had died alone. With the virtual team things they had had to do like birthdays and leaving dos.
"ah but there's all these scumbag doctors and nurses, if you investigate THEM you're bound to find bad'uns" says the generate moral vacuum that is today's Tory. The same immoral stupidity that says poor people are only hungry and in the dark because they can't cook or need to get a better job. The same sneering arrogance that will see a man who paid £10k out of his own pocket for a taxi ride to fundraiser throwing minor scraps to the plebs today then saying "why aren't you degenerates greatful"?
So yes, do keep saying how the polls are ok. How the MPs are right and their constituents are wrong. Because even if there was a change of PM tomorrow we get to ride the down slope a while before things improve. So if you really want Bonzo there saying "what crisis" and his ministers sneering at their voters then go right ahead.
With monster donations & powerful media allies he told the most brazen lie (oven ready/no Irish Sea border) in recent history to win a majority against a weak Labour leader, gaining a whole 1.2% on the share of vote won by Theresa May
In fairness to increase the Tory vote after already being in power for 9 years was quite an achievement. Blair certainly didn't. Or Maggie.
Broadly Tory status quo ante for next GE -
-ves going into the next GE - anti-Corbyn unwind +ves solid Brexit floor.
Boris' behaviour and cost of living crisis will tip the scales to them being out of power though. Labour will be desperate that the Lib Dems get sufficient numbers so they aren't relying on c&s from the SNP.
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
No, it won't.
There will be hordes of people on Twitter declaring that cutting the train services is the best, most Scottish thing since {insert Scottish Nationalist legendary event} and anyone who doesn't like it is an English Tory.
Any resemblance to a political party and leader we are discussing is purely accidental.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. £10bn on UC could have made a real difference for those suffering genuine hardship as opposed to wondering if they can afford a second ski trip.
UC receivers don't vote Tory. Pensioners do...
So? We need a government that is focused on the real needs of the country, not simply getting itself elected again. Boris is not providing it.
The Treasury don't want to add anything to UC because they don't believe it will be allowed to fall back again later.
One off grants (or better, two off grants) would be a simple way to solve that problem. It is really not hard if you want to solve it. And, frankly, UC needs a serious catch up on the unanticipated inflation anyway. It's not just fuel that is going up.
One thing about inflation, won't it will have reduced the national debt in real terms ?
Hugely. Even although a fair bit of government debt is index linked at the moment the "real" rate of interest has gone even more sharply negative too. Despite the tiny increases in the base rate borrowing has never been cheaper.
Its yet another reason why the government really didn't to mess about with windfall taxes. They have had a considerable windfall themselves, not just in the reduction in debt but in the VAT and CT returns on those increased costs and profits.
For first time in I don't know how long my supermarket has emailed to say that today's delivery will contain everything I ordered with no substitutions.
Just a one-off or are we seeing the end of the supply chain issues?
Fwiw there were no obvious gaps on the shelves at my local supermarket yesterday. Mask-wearing was down to about 50 per cent btw.
I cannot find ginger beer anywhere - and I need it!!!
Sainsbury's has an online stock checker (which confirms several brands of ginger beer are available at my local branch). Try it at: https://stockchecker.sainsburys.co.uk/
Mind you, I've not checked it with something I know to be out of stock!
Other supermarkets probably offer something similar.
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
The trains are interesting because no timetable should be built on the assumption that people will willing work overtime continually.
Which goes back to historic working practises - in the Goode Olde Days*, overtime was seen as extra money by the work force. Some labour disputes actually occurred because companies hired more workers to reduce overtime and the workers saw their weekly pay packets cut.
For first time in I don't know how long my supermarket has emailed to say that today's delivery will contain everything I ordered with no substitutions.
Just a one-off or are we seeing the end of the supply chain issues?
Fwiw there were no obvious gaps on the shelves at my local supermarket yesterday. Mask-wearing was down to about 50 per cent btw.
Mask wearing still at 50%, where are you? I see so few I'd almost forgotten it was a thing!
I just can't stand this attitude. It's literally no better than the Custard Conservatives who are failing to remove Boris. Country before party, people! Keeping Boris looks a lot to me like electoral seppuku for the Tories, but it's bad for the country too.
Those who want the country to suffer for relative party advantage are not the good guys whichever side they're on.
Correct. And as people keep saying he is awfully good at winning elections. The bollocks about All the better if he is still in place in 2024, is bollocks. Because the thought of him with another 5 year mandate is Hitler level frightening.
Boris Derangement Syndrome rears its ugly head.
Our Prime Minister, whose vaccine programme saved thousands of lives, is as frightening as a man who caused 30 million deaths, because he had a couple of drinks jn his own house and then shaved the truth about it. Apparently.
For those of us with Johnson Derangement Syndrome, some of whom crossed that line yesterday, there is a disbelief at the unquestioning support of this odious creature, and the acceptance that his cock and bull defence must be true, and we have to move on.
The idea that Johnson overcame the Ministerial Code with another lie, upon lie, upon lie, with the story growing more absurd with each denial is really rather frightening. It's Trumpesque, it's plain wrong! Justice has not been served.
Your assertion, that we should allow Johnson's misbehaviour and outrageous defence of it because he oversaw a (credit where it is due) successful and slightly quicker than elsewhere vaccine rollout is an odd one. It's like suggesting Harold Shipman's pleasant bedside manner made him an excellent GP, or we should mitigate Fred West's crimes because he was a first class plasterer.
Yesterday was a bad day for democracy.
Why was yesterday a “bad day for democracy”?
No vote on getting rid of Boris by the voters was suppressed or cancelled. It didn’t change the fact that at some point people will get a vote at a GE and if he’s still then then they have their democratic say on his actions.
The fact that we are in a democracy means that, unlike in an autocracy or fascist state, means that the public can make their criticisms publicly, the press can report freely and people can make up their own minds.
Do you think in a non-democracy that people would have even heard about these parties and been able to criticise publicly - especially members of the governing party?
So not sure why it’s a bad day for democracy.
Simply because the etiquettes and norms of Parliament, the checks and balances of Executive power were trashed yesterday. There was no sanction for a politician who wilfully disregarded the law on multiple occasions, and subsequently lied that he hadn't. To be overly melodramatic, that is the road to anarchy.
I am not asking for a change of party, I am not demanding a General Election. I just want an unfit head of state, who purports to represent me, removed for gross misconduct in high office.
I would love him to be removed too however I don’t understand why you think that the checks and balances were trashed yesterday? He’s under investigation for “misleading parliament” so a check and balance is in action, the Tory MPs have the power to remove him - that hasn’t been removed by him yesterday - whether they do is a different matter but it’s not going to not happen because they are worried the secret police will drag them off for standing up to him.
So effectively the processes are still there, haven’t been squashed by some dictator and ultimately he can be voted out if people think he has been guilty of “gross misconduct in public office”.
You also are sure he’s guilty of gross misconduct in public office - the mere fact that he has to survive certain investigations and potential rebellion show that we still do absolutely have a system of checks and balances thankfully and aren’t ruled by “feels”.
And he isn’t out “head of state” - that’s the one having a big party (legally) next weekend.
Again however I think he’s totally unsuitable as PM - lazy, arrogant, probably vindictive, and actually more importantly he has no vision and no application to make the country better which should be the absolute reason to be PM whatever colour rosette they wear. He’s become “world king” and has absolutely no idea what to do with it.
