If Boris resigned would England bat any better? Probably not*. Would the government have a radical change in direction? Almost certainly not. Would Ukraine suddenly go better? Very probably not, possibly the reverse. Would we have a less severe cost of living crisis? Nope.
I think we are a point when Boris needs to just soak up some of the vitriol and grumpiness for a while. The Tories will probably need to change leader before the next election, but as Saint Augustine would say, not yet.
* of course if I was wrong about this he should certainly resign today.
If BoZo gets booed at the Queen's Jubilee, imagine the reception he would get at her funeral.
Tory MPs must do the right thing now...
While I agree his mps must act, hopefully on monday, I do not agree he would be booed at HMQ funeral as it would be a very sombre occasion and would not be well received by the public
There are times in life when something trumps politics, this would be one of them
She will likely live until 2025 if she Iives as long as her husband and 2027 if she lives as long as her mother ie past the likely next general election date of 2024. So Johnson may not be PM or even Tory leader by then anyway, it might be PM Starmer with a new Tory Leader of the Opposition
I think she has ages left. In months my spread offering* would be 39/42.
* Indicative only. Not right to bet on this sort of thing. I do have her in our covid DeadPool, come to think of it, but that's just a bit of harmless fun.
"Culminate. A term from Clausewitz (book 7, chapter 5), an offensive culminates (or reaches its culminating point) when the advantage in strength no longer favors the attacker sufficiently enough to continue pushing forward. Crucially, this does not mean the offensive ends: an attacker may not know their offensive has culminated and may keep ‘pushing’ and achieving nothing for some time. At the same time, the culmination of an offensive operation (see Operations) does not end a war – the attacker may merely rebuild strength (reinforcements, supplies, organization) to push again later, something that is generally termed an ‘operational pause.’"
Wont be a surprise when it becomes clear that RU has culminated in Donbas, Putin calls for a ceasefire and uses it to regroup.
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
Why? 1. Morality. He could wake up one morning having been visited by the holy ghost who had shown him that lying and cheating and criminality are Bad. Repent and the kingdom of Heaven will be yours and all that. 2. Because he has been handed the pearl-handled revolver as happened to Thatcher and IDS and May before him. Not everyone in the party is a pliable lickspittle like your good self - they have a string track record of removing failures. 3. Because he loses the no confidence vote, or wins it so narrowly that the "its all over, lets move on" please from intellectual heavyweights like Simon Clarke fall flat on their face.
Its true that there is no obvious successor now. Nor was there in 1990 (please linky a poll before Howe resigned showing that Major would win the election). That doesn't mean that good people carry on supporting bad people, bad policies and misbehaviour. I know your personal support remains for the lying crook, but you aren't most Tory voters - how many of them voted Plaid Cymru...?
Polling in November 1990 showed both Major and Heseltine leading Kinnock Labour and that was BEFORE the first ballot against Thatcher.
There is no such polling now showing any alternative Tory leader leading Starmer Labour
Would appreciate you posting links. This is an interesting point in political history, and having studied this only a few years after doing A-level politics I do not remember that at all.
Of course even if accurate it isn't necessarily relevant. It is not comparing like with like (typical of hyufd) Even if no Tory leader currently does outperform Starmer (again I don't know if that is true) you want to pick the one that will perform best.
I don't believe it is accurate. It isn't how I remember it or how the evidence was taught reasonably soon afterwards. If I'm wrong I will be happy to say so, but I think HY is so desperate to say that black is white that he'll say literally anything and think we are stupid enough to believe it.
If BoZo gets booed at the Queen's Jubilee, imagine the reception he would get at her funeral.
Tory MPs must do the right thing now...
While I agree his mps must act, hopefully on monday, I do not agree he would be booed at HMQ funeral as it would be a very sombre occasion and would not be well received by the public
There are times in life when something trumps politics, this would be one of them
For once I agree, even I wouldn't boo Johnson at HM's funeral. Incidentally, I do worry that HM may not have long to go. Think she may have spent all her last energies on being around for the Jubilee.
I am quite concerned just how ill she is, and certainly as we age mobility becomes a problem (as I can vouch for) but she is 96 and is looking increasingly frail and I am 100% certain she would not have wanted to miss the amount of celebrations she has if she was not suffering debilitating health issues
If BoZo gets booed at the Queen's Jubilee, imagine the reception he would get at her funeral.
Tory MPs must do the right thing now...
While I agree his mps must act, hopefully on monday, I do not agree he would be booed at HMQ funeral as it would be a very sombre occasion and would not be well received by the public
There are times in life when something trumps politics, this would be one of them
For once I agree, even I wouldn't boo Johnson at HM's funeral. Incidentally, I do worry that HM may not have long to go. Think she may have spent all her last energies on being around for the Jubilee.
I am quite concerned just how ill she is, and certainly as we age mobility becomes a problem (as I can vouch for) but she is 96 and is looking increasingly frail and I am 100% certain she would not have wanted to miss the amount of celebrations she has if she was not suffering debilitating health issues
There's usually a couple of years lag between having to go into a home, and final curtain though
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
Why? 1. Morality. He could wake up one morning having been visited by the holy ghost who had shown him that lying and cheating and criminality are Bad. Repent and the kingdom of Heaven will be yours and all that. 2. Because he has been handed the pearl-handled revolver as happened to Thatcher and IDS and May before him. Not everyone in the party is a pliable lickspittle like your good self - they have a string track record of removing failures. 3. Because he loses the no confidence vote, or wins it so narrowly that the "its all over, lets move on" please from intellectual heavyweights like Simon Clarke fall flat on their face.
Its true that there is no obvious successor now. Nor was there in 1990 (please linky a poll before Howe resigned showing that Major would win the election). That doesn't mean that good people carry on supporting bad people, bad policies and misbehaviour. I know your personal support remains for the lying crook, but you aren't most Tory voters - how many of them voted Plaid Cymru...?
Polling in November 1990 showed both Major and Heseltine leading Kinnock Labour and that was BEFORE the first ballot against Thatcher.
There is no such polling now showing any alternative Tory leader leading Starmer Labour
Would appreciate you posting links. This is an interesting point in political history, and having studied this only a few years after doing A-level politics I do not remember that at all.
Of course even if accurate it isn't necessarily relevant. It is not comparing like with like (typical of hyufd) Even if no Tory leader currently does outperform Starmer (again I don't know if that is true) you want to pick the one that will perform best.
I don't believe it is accurate. It isn't how I remember it or how the evidence was taught reasonably soon afterwards. If I'm wrong I will be happy to say so, but I think HY is so desperate to say that black is white that he'll say literally anything and think we are stupid enough to believe it.
It's not how I recall the situation, either. The obsession with hourly (it seems) polling hadn't really taken hold either.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
Brady - and I think your figures are not far out but a rebellion of that size would result in his resignation fairly quickly even if the1922 have to change their rules
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls also show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
He should resign as he is unfit for the office he holds and has lost vast swathes of the country
Your argument over alternatives is irrelevant, as he could suffer a serious accident or health issue or worse and would have to be replaced
You obsess over polling, but there are replacements for Boris and no matter there comes a time when one has to do the right thing and that time is now for conservative mps to vote him out of office
Has Boris had a serious accident or health issue? No.
I don't care what Boris has done I only care about maximising the Tory voteshare as a Tory member and unless another Tory leader is shown in polls to have a clear lead over Starmer Labour, which none are, then Boris stays as far as I am concerned. Especially given most alternatives, Hunt, Raab, Patel, Sunak, Gove, Truss etc poll even worse with the voters than Boris anyway now.
If Boris went I would back Ben Wallace or Javid as the only alternatives who poll a bit better but even they as I said do no better than Starmer
How accurate is hypothetical polling of potential alternative leaders? I doubt most people have enough sense of what Hunt or Wallace or Truss is like for such polling to be particularly reliable. (The polling will have been more accurate for better known figures like Heseltine and Johnson, I’d’ve guessed.)
"Culminate. A term from Clausewitz (book 7, chapter 5), an offensive culminates (or reaches its culminating point) when the advantage in strength no longer favors the attacker sufficiently enough to continue pushing forward. Crucially, this does not mean the offensive ends: an attacker may not know their offensive has culminated and may keep ‘pushing’ and achieving nothing for some time. At the same time, the culmination of an offensive operation (see Operations) does not end a war – the attacker may merely rebuild strength (reinforcements, supplies, organization) to push again later, something that is generally termed an ‘operational pause.’"
Wont be a surprise when it becomes clear that RU has culminated in Donbas, Putin calls for a ceasefire and uses it to regroup.
And some useful idiots will believe it is the time to sue for peace.
If BoZo gets booed at the Queen's Jubilee, imagine the reception he would get at her funeral.
Tory MPs must do the right thing now...
While I agree his mps must act, hopefully on monday, I do not agree he would be booed at HMQ funeral as it would be a very sombre occasion and would not be well received by the public
There are times in life when something trumps politics, this would be one of them
For once I agree, even I wouldn't boo Johnson at HM's funeral. Incidentally, I do worry that HM may not have long to go. Think she may have spent all her last energies on being around for the Jubilee.
I am quite concerned just how ill she is, and certainly as we age mobility becomes a problem (as I can vouch for) but she is 96 and is looking increasingly frail and I am 100% certain she would not have wanted to miss the amount of celebrations she has if she was not suffering debilitating health issues
There's usually a couple of years lag between having to go into a home, and final curtain though
6-9 month's on average, IIRC from my time Inspecting Homes. Of course some people last a lot longer. The worst thing the family can do, again IIRC, is to move an elderly resident from one care setting to another.
“Given that it looks as though Tory MPs are waiting till after the June 23rd by elections to happen”
Apologise for being controversial, but what have you seen and hear Mike that makes you say that with such confidence? I can’t find any evidence they are waiting, the impression I have is it’s out of control, out of control in the sense of they can submit letters quietly but they seem to want the world to know they are are distancing themselves from Boris.
My idea is if they wanted extra votes to perhaps squeak over a line, waiting for by election losses could be that. But it might not be as coordinated as your “ Given that it looks as though Tory MPs are waiting till after the June 23rd by elections to happen” statement, it’s more having reflected on things since not just the Gray Report but Boris appalling reaction to it, such as his unconvincing interview with mumsnet that’s the driving it. Besides, if Boris MPs still want Boris, they will point to by election losses mid term that are won back at generals elections, so no big deal wouldn’t they?.
And then, finally, there is the apparent attempt to capture “Waitrose woman” – another of those imagined market-research categories, like Mondeo Man, which can unlock a supposed electoral demographic. This group, real or not, apparently shops at expensive supermarkets, voted Remain, is small-c conservative, and doesn’t like Johnson. How does the Rwanda policy or the Protocol decision attract them? No-one has explained this discrepancy.
It’s not just Johnson. The confusion goes all the way down. Leading Tory MP Tobias Ellwood deserves considerable respect for breaking the omerta on Brexit this week. In an article for the House magazine, he dared to say the thing that no-one will mention: Britain is suffering for having left the European single market. Regulatory checks are holding up trade and driving up prices. They’re part of the reason why the Northern Ireland issue has become so acute.
His reward, it goes without saying, was instant dismissal and sneering condescension. Reporters and Tory MPs rejected it out of hand.
That was always going to be the way it played out once someone opened the window to let the air in. Everyone else would stand up and scream for him to shut it again. But Ellwood was doing something striking. He was daring to speak in terms of economic and political rationality in a party which has forsaken them.
A closer relationship with Europe is inevitable. It might be a new trade deal, or customs union membership, or single market membership, or even full EU membership. It might be a few years or a decade. But it is coming.
It is coming by virtue of trading gravity. They are big, they are right next to us, and eventually people will start asking what we can do to trade more easily with them. And once you start asking that question, you are entering the debate upon which the EU is founded.
Ellwood wasn’t just daring to suggest it. He was providing the first instance of a process which will one day need to take place: the Tory rapprochement with reality. There will be kickbacks and much gnashing and wailing. But reality will demand to be let in. It must, in the end, be faced up to, no matter how intense your dream-state.
Johnson’s splatter-against-the-walls personal defence strategy is just the start. As the party declines, it is going to keep exploring all sorts of contradictory and desperate gambits to reverse its misfortune.
It is about to experience an almighty hangover. For years now, Conservatives have given up on reality-based politics and committed exclusively to character-based politics. Now they are waking up after a hell of a bender. The pain hasn’t hit yet, but they just got that first stabbing jolt in their temple, and, with it, the knowledge that it’s going to be a horrible day.
LOL. It is highly amusing to see Dunt talk about "rapprochement with reality" as he rehashes for the umpteenth time why Britain must be in the EU's market, using perverted logic that would mean Canada has to be in the USA or Japan has to be in China.