I agree entirely
The Tories have degraded into a bunch of snobbish, clueless incompetents, with a tin ear, and a dash of cruelty. There are some decent ministers, who mean well, but generally - pff
I could, however, cope with all that, just about. I could hold mg nose and vote Tory. Because Labour, after all, is the party that wanted a 2nd referendum, had Corbyn as a leader, and doesn’t know what a woman is. The Labour Party repels me. They are even worse
But then I look back at the Tories and I realise they are not just sleazy and the rest, they have no idea where they are going. No grand plan. Nothing
There is a blinkered pig-ignorance about the remaining pro-Boris advocates. Arrogance, hubris and in many MPs cases genuine stupidity allows the madness that what they think must be what all right-thinking people think because they are right-thinking.
Meanwhile, out there in the real world the normals think "are you taking the piss?". Too many of these pieces directly comparing and contrasting the "I was doing essential work" with the legal instructions not to do such things. With grieving relatives being dragged apart at a funeral for someone who had died alone. With the virtual team things they had had to do like birthdays and leaving dos.
"ah but there's all these scumbag doctors and nurses, if you investigate THEM you're bound to find bad'uns" says the generate moral vacuum that is today's Tory. The same immoral stupidity that says poor people are only hungry and in the dark because they can't cook or need to get a better job. The same sneering arrogance that will see a man who paid £10k out of his own pocket for a taxi ride to fundraiser throwing minor scraps to the plebs today then saying "why aren't you degenerates greatful"?
So yes, do keep saying how the polls are ok. How the MPs are right and their constituents are wrong. Because even if there was a change of PM tomorrow we get to ride the down slope a while before things improve. So if you really want Bonzo there saying "what crisis" and his ministers sneering at their voters then go right ahead.
With monster donations & powerful media allies he told the most brazen lie (oven ready/no Irish Sea border) in recent history to win a majority against a weak Labour leader, gaining a whole 1.2% on the share of vote won by Theresa May
In fairness to increase the Tory vote after already being in power for 9 years was quite an achievement. Blair certainly didn't. Or Maggie.
Broadly Tory status quo ante for next GE -
-ves going into the next GE - anti-Corbyn unwind +ves solid Brexit floor.
Boris' behaviour and cost of living crisis will tip the scales to them being out of power though. Labour will be desperate that the Lib Dems get sufficient numbers so they aren't relying on c&s from the SNP.
I'm not so sure. The best result for Labour could be a failed attempt to create a Government due to the SNP being awkward. Followed by a second election where the choice in Scotland is vote SNP and continue this lack of Government or vote Labour and let us actually get things done.
I have no fear that he might try to overturn democracy and cancel an election
He illegally shutdown Parliament when they wouldn't vote the way he wanted.
To be exact, he tried to get parliament prorogued.
Then a court case was brought. Which said it it wasn't allowed. So he didn't.
Incidentally, I have one for the Putin-Must-Have-A-Way out types...
1) Boris Johnson apparently is the next Hitler 2) Which means he must be worse than Putin 3) If he is worse than Putin, if the Western side loses in Ukraine... 4) ... won't he use nuclear weapons? 5) Surely this means that everyone on the planet needs to appease Boris Johnson?
Someone who still thinks Johnson is funny.
I can laugh at nearly anything.
Just waiting for someone to fix the fucking toaster. It's not complicated, or even that hard.
@Leon in just two posts you have said the following to posters:
Get a grip Stop overreacting Calm the F down
Really? The person who panics and overreacts at absolutely everything is posting this?
Yes, that’s how bad the anti-Boris hysteria has got, across the political aisle. PB’s Champion Over-reacter is telling them to calm down
I’m sensing that the latest failure to eject Boris has tipped many over the edge. They really thought they had him, this time. Yet not. The anger and frustration BURNS
I think it is fair to say that people are focusing on the wrong thing.
I'm furious that we have a PM who is so without integrity, that he remains in post.
I'm possibly even more furious that there isn't the mitigating factor of "greater purpose" - no programme of legislation to push through. He cowers behind "crises" as if he, the laziest PM since the war, is the only one who can remain on top of the issues.
But to be angry because you *expected* him to be gone is not seeing the world as it is.
There is no way to get him out other than a general election (barring a sudden white knight leadership candidate around whom the Tory MPs coalesce). That's a heck of a long time in which to maintain the current levels of frothing ire.
So by all means froth to strengthen the ties in the anti-Johnson coalition. But there needs to be a plan, based on him still being in place for a long time yet.
Of course, if he goes, things get a lot tougher for the opposition, because we are in new territory.
Well I'm no fan of the government, but I won't say no to a few hundred quid off the gas and leccy.
You won't get a few hundred quid off. Your bills will still shoot up. Just not by quite the mad amounts being warned. So EDF say 40% of customers will be in fuel poverty. This cuts it to 35% - anyone feel better off?
Same as the fuel duty cut. The reason this was always a stupid policy was that rising prices would quickly reverse it. And they have. With pump prices the highest on record you can't say "ahbut they would be 6p higher if we hadn't so please vote for us".
Sorry but I disagree. Cutting taxes is a reasonable response to rising prices. Yes it doesn't reverse the price rise, but nothing will. The price has to be paid, one way or another, but there's no reason for the state to be adding insult to injury by adding taxes on top of the rises and on top of other taxes.
Anyone who thinks there's a magic solution to eliminate cost from people's lives is in Dreamland but cutting taxes is a rational and reasonable way to mitigate the harm and smooth the transition in the price changes.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. £10bn on UC could have made a real difference for those suffering genuine hardship as opposed to wondering if they can afford a second ski trip.
UC receivers don't vote Tory. Pensioners do...
So? We need a government that is focused on the real needs of the country, not simply getting itself elected again. Boris is not providing it.
The Treasury don't want to add anything to UC because they don't believe it will be allowed to fall back again later.
One off grants (or better, two off grants) would be a simple way to solve that problem. It is really not hard if you want to solve it. And, frankly, UC needs a serious catch up on the unanticipated inflation anyway. It's not just fuel that is going up.
One thing about inflation, won't it will have reduced the national debt in real terms ?
Hugely. Even although a fair bit of government debt is index linked at the moment the "real" rate of interest has gone even more sharply negative too. Despite the tiny increases in the base rate borrowing has never been cheaper.
Its yet another reason why the government really didn't to mess about with windfall taxes. They have had a considerable windfall themselves, not just in the reduction in debt but in the VAT and CT returns on those increased costs and profits.
Osborne did a reverse of the windfall back in 2015 when oil and gas prices were low. He should have introduced a stabiliser mechanism so the reverse (High oil price, high profits) (Now occurring) automatically lead to extra treasury revenues at the time. The "windfall" tax simply corrects this I think - though it is clunky.
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
The trains are interesting because no timetable should be built on the assumption that people will willing work overtime continually.
Absolutely. We have had a baleful conspiracy here between franchises who were not interested in training new drivers and unions who saw that the shortage put another £20k a year on their members already considerable wage packets. It absolutely should have been a requirement of all franchises that they trained at least as many drivers as they lost through wastage and it doesn't seem to have been. But its the Scottish government's problem now.
Whilst Sebastian Fox has announced a sweeping away of the post-privatisation financial sink hole we're still awaiting anything more than a name and a competition by Tory MPs for where its HQ should be.
"Just nationalise them" was not the answer as I kept pointing out. Scotrail is now state owned yet the framework which makes the rail industry economically "difficult" to run is still in place.
I can hardly blame the unions for trying to secure a bucket of cash for their members - that's their job. Especially now with inflation on runaway mode. Nor do the Scottish government have a magic wand they can wave to fix this. It does illustrate though the scale of the mess. Some of the drivers depots work very limited routes yet have seen mega cuts to services due to lack of drivers not working overtime.