The only "reality" is that Dunt can't accept he lost and is still living in a parallel universe where everything is going to be reversed and all will be right with the world again.
The Canadian and US markets are very highly integrated in a number of areas.
And both Canada and Mexico essentially have to follow US trade policies and rules. Philip's missed the target with his post; being next to a large trading bloc essentially leaves you with the choice between being a rule-taker or doing immense self-harm.
Canada don’t, for example, share food standards with the US. Trucks carrying food from the Lower 48 to Alaska must be protected by a seal on the truck doors. You can’t deliver some of the contents to Canada on the way to Alaska.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
Brady - and I think your figures are not far out but a rebellion of that size would result in his resignation fairly quickly even if the1922 have to change their rules
Anyone else yes, Big Dog no. He's won the vote, end of.
If BoZo gets booed at the Queen's Jubilee, imagine the reception he would get at her funeral.
Tory MPs must do the right thing now...
While I agree his mps must act, hopefully on monday, I do not agree he would be booed at HMQ funeral as it would be a very sombre occasion and would not be well received by the public
There are times in life when something trumps politics, this would be one of them
For once I agree, even I wouldn't boo Johnson at HM's funeral. Incidentally, I do worry that HM may not have long to go. Think she may have spent all her last energies on being around for the Jubilee.
I am quite concerned just how ill she is, and certainly as we age mobility becomes a problem (as I can vouch for) but she is 96 and is looking increasingly frail and I am 100% certain she would not have wanted to miss the amount of celebrations she has if she was not suffering debilitating health issues
There's usually a couple of years lag between having to go into a home, and final curtain though
6-9 month's on average, IIRC from my time Inspecting Homes. Of course some people last a lot longer. The worst thing the family can do, again IIRC, is to move an elderly resident from one care setting to another.
I do some work for the Care Commission. Those statistics are still right. It causes considerable angst when a home is performing poorly, recognising that closing it is very likely to accelerate the deaths of some of the residents.
Dr Oz will face Dem's Fetterman in what promises to be one of the great battles of 2022 cycle.
Do you reckon? Will Dr Oz not walk it in a midterm against the president's party whose candidate is going through hushed-up but rumoured serious health issues?
A couple of interesting France24 items wrt the Stade de France catastrophe.
1 - France24 factcheck debunking a couple of fake videos of "local ethnic minorities causing trouble". Including a couple I have seen in our media - eg the "France does not belong to the French" vid. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSNILCZc48k
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls also show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
He should resign as he is unfit for the office he holds and has lost vast swathes of the country
Your argument over alternatives is irrelevant, as he could suffer a serious accident or health issue or worse and would have to be replaced
You obsess over polling, but there are replacements for Boris and no matter there comes a time when one has to do the right thing and that time is now for conservative mps to vote him out of office
Has Boris had a serious accident or health issue? No.
I don't care what Boris has done I only care about maximising the Tory voteshare as a Tory member and unless another Tory leader is shown in polls to have a clear lead over Starmer Labour, which none are, then Boris stays as far as I am concerned. Especially given most alternatives, Hunt, Raab, Patel, Sunak, Gove, Truss etc poll even worse with the voters than Boris anyway now.
If Boris went I would back Ben Wallace or Javid as the only alternatives who poll a bit better but even they as I said do no better than Starmer
How accurate is hypothetical polling of potential alternative leaders? I doubt most people have enough sense of what Hunt or Wallace or Truss is like for such polling to be particularly reliable. (The polling will have been more accurate for better known figures like Heseltine and Johnson, I’d’ve guessed.)
It is accurate enough and was accurate enough when Major won in 1992 and Johnson won in 2019.
So the anti Johnsonites can whinge as much as they want but only Tory Mzps and Tory members like me get to choose our PM until the next general election in 2024 thanks to the Tory landslide of 2019 and Johnson will not be removed unless clear polling evidence of an alternative leader leading Starmer, which there isn't.
Hunt is a former Foreign Secretary, Truss is Foreign Secretary, Patel is Home Secretary the idea the public don't know who the top ranked Tories are beyond Johnson is a pathetic excuse
I used to love it back in the day when it was a real place with a properly edgy vibe. Then gentrification took over. The lambretta seats went, and in came all sorts of trendy eateries and shops selling fancy things at exorbitant prices.
Two of my young guests yesterday announced that they're leaving London next month for a provincial city. Now that they can predominantly work from home they no longer find London an attractive proposition. They'd rather be in a city where you can easily walk or cycle from one part to the other in a matter of minutes.
Which ‘provincial city?’
Brizzle
I was being coy in case they read this!!!!
Hmmm. They may find it a bit bigger than they expect, speaking as somebody who used to live there.
But it is a lovely city.
Good on you, Bristolian.
One of them grew up there and spent the first 20 years of their life in it so knows it very well. A return to their roots. I think it's fairly easy to get around in minutes on foot or bike as long as you don't mind the steep climb up to Clifton etc.
The regeneration around the harbour is superb. Brilliant food to be had as well these days.
Well, I was in Downend and Frenchay, so rather out on a limb and that may have coloured my views.
But as you say there is a great deal to enjoy there.
If I was young I'd be off to Birmingham. What it lacks in beauty it makes up in energy. It is going to be 45 minutes to London in a couple of years on HS2. For salaried jobs in many industries, it is pretty much at London wages. And the property prices.... very affordable, as in you can actually buy a nice house/flat in a nice area for the money that you earn in a professional job. You can have the 15 minute lifestyle if that is what you want. Makes me wonder about all the criticism of house prices. There is no problem at all in large parts of the country. It really is concentrated in the south east, and for many people, the best answer is simply to move. My own assessment of London before quitting it 10 years ago was that it is fine if you either have serious wealth or are building up a career in your twenties. But there is no point sticking around beyond that.
I lived in Birmingham in the 1980s. Let’s just say it’s improved somewhat since then. Not sure if it’s still the same now, but back then it felt like a collection of smaller towns that had come together - Selly Oak, Mosley, Harborne, Handsworth, Aston, Bournville, Balsall Heath, etc - rather than a single entity that had grown outwards. All those places and many others had very different personalities. And that’s before you moved into the Black Country, which will never, ever, be Brum.
Let's explore the context of your comment in the context of darkage's earlier: "If I was young I'd be off to Birmingham..... It is going to be 45 minutes to London in a couple of years on HS2."
Well it's not going to be 45 minutes from any of Selly Oak, Mosley, Harborne, Handsworth, Aston, Bournville or Balsall Heath. All are, together with most of the rest of Birmingham and the Black Country, heavily integrated into the rail hub that is Birmingham New Street. There are some tweaks planned, but they're not going to alter the situation for most. So for rail travellers the choice will still be: - Either arrive at Birmingham New Street and allow at least 30 mins to get out of the station and make a stress filled dash across to Curzon Street to catch HS2. - Or just walk across the concourse to the neighbouring platform at New Street to get on a West Coast main line service that takes about 35 minutes longer to get there than HS2. Just a 5 minute difference.
If you're coming from Wolverhampton or Sandwell the choice is even simpler, you don't even need to get off the WCML service while it stops at New Street.
So in contrast to what are no doubt fantastical passenger number figures built into the HS2 business case, I just can't see HS2 being a draw to rail travellers from Birmingham and the Black Country to London. The vast majority will continue to use the WCML (or the Chiltern Line which is far cheaper than the WCML and will be even cheaper still than HS2.)
Curzon Street will be more convenient to business people travelling from London for the occasional meeting in Birmingham City Centre (although whether there are going to be many meetings going forward might be questioned given the with the widespread adoption of Zoom etc.) But that amounts to an added benefit to businesses and their employees based in London. Hardly levelling up is it?
It's a ten minute walk from New Street to Curzon Street...
Edit - also, you're making some false assumptions about the speed of the trains from New Street. When the Pendolinos are retired they will not be replaced with more titling trains, because HS2 will be carrying the fast traffic. So you can extend journey times to London on the WCML (which will in any case be needed for more pathways).
You will still be able to get to London from New Street, but it will take about 100 minutes. As against that, there will be more frequent and probably rather cheaper trains.
So your five minutes has become 45, but at lower cost and more regular intervals.
Nonsense on timing.
It's a good half mile between the station entrances. That's 15 minutes but only between the station entrances. Then you have to add in the time to get through the barriers at New Street and then up to the station entrance, which in my experience can be quite a long time, and then quite a bit of time again at Curzon Street. Any sane person is going to allow themselves at least 30 minutes to get across town in total. Probably a bit more if you're in possession of an HS2 ticket costing an arm and a leg and want to make sure you're not going to have a sliding doors moment.... I said 30 minutes but it could be more.
And even now it's only 1 hour 23 minutes from New Street to Euston. Check the timetable. Probably 1 hour 20 minutes or less by the 2030s with the next generation of trains.* So that's a 35 minute difference between the claimed 45 minute HS2 journey time (which might yet prove to be as unreliable as their financial claims).
So that's 5 minutes saving, at most, at the the cost of the effort and stress of having to leg it across town and pay a lot more for the privilege.
*Edit. I am a tad reluctant to accept your point that the people of Wolverhampton should learn to live with crap slower trains replacing their current fast trains, as the price of bailing out HS2.
And then, finally, there is the apparent attempt to capture “Waitrose woman” – another of those imagined market-research categories, like Mondeo Man, which can unlock a supposed electoral demographic. This group, real or not, apparently shops at expensive supermarkets, voted Remain, is small-c conservative, and doesn’t like Johnson. How does the Rwanda policy or the Protocol decision attract them? No-one has explained this discrepancy.
It’s not just Johnson. The confusion goes all the way down. Leading Tory MP Tobias Ellwood deserves considerable respect for breaking the omerta on Brexit this week. In an article for the House magazine, he dared to say the thing that no-one will mention: Britain is suffering for having left the European single market. Regulatory checks are holding up trade and driving up prices. They’re part of the reason why the Northern Ireland issue has become so acute.
His reward, it goes without saying, was instant dismissal and sneering condescension. Reporters and Tory MPs rejected it out of hand.
That was always going to be the way it played out once someone opened the window to let the air in. Everyone else would stand up and scream for him to shut it again. But Ellwood was doing something striking. He was daring to speak in terms of economic and political rationality in a party which has forsaken them.
A closer relationship with Europe is inevitable. It might be a new trade deal, or customs union membership, or single market membership, or even full EU membership. It might be a few years or a decade. But it is coming.
It is coming by virtue of trading gravity. They are big, they are right next to us, and eventually people will start asking what we can do to trade more easily with them. And once you start asking that question, you are entering the debate upon which the EU is founded.
Ellwood wasn’t just daring to suggest it. He was providing the first instance of a process which will one day need to take place: the Tory rapprochement with reality. There will be kickbacks and much gnashing and wailing. But reality will demand to be let in. It must, in the end, be faced up to, no matter how intense your dream-state.
Johnson’s splatter-against-the-walls personal defence strategy is just the start. As the party declines, it is going to keep exploring all sorts of contradictory and desperate gambits to reverse its misfortune.
It is about to experience an almighty hangover. For years now, Conservatives have given up on reality-based politics and committed exclusively to character-based politics. Now they are waking up after a hell of a bender. The pain hasn’t hit yet, but they just got that first stabbing jolt in their temple, and, with it, the knowledge that it’s going to be a horrible day.
LOL. It is highly amusing to see Dunt talk about "rapprochement with reality" as he rehashes for the umpteenth time why Britain must be in the EU's market, using perverted logic that would mean Canada has to be in the USA or Japan has to be in China.
The only "reality" is that Dunt can't accept he lost and is still living in a parallel universe where everything is going to be reversed and all will be right with the world again.
The Canadian and US markets are very highly integrated in a number of areas.
And both Canada and Mexico essentially have to follow US trade policies and rules. Philip's missed the target with his post; being next to a large trading bloc essentially leaves you with the choice between being a rule-taker or doing immense self-harm.
Canada don’t, for example, share food standards with the US. Trucks carrying food from the Lower 48 to Alaska must be protected by a seal on the truck doors. You can’t deliver some of the contents to Canada on the way to Alaska.
If Boris resigned would England bat any better? Probably not*. Would the government have a radical change in direction? Almost certainly not. Would Ukraine suddenly go better? Very probably not, possibly the reverse. Would we have a less severe cost of living crisis? Nope.
I think we are a point when Boris needs to just soak up some of the vitriol and grumpiness for a while. The Tories will probably need to change leader before the next election, but as Saint Augustine would say, not yet.
* of course if I was wrong about this he should certainly resign today.
The answer to a radical change of direction surely depends who they go for?
A Hunt Tugenhat type is a radical change back to Cameron conservatism. A Patel Dorries type is further radical change down the authoritarian path. A Javid/Zahawi/Barclay/Wallace is a march back from spin to competence. Raab gives us neither the spin nor the competence. God knows what we get from Truss.
Sunak and Gove seem the only ones to keep us on a similar political path.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
Brady - and I think your figures are not far out but a rebellion of that size would result in his resignation fairly quickly even if the1922 have to change their rules
Anyone else yes, Big Dog no. He's won the vote, end of.
No - He would not survive long with 110 of his mps causing chaos in government
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls also show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
He should resign as he is unfit for the office he holds and has lost vast swathes of the country
Your argument over alternatives is irrelevant, as he could suffer a serious accident or health issue or worse and would have to be replaced
You obsess over polling, but there are replacements for Boris and no matter there comes a time when one has to do the right thing and that time is now for conservative mps to vote him out of office
Has Boris had a serious accident or health issue? No.
I don't care what Boris has done I only care about maximising the Tory voteshare as a Tory member and unless another Tory leader is shown in polls to have a clear lead over Starmer Labour, which none are, then Boris stays as far as I am concerned. Especially given most alternatives, Hunt, Raab, Patel, Sunak, Gove, Truss etc poll even worse with the voters than Boris anyway now.
If Boris went I would back Ben Wallace or Javid as the only alternatives who poll a bit better but even they as I said do no better than Starmer
How accurate is hypothetical polling of potential alternative leaders? I doubt most people have enough sense of what Hunt or Wallace or Truss is like for such polling to be particularly reliable. (The polling will have been more accurate for better known figures like Heseltine and Johnson, I’d’ve guessed.)
I think that's a key point. But even if politicians are well-known polling can be misleading. I well remember the hypothetical polling saying that the dud Brown would be a very popular Prime Minister. Then, after a short honeymoon, he was the least popular in history. Partly his own ineptitude in having no idea what he wanted to do when he reached the office he had seemed for for so long, partly his lack of political judgement, and partly events, in particular an economic meltdown.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
Brady - and I think your figures are not far out but a rebellion of that size would result in his resignation fairly quickly even if the1922 have to change their rules
It should do. But consider the Thatcher precedent. In her case, it took the Cabinet and a spouse with a hinterland to tell her that the game was up. Which she then had the class to accept.
If Boris wins with a bare majority, or even a decisive one like 187-172, who is there to tell him that it's time to go? Who will be listened to?
If BoZo gets booed at the Queen's Jubilee, imagine the reception he would get at her funeral.
Tory MPs must do the right thing now...
While I agree his mps must act, hopefully on monday, I do not agree he would be booed at HMQ funeral as it would be a very sombre occasion and would not be well received by the public
There are times in life when something trumps politics, this would be one of them
She will likely live until 2025 if she Iives as long as her husband and 2027 if she lives as long as her mother ie past the likely next general election date of 2024. So Johnson may not be PM or even Tory leader by then anyway, it might be PM Starmer with a new Tory Leader of the Opposition
You have absolutely no idea how long she will live
We all hope she'll send herself a telegram, like Fats Waller did a letter.
I agree. Should be a good party again, although I don't envy those who have to plan for her death prior to the events as must have been the case for the Jubilee.
HYUFD now predicting how long the Queen will live is bizarre.
In an effort to claim the most tasteless post ever, is there a book on the date of her demise?
PB is a nest of horrible Republican vipers 😠
I just want to throw my arms around her and give her a big hug like she’s my own Nan.
If BoZo gets booed at the Queen's Jubilee, imagine the reception he would get at her funeral.
Tory MPs must do the right thing now...
While I agree his mps must act, hopefully on monday, I do not agree he would be booed at HMQ funeral as it would be a very sombre occasion and would not be well received by the public
There are times in life when something trumps politics, this would be one of them
For once I agree, even I wouldn't boo Johnson at HM's funeral. Incidentally, I do worry that HM may not have long to go. Think she may have spent all her last energies on being around for the Jubilee.
I am quite concerned just how ill she is, and certainly as we age mobility becomes a problem (as I can vouch for) but she is 96 and is looking increasingly frail and I am 100% certain she would not have wanted to miss the amount of celebrations she has if she was not suffering debilitating health issues
There's usually a couple of years lag between having to go into a home, and final curtain though
6-9 month's on average, IIRC from my time Inspecting Homes. Of course some people last a lot longer. The worst thing the family can do, again IIRC, is to move an elderly resident from one care setting to another.
I do some work for the Care Commission. Those statistics are still right. It causes considerable angst when a home is performing poorly, recognising that closing it is very likely to accelerate the deaths of some of the residents.
Thanks Mr L. The 'closing concern' was around 20 years ago, too.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
Brady - and I think your figures are not far out but a rebellion of that size would result in his resignation fairly quickly even if the1922 have to change their rules
Anyone else yes, Big Dog no. He's won the vote, end of.
No - He would not survive long with 110 of his mps causing chaos in government
In addition to the already exceptional efforts of him and most of his Cabinet.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
Brady - and I think your figures are not far out but a rebellion of that size would result in his resignation fairly quickly even if the1922 have to change their rules
Anyone else yes, Big Dog no. He's won the vote, end of.
No - He would not survive long with 110 of his mps causing chaos in government
I thought causing chaos is what the payroll vote have been doing since he was elected? No?
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
At least that. What HY and Dorries don't seem to get is that the momentum is building visibly day by day now. This wasn't "they need to act, they keep making excuses why they won't". This is people submitting letters and speaking in openly very critical terms each and every day.
And that was before Parliament broke up for the Lets Boo Boris festival. Tory MPs - even lickspittle worms like Duguid - have gone home. And if he turns up to see his people in Fraserburgh today they aren't going to be saying "good old Boris". When fruitcakes and loonies like Desmond Swayne or Peter Bone go and meet people, they are going to have to be profoundly selective to only hear the "good old Boris" messages they insist are all people are saying.
What they miss is that the more we are assured that everyone in Wellingborough is cheering the boss on, the more we know they are not. Its like their response to the cost of living crisis - deny, patronise, sneer - you can only tell people black is white for so long before they realise it isn't, and then start thinking you are delusional in still saying it is. That is the choice for Tory MPs.
What you don't get is the momentum for change is driven by non Tories like you when only Tories get to decide who the PM is until the next general election. So any opinions of non Tories are irrelevant and the polling is clear most Tory voters and members want Johnson to stay.
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
Why? 1. Morality. He could wake up one morning having been visited by the holy ghost who had shown him that lying and cheating and criminality are Bad. Repent and the kingdom of Heaven will be yours and all that. 2. Because he has been handed the pearl-handled revolver as happened to Thatcher and IDS and May before him. Not everyone in the party is a pliable lickspittle like your good self - they have a string track record of removing failures. 3. Because he loses the no confidence vote, or wins it so narrowly that the "its all over, lets move on" please from intellectual heavyweights like Simon Clarke fall flat on their face.
Its true that there is no obvious successor now. Nor was there in 1990 (please linky a poll before Howe resigned showing that Major would win the election). That doesn't mean that good people carry on supporting bad people, bad policies and misbehaviour. I know your personal support remains for the lying crook, but you aren't most Tory voters - how many of them voted Plaid Cymru...?
Polling in November 1990 showed both Major and Heseltine leading Kinnock Labour and that was BEFORE the first ballot against Thatcher.
There is no such polling now showing any alternative Tory leader leading Starmer Labour
Would appreciate you posting links. This is an interesting point in political history, and having studied this only a few years after doing A-level politics I do not remember that at all.
Of course even if accurate it isn't necessarily relevant. It is not comparing like with like (typical of hyufd) Even if no Tory leader currently does outperform Starmer (again I don't know if that is true) you want to pick the one that will perform best.
I don't believe it is accurate. It isn't how I remember it or how the evidence was taught reasonably soon afterwards. If I'm wrong I will be happy to say so, but I think HY is so desperate to say that black is white that he'll say literally anything and think we are stupid enough to believe it.
It's not how I recall the situation, either. The obsession with hourly (it seems) polling hadn't really taken hold either.
The type of polling we take for normal nowadays did not exist back in 1990 - because the cost prior to the internet appearing made it utterly impossible and unaffordable.
In 1990 you wouldn't be asking people favourability questions because that would cost the modern equivalent of £2-4000 a question...
What an utter scruff our Prime Minister, he's worse than Steptoe Corbyn.
That tie isn't aligned properly with the shirt.
He'd also be better off with a double breasted waistcoat.
Morning suits are meant to make the man look so elegant and classy (which is why I regularly wear them) but he doesn't look at all good in one.
He doesn't have a good body for clothes, with his short neck, and hunched obesity, but even so! His lack of sartorial effort on such a day shows real contempt for others and the occasion. Carrie looked presentable though, and clearly looks after herself well.
being a natural scruff myself , I do have sympathy for him . It is not contempt for an occasion but a genuine inability to dress to the high standards of formal dress. Just like some people cannot drive or draw or do math , some people genuinely cannot dress or look smart
If Boris resigned would England bat any better? Probably not*. Would the government have a radical change in direction? Almost certainly not. Would Ukraine suddenly go better? Very probably not, possibly the reverse. Would we have a less severe cost of living crisis? Nope.
I think we are a point when Boris needs to just soak up some of the vitriol and grumpiness for a while. The Tories will probably need to change leader before the next election, but as Saint Augustine would say, not yet.
* of course if I was wrong about this he should certainly resign today.
The answer to a radical change of direction surely depends who they go for?
A Hunt Tugenhat type is a radical change back to Cameron conservatism. A Patel Dorries type is further radical change down the authoritarian path. A Javid/Zahawi/Barclay/Wallace is a march back from spin to competence. Raab gives us neither the spin nor the competence. God knows what we get from Truss.
Sunak and Gove seem the only ones to keep us on a similar political path.
I think that you are seriously overestimating the government's room for manouver. A recession is now built in, spaffing more cash will make little difference in the short run and may do even more damage in the medium term. Inflation will fall but to a much higher base than we have been used to or are comfortable with. Strikes are going to be endemic, particularly in the public sector. The majority are going to find that they have to tighten their belts way more than we are used to. There is nothing that can be done about this, even if government suddenly got competent. By next summer there may be more options and choices available but right now a new leader is simply going to be tarnished with all this.
And then, finally, there is the apparent attempt to capture “Waitrose woman” – another of those imagined market-research categories, like Mondeo Man, which can unlock a supposed electoral demographic. This group, real or not, apparently shops at expensive supermarkets, voted Remain, is small-c conservative, and doesn’t like Johnson. How does the Rwanda policy or the Protocol decision attract them? No-one has explained this discrepancy.
It’s not just Johnson. The confusion goes all the way down. Leading Tory MP Tobias Ellwood deserves considerable respect for breaking the omerta on Brexit this week. In an article for the House magazine, he dared to say the thing that no-one will mention: Britain is suffering for having left the European single market. Regulatory checks are holding up trade and driving up prices. They’re part of the reason why the Northern Ireland issue has become so acute.
His reward, it goes without saying, was instant dismissal and sneering condescension. Reporters and Tory MPs rejected it out of hand.
That was always going to be the way it played out once someone opened the window to let the air in. Everyone else would stand up and scream for him to shut it again. But Ellwood was doing something striking. He was daring to speak in terms of economic and political rationality in a party which has forsaken them.
A closer relationship with Europe is inevitable. It might be a new trade deal, or customs union membership, or single market membership, or even full EU membership. It might be a few years or a decade. But it is coming.
It is coming by virtue of trading gravity. They are big, they are right next to us, and eventually people will start asking what we can do to trade more easily with them. And once you start asking that question, you are entering the debate upon which the EU is founded.
Ellwood wasn’t just daring to suggest it. He was providing the first instance of a process which will one day need to take place: the Tory rapprochement with reality. There will be kickbacks and much gnashing and wailing. But reality will demand to be let in. It must, in the end, be faced up to, no matter how intense your dream-state.
Johnson’s splatter-against-the-walls personal defence strategy is just the start. As the party declines, it is going to keep exploring all sorts of contradictory and desperate gambits to reverse its misfortune.
It is about to experience an almighty hangover. For years now, Conservatives have given up on reality-based politics and committed exclusively to character-based politics. Now they are waking up after a hell of a bender. The pain hasn’t hit yet, but they just got that first stabbing jolt in their temple, and, with it, the knowledge that it’s going to be a horrible day.
LOL. It is highly amusing to see Dunt talk about "rapprochement with reality" as he rehashes for the umpteenth time why Britain must be in the EU's market, using perverted logic that would mean Canada has to be in the USA or Japan has to be in China.
The only "reality" is that Dunt can't accept he lost and is still living in a parallel universe where everything is going to be reversed and all will be right with the world again.