This demonstrates how reliant the network was not on contracted hours but on drivers working rest days and overtime. That may work in bus world but never did in train world. Yet decades after the bus companies won the first franchises and the likes of South West Trains simply fired half the drivers to boost profits, we have never been able to get past this basic point - because the privatisation framework doesn't allow enough drivers to be hired because costs because subsidy.
Only when they bonfire all these myriad contracts and remove all the costs associated do we have a chance. And yes, nationalised operators still operate in the privatised framework. And in England are *still* privatised - operated by OLR Rail who are a consortium of private contractors no different to private operators in how they operate...
Well I'm no fan of the government, but I won't say no to a few hundred quid off the gas and leccy.
You won't get a few hundred quid off. Your bills will still shoot up. Just not by quite the mad amounts being warned. So EDF say 40% of customers will be in fuel poverty. This cuts it to 35% - anyone feel better off?
Same as the fuel duty cut. The reason this was always a stupid policy was that rising prices would quickly reverse it. And they have. With pump prices the highest on record you can't say "ahbut they would be 6p higher if we hadn't so please vote for us".
I'm fixed till October 2023. The little one has meant my consumption has gone up, but it's still a saving.
Was actually a Ministry of Justice cleaner who died of hypertension of the heart.
Not to minimise the tragedy of the event, or the contract that drove him to work when he was clearly ill, but there are enough genuine sticks to beat this government (sic) with without inventing them.
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
The trains are interesting because no timetable should be built on the assumption that people will willing work overtime continually.
Absolutely. We have had a baleful conspiracy here between franchises who were not interested in training new drivers and unions who saw that the shortage put another £20k a year on their members already considerable wage packets. It absolutely should have been a requirement of all franchises that they trained at least as many drivers as they lost through wastage and it doesn't seem to have been. But its the Scottish government's problem now.
Whilst Sebastian Fox has announced a sweeping away of the post-privatisation financial sink hole we're still awaiting anything more than a name and a competition by Tory MPs for where its HQ should be.
"Just nationalise them" was not the answer as I kept pointing out. Scotrail is now state owned yet the framework which makes the rail industry economically "difficult" to run is still in place.
I can hardly blame the unions for trying to secure a bucket of cash for their members - that's their job. Especially now with inflation on runaway mode. Nor do the Scottish government have a magic wand they can wave to fix this. It does illustrate though the scale of the mess. Some of the drivers depots work very limited routes yet have seen mega cuts to services due to lack of drivers not working overtime.
This demonstrates how reliant the network was not on contracted hours but on drivers working rest days and overtime. That may work in bus world but never did in train world. Yet decades after the bus companies won the first franchises and the likes of South West Trains simply fired half the drivers to boost profits, we have never been able to get past this basic point - because the privatisation framework doesn't allow enough drivers to be hired because costs because subsidy.
Only when they bonfire all these myriad contracts and remove all the costs associated do we have a chance. And yes, nationalised operators still operate in the privatised framework. And in England are *still* privatised - operated by OLR Rail who are a consortium of private contractors no different to private operators in how they operate...
The thing is a train driver can't just start work tomorrow - they need a year or so of training first..
One thing we seem to have completely forgotten in this country is that there a whole piles of things that you need to keep going (or at the very least ticking over) because unless you continually do it something falls apart later.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. £10bn on UC could have made a real difference for those suffering genuine hardship as opposed to wondering if they can afford a second ski trip.
UC receivers don't vote Tory. Pensioners do...
So? We need a government that is focused on the real needs of the country, not simply getting itself elected again. Boris is not providing it.
The Treasury don't want to add anything to UC because they don't believe it will be allowed to fall back again later.
One off grants (or better, two off grants) would be a simple way to solve that problem. It is really not hard if you want to solve it. And, frankly, UC needs a serious catch up on the unanticipated inflation anyway. It's not just fuel that is going up.
One thing about inflation, won't it will have reduced the national debt in real terms ?
Hugely. Even although a fair bit of government debt is index linked at the moment the "real" rate of interest has gone even more sharply negative too. Despite the tiny increases in the base rate borrowing has never been cheaper.
Its yet another reason why the government really didn't to mess about with windfall taxes. They have had a considerable windfall themselves, not just in the reduction in debt but in the VAT and CT returns on those increased costs and profits.
Osborne did a reverse of the windfall back in 2015 when oil and gas prices were low. He should have introduced a stabiliser mechanism so the reverse (High oil price, high profits) (Now occurring) automatically lead to extra treasury revenues at the time. The "windfall" tax simply corrects this I think - though it is clunky.
It's clunky because it's also wrong - I'm sure @Richard_Tyndall pointed out that the mechanisms are still there and they just need to be configured appropriately.
However that mechanism only covers North Sea Oil and Gas and I suspect the Government wants more than that...
On topic, the LibDem poster is hard-hitting and effective.
The Conservatives are consigning themselves to a landslide defeat in two years.
Why do we not see that in the opinion polls?
Arguably, we are: the combined Labour + LibDem + Green number in all polls is now almost always at 55%+ and is sometimes now getting close to 60%. The Tories, meanwhile, have on occasions been as low as 31%, their 1997 election result.
The Tories polled lower than now during the 2010-2015 Parliament. Suffice it to say that they did not suffer a landslide defeat in GE2015.
The combined opposition was not polling as high, neither was the LOTO regularly leading on best PM, neither was there any doubt which party led on the economy.
All good points, and yet we see very large numbers of 2019 Tory voters saying "Don't Know" to pollsters - 28% are don't know/would not vote/refused in the latest YouGov, compared to 17% in a random May 2013 YouGov poll. I'd suggest that these voters will be easier to tempt back, as they haven't made the step of saying they will vote for another party.
There's a lot that needs to happen between now and the GE for Labour to win that election, let alone by a landslide.
And Boris is a “lucky general”, as we have seen time and again. He’s used to winning, and he’s good at winning. That is significant
You can see the terror in the eyes of Lefties, as they contemplate him. It is one reason they desperately want him gone, because he unnerves them; a lot of the hysterical hatred and moral disapproval of him is just badly-disguised fear
And even though I get some satisfaction at detecting this fear, I agree that he is a shoddy PM
There it is. The sado-populism at the heart of this whole project. "I don't like him, but I like the other side suffering enough to relish it." He is Britain Trump, and you are Britain Maga Hat.
But this is not true. You’ve just proved my point. The hysteria about Boris is overdone. Earlier on this thread an apparently sane PB-er seriously compared Boris to Hitler.
Hitler? Really?? Boris has many faults, but he isn’t about to set up gas chambers
Likewise, I find Bozza alarmingly lax and depressingly bereft of good ideas, but I have no fear that he might try to overturn democracy and cancel an election (it’s the Remoaners that did that). Boris is not Trump, either
Calm the F down. This knicker-wetting will be a handicap for the Left if it continues. This is where Boris DOES use Trumpite tactics (tho many politicians use this tactic) - he does and says things which he knows will provoke his thin-skinned foes, so they lose it, and focus on the naughty words, and forget their real target
And who doesn’t enjoy the lamentations of their enemies? It is one of the modest joys of being a politics geek
The biggest problem I have with Labour at the moment (ok two problems) is: 1) lack of policy - I need to see their vision of what the country should look like in 2030 (or 2035 if they are ambitious) 2) A lack of a sense of humour. Starmer is irretrievably dour, and is molding a team around him who are the same. I get the sense of anger in the conuntry and labour is riding that too, but at some point a bit of joy must come into life too. Even in the trenches people told jokes.