The Canadian and US markets are very highly integrated in a number of areas.
And both Canada and Mexico essentially have to follow US trade policies and rules. Philip's missed the target with his post; being next to a large trading bloc essentially leaves you with the choice between being a rule-taker or doing immense self-harm.
Canada don’t, for example, share food standards with the US. Trucks carrying food from the Lower 48 to Alaska must be protected by a seal on the truck doors. You can’t deliver some of the contents to Canada on the way to Alaska.
Bit like shipping to RoI via Norn, then?
In theory, although RoI truckers will tell you that the french have been breaking the seals on lorries from the RoI at Calais, to check the contents, even though they are not supposed to. They are not amused.
"Culminate. A term from Clausewitz (book 7, chapter 5), an offensive culminates (or reaches its culminating point) when the advantage in strength no longer favors the attacker sufficiently enough to continue pushing forward. Crucially, this does not mean the offensive ends: an attacker may not know their offensive has culminated and may keep ‘pushing’ and achieving nothing for some time. At the same time, the culmination of an offensive operation (see Operations) does not end a war – the attacker may merely rebuild strength (reinforcements, supplies, organization) to push again later, something that is generally termed an ‘operational pause.’"
Wont be a surprise when it becomes clear that RU has culminated in Donbas, Putin calls for a ceasefire and uses it to regroup.
Seems Russian artillery can punch a hole in the Ukrainian defences, but the rest of the Russian forces can't follow up and capitalise. And lose significant men and materials in the process of discovering this. Repeat ad nauseum.
What will change is the kit the Ukrainians have to throw into counter-attacks. The Ukrainians might well agree a ceasefire only when Russian troops are forced back to the border. They might reasonably expect a culmination to change into a rout, when the twentieth Russian forces face twenty-first century hardware. Russian long-range demolition only works if they have the longer reach. When Ukraine has the longer reach, that artillery is getting out of there....
"Culminate. A term from Clausewitz (book 7, chapter 5), an offensive culminates (or reaches its culminating point) when the advantage in strength no longer favors the attacker sufficiently enough to continue pushing forward. Crucially, this does not mean the offensive ends: an attacker may not know their offensive has culminated and may keep ‘pushing’ and achieving nothing for some time. At the same time, the culmination of an offensive operation (see Operations) does not end a war – the attacker may merely rebuild strength (reinforcements, supplies, organization) to push again later, something that is generally termed an ‘operational pause.’"
The Ukrainians had said that Russia was massing troops around Izium for a push towards Sloviansk, and on the southern front for a push towards Zaporizhzhia, so it may well be that they can redeploy troops and still take Severodonetsk.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
Brady - and I think your figures are not far out but a rebellion of that size would result in his resignation fairly quickly even if the1922 have to change their rules
It should do. But consider the Thatcher precedent. In her case, it took the Cabinet and a spouse with a hinterland to tell her that the game was up. Which she then had the class to accept.
If Boris wins with a bare majority, or even a decisive one like 187-172, who is there to tell him that it's time to go? Who will be listened to?
I am not sure what it would take the greasy piglet to resign. He's certainly not going to listen to fellow ministers. Perhaps Carrie? If she's still around.
"Culminate. A term from Clausewitz (book 7, chapter 5), an offensive culminates (or reaches its culminating point) when the advantage in strength no longer favors the attacker sufficiently enough to continue pushing forward. Crucially, this does not mean the offensive ends: an attacker may not know their offensive has culminated and may keep ‘pushing’ and achieving nothing for some time. At the same time, the culmination of an offensive operation (see Operations) does not end a war – the attacker may merely rebuild strength (reinforcements, supplies, organization) to push again later, something that is generally termed an ‘operational pause.’"
Wont be a surprise when it becomes clear that RU has culminated in Donbas, Putin calls for a ceasefire and uses it to regroup.
Seems Russian artillery can punch a hole in the Ukrainian defences, but the rest of the Russian forces can't follow up and capitalise. And lose significant men and materials in the process of discovering this. Repeat ad nauseum.
What will change is the kit the Ukrainians have to throw into counter-attacks. The Ukrainians might well agree a ceasefire only when Russian troops are forced back to the border. They might reasonably expect a culmination to change into a rout, when the twentieth Russian forces face twenty-first century hardware. Russian long-range demolition only works if they have the longer reach. When Ukraine has the longer reach, that artillery is getting out of there....
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
At least that. What HY and Dorries don't seem to get is that the momentum is building visibly day by day now. This wasn't "they need to act, they keep making excuses why they won't". This is people submitting letters and speaking in openly very critical terms each and every day.
And that was before Parliament broke up for the Lets Boo Boris festival. Tory MPs - even lickspittle worms like Duguid - have gone home. And if he turns up to see his people in Fraserburgh today they aren't going to be saying "good old Boris". When fruitcakes and loonies like Desmond Swayne or Peter Bone go and meet people, they are going to have to be profoundly selective to only hear the "good old Boris" messages they insist are all people are saying.
What they miss is that the more we are assured that everyone in Wellingborough is cheering the boss on, the more we know they are not. Its like their response to the cost of living crisis - deny, patronise, sneer - you can only tell people black is white for so long before they realise it isn't, and then start thinking you are delusional in still saying it is. That is the choice for Tory MPs.
What you don't get is the momentum for change is driven by non Tories like you when only Tories get to decide who the PM is until the next general election. So any opinions of non Tories are irrelevant and the polling is clear most Tory voters and members want Johnson to stay.
That omitted not is the greatest Freudian slip of all time. It is out of your hands now.
If BoZo gets booed at the Queen's Jubilee, imagine the reception he would get at her funeral.
Tory MPs must do the right thing now...
While I agree his mps must act, hopefully on monday, I do not agree he would be booed at HMQ funeral as it would be a very sombre occasion and would not be well received by the public
There are times in life when something trumps politics, this would be one of them
For once I agree, even I wouldn't boo Johnson at HM's funeral. Incidentally, I do worry that HM may not have long to go. Think she may have spent all her last energies on being around for the Jubilee.
I am quite concerned just how ill she is, and certainly as we age mobility becomes a problem (as I can vouch for) but she is 96 and is looking increasingly frail and I am 100% certain she would not have wanted to miss the amount of celebrations she has if she was not suffering debilitating health issues
She looks a lot healthier than her ten year younger cousin, the Duke of Kent.
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
Why? 1. Morality. He could wake up one morning having been visited by the holy ghost who had shown him that lying and cheating and criminality are Bad. Repent and the kingdom of Heaven will be yours and all that. 2. Because he has been handed the pearl-handled revolver as happened to Thatcher and IDS and May before him. Not everyone in the party is a pliable lickspittle like your good self - they have a string track record of removing failures. 3. Because he loses the no confidence vote, or wins it so narrowly that the "its all over, lets move on" please from intellectual heavyweights like Simon Clarke fall flat on their face.
Its true that there is no obvious successor now. Nor was there in 1990 (please linky a poll before Howe resigned showing that Major would win the election). That doesn't mean that good people carry on supporting bad people, bad policies and misbehaviour. I know your personal support remains for the lying crook, but you aren't most Tory voters - how many of them voted Plaid Cymru...?
Polling in November 1990 showed both Major and Heseltine leading Kinnock Labour and that was BEFORE the first ballot against Thatcher.
There is no such polling now showing any alternative Tory leader leading Starmer Labour
Would appreciate you posting links. This is an interesting point in political history, and having studied this only a few years after doing A-level politics I do not remember that at all.
A November 1990 Harris poll had, for example, the Conservatives leading Kinnock Labour by 10% under Heseltine, 7% under Major and 4% under Hurd. That at a time they trailed under Thatcher.
Before the first ballot too a Mail poll had the Thatcher led Tories trailing Kinnock Labour in key marginal seats that would all be saved if Heseltine became Tory leader.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
Brady - and I think your figures are not far out but a rebellion of that size would result in his resignation fairly quickly even if the1922 have to change their rules
It should do. But consider the Thatcher precedent. In her case, it took the Cabinet and a spouse with a hinterland to tell her that the game was up. Which she then had the class to accept.
If Boris wins with a bare majority, or even a decisive one like 187-172, who is there to tell him that it's time to go? Who will be listened to?
For Bozo 190-179 would be a decisive victory and enough to keep going...
If Boris resigned would England bat any better? Probably not*. Would the government have a radical change in direction? Almost certainly not. Would Ukraine suddenly go better? Very probably not, possibly the reverse. Would we have a less severe cost of living crisis? Nope.
I think we are a point when Boris needs to just soak up some of the vitriol and grumpiness for a while. The Tories will probably need to change leader before the next election, but as Saint Augustine would say, not yet.
* of course if I was wrong about this he should certainly resign today.
The answer to a radical change of direction surely depends who they go for?
A Hunt Tugenhat type is a radical change back to Cameron conservatism. A Patel Dorries type is further radical change down the authoritarian path. A Javid/Zahawi/Barclay/Wallace is a march back from spin to competence. Raab gives us neither the spin nor the competence. God knows what we get from Truss.
Sunak and Gove seem the only ones to keep us on a similar political path.
I think that you are seriously overestimating the government's room for manouver. A recession is now built in, spaffing more cash will make little difference in the short run and may do even more damage in the medium term. Inflation will fall but to a much higher base than we have been used to or are comfortable with. Strikes are going to be endemic, particularly in the public sector. The majority are going to find that they have to tighten their belts way more than we are used to. There is nothing that can be done about this, even if government suddenly got competent. By next summer there may be more options and choices available but right now a new leader is simply going to be tarnished with all this.
For most leaders, that would be a good reason to keep them on, to absorb the external toxicity and let clean hands take over afterwards.
The trouble in the case is the quantity of toxins Johnson is excreting himself. Leave him in place for another year and the situation may well be beyond repair.
If Boris resigned would England bat any better? Probably not*. Would the government have a radical change in direction? Almost certainly not. Would Ukraine suddenly go better? Very probably not, possibly the reverse. Would we have a less severe cost of living crisis? Nope.
I think we are a point when Boris needs to just soak up some of the vitriol and grumpiness for a while. The Tories will probably need to change leader before the next election, but as Saint Augustine would say, not yet.
* of course if I was wrong about this he should certainly resign today.
The answer to a radical change of direction surely depends who they go for?
A Hunt Tugenhat type is a radical change back to Cameron conservatism. A Patel Dorries type is further radical change down the authoritarian path. A Javid/Zahawi/Barclay/Wallace is a march back from spin to competence. Raab gives us neither the spin nor the competence. God knows what we get from Truss.
Sunak and Gove seem the only ones to keep us on a similar political path.
I think that you are seriously overestimating the government's room for manouver. A recession is now built in, spaffing more cash will make little difference in the short run and may do even more damage in the medium term. Inflation will fall but to a much higher base than we have been used to or are comfortable with. Strikes are going to be endemic, particularly in the public sector. The majority are going to find that they have to tighten their belts way more than we are used to. There is nothing that can be done about this, even if government suddenly got competent. By next summer there may be more options and choices available but right now a new leader is simply going to be tarnished with all this.
Governments are not all about economics. Stuff like how independent will the judiciary be, how do we talk about our neighbours and ourselves, is the BBC public or private, emphasis given to the environment vs health and wellbeing vs economy all matter too. Even on the economics, whilst the govt can do little to alleviate the short term pain (and what they can do they probably have to even if they instinctively don't want to a la Sunak), how we plan for the next couple of decades is really important as the world is going to change faster than anytime in our lifetimes over that period.
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
Why? 1. Morality. He could wake up one morning having been visited by the holy ghost who had shown him that lying and cheating and criminality are Bad. Repent and the kingdom of Heaven will be yours and all that. 2. Because he has been handed the pearl-handled revolver as happened to Thatcher and IDS and May before him. Not everyone in the party is a pliable lickspittle like your good self - they have a string track record of removing failures. 3. Because he loses the no confidence vote, or wins it so narrowly that the "its all over, lets move on" please from intellectual heavyweights like Simon Clarke fall flat on their face.
Its true that there is no obvious successor now. Nor was there in 1990 (please linky a poll before Howe resigned showing that Major would win the election). That doesn't mean that good people carry on supporting bad people, bad policies and misbehaviour. I know your personal support remains for the lying crook, but you aren't most Tory voters - how many of them voted Plaid Cymru...?
Polling in November 1990 showed both Major and Heseltine leading Kinnock Labour and that was BEFORE the first ballot against Thatcher.
There is no such polling now showing any alternative Tory leader leading Starmer Labour
Would appreciate you posting links. This is an interesting point in political history, and having studied this only a few years after doing A-level politics I do not remember that at all.