Absolutely. This is one reason I think Rayner would be an excellent Labour leader. She has a sense of humour, and she has a kind of chirpy working class optimism (apologies if that sounds snobbish, I don’t know how else to phrase it)
Late 2024 could be a depressing place in time. The leader that offers a cheerful road out could win on optimism alone. Starmer doesn’t do cheerfulness
I'd go with that. Rayner is far more of a threat to the Tories, especially in the Red Wall. The flip side is that, for many of the Home Counties' seats, many middle class voters may be wary of having her as PM, so may stick with the Tories rather than LDs who would side with Labour.
You may be right, but on the other hand she may be a Northern peasant of the type detested by the Mail and Express. Don't forget there are good "salt of the earth" Northerners (Conservative voters) and bad Northern working class anarchists (Labour MPs). Forgive me for ignoring another of your cast iron political tips.
Well I'm no fan of the government, but I won't say no to a few hundred quid off the gas and leccy.
You won't get a few hundred quid off. Your bills will still shoot up. Just not by quite the mad amounts being warned. So EDF say 40% of customers will be in fuel poverty. This cuts it to 35% - anyone feel better off?
Same as the fuel duty cut. The reason this was always a stupid policy was that rising prices would quickly reverse it. And they have. With pump prices the highest on record you can't say "ahbut they would be 6p higher if we hadn't so please vote for us".
Sorry but I disagree. Cutting taxes is a reasonable response to rising prices. Yes it doesn't reverse the price rise, but nothing will. The price has to be paid, one way or another, but there's no reason for the state to be adding insult to injury by adding taxes on top of the rises and on top of other taxes.
Anyone who thinks there's a magic solution to eliminate cost from people's lives is in Dreamland but cutting taxes is a rational and reasonable way to mitigate the harm and smooth the transition in the price changes.
Sure, we know there is no magic solution. I am pointing to the political stupidity of going out claiming people will pay less. They will not - they will pay more. That they would have paid even more without the rebate won't win any votes.
And was always thus. Cutting fuel duty was always a stupid policy when prices were rising which is why Blair and Brown resisted calls to do so in the great fuel crisis of 2000 when prices were shockingly high at £1.20 a litre.
Sunak need not have bothered cut 5p duty and lose 1p VAT off fuel - its the highest ever, people are screaming, there are no votes to be gained. Better to target the money differently and put it into people's pockets directly so that they feel it there before spending it.
"I just got £200 cash off my tax bill" is better than "I've been saved £200 off a theoretical fuel bill which is more than I can afford anyway". Politically speaking.
For first time in I don't know how long my supermarket has emailed to say that today's delivery will contain everything I ordered with no substitutions.
Just a one-off or are we seeing the end of the supply chain issues?
Fwiw there were no obvious gaps on the shelves at my local supermarket yesterday. Mask-wearing was down to about 50 per cent btw.
Mask wearing still at 50%, where are you? I see so few I'd almost forgotten it was a thing!
Outer London. Another, possibly more pertinent, question is *when* am I? Midday, midweek, so there are a lot of retired customers.
@Leon in just two posts you have said the following to posters:
Get a grip Stop overreacting Calm the F down
Really? The person who panics and overreacts at absolutely everything is posting this?
Yes, that’s how bad the anti-Boris hysteria has got, across the political aisle. PB’s Champion Over-reacter is telling them to calm down
I’m sensing that the latest failure to eject Boris has tipped many over the edge. They really thought they had him, this time. Yet not. The anger and frustration BURNS
Good response although I don't think you are correct. The report was a bit of a damp squib. I think people get angry when he is banged to rights (as he has been several times) and doesn't go. This wasn't it. Cakegate was a non event (really feel sorry for Sunak). So that's when people get angry, when he rides out an obvious event. That is why there hasn't been more of a reaction from anti Boris Tory MPs this time.
Well I'm no fan of the government, but I won't say no to a few hundred quid off the gas and leccy.
You won't get a few hundred quid off. Your bills will still shoot up. Just not by quite the mad amounts being warned. So EDF say 40% of customers will be in fuel poverty. This cuts it to 35% - anyone feel better off?
Same as the fuel duty cut. The reason this was always a stupid policy was that rising prices would quickly reverse it. And they have. With pump prices the highest on record you can't say "ahbut they would be 6p higher if we hadn't so please vote for us".
Yes, I said at the time it was stupid, because it meant they were taking responsibility for future increases. They would have done better to go down the sackcloth and ashes route and appeal to everyone to pull together for the good of the country to get through these difficult times, while providing targeted help to those worst affected - but they apparently weren't paying attention to how Cameron and Osborne managed to get people to vote for austerity.
It is more difficult than that. For the past two years, voters have become used to Governments bailing them out when tough times come. No Government could get away with what Cameron and Osborne did - the voters would just say "yes but you give us cash 2 years ago, why not now?"
Cameron and Osborne credited the voting public with a bit more sense than that.
There was potential for a message along the lines of, "we took extraordinary measures during the extraordinary period of the pandemic, and the economy is stronger as a result, but now we need to do the responsible things to repay what we've borrowed."
It's just that Johnson isn't capable of being responsible.
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
The trains are interesting because no timetable should be built on the assumption that people will willing work overtime continually.
Absolutely. We have had a baleful conspiracy here between franchises who were not interested in training new drivers and unions who saw that the shortage put another £20k a year on their members already considerable wage packets. It absolutely should have been a requirement of all franchises that they trained at least as many drivers as they lost through wastage and it doesn't seem to have been. But its the Scottish government's problem now.
Whilst Sebastian Fox has announced a sweeping away of the post-privatisation financial sink hole we're still awaiting anything more than a name and a competition by Tory MPs for where its HQ should be.
"Just nationalise them" was not the answer as I kept pointing out. Scotrail is now state owned yet the framework which makes the rail industry economically "difficult" to run is still in place.
I can hardly blame the unions for trying to secure a bucket of cash for their members - that's their job. Especially now with inflation on runaway mode. Nor do the Scottish government have a magic wand they can wave to fix this. It does illustrate though the scale of the mess. Some of the drivers depots work very limited routes yet have seen mega cuts to services due to lack of drivers not working overtime.
This demonstrates how reliant the network was not on contracted hours but on drivers working rest days and overtime. That may work in bus world but never did in train world. Yet decades after the bus companies won the first franchises and the likes of South West Trains simply fired half the drivers to boost profits, we have never been able to get past this basic point - because the privatisation framework doesn't allow enough drivers to be hired because costs because subsidy.
Only when they bonfire all these myriad contracts and remove all the costs associated do we have a chance. And yes, nationalised operators still operate in the privatised framework. And in England are *still* privatised - operated by OLR Rail who are a consortium of private contractors no different to private operators in how they operate...
The thing is a train driver can't just start work tomorrow - they need a year or so of training first..
One thing we seem to have completely forgotten in this country is that there a whole piles of things that you need to keep going (or at the very least ticking over) because unless you continually do it something falls apart later.
Especially so when the train driver is based in Mallaig or Wick...
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
The trains are interesting because no timetable should be built on the assumption that people will willing work overtime continually.
Absolutely. We have had a baleful conspiracy here between franchises who were not interested in training new drivers and unions who saw that the shortage put another £20k a year on their members already considerable wage packets. It absolutely should have been a requirement of all franchises that they trained at least as many drivers as they lost through wastage and it doesn't seem to have been. But its the Scottish government's problem now.
Whilst Sebastian Fox has announced a sweeping away of the post-privatisation financial sink hole we're still awaiting anything more than a name and a competition by Tory MPs for where its HQ should be.