A November 1990 Harris poll had, for example, the Conservatives leading Kinnock Labour by 10% under Heseltine, 7% under Major and 4% under Hurd. That at a time they trailed under Thatcher.
There is no such polling showing Hunt, Sunak, Patel, Truss, Raab, Wallace etc leading Starmer Labour now
Worth noting that it's a single poll but its worth quoting this bit
On Saturday, Tory party strategists were also buoyed by the performance of the London stock exchange, which soared at Friday’s close because of hopes for closer British cooperation with Europe as the Thatcher era ends.
British investors were expressing confidence that either Heseltine, 57, Hurd, 60, or Major, 47, would be good news for business and would forge better ties with Europe and reduce interest rates.
"Culminate. A term from Clausewitz (book 7, chapter 5), an offensive culminates (or reaches its culminating point) when the advantage in strength no longer favors the attacker sufficiently enough to continue pushing forward. Crucially, this does not mean the offensive ends: an attacker may not know their offensive has culminated and may keep ‘pushing’ and achieving nothing for some time. At the same time, the culmination of an offensive operation (see Operations) does not end a war – the attacker may merely rebuild strength (reinforcements, supplies, organization) to push again later, something that is generally termed an ‘operational pause.’"
Wont be a surprise when it becomes clear that RU has culminated in Donbas, Putin calls for a ceasefire and uses it to regroup.
That seems pretty likely given the refocused objectives. Consolidation presumably the priority once advances stall. And if there's a ceasefire allies will not like if Ukraine breaks it.
"Culminate. A term from Clausewitz (book 7, chapter 5), an offensive culminates (or reaches its culminating point) when the advantage in strength no longer favors the attacker sufficiently enough to continue pushing forward. Crucially, this does not mean the offensive ends: an attacker may not know their offensive has culminated and may keep ‘pushing’ and achieving nothing for some time. At the same time, the culmination of an offensive operation (see Operations) does not end a war – the attacker may merely rebuild strength (reinforcements, supplies, organization) to push again later, something that is generally termed an ‘operational pause.’"
Wont be a surprise when it becomes clear that RU has culminated in Donbas, Putin calls for a ceasefire and uses it to regroup.
That seems pretty likely given the refocused objectives. Consolidation presumably the priority once advances stall. And if there's a ceasefire allies will not like if Ukraine breaks it.
Why would Ukraine's allies accept or support a ceasefire especially one offered by Russia
They should at least get a Jimmy Savile impersonator to announce this.
K*nt and the Gang should have revived the strange and beautiful tradition of the Double A Side by simultaneously releasing it with their hautingly memorable ballad "Shitting on a Picture of the Queen".
If Boris resigned would England bat any better? Probably not*. Would the government have a radical change in direction? Almost certainly not. Would Ukraine suddenly go better? Very probably not, possibly the reverse. Would we have a less severe cost of living crisis? Nope.
I think we are a point when Boris needs to just soak up some of the vitriol and grumpiness for a while. The Tories will probably need to change leader before the next election, but as Saint Augustine would say, not yet.
* of course if I was wrong about this he should certainly resign today.
The answer to a radical change of direction surely depends who they go for?
A Hunt Tugenhat type is a radical change back to Cameron conservatism. A Patel Dorries type is further radical change down the authoritarian path. A Javid/Zahawi/Barclay/Wallace is a march back from spin to competence. Raab gives us neither the spin nor the competence. God knows what we get from Truss.
Sunak and Gove seem the only ones to keep us on a similar political path.
I think that you are seriously overestimating the government's room for manouver. A recession is now built in, spaffing more cash will make little difference in the short run and may do even more damage in the medium term. Inflation will fall but to a much higher base than we have been used to or are comfortable with. Strikes are going to be endemic, particularly in the public sector. The majority are going to find that they have to tighten their belts way more than we are used to. There is nothing that can be done about this, even if government suddenly got competent. By next summer there may be more options and choices available but right now a new leader is simply going to be tarnished with all this.
Governments are not all about economics. Stuff like how independent will the judiciary be, how do we talk about our neighbours and ourselves, is the BBC public or private, emphasis given to the environment vs health and wellbeing vs economy all matter too. Even on the economics, whilst the govt can do little to alleviate the short term pain (and what they can do they probably have to even if they instinctively don't want to a la Sunak), how we plan for the next couple of decades is really important as the world is going to change faster than anytime in our lifetimes over that period.
Exactly. A government that believed in Parliamentary democracy and the rule of law would be a major step-up from the one we have currently, whatever the economics. I am not sure any realistic replacement for Johnson would deliver that, though. That’s how low the Conservative party has sunk.
I used to love it back in the day when it was a real place with a properly edgy vibe. Then gentrification took over. The lambretta seats went, and in came all sorts of trendy eateries and shops selling fancy things at exorbitant prices.
Two of my young guests yesterday announced that they're leaving London next month for a provincial city. Now that they can predominantly work from home they no longer find London an attractive proposition. They'd rather be in a city where you can easily walk or cycle from one part to the other in a matter of minutes.
Which ‘provincial city?’
Brizzle
I was being coy in case they read this!!!!
Hmmm. They may find it a bit bigger than they expect, speaking as somebody who used to live there.
But it is a lovely city.
Good on you, Bristolian.
One of them grew up there and spent the first 20 years of their life in it so knows it very well. A return to their roots. I think it's fairly easy to get around in minutes on foot or bike as long as you don't mind the steep climb up to Clifton etc.
The regeneration around the harbour is superb. Brilliant food to be had as well these days.
Well, I was in Downend and Frenchay, so rather out on a limb and that may have coloured my views.
But as you say there is a great deal to enjoy there.
If I was young I'd be off to Birmingham. What it lacks in beauty it makes up in energy. It is going to be 45 minutes to London in a couple of years on HS2. For salaried jobs in many industries, it is pretty much at London wages. And the property prices.... very affordable, as in you can actually buy a nice house/flat in a nice area for the money that you earn in a professional job. You can have the 15 minute lifestyle if that is what you want. Makes me wonder about all the criticism of house prices. There is no problem at all in large parts of the country. It really is concentrated in the south east, and for many people, the best answer is simply to move. My own assessment of London before quitting it 10 years ago was that it is fine if you either have serious wealth or are building up a career in your twenties. But there is no point sticking around beyond that.
I lived in Birmingham in the 1980s. Let’s just say it’s improved somewhat since then. Not sure if it’s still the same now, but back then it felt like a collection of smaller towns that had come together - Selly Oak, Mosley, Harborne, Handsworth, Aston, Bournville, Balsall Heath, etc - rather than a single entity that had grown outwards. All those places and many others had very different personalities. And that’s before you moved into the Black Country, which will never, ever, be Brum.
Let's explore the context of your comment in the context of darkage's earlier: "If I was young I'd be off to Birmingham..... It is going to be 45 minutes to London in a couple of years on HS2."
Well it's not going to be 45 minutes from any of Selly Oak, Mosley, Harborne, Handsworth, Aston, Bournville or Balsall Heath. All are, together with most of the rest of Birmingham and the Black Country, heavily integrated into the rail hub that is Birmingham New Street. There are some tweaks planned, but they're not going to alter the situation for most. So for rail travellers the choice will still be: - Either arrive at Birmingham New Street and allow at least 30 mins to get out of the station and make a stress filled dash across to Curzon Street to catch HS2. - Or just walk across the concourse to the neighbouring platform at New Street to get on a West Coast main line service that takes about 35 minutes longer to get there than HS2. Just a 5 minute difference.
If you're coming from Wolverhampton or Sandwell the choice is even simpler, you don't even need to get off the WCML service while it stops at New Street.
So in contrast to what are no doubt fantastical passenger number figures built into the HS2 business case, I just can't see HS2 being a draw to rail travellers from Birmingham and the Black Country to London. The vast majority will continue to use the WCML (or the Chiltern Line which is far cheaper than the WCML and will be even cheaper still than HS2.)
Curzon Street will be more convenient to business people travelling from London for the occasional meeting in Birmingham City Centre (although whether there are going to be many meetings going forward might be questioned given the with the widespread adoption of Zoom etc.) But that amounts to an added benefit to businesses and their employees based in London. Hardly levelling up is it?
It's a ten minute walk from New Street to Curzon Street...
Edit - also, you're making some false assumptions about the speed of the trains from New Street. When the Pendolinos are retired they will not be replaced with more titling trains, because HS2 will be carrying the fast traffic. So you can extend journey times to London on the WCML (which will in any case be needed for more pathways).
You will still be able to get to London from New Street, but it will take about 100 minutes. As against that, there will be more frequent and probably rather cheaper trains.
So your five minutes has become 45, but at lower cost and more regular intervals.
Nonsense on timing.
It's a good half mile between the station entrances. That's 15 minutes but only between the station entrances. Then you have to add in the time to get through the barriers at New Street and then up to the station entrance, which in my experience can be quite a long time, and then quite a bit of time again at Curzon Street. Any sane person is going to allow themselves at least 30 minutes to get across town in total. Probably a bit more if you're in possession of an HS2 ticket costing an arm and a leg and want to make sure you're not going to have a sliding doors moment.... I said 30 minutes but it could be more.
And even now it's only 1 hour 23 minutes from New Street to Euston. Check the timetable. Probably 1 hour 20 minutes or less by the 2030s with the next generation of trains.* So that's a 35 minute difference between the claimed 45 minute HS2 journey time (which might yet prove to be as unreliable as their financial claims).
So that's 5 minutes saving, at most, at the the cost of the effort and stress of having to leg it across town and pay a lot more for the privilege.
*Edit. I am a tad reluctant to accept your point that the people of Wolverhampton should learn to live with crap slower trains replacing their current fast trains, as the price of bailing out HS2.
15 minutes to walk half a mile? And you accuse me of talking nonsense? Ten minutes is a maximum. When I walk New Street to Moor Street, it’s seven minutes, and I’m no paragon of fitness.
As for New Street, I use it regularly. Three minutes max to get out. And the same the other end, and trains will be leaving for London every 4-5 minutes so there’s no need to worry about timings.
If you’d looked below you would have seen I addressed the point about slower trains. I’m not sure tbh how even if they were slower that would be worse than the appalling delays New Street and the WCML south of Rugby cause now.
I think your post says more about your reflexive dislike of HS2 than anything else.
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls also show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
He should resign as he is unfit for the office he holds and has lost vast swathes of the country
Your argument over alternatives is irrelevant, as he could suffer a serious accident or health issue or worse and would have to be replaced
You obsess over polling, but there are replacements for Boris and no matter there comes a time when one has to do the right thing and that time is now for conservative mps to vote him out of office
Has Boris had a serious accident or health issue? No.
I don't care what Boris has done I only care about maximising the Tory voteshare as a Tory member and unless another Tory leader is shown in polls to have a clear lead over Starmer Labour, which none are, then Boris stays as far as I am concerned. Especially given most alternatives, Hunt, Raab, Patel, Sunak, Gove, Truss etc poll even worse with the voters than Boris anyway now.
If Boris went I would back Ben Wallace or Javid as the only alternatives who poll a bit better but even they as I said do no better than Starmer
Ignore all the other replies to your post HY, they are glib and a bit rude, my reply here actually helps you get it right.
The polling you are referring to - I won’t use strong words like bogus, perhaps fantasy - but don’t reflect the reality of how voters would see someone after they are crowned, after the rigours of the contest, all the oxygen of publicity, authority and backing they would get with the crown. And the ditching of unpopular policies and comical cabinet appointments.
More importantly truth is Boris has the advantage of the crown right now but is polling right down with them not way above them. For Boris, it’s all gone Richard II. To many mistakes made, impression set in stone. No way back.
Surely HY you would think about your leadership vote this summer on something more than a fantasy poll from polling company? You would listen to their programme, how they actually manage the rigours of the contest, the debates, the interviews?
I will go further HY. You are definitely not voting Javid, the polls you quote seem oblivious to the inherent vice of his past tax dodging we may only have a small part of the iceberg. And remember moment he was ambushed by anti vaxxer and was stumped so turned to the medical team for help was so rubbish?
It’s about carrying out due diligence and finding inherent vice isn’t it - so it doesn’t quickly go pair shaped after the initial poll bounce. After that and the crowing your fantasy polls show a different result when it’s all for real. But it’s your own political instinct that has to work out how long the bounce lasts for when the person is PM for real.
If BoZo gets booed at the Queen's Jubilee, imagine the reception he would get at her funeral.
Tory MPs must do the right thing now...
While I agree his mps must act, hopefully on monday, I do not agree he would be booed at HMQ funeral as it would be a very sombre occasion and would not be well received by the public
There are times in life when something trumps politics, this would be one of them
She will likely live until 2025 if she Iives as long as her husband and 2027 if she lives as long as her mother ie past the likely next general election date of 2024. So Johnson may not be PM or even Tory leader by then anyway, it might be PM Starmer with a new Tory Leader of the Opposition
You have absolutely no idea how long she will live
We all hope she'll send herself a telegram, like Fats Waller did a letter.