"Just nationalise them" was not the answer as I kept pointing out. Scotrail is now state owned yet the framework which makes the rail industry economically "difficult" to run is still in place.
I can hardly blame the unions for trying to secure a bucket of cash for their members - that's their job. Especially now with inflation on runaway mode. Nor do the Scottish government have a magic wand they can wave to fix this. It does illustrate though the scale of the mess. Some of the drivers depots work very limited routes yet have seen mega cuts to services due to lack of drivers not working overtime.
This demonstrates how reliant the network was not on contracted hours but on drivers working rest days and overtime. That may work in bus world but never did in train world. Yet decades after the bus companies won the first franchises and the likes of South West Trains simply fired half the drivers to boost profits, we have never been able to get past this basic point - because the privatisation framework doesn't allow enough drivers to be hired because costs because subsidy.
Only when they bonfire all these myriad contracts and remove all the costs associated do we have a chance. And yes, nationalised operators still operate in the privatised framework. And in England are *still* privatised - operated by OLR Rail who are a consortium of private contractors no different to private operators in how they operate...
The thing is a train driver can't just start work tomorrow - they need a year or so of training first..
One thing we seem to have completely forgotten in this country is that there a whole piles of things that you need to keep going (or at the very least ticking over) because unless you continually do it something falls apart later.
A big prat of the problem with Hammersmith bridge in London was that the council, rather proudly, got rid of the dedicated bridge watch post. I forget the actual title, but it involved a chap who would go round the bridge on a near daily basis and look for issues - tap on things with a hammer etc.
They replaced it with "proper" inspections from an outside company. But those were expensive, so they were less frequent.
So when some of the moving parts started to seize....
There is a blinkered pig-ignorance about the remaining pro-Boris advocates. Arrogance, hubris and in many MPs cases genuine stupidity allows the madness that what they think must be what all right-thinking people think because they are right-thinking.
Meanwhile, out there in the real world the normals think "are you taking the piss?". Too many of these pieces directly comparing and contrasting the "I was doing essential work" with the legal instructions not to do such things. With grieving relatives being dragged apart at a funeral for someone who had died alone. With the virtual team things they had had to do like birthdays and leaving dos.
"ah but there's all these scumbag doctors and nurses, if you investigate THEM you're bound to find bad'uns" says the generate moral vacuum that is today's Tory. The same immoral stupidity that says poor people are only hungry and in the dark because they can't cook or need to get a better job. The same sneering arrogance that will see a man who paid £10k out of his own pocket for a taxi ride to fundraiser throwing minor scraps to the plebs today then saying "why aren't you degenerates greatful"?
So yes, do keep saying how the polls are ok. How the MPs are right and their constituents are wrong. Because even if there was a change of PM tomorrow we get to ride the down slope a while before things improve. So if you really want Bonzo there saying "what crisis" and his ministers sneering at their voters then go right ahead.
With monster donations & powerful media allies he told the most brazen lie (oven ready/no Irish Sea border) in recent history to win a majority against a weak Labour leader, gaining a whole 1.2% on the share of vote won by Theresa May
In fairness to increase the Tory vote after already being in power for 9 years was quite an achievement. Blair certainly didn't. Or Maggie.
Except....
2010: The Coalition took over from Labour
2015 Cameron leads a Conservative Government that took over from the Coalition
2017 Theresa May takes over from Cameron, then gets reduced to a minority Government - in power with DUP help (sort of Coalition). This minority Government is hamstrung by an ability to get Brexit through Westminster
2019 Boris gets an 80 seat majority and gets Brexit through Westminster.
The voter hasn't seen a continuous "Conservative Government". They have seen shifts and turns and changes that has seemed like a series of changes of Government.
I just can't stand this attitude. It's literally no better than the Custard Conservatives who are failing to remove Boris. Country before party, people! Keeping Boris looks a lot to me like electoral seppuku for the Tories, but it's bad for the country too.
Those who want the country to suffer for relative party advantage are not the good guys whichever side they're on.
Correct. And as people keep saying he is awfully good at winning elections. The bollocks about All the better if he is still in place in 2024, is bollocks. Because the thought of him with another 5 year mandate is Hitler level frightening.
Boris Derangement Syndrome rears its ugly head.
Our Prime Minister, whose vaccine programme saved thousands of lives, is as frightening as a man who caused 30 million deaths, because he had a couple of drinks jn his own house and then shaved the truth about it. Apparently.
For those of us with Johnson Derangement Syndrome, some of whom crossed that line yesterday, there is a disbelief at the unquestioning support of this odious creature, and the acceptance that his cock and bull defence must be true, and we have to move on.
The idea that Johnson overcame the Ministerial Code with another lie, upon lie, upon lie, with the story growing more absurd with each denial is really rather frightening. It's Trumpesque, it's plain wrong! Justice has not been served.
Your assertion, that we should allow Johnson's misbehaviour and outrageous defence of it because he oversaw a (credit where it is due) successful and slightly quicker than elsewhere vaccine rollout is an odd one. It's like suggesting Harold Shipman's pleasant bedside manner made him an excellent GP, or we should mitigate Fred West's crimes because he was a first class plasterer.
Yesterday was a bad day for democracy.
Why was yesterday a “bad day for democracy”?
No vote on getting rid of Boris by the voters was suppressed or cancelled. It didn’t change the fact that at some point people will get a vote at a GE and if he’s still then then they have their democratic say on his actions.
The fact that we are in a democracy means that, unlike in an autocracy or fascist state, means that the public can make their criticisms publicly, the press can report freely and people can make up their own minds.
Do you think in a non-democracy that people would have even heard about these parties and been able to criticise publicly - especially members of the governing party?
So not sure why it’s a bad day for democracy.
Simply because the etiquettes and norms of Parliament, the checks and balances of Executive power were trashed yesterday. There was no sanction for a politician who wilfully disregarded the law on multiple occasions, and subsequently lied that he hadn't. To be overly melodramatic, that is the road to anarchy.
I am not asking for a change of party, I am not demanding a General Election. I just want an unfit head of state, who purports to represent me, removed for gross misconduct in high office.
I would love him to be removed too however I don’t understand why you think that the checks and balances were trashed yesterday? He’s under investigation for “misleading parliament” so a check and balance is in action, the Tory MPs have the power to remove him - that hasn’t been removed by him yesterday - whether they do is a different matter but it’s not going to not happen because they are worried the secret police will drag them off for standing up to him.
So effectively the processes are still there, haven’t been squashed by some dictator and ultimately he can be voted out if people think he has been guilty of “gross misconduct in public office”.
You also are sure he’s guilty of gross misconduct in public office - the mere fact that he has to survive certain investigations and potential rebellion show that we still do absolutely have a system of checks and balances thankfully and aren’t ruled by “feels”.
And he isn’t out “head of state” - that’s the one having a big party (legally) next weekend.
Again however I think he’s totally unsuitable as PM - lazy, arrogant, probably vindictive, and actually more importantly he has no vision and no application to make the country better which should be the absolute reason to be PM whatever colour rosette they wear. He’s become “world king” and has absolutely no idea what to do with it.
I agree entirely
The Tories have degraded into a bunch of snobbish, clueless incompetents, with a tin ear, and a dash of cruelty. There are some decent ministers, who mean well, but generally - pff
I could, however, cope with all that, just about. I could hold mg nose and vote Tory. Because Labour, after all, is the party that wanted a 2nd referendum, had Corbyn as a leader, and doesn’t know what a woman is. The Labour Party repels me. They are even worse
But then I look back at the Tories and I realise they are not just sleazy and the rest, they have no idea where they are going. No grand plan. Nothing
It’s a pitiful choice. At a painful time
Absolutely - I don’t care if the PM is into pet-play, spends the weekend at chequers watching TSE’s step mom collection, is a nasty person but I want them to have a vision that’s realisable and then pull all the levers to get things done.