I agree. Should be a good party again, although I don't envy those who have to plan for her death prior to the events as must have been the case for the Jubilee.
HYUFD now predicting how long the Queen will live is bizarre.
An inferred longevity from the Queen Mum is one thing — from the Duke of Edinburgh suggests a rather loose grasp of genetics.
They should at least get a Jimmy Savile impersonator to announce this.
K*nt and the Gang should have revived the strange and beautiful tradition of the Double A Side by simultaneously releasing it with their hautingly memorable ballad "Shitting on a Picture of the Queen".
Official Chart website has them 20th as far as I can see. Can't move on twitter for fakes.
They should at least get a Jimmy Savile impersonator to announce this.
K*nt and the Gang should have revived the strange and beautiful tradition of the Double A Side by simultaneously releasing it with their hautingly memorable ballad "Shitting on a Picture of the Queen".
Official Chart website has them 20th as far as I can see. Can't move on twitter for fakes.
Click on the tab marked "sales". You'll be re-assured.
If BoZo gets booed at the Queen's Jubilee, imagine the reception he would get at her funeral.
Tory MPs must do the right thing now...
While I agree his mps must act, hopefully on monday, I do not agree he would be booed at HMQ funeral as it would be a very sombre occasion and would not be well received by the public
There are times in life when something trumps politics, this would be one of them
She will likely live until 2025 if she Iives as long as her husband and 2027 if she lives as long as her mother ie past the likely next general election date of 2024. So Johnson may not be PM or even Tory leader by then anyway, it might be PM Starmer with a new Tory Leader of the Opposition
You have absolutely no idea how long she will live
We all hope she'll send herself a telegram, like Fats Waller did a letter.
I agree. Should be a good party again, although I don't envy those who have to plan for her death prior to the events as must have been the case for the Jubilee.
HYUFD now predicting how long the Queen will live is bizarre.
An inferred longevity from the Queen Mum is one thing — from the Duke of Edinburgh suggests a rather loose grasp of genetics.
Though ER & DoE were cousins (cue Duelling Banjos).
If BoZo gets booed at the Queen's Jubilee, imagine the reception he would get at her funeral.
Tory MPs must do the right thing now...
While I agree his mps must act, hopefully on monday, I do not agree he would be booed at HMQ funeral as it would be a very sombre occasion and would not be well received by the public
There are times in life when something trumps politics, this would be one of them
She will likely live until 2025 if she Iives as long as her husband and 2027 if she lives as long as her mother ie past the likely next general election date of 2024. So Johnson may not be PM or even Tory leader by then anyway, it might be PM Starmer with a new Tory Leader of the Opposition
You have absolutely no idea how long she will live
We all hope she'll send herself a telegram, like Fats Waller did a letter.
I agree. Should be a good party again, although I don't envy those who have to plan for her death prior to the events as must have been the case for the Jubilee.
HYUFD now predicting how long the Queen will live is bizarre.
An inferred longevity from the Queen Mum is one thing — from the Duke of Edinburgh suggests a rather loose grasp of genetics.
Not completely. It is indicative of a healthy enough lifestyle to have reached that age. Also spouses have a 66% increased chance of dying shortly after their spouses death, so having passed that hurdle boosts her life expectancy a tad more.
If BoZo gets booed at the Queen's Jubilee, imagine the reception he would get at her funeral.
Tory MPs must do the right thing now...
While I agree his mps must act, hopefully on monday, I do not agree he would be booed at HMQ funeral as it would be a very sombre occasion and would not be well received by the public
There are times in life when something trumps politics, this would be one of them
She will likely live until 2025 if she Iives as long as her husband and 2027 if she lives as long as her mother ie past the likely next general election date of 2024. So Johnson may not be PM or even Tory leader by then anyway, it might be PM Starmer with a new Tory Leader of the Opposition
You have absolutely no idea how long she will live
We all hope she'll send herself a telegram, like Fats Waller did a letter.
I agree. Should be a good party again, although I don't envy those who have to plan for her death prior to the events as must have been the case for the Jubilee.
HYUFD now predicting how long the Queen will live is bizarre.
In an effort to claim the most tasteless post ever, is there a book on the date of her demise?
No. Nor will be.
Well, there sort of might be. As a thought exercise, imagine a Festival to celebrate HMQ's 71st year, and then see what it costs to insure against cancellation.
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls also show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
He should resign as he is unfit for the office he holds and has lost vast swathes of the country
Your argument over alternatives is irrelevant, as he could suffer a serious accident or health issue or worse and would have to be replaced
You obsess over polling, but there are replacements for Boris and no matter there comes a time when one has to do the right thing and that time is now for conservative mps to vote him out of office
Has Boris had a serious accident or health issue? No.
I don't care what Boris has done I only care about maximising the Tory voteshare as a Tory member and unless another Tory leader is shown in polls to have a clear lead over Starmer Labour, which none are, then Boris stays as far as I am concerned. Especially given most alternatives, Hunt, Raab, Patel, Sunak, Gove, Truss etc poll even worse with the voters than Boris anyway now.
If Boris went I would back Ben Wallace or Javid as the only alternatives who poll a bit better but even they as I said do no better than Starmer
Ignore all the other replies to your post HY, they are glib and a bit rude, my reply here actually helps you get it right.
The polling you are referring to - I won’t use strong words like bogus, perhaps fantasy - but don’t reflect the reality of how voters would see someone after they are crowned, after the rigours of the contest, all the oxygen of publicity, authority and backing they would get with the crown. And the ditching of unpopular policies and comical cabinet appointments.
More importantly truth is Boris has the advantage of the crown right now but is polling right down with them not way above them. For Boris, it’s all gone Richard II. To many mistakes made, impression set in stone. No way back.
Surely HY you would think about your leadership vote this summer on something more than a fantasy poll from polling company? You would listen to their programme, how they actually manage the rigours of the contest, the debates, the interviews?
I will go further HY. You are definitely not voting Javid, the polls you quote seem oblivious to the inherent vice of his past tax dodging we may only have a small part of the iceberg. And remember moment he was ambushed by anti vaxxer and was stumped so turned to the medical team for help was so rubbish?
It’s about carrying out due diligence and finding inherent vice isn’t it - so it doesn’t quickly go pair shaped after the initial poll bounce. After that and the crowing your fantasy polls show a different result when it’s all for real. But it’s your own political instinct that has to work out how long the bounce lasts for when the person is PM for real.
No, in my experience hypothetical polls are pretty accurate, as they were for Johnson in 2019, Cameron in 2005 and Major in 1992. Or indeed for Blair in 1994. Polling was also clear in 2015 David Miliband was more electable than Ed and in 2015 Burnham more electable than Corbyn and was correct as was polling in 1997 and 2001 showing Clarke more electable than Hague or IDS.
So on that basis there is little evidence removing Johnson makes a difference and maybe only Wallace would do better. Though of course if Johnson is removed you might even get a harder right PM like Patel or Truss or Raab now if they got to the final 2 and told the members what they want to hear, there is no guarantee it would be PM Wallace or Hunt or Sunak
They should at least get a Jimmy Savile impersonator to announce this.
K*nt and the Gang should have revived the strange and beautiful tradition of the Double A Side by simultaneously releasing it with their hautingly memorable ballad "Shitting on a Picture of the Queen".
Official Chart website has them 20th as far as I can see. Can't move on twitter for fakes.
Click on the tab marked "sales". You'll be re-assured.
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls also show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
He should resign as he is unfit for the office he holds and has lost vast swathes of the country
Your argument over alternatives is irrelevant, as he could suffer a serious accident or health issue or worse and would have to be replaced
You obsess over polling, but there are replacements for Boris and no matter there comes a time when one has to do the right thing and that time is now for conservative mps to vote him out of office
Has Boris had a serious accident or health issue? No.
I don't care what Boris has done I only care about maximising the Tory voteshare as a Tory member and unless another Tory leader is shown in polls to have a clear lead over Starmer Labour, which none are, then Boris stays as far as I am concerned. Especially given most alternatives, Hunt, Raab, Patel, Sunak, Gove, Truss etc poll even worse with the voters than Boris anyway now.
If Boris went I would back Ben Wallace or Javid as the only alternatives who poll a bit better but even they as I said do no better than Starmer
Ignore all the other replies to your post HY, they are glib and a bit rude, my reply here actually helps you get it right.
The polling you are referring to - I won’t use strong words like bogus, perhaps fantasy - but don’t reflect the reality of how voters would see someone after they are crowned, after the rigours of the contest, all the oxygen of publicity, authority and backing they would get with the crown. And the ditching of unpopular policies and comical cabinet appointments.
More importantly truth is Boris has the advantage of the crown right now but is polling right down with them not way above them. For Boris, it’s all gone Richard II. To many mistakes made, impression set in stone. No way back.
Surely HY you would think about your leadership vote this summer on something more than a fantasy poll from polling company? You would listen to their programme, how they actually manage the rigours of the contest, the debates, the interviews?
I will go further HY. You are definitely not voting Javid, the polls you quote seem oblivious to the inherent vice of his past tax dodging we may only have a small part of the iceberg. And remember moment he was ambushed by anti vaxxer and was stumped so turned to the medical team for help was so rubbish?
It’s about carrying out due diligence and finding inherent vice isn’t it - so it doesn’t quickly go pair shaped after the initial poll bounce. After that and the crowing your fantasy polls show a different result when it’s all for real. But it’s your own political instinct that has to work out how long the bounce lasts for when the person is PM for real.
No, in my experience hypothetical polls are pretty accurate, as they were for Johnson in 2019, Cameron in 2005 and Major in 1992. Or indeed for Blair in 1994. Polling was also clear in 2015 David Miliband was more electable than Ed and in 2015 Burnham more electable than Corbyn and was correct as was polling in 1997 and 2001 showing Clarke more electable than Hague or IDS.
So on that basis there is little evidence removing Johnson makes a difference and maybe only Wallace would do better. Though of course if Johnson is removed you might even get a harder right PM like Patel or Truss now if they got to the final 2 and told the members what they want to hear, there is no guarantee it would be PM Wallace or Hunt
And with Wallace the public don't really know him yet. His plaudits come from not being an obvious twat and there being wars on in Afghanistan and Ukraine to boost his profile. I would expect he would be an improvement but I very much doubt the broader public have a settled opinion on him.
"Culminate. A term from Clausewitz (book 7, chapter 5), an offensive culminates (or reaches its culminating point) when the advantage in strength no longer favors the attacker sufficiently enough to continue pushing forward. Crucially, this does not mean the offensive ends: an attacker may not know their offensive has culminated and may keep ‘pushing’ and achieving nothing for some time. At the same time, the culmination of an offensive operation (see Operations) does not end a war – the attacker may merely rebuild strength (reinforcements, supplies, organization) to push again later, something that is generally termed an ‘operational pause.’"
Wont be a surprise when it becomes clear that RU has culminated in Donbas, Putin calls for a ceasefire and uses it to regroup.
When Russia pulled back in the West and regrouped in the East, a number of commentators thought they had enough, between reserves and redeployment, for one more offensive.
If Boris resigned would England bat any better? Probably not*. Would the government have a radical change in direction? Almost certainly not. Would Ukraine suddenly go better? Very probably not, possibly the reverse. Would we have a less severe cost of living crisis? Nope.
I think we are a point when Boris needs to just soak up some of the vitriol and grumpiness for a while. The Tories will probably need to change leader before the next election, but as Saint Augustine would say, not yet.
* of course if I was wrong about this he should certainly resign today.
The answer to a radical change of direction surely depends who they go for?
A Hunt Tugenhat type is a radical change back to Cameron conservatism. A Patel Dorries type is further radical change down the authoritarian path. A Javid/Zahawi/Barclay/Wallace is a march back from spin to competence. Raab gives us neither the spin nor the competence. God knows what we get from Truss.
Sunak and Gove seem the only ones to keep us on a similar political path.
I think that you are seriously overestimating the government's room for manouver. A recession is now built in, spaffing more cash will make little difference in the short run and may do even more damage in the medium term. Inflation will fall but to a much higher base than we have been used to or are comfortable with. Strikes are going to be endemic, particularly in the public sector. The majority are going to find that they have to tighten their belts way more than we are used to. There is nothing that can be done about this, even if government suddenly got competent. By next summer there may be more options and choices available but right now a new leader is simply going to be tarnished with all this.
Governments are not all about economics. Stuff like how independent will the judiciary be, how do we talk about our neighbours and ourselves, is the BBC public or private, emphasis given to the environment vs health and wellbeing vs economy all matter too. Even on the economics, whilst the govt can do little to alleviate the short term pain (and what they can do they probably have to even if they instinctively don't want to a la Sunak), how we plan for the next couple of decades is really important as the world is going to change faster than anytime in our lifetimes over that period.
Exactly. A government that believed in Parliamentary democracy and the rule of law would be a major step-up from the one we have currently, whatever the economics. I am not sure any realistic replacement for Johnson would deliver that, though. That’s how low the Conservative party has sunk.
It isn't for government to believe or disbelieve in Parliamentary democracy. That is Parliament's job. If it doesn't do it no-one else can. Parliament, not government is our supreme authority. If we don't like the one we have we have regular chances to change it.
The rule of law is of course enforced by our court system and the massive structure of civil and criminal law which is highly developed in this country. Government's job is to obey its demands and be accountable to it. Government, in many forms, is in court every sitting day doing exactly that.
They should at least get a Jimmy Savile impersonator to announce this.
K*nt and the Gang should have revived the strange and beautiful tradition of the Double A Side by simultaneously releasing it with their hautingly memorable ballad "Shitting on a Picture of the Queen".
Official Chart website has them 20th as far as I can see. Can't move on twitter for fakes.
Click on the tab marked "sales". You'll be re-assured.
Oh I see.
And Lo. It's gone. Melted into the ether like the boos for Boris.
Morning all. I'm more convinced of the change in the air principle today. Its all waiting the other side of the BH weekend. The booing, the mood music, it all leads to a bitter resignation. I know personal anecdotes aren't worth a hill of beans but even family members ive conversed with recently (last 3 days) who have been brexity borisy boosterers are saying his behaviour, the lies, the drift, the shittiness of it all are too much. Theres a sense of scales dropping even from the eyes most reluctant to see. He can go as an unpopular arse or he can cling on and become properly despised. A boogeyman for the century. A scumbag, a scoundrel, a real shit. Go on Wednesday Boris. You get to be a day better than Brown. For the pre pandemic chuckles only you get that. A day better than the Gorgon.
"Culminate. A term from Clausewitz (book 7, chapter 5), an offensive culminates (or reaches its culminating point) when the advantage in strength no longer favors the attacker sufficiently enough to continue pushing forward. Crucially, this does not mean the offensive ends: an attacker may not know their offensive has culminated and may keep ‘pushing’ and achieving nothing for some time. At the same time, the culmination of an offensive operation (see Operations) does not end a war – the attacker may merely rebuild strength (reinforcements, supplies, organization) to push again later, something that is generally termed an ‘operational pause.’"
Wont be a surprise when it becomes clear that RU has culminated in Donbas, Putin calls for a ceasefire and uses it to regroup.
Seems Russian artillery can punch a hole in the Ukrainian defences, but the rest of the Russian forces can't follow up and capitalise. And lose significant men and materials in the process of discovering this. Repeat ad nauseum.
What will change is the kit the Ukrainians have to throw into counter-attacks. The Ukrainians might well agree a ceasefire only when Russian troops are forced back to the border. They might reasonably expect a culmination to change into a rout, when the twentieth Russian forces face twenty-first century hardware. Russian long-range demolition only works if they have the longer reach. When Ukraine has the longer reach, that artillery is getting out of there....
Which is where the longer range missiles for the MLRS system come in. If you can hit a target 100Km plus away, with GPS level accuracy, then opposing artillery is dead. Unless they are very good at distributed shoot and scoot - rather than lining up guns in a row, with a tea tent.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
At least that. What HY and Dorries don't seem to get is that the momentum is building visibly day by day now. This wasn't "they need to act, they keep making excuses why they won't". This is people submitting letters and speaking in openly very critical terms each and every day.
And that was before Parliament broke up for the Lets Boo Boris festival. Tory MPs - even lickspittle worms like Duguid - have gone home. And if he turns up to see his people in Fraserburgh today they aren't going to be saying "good old Boris". When fruitcakes and loonies like Desmond Swayne or Peter Bone go and meet people, they are going to have to be profoundly selective to only hear the "good old Boris" messages they insist are all people are saying.
What they miss is that the more we are assured that everyone in Wellingborough is cheering the boss on, the more we know they are not. Its like their response to the cost of living crisis - deny, patronise, sneer - you can only tell people black is white for so long before they realise it isn't, and then start thinking you are delusional in still saying it is. That is the choice for Tory MPs.
What you don't get is the momentum for change is driven by non Tories like you when only Tories get to decide who the PM is until the next general election. So any opinions of non Tories are irrelevant and the polling is clear most Tory voters and members want Johnson to stay.
Fortunately you are about to find 54+ conservative mps are about to bring your hero crashing down to earth and they have the conservative party's reputation and future in their hands
Each and every one of them are the real conservatives who will ultimately see your hero out of office
They have my full support and are the path to me re-joining the party and campaigning to win the next GE
You can always join RUK or whoever they are as you do seem suited to one another
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls also show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
He should resign as he is unfit for the office he holds and has lost vast swathes of the country
Your argument over alternatives is irrelevant, as he could suffer a serious accident or health issue or worse and would have to be replaced
You obsess over polling, but there are replacements for Boris and no matter there comes a time when one has to do the right thing and that time is now for conservative mps to vote him out of office
Has Boris had a serious accident or health issue? No.
I don't care what Boris has done I only care about maximising the Tory voteshare as a Tory member and unless another Tory leader is shown in polls to have a clear lead over Starmer Labour, which none are, then Boris stays as far as I am concerned. Especially given most alternatives, Hunt, Raab, Patel, Sunak, Gove, Truss etc poll even worse with the voters than Boris anyway now.
If Boris went I would back Ben Wallace or Javid as the only alternatives who poll a bit better but even they as I said do no better than Starmer
Ignore all the other replies to your post HY, they are glib and a bit rude, my reply here actually helps you get it right.
The polling you are referring to - I won’t use strong words like bogus, perhaps fantasy - but don’t reflect the reality of how voters would see someone after they are crowned, after the rigours of the contest, all the oxygen of publicity, authority and backing they would get with the crown. And the ditching of unpopular policies and comical cabinet appointments.
More importantly truth is Boris has the advantage of the crown right now but is polling right down with them not way above them. For Boris, it’s all gone Richard II. To many mistakes made, impression set in stone. No way back.
Surely HY you would think about your leadership vote this summer on something more than a fantasy poll from polling company? You would listen to their programme, how they actually manage the rigours of the contest, the debates, the interviews?
I will go further HY. You are definitely not voting Javid, the polls you quote seem oblivious to the inherent vice of his past tax dodging we may only have a small part of the iceberg. And remember moment he was ambushed by anti vaxxer and was stumped so turned to the medical team for help was so rubbish?
It’s about carrying out due diligence and finding inherent vice isn’t it - so it doesn’t quickly go pair shaped after the initial poll bounce. After that and the crowing your fantasy polls show a different result when it’s all for real. But it’s your own political instinct that has to work out how long the bounce lasts for when the person is PM for real.
No, in my experience hypothetical polls are pretty accurate, as they were for Johnson in 2019, Cameron in 2005 and Major in 1992. Or indeed for Blair in 1994. Polling was also clear in 2015 David Miliband was more electable than Ed and in 2015 Burnham more electable than Corbyn and was correct as was polling in 1997 and 2001 showing Clarke more electable than Hague or IDS.
So on that basis there is little evidence removing Johnson makes a difference and maybe only Wallace would do better. Though of course if Johnson is removed you might even get a harder right PM like Patel or Truss now if they got to the final 2 and told the members what they want to hear, there is no guarantee it would be PM Wallace or Hunt
And with Wallace the public don't really know him yet. His plaudits come from not being an obvious twat and there being wars on in Afghanistan and Ukraine to boost his profile. I would expect he would be an improvement but I very much doubt the broader public have a settled opinion on him.
Does not Wallace have his name underneath the most recent set of army cuts, even if he might blame his predecessor? Whether it matters depends on opponents making an issue of it, of course.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
Brady - and I think your figures are not far out but a rebellion of that size would result in his resignation fairly quickly even if the1922 have to change their rules
It should do. But consider the Thatcher precedent. In her case, it took the Cabinet and a spouse with a hinterland to tell her that the game was up. Which she then had the class to accept.
If Boris wins with a bare majority, or even a decisive one like 187-172, who is there to tell him that it's time to go? Who will be listened to?
One reason Thatcher hesitated was the expressions of support from local parties coming into Downing Street.
The MPs were the ones who removed her. She was still quite popular with the wider party.
Iro earlier posts, hypothetical polling is garbage in that all the unselected and unelected hypotheticals are never actually tested in leadership or at the polls and ousted leaders arent able to navigate a recovery so fools can later cut and paste any old shitty theory they like about 'proof' of correct or incorrect choices. We know nothing of the road not travelled.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
At least that. What HY and Dorries don't seem to get is that the momentum is building visibly day by day now. This wasn't "they need to act, they keep making excuses why they won't". This is people submitting letters and speaking in openly very critical terms each and every day.
And that was before Parliament broke up for the Lets Boo Boris festival. Tory MPs - even lickspittle worms like Duguid - have gone home. And if he turns up to see his people in Fraserburgh today they aren't going to be saying "good old Boris". When fruitcakes and loonies like Desmond Swayne or Peter Bone go and meet people, they are going to have to be profoundly selective to only hear the "good old Boris" messages they insist are all people are saying.
What they miss is that the more we are assured that everyone in Wellingborough is cheering the boss on, the more we know they are not. Its like their response to the cost of living crisis - deny, patronise, sneer - you can only tell people black is white for so long before they realise it isn't, and then start thinking you are delusional in still saying it is. That is the choice for Tory MPs.
What you don't get is the momentum for change is driven by non Tories like you when only Tories get to decide who the PM is until the next general election. So any opinions of non Tories are irrelevant and the polling is clear most Tory voters and members want Johnson to stay.
Fortunately you are about to find 54+ conservative mps are about to bring your hero crashing down to earth and they have the conservative party's reputation and future in their hands
Each and every one of them are the real conservatives who will ultimately see your hero out of office
They have my full support and are the path to me re-joining the party and campaigning to win the next GE
You can always join RUK or whoever they are as you do seem suited to one another
I have campaigned for Major, Hague, IDS, Howard, Cameron, May and Boris in my time, I support whoever the Tory leader is. I have never voted Labour at a general election unlike you either.
However there is no guarantee removing Johnson gets a centrist PM, MPs might put Hunt or Sunak and Patel as the final 2 to members with members voting for Patel, so we get PM Priti and a vote on restoration of the death penalty and an ultra hard asylum policy. Who knows?
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
At least that. What HY and Dorries don't seem to get is that the momentum is building visibly day by day now. This wasn't "they need to act, they keep making excuses why they won't". This is people submitting letters and speaking in openly very critical terms each and every day.
And that was before Parliament broke up for the Lets Boo Boris festival. Tory MPs - even lickspittle worms like Duguid - have gone home. And if he turns up to see his people in Fraserburgh today they aren't going to be saying "good old Boris". When fruitcakes and loonies like Desmond Swayne or Peter Bone go and meet people, they are going to have to be profoundly selective to only hear the "good old Boris" messages they insist are all people are saying.
What they miss is that the more we are assured that everyone in Wellingborough is cheering the boss on, the more we know they are not. Its like their response to the cost of living crisis - deny, patronise, sneer - you can only tell people black is white for so long before they realise it isn't, and then start thinking you are delusional in still saying it is. That is the choice for Tory MPs.
What you don't get is the momentum for change is driven by non Tories like you when only Tories get to decide who the PM is until the next general election. So any opinions of non Tories are irrelevant and the polling is clear most Tory voters and members want Johnson to stay.
Right now its the momentum of MPs that matters. I am not talking about non-Tory voters or even Tory members. Just MPs.
You talk such laughable nonsense with that arrogant haughty tone that only true PC-voting Tories can pull off.
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls also show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
He should resign as he is unfit for the office he holds and has lost vast swathes of the country
Your argument over alternatives is irrelevant, as he could suffer a serious accident or health issue or worse and would have to be replaced
You obsess over polling, but there are replacements for Boris and no matter there comes a time when one has to do the right thing and that time is now for conservative mps to vote him out of office
Has Boris had a serious accident or health issue? No.
I don't care what Boris has done I only care about maximising the Tory voteshare as a Tory member and unless another Tory leader is shown in polls to have a clear lead over Starmer Labour, which none are, then Boris stays as far as I am concerned. Especially given most alternatives, Hunt, Raab, Patel, Sunak, Gove, Truss etc poll even worse with the voters than Boris anyway now.