Unfortunately I’m not sure whether it’s a symptom or the cause of the attitude and comment you see here a lot:
It’s not good politics.
I don’t give a shit if it’s not good politics as that implies that the only things that should be done are things that help get re-elected or get a quick win for the government.
This short termism, “optics”, crap media obsessed with gotchas and reacting to twitter is what stops the country moving forward.
How many times does a party say “we realise that this issue is something that cannot be fixed Over one electoral cycle so we are going to create a cross party commission to find a way that we can fix this that will not be derailed by a change of party in govt”.
For example - “levelling up” or Northern Ireland”.
They just want everything done for short term political gain to win the next election so don’t want to “share the glory” but if you found common ground on levelling up then that programme (for example a lizzy line across the north) could get going without people not committing in case the next government decides they want something that suits their electoral chances.
So again people need to stop this bollocks of “it’s sensible but not good politics” as good politics seems to be exactly what we don’t need (protecting pensioners good “politics” bad for the country).
There is a blinkered pig-ignorance about the remaining pro-Boris advocates. Arrogance, hubris and in many MPs cases genuine stupidity allows the madness that what they think must be what all right-thinking people think because they are right-thinking.
Meanwhile, out there in the real world the normals think "are you taking the piss?". Too many of these pieces directly comparing and contrasting the "I was doing essential work" with the legal instructions not to do such things. With grieving relatives being dragged apart at a funeral for someone who had died alone. With the virtual team things they had had to do like birthdays and leaving dos.
"ah but there's all these scumbag doctors and nurses, if you investigate THEM you're bound to find bad'uns" says the generate moral vacuum that is today's Tory. The same immoral stupidity that says poor people are only hungry and in the dark because they can't cook or need to get a better job. The same sneering arrogance that will see a man who paid £10k out of his own pocket for a taxi ride to fundraiser throwing minor scraps to the plebs today then saying "why aren't you degenerates greatful"?
So yes, do keep saying how the polls are ok. How the MPs are right and their constituents are wrong. Because even if there was a change of PM tomorrow we get to ride the down slope a while before things improve. So if you really want Bonzo there saying "what crisis" and his ministers sneering at their voters then go right ahead.
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
The trains are interesting because no timetable should be built on the assumption that people will willing work overtime continually.
Absolutely. We have had a baleful conspiracy here between franchises who were not interested in training new drivers and unions who saw that the shortage put another £20k a year on their members already considerable wage packets. It absolutely should have been a requirement of all franchises that they trained at least as many drivers as they lost through wastage and it doesn't seem to have been. But its the Scottish government's problem now.
Whilst Sebastian Fox has announced a sweeping away of the post-privatisation financial sink hole we're still awaiting anything more than a name and a competition by Tory MPs for where its HQ should be.
"Just nationalise them" was not the answer as I kept pointing out. Scotrail is now state owned yet the framework which makes the rail industry economically "difficult" to run is still in place.
I can hardly blame the unions for trying to secure a bucket of cash for their members - that's their job. Especially now with inflation on runaway mode. Nor do the Scottish government have a magic wand they can wave to fix this. It does illustrate though the scale of the mess. Some of the drivers depots work very limited routes yet have seen mega cuts to services due to lack of drivers not working overtime.
This demonstrates how reliant the network was not on contracted hours but on drivers working rest days and overtime. That may work in bus world but never did in train world. Yet decades after the bus companies won the first franchises and the likes of South West Trains simply fired half the drivers to boost profits, we have never been able to get past this basic point - because the privatisation framework doesn't allow enough drivers to be hired because costs because subsidy.
Only when they bonfire all these myriad contracts and remove all the costs associated do we have a chance. And yes, nationalised operators still operate in the privatised framework. And in England are *still* privatised - operated by OLR Rail who are a consortium of private contractors no different to private operators in how they operate...
The thing is a train driver can't just start work tomorrow - they need a year or so of training first..
One thing we seem to have completely forgotten in this country is that there a whole piles of things that you need to keep going (or at the very least ticking over) because unless you continually do it something falls apart later.
Just another thing that got sacrificed in the name of reducing the number of deaths within 28 days of a positive test for a single respiratory virus.
The good news from Rentoul's tweets is that we might only have another 85 years to go before the politicians of Scotland stop wrangling about constitutional questions and start addressing Scotland's multiple difficulties. You might even be able to make the argument that this sad obsession really took hold as early as 1979 which would put us more than 40 years through this nonsense.
All you need to do is to persuade the party which you support relentlessly to come up with a vision and policies that Scots might vote for. Even one policy would be a start.
I completely agree Divvie. No to independence is not a policy for government. Nor is laughing at the stunning incompetence of Nicola's coterie. That joke wore out a long time ago. Scotland needs an alternative government. It is looking more likely that will come from Labour than the Tories.
The problem that Scotland has is that every time anyone mentions issues within Scotland (Education, Police, Health, Ship building) the SNP scream it would be different under independency and their voters continue voting for the SNP...
So far. And don't forget the trains. That may prove a step too far even for Nicola.
The trains are interesting because no timetable should be built on the assumption that people will willing work overtime continually.
Absolutely. We have had a baleful conspiracy here between franchises who were not interested in training new drivers and unions who saw that the shortage put another £20k a year on their members already considerable wage packets. It absolutely should have been a requirement of all franchises that they trained at least as many drivers as they lost through wastage and it doesn't seem to have been. But its the Scottish government's problem now.
Whilst Sebastian Fox has announced a sweeping away of the post-privatisation financial sink hole we're still awaiting anything more than a name and a competition by Tory MPs for where its HQ should be.
"Just nationalise them" was not the answer as I kept pointing out. Scotrail is now state owned yet the framework which makes the rail industry economically "difficult" to run is still in place.
I can hardly blame the unions for trying to secure a bucket of cash for their members - that's their job. Especially now with inflation on runaway mode. Nor do the Scottish government have a magic wand they can wave to fix this. It does illustrate though the scale of the mess. Some of the drivers depots work very limited routes yet have seen mega cuts to services due to lack of drivers not working overtime.
This demonstrates how reliant the network was not on contracted hours but on drivers working rest days and overtime. That may work in bus world but never did in train world. Yet decades after the bus companies won the first franchises and the likes of South West Trains simply fired half the drivers to boost profits, we have never been able to get past this basic point - because the privatisation framework doesn't allow enough drivers to be hired because costs because subsidy.
Only when they bonfire all these myriad contracts and remove all the costs associated do we have a chance. And yes, nationalised operators still operate in the privatised framework. And in England are *still* privatised - operated by OLR Rail who are a consortium of private contractors no different to private operators in how they operate...
The thing is a train driver can't just start work tomorrow - they need a year or so of training first..
One thing we seem to have completely forgotten in this country is that there a whole piles of things that you need to keep going (or at the very least ticking over) because unless you continually do it something falls apart later.
Just another thing that got sacrificed in the name of reducing the number of deaths within 28 days of a positive test for a single respiratory virus.
The lack of training starts decades ago (probably circa 2000 or so) it's got nothing to do with Covid...
For first time in I don't know how long my supermarket has emailed to say that today's delivery will contain everything I ordered with no substitutions.
Just a one-off or are we seeing the end of the supply chain issues?
Fwiw there were no obvious gaps on the shelves at my local supermarket yesterday. Mask-wearing was down to about 50 per cent btw.
I cannot find ginger beer anywhere - and I need it!!!
Lol, the Tory party should change course nor because they’re corrupt, self serving rsoles but just in case Kommissar Keir takes charge.
It's the Trumpian language that rankles with me. Radical hard left alliance. It's garbage.
But I suppose my reflexive response is a mirror image of those on the right when we on the left say there's an incipient whiff of fascism about the government, its policies and the way it operates.
I find it hard to picture any possible Labour/Lib Dem, and maybe even Green, coalition being radically hard left. Mushily soft left, maybe. And that would suit me down to the ground.
For first time in I don't know how long my supermarket has emailed to say that today's delivery will contain everything I ordered with no substitutions.
Just a one-off or are we seeing the end of the supply chain issues?
Fwiw there were no obvious gaps on the shelves at my local supermarket yesterday. Mask-wearing was down to about 50 per cent btw.
Mask wearing still at 50%, where are you? I see so few I'd almost forgotten it was a thing!
Outer London. Another, possibly more pertinent, question is *when* am I? Midday, midweek, so there are a lot of retired customers.
I'm Outer London too, but mostly shop in the evening when it's workers after work. But I'm close to town and do often quickly nip in for something at lunchtime, but if more than 20% wear masks even then I'd be surprised.
Do we have to rename Captain Hindsight as Captain Foresight for predicting this at last weeks PMQs?
Opetation Reverse Ferret in full swing. Why do the Cabinet Ministers set themselves up for this humiliation so readily?
It's things like Captain Hindsight and Sir Beer Korma that Labour should and does fear with Boris. Most Brits don't take any politicians seriously and one that can make you laugh has a huge advantage. SKS is very much the Ernie Wise of these 2 and they know it.
I think being associated with beer and takeaway curry has actually improved Starmers image. Not so stuffy, and more normal.
Quite a lot of obvious difference to the bacchanalia that was Downing St over lockdown.
I see that the Texas shooter wore dresses is the latest ‘reason’ from the gun nuts.
And Ted Cruz wants to ban doors in schools to solve the problem.
My wife shared something with me she'd seen on TikTok. Apparently some British kids had been shown clear backpacks that American kids take to school and they thought they looked fun. The woman said how sweet it was that in Britain kids wouldn't have any reason to think or realise why the backpacks are clear . . .
Comments
A note of warning. Never mind not getting the credit for being dragged kicking and screaming to intervene. What they are proposing is still not enough. Anyone want to say "thanks Rishi" for 5p a litre off duty now that fuel prices are the highest they have even been and are still rising?
Then the plan from our old provider (prior to them going belly up) was to keep it at £100 a month during the summer but £170 in the winter (as that covers the gas).
That meant we are now being billed £370 a month at the moment which should put as well in credit come the winter.
Meanwhile the areas that are a problem (the front room and hallway) are going to be insulated before the winter hits even if it means I'm doing it myself.
I am not asking for a change of party, I am not demanding a General Election. I just want an unfit head of state, who purports to represent me, removed for gross misconduct in high office.
Sadly.
What the Tories will do to rebuild support among the working age population, grads, the Tory left/Blue Wall and among rural voters (the next crack in the wall) remains to be seen.
Plus there is a mounting 'apres moi, le deluge' feeling. I don't see anyone among Tory potential successors who could keep this precarious 2016 electoral coalition together.
Same as the fuel duty cut. The reason this was always a stupid policy was that rising prices would quickly reverse it. And they have. With pump prices the highest on record you can't say "ahbut they would be 6p higher if we hadn't so please vote for us".
In neighbouring Turkey, inflation is 70%
This crisis is global. Brace
1) lack of policy - I need to see their vision of what the country should look like in 2030 (or 2035 if they are ambitious)
2) A lack of a sense of humour. Starmer is irretrievably dour, and is molding a team around him who are the same. I get the sense of anger in the conuntry and labour is riding that too, but at some point a bit of joy must come into life too. Even in the trenches people told jokes.
Late 2024 could be a depressing place in time. The leader that offers a cheerful road out could win on optimism alone. Starmer doesn’t do cheerfulness
It is clear that nothing would assuage your criticism, and to be fair it does seem many think that any support package will not be sufficient which to be fair it won't
However, today's support package is likely to be as generous or even more so than labour maybe those critics need to come up with their own remedy on how they would square this impossible conundrum
To me it is those on the lowest incomes must be supported, but many millions will have to review their lifestyles as no political party can sustain it for them
Get a grip
Stop overreacting
Calm the F down
Really? The person who panics and overreacts at absolutely everything is posting this?
https://twitter.com/thehistoryguy/status/1529400906361495553?t=8bNi8qBn2ZPJwhevto4TSg&s=19
Is Johnson actually good at politics though?
With monster donations & powerful media allies he told the most brazen lie (oven ready/no Irish Sea border) in recent history to win a majority against a weak Labour leader, gaining a whole 1.2% on the share of vote won by Theresa May
That's the genius of proffering money off bills to people who can now afford a second skiing holiday - its an ideologically Conservative policy unlike the woke communism of not letting people starve.
So effectively the processes are still there, haven’t been squashed by some dictator and ultimately he can be voted out if people think he has been guilty of “gross misconduct in public office”.
You also are sure he’s guilty of gross misconduct in public office - the mere fact that he has to survive certain investigations and potential rebellion show that we still do absolutely have a system of checks and balances thankfully and aren’t ruled by “feels”.
And he isn’t out “head of state” - that’s the one having a big party (legally) next weekend.
Again however I think he’s totally unsuitable as PM - lazy, arrogant, probably vindictive, and actually more importantly he has no vision and no application to make the country better which should be the absolute reason to be PM whatever colour rosette they wear. He’s become “world king” and has absolutely no idea what to do with it.
What Johnson worked out was that all those checks and balances are phoney- they may look impressive, but they are elaborately-painted cardboard cutouts. If you are shameless enough, and you nobble your party rivals, there's not much to restrain the actions of a PM from one general election to the next.
Fine if you are confident that the PM will always be a Decent Chap(ette). Not fine if an Indecent Chap with a genius intuitive understanding of power gets past all the barriers which are meant to keep them away from the apex.
His political instincts are also good. In Left Out, an account of the later Corbyn years, the authors report that while Starmer was pushing for a 2nd Referendum he was privately telling allies that it was a lost cause. I believe he did it because he needed to do it. The membership would never elect another leader ambivalent about Brexit, nevermind a Lexiteer, and the costs of alienating the Remainer base outweighed the costs of alienating the Leaver base. To win the leadership and to firm up Labour's floor, Starmer needed to advocate for a 2nd referendum. That he's personally a Remainer presumably helped that position. Now that he needs to win in the country at large, he's happy to repudiate rejoin for the moment. The Brexit question is just one example. He has transformed the Labour Party, though there is still work to do there.
On policy, I'm sure he has his own ideas but he also has a good team around him. Ed Miliband is a policy wonk like no other, and I believe the Tories have pretty much implemented his manifesto already. Boris will just nick the best bits, so he needs to keep his powder dry.
In conclusion, I think we'll see a different Starmer come the election. Less of the priggish LOTO and a more relaxed, approachable PM-in-Waiting. I'm expecting big things, presuming Durham don't issue an FPN...
In other words, 'Dear Keir, I wrote but you ain't callin...'
I’m sensing that the latest failure to eject Boris has tipped many over the edge. They really thought they had him, this time. Yet not. The anger and frustration BURNS
As I keep pointing out, whilst there are few solutions to the crisis there is a very real solution to the political issue of managing the crisis.
The Tories give the very clear impression of not caring that people are suffering. They're blaming the poor for being hungry, blaming working people for being scared of energy bills because they should have got a better job, blaming UC claimants smashed by the £20 a week cut because why are they on "benefits" like a scrounger?
Humility and honesty would go a long way. The coalition got it - "we're all in this together" despite some horrible cuts that really bit hard after 2015. But they *looked* like they understood and were concerned. This lot? We know they don't care.
People vote on emotional triggers as well as financial - we know that. How much reportage is there at the moment quoting voters from polling groups where 2019 Tories and swing voters are saying this lot don't care about us? A lack of policy ideas is one thing, sneering arrogance is quite another.
I ******' hate the *******!
-ves going into the next GE - anti-Corbyn unwind
+ves solid Brexit floor.
Boris' behaviour and cost of living crisis will tip the scales to them being out of power though. Labour will be desperate that the Lib Dems get sufficient numbers so they aren't relying on c&s from the SNP.
There will be hordes of people on Twitter declaring that cutting the train services is the best, most Scottish thing since {insert Scottish Nationalist legendary event} and anyone who doesn't like it is an English Tory.
Any resemblance to a political party and leader we are discussing is purely accidental.
Its yet another reason why the government really didn't to mess about with windfall taxes. They have had a considerable windfall themselves, not just in the reduction in debt but in the VAT and CT returns on those increased costs and profits.
https://stockchecker.sainsburys.co.uk/
Mind you, I've not checked it with something I know to be out of stock!
Other supermarkets probably offer something similar.
*Which weren't good.
The Tories have degraded into a bunch of snobbish, clueless incompetents, with a tin ear, and a dash of cruelty. There are some decent ministers, who mean well, but generally - pff
I could, however, cope with all that, just about. I could hold mg nose and vote Tory. Because Labour, after all, is the party that wanted a 2nd referendum, had Corbyn as a leader, and doesn’t know what a woman is. The Labour Party repels me. They are even worse
But then I look back at the Tories and I realise they are not just sleazy and the rest, they have no idea where they are going. No grand plan. Nothing
It’s a pitiful choice. At a painful time
Just waiting for someone to fix the fucking toaster. It's not complicated, or even that hard.
I'm furious that we have a PM who is so without integrity, that he remains in post.
I'm possibly even more furious that there isn't the mitigating factor of "greater purpose" - no programme of legislation to push through. He cowers behind "crises" as if he, the laziest PM since the war, is the only one who can remain on top of the issues.
But to be angry because you *expected* him to be gone is not seeing the world as it is.
There is no way to get him out other than a general election (barring a sudden white knight leadership candidate around whom the Tory MPs coalesce). That's a heck of a long time in which to maintain the current levels of frothing ire.
So by all means froth to strengthen the ties in the anti-Johnson coalition. But there needs to be a plan, based on him still being in place for a long time yet.
Of course, if he goes, things get a lot tougher for the opposition, because we are in new territory.
Anyone who thinks there's a magic solution to eliminate cost from people's lives is in Dreamland but cutting taxes is a rational and reasonable way to mitigate the harm and smooth the transition in the price changes.
The "windfall" tax simply corrects this I think - though it is clunky.
"Just nationalise them" was not the answer as I kept pointing out. Scotrail is now state owned yet the framework which makes the rail industry economically "difficult" to run is still in place.
I can hardly blame the unions for trying to secure a bucket of cash for their members - that's their job. Especially now with inflation on runaway mode. Nor do the Scottish government have a magic wand they can wave to fix this. It does illustrate though the scale of the mess. Some of the drivers depots work very limited routes yet have seen mega cuts to services due to lack of drivers not working overtime.
This demonstrates how reliant the network was not on contracted hours but on drivers working rest days and overtime. That may work in bus world but never did in train world. Yet decades after the bus companies won the first franchises and the likes of South West Trains simply fired half the drivers to boost profits, we have never been able to get past this basic point - because the privatisation framework doesn't allow enough drivers to be hired because costs because subsidy.
Only when they bonfire all these myriad contracts and remove all the costs associated do we have a chance. And yes, nationalised operators still operate in the privatised framework. And in England are *still* privatised - operated by OLR Rail who are a consortium of private contractors no different to private operators in how they operate...
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/jun/26/emanuel-gomes-died-just-hours-after-his-cleaning-shift-why-was-he-working
Was actually a Ministry of Justice cleaner who died of hypertension of the heart.
Not to minimise the tragedy of the event, or the contract that drove him to work when he was clearly ill, but there are enough genuine sticks to beat this government (sic) with without inventing them.
One thing we seem to have completely forgotten in this country is that there a whole piles of things that you need to keep going (or at the very least ticking over) because unless you continually do it something falls apart later.
However that mechanism only covers North Sea Oil and Gas and I suspect the Government wants more than that...
And was always thus. Cutting fuel duty was always a stupid policy when prices were rising which is why Blair and Brown resisted calls to do so in the great fuel crisis of 2000 when prices were shockingly high at £1.20 a litre.
Sunak need not have bothered cut 5p duty and lose 1p VAT off fuel - its the highest ever, people are screaming, there are no votes to be gained. Better to target the money differently and put it into people's pockets directly so that they feel it there before spending it.
"I just got £200 cash off my tax bill" is better than "I've been saved £200 off a theoretical fuel bill which is more than I can afford anyway". Politically speaking.
There was potential for a message along the lines of, "we took extraordinary measures during the extraordinary period of the pandemic, and the economy is stronger as a result, but now we need to do the responsible things to repay what we've borrowed."
It's just that Johnson isn't capable of being responsible.
John Rentoul
@JohnRentoul
·
38m
No new Tory MPs have called for PM to go, but my list of those who have publicly criticised him is already up to 58
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A lot of retractions I suspect...
They replaced it with "proper" inspections from an outside company. But those were expensive, so they were less frequent.
So when some of the moving parts started to seize....
2010: The Coalition took over from Labour
2015 Cameron leads a Conservative Government that took over from the Coalition
2017 Theresa May takes over from Cameron, then gets reduced to a minority Government - in power with DUP help (sort of Coalition). This minority Government is hamstrung by an ability to get Brexit through Westminster
2019 Boris gets an 80 seat majority and gets Brexit through Westminster.
The voter hasn't seen a continuous "Conservative Government". They have seen shifts and turns and changes that has seemed like a series of changes of Government.
Unfortunately I’m not sure whether it’s a symptom or the cause of the attitude and comment you see here a lot:
It’s not good politics.
I don’t give a shit if it’s not good politics as that implies that the only things that should be done are things that help get re-elected or get a quick win for the government.
This short termism, “optics”, crap media obsessed with gotchas and reacting to twitter is what stops the country moving forward.
How many times does a party say “we realise that this issue is something that cannot be fixed Over one electoral cycle so we are going to create a cross party commission to find a way that we can fix this that will not be derailed by a change of party in govt”.
For example - “levelling up” or Northern Ireland”.
They just want everything done for short term political gain to win the next election so don’t want to “share the glory” but if you found common ground on levelling up then that programme (for example a lizzy line across the north) could get going without people not committing in case the next government decides they want something that suits their electoral chances.
So again people need to stop this bollocks of “it’s sensible but not good politics” as good politics seems to be exactly what we don’t need (protecting pensioners good “politics” bad for the country).
Game over
But I suppose my reflexive response is a mirror image of those on the right when we on the left say there's an incipient whiff of fascism about the government, its policies and the way it operates.
I find it hard to picture any possible Labour/Lib Dem, and maybe even Green, coalition being radically hard left. Mushily soft left, maybe. And that would suit me down to the ground.