If Boris went I would back Ben Wallace or Javid as the only alternatives who poll a bit better but even they as I said do no better than Starmer
Ignore all the other replies to your post HY, they are glib and a bit rude, my reply here actually helps you get it right.
The polling you are referring to - I won’t use strong words like bogus, perhaps fantasy - but don’t reflect the reality of how voters would see someone after they are crowned, after the rigours of the contest, all the oxygen of publicity, authority and backing they would get with the crown. And the ditching of unpopular policies and comical cabinet appointments.
More importantly truth is Boris has the advantage of the crown right now but is polling right down with them not way above them. For Boris, it’s all gone Richard II. To many mistakes made, impression set in stone. No way back.
Surely HY you would think about your leadership vote this summer on something more than a fantasy poll from polling company? You would listen to their programme, how they actually manage the rigours of the contest, the debates, the interviews?
I will go further HY. You are definitely not voting Javid, the polls you quote seem oblivious to the inherent vice of his past tax dodging we may only have a small part of the iceberg. And remember moment he was ambushed by anti vaxxer and was stumped so turned to the medical team for help was so rubbish?
It’s about carrying out due diligence and finding inherent vice isn’t it - so it doesn’t quickly go pair shaped after the initial poll bounce. After that and the crowing your fantasy polls show a different result when it’s all for real. But it’s your own political instinct that has to work out how long the bounce lasts for when the person is PM for real.
No, in my experience hypothetical polls are pretty accurate, as they were for Johnson in 2019, Cameron in 2005 and Major in 1992. Or indeed for Blair in 1994. Polling was also clear in 2015 David Miliband was more electable than Ed and in 2015 Burnham more electable than Corbyn and was correct as was polling in 1997 and 2001 showing Clarke more electable than Hague or IDS.
So on that basis there is little evidence removing Johnson makes a difference and maybe only Wallace would do better. Though of course if Johnson is removed you might even get a harder right PM like Patel or Truss now if they got to the final 2 and told the members what they want to hear, there is no guarantee it would be PM Wallace or Hunt
And with Wallace the public don't really know him yet. His plaudits come from not being an obvious twat and there being wars on in Afghanistan and Ukraine to boost his profile. I would expect he would be an improvement but I very much doubt the broader public have a settled opinion on him.
Does not Wallace have his name underneath the most recent set of army cuts, even if he might blame his predecessor? Whether it matters depends on opponents making an issue of it, of course.
The voting public don't give a shit about defence cuts as longs as "cap badges", the Red Arrows, BoBMF, etc. survive.
Another beautiful Buchan morning! Have to giggle somewhat at the deliberate manipulation of the news by the Tory BBC News managers and how quickly it got pulled apart.
When their own reporting team are broadcasting live and comment on the booing with "wow" and "I wasn't expecting that" its rather difficult to just edit the entire episode out as if it didn't happen. Because it did happen and we heard your channel report it.
When he has gone and all he is focused on is how many Churchill books he needs to right to pay off Carrie's divorce settlement there needs to be a clearout of the BBC top brass.
Yet Tory ministers seem convinced the Beeb is packed full of lefties who hate them and undermine them all the time.
BBC1 has definitely tacked to the right over the last year under new direction. That's evident not just in how things are reported, but what is selected to be reported. Quite a lot of stories damaging to the government have either been ignored or skated over. Newsnight's output is still more critical (in the right sense of the word - analytical), though I'm not sure how long that will last.
I don't think it's tacking to the right it's losing it's nerve. It's not a good place for the BBC to be but they are left with little choice. For those old enough to remember Thatcher did the same. In fact she was worse. She changed the DG and seriously emasculated the organisation
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
Brady - and I think your figures are not far out but a rebellion of that size would result in his resignation fairly quickly even if the1922 have to change their rules
It should do. But consider the Thatcher precedent. In her case, it took the Cabinet and a spouse with a hinterland to tell her that the game was up. Which she then had the class to accept.
If Boris wins with a bare majority, or even a decisive one like 187-172, who is there to tell him that it's time to go? Who will be listened to?
One reason Thatcher hesitated was the expressions of support from local parties coming into Downing Street.
The MPs were the ones who removed her. She was still quite popular with the wider party.
Johnson cannot count on that, I think.
Telegraph reported yesterday he has lost the grass root constituencies
They should at least get a Jimmy Savile impersonator to announce this.
I learned recently that ‘nonce’ is an acronym. It comes from Wakefield Prison. For their own safety, child sex offenders aren’t allowed mix with the general prison population, so their cells were marked ‘Not on normal courtyard exercise’.
If Boris resigned would England bat any better? Probably not*. Would the government have a radical change in direction? Almost certainly not. Would Ukraine suddenly go better? Very probably not, possibly the reverse. Would we have a less severe cost of living crisis? Nope.
I think we are a point when Boris needs to just soak up some of the vitriol and grumpiness for a while. The Tories will probably need to change leader before the next election, but as Saint Augustine would say, not yet.
* of course if I was wrong about this he should certainly resign today.
The answer to a radical change of direction surely depends who they go for?
A Hunt Tugenhat type is a radical change back to Cameron conservatism. A Patel Dorries type is further radical change down the authoritarian path. A Javid/Zahawi/Barclay/Wallace is a march back from spin to competence. Raab gives us neither the spin nor the competence. God knows what we get from Truss.
Sunak and Gove seem the only ones to keep us on a similar political path.
I think that you are seriously overestimating the government's room for manouver. A recession is now built in, spaffing more cash will make little difference in the short run and may do even more damage in the medium term. Inflation will fall but to a much higher base than we have been used to or are comfortable with. Strikes are going to be endemic, particularly in the public sector. The majority are going to find that they have to tighten their belts way more than we are used to. There is nothing that can be done about this, even if government suddenly got competent. By next summer there may be more options and choices available but right now a new leader is simply going to be tarnished with all this.
Governments are not all about economics. Stuff like how independent will the judiciary be, how do we talk about our neighbours and ourselves, is the BBC public or private, emphasis given to the environment vs health and wellbeing vs economy all matter too. Even on the economics, whilst the govt can do little to alleviate the short term pain (and what they can do they probably have to even if they instinctively don't want to a la Sunak), how we plan for the next couple of decades is really important as the world is going to change faster than anytime in our lifetimes over that period.
Exactly. A government that believed in Parliamentary democracy and the rule of law would be a major step-up from the one we have currently, whatever the economics. I am not sure any realistic replacement for Johnson would deliver that, though. That’s how low the Conservative party has sunk.
It isn't for government to believe or disbelieve in Parliamentary democracy. That is Parliament's job. If it doesn't do it no-one else can. Parliament, not government is our supreme authority. If we don't like the one we have we have regular chances to change it.
The rule of law is of course enforced by our court system and the massive structure of civil and criminal law which is highly developed in this country. Government's job is to obey its demands and be accountable to it. Government, in many forms, is in court every sitting day doing exactly that.
The government can change the rules. I totally agree that this one is doing so with the aid of Conservative MPs. Hence my final point.
Why would Johnson step aside? He is the leader who won the Conservatives their biggest general election win since Thatcher in 2019 nobody else.
There is also no clear alternative, polls show every other potential alternative Tory leader polls worse with the public than Johnson apart from Wallace and Javid but even they poll no better than Starmer.
This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't, nor is it 2019 either when Boris led Corbyn in polls but May didn't
Why? 1. Morality. He could wake up one morning having been visited by the holy ghost who had shown him that lying and cheating and criminality are Bad. Repent and the kingdom of Heaven will be yours and all that. 2. Because he has been handed the pearl-handled revolver as happened to Thatcher and IDS and May before him. Not everyone in the party is a pliable lickspittle like your good self - they have a string track record of removing failures. 3. Because he loses the no confidence vote, or wins it so narrowly that the "its all over, lets move on" please from intellectual heavyweights like Simon Clarke fall flat on their face.
Its true that there is no obvious successor now. Nor was there in 1990 (please linky a poll before Howe resigned showing that Major would win the election). That doesn't mean that good people carry on supporting bad people, bad policies and misbehaviour. I know your personal support remains for the lying crook, but you aren't most Tory voters - how many of them voted Plaid Cymru...?
Polling in November 1990 showed both Major and Heseltine leading Kinnock Labour and that was BEFORE the first ballot against Thatcher.
There is no such polling now showing any alternative Tory leader leading Starmer Labour
Would appreciate you posting links. This is an interesting point in political history, and having studied this only a few years after doing A-level politics I do not remember that at all.
A November 1990 Harris poll had, for example, the Conservatives leading Kinnock Labour by 10% under Heseltine, 7% under Major and 4% under Hurd. That at a time they trailed under Thatcher.
Before the first ballot too a Mail poll had the Thatcher led Tories trailing Kinnock Labour in key marginal seats that would all be saved if Heseltine became Tory leader.
There is no such polling showing Hunt, Sunak, Patel, Truss, Raab, Wallace etc leading Starmer Labour now
Laughable. You're taking polls done *during* the leadership contest of the declared candidates. Whereas upthread you said: "This is not 1990 when Major and Heseltine led Kinnock in polls but Thatcher didn't". But Thatcher wasn't in these polls. As she had withdrawn. So once again you are talking utter tosh.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
At least that. What HY and Dorries don't seem to get is that the momentum is building visibly day by day now. This wasn't "they need to act, they keep making excuses why they won't". This is people submitting letters and speaking in openly very critical terms each and every day.
And that was before Parliament broke up for the Lets Boo Boris festival. Tory MPs - even lickspittle worms like Duguid - have gone home. And if he turns up to see his people in Fraserburgh today they aren't going to be saying "good old Boris". When fruitcakes and loonies like Desmond Swayne or Peter Bone go and meet people, they are going to have to be profoundly selective to only hear the "good old Boris" messages they insist are all people are saying.
What they miss is that the more we are assured that everyone in Wellingborough is cheering the boss on, the more we know they are not. Its like their response to the cost of living crisis - deny, patronise, sneer - you can only tell people black is white for so long before they realise it isn't, and then start thinking you are delusional in still saying it is. That is the choice for Tory MPs.
What you don't get is the momentum for change is driven by non Tories like you when only Tories get to decide who the PM is until the next general election. So any opinions of non Tories are irrelevant and the polling is clear most Tory voters and members want Johnson to stay.
Fortunately you are about to find 54+ conservative mps are about to bring your hero crashing down to earth and they have the conservative party's reputation and future in their hands
Each and every one of them are the real conservatives who will ultimately see your hero out of office
They have my full support and are the path to me re-joining the party and campaigning to win the next GE
You can always join RUK or whoever they are as you do seem suited to one another
I have campaigned for Major, Hague, IDS, Howard, Cameron, May and Boris in my time, I support whoever the Tory leader is. I have never voted Labour at a general election unlike you either.
However there is no guarantee removing Johnson gets a centrist PM, MPs might put Hunt or Sunak and Patel as the final 2 to members with members voting for Patel, so we get PM Priti and a vote on restoration of the death penalty and an ultra hard asylum policy. Who knows?
They should at least get a Jimmy Savile impersonator to announce this.
I learned recently that ‘nonce’ is an acronym. It comes from Wakefield Prison. For their own safety, child sex offenders aren’t allowed mix with the general prison population, so their cells were marked ‘Not on normal courtyard exercise’.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
At least that. What HY and Dorries don't seem to get is that the momentum is building visibly day by day now. This wasn't "they need to act, they keep making excuses why they won't". This is people submitting letters and speaking in openly very critical terms each and every day.
And that was before Parliament broke up for the Lets Boo Boris festival. Tory MPs - even lickspittle worms like Duguid - have gone home. And if he turns up to see his people in Fraserburgh today they aren't going to be saying "good old Boris". When fruitcakes and loonies like Desmond Swayne or Peter Bone go and meet people, they are going to have to be profoundly selective to only hear the "good old Boris" messages they insist are all people are saying.
What they miss is that the more we are assured that everyone in Wellingborough is cheering the boss on, the more we know they are not. Its like their response to the cost of living crisis - deny, patronise, sneer - you can only tell people black is white for so long before they realise it isn't, and then start thinking you are delusional in still saying it is. That is the choice for Tory MPs.
What you don't get is the momentum for change is driven by non Tories like you when only Tories get to decide who the PM is until the next general election. So any opinions of non Tories are irrelevant and the polling is clear most Tory voters and members want Johnson to stay.
Fortunately you are about to find 54+ conservative mps are about to bring your hero crashing down to earth and they have the conservative party's reputation and future in their hands
Each and every one of them are the real conservatives who will ultimately see your hero out of office
They have my full support and are the path to me re-joining the party and campaigning to win the next GE
You can always join RUK or whoever they are as you do seem suited to one another
I have campaigned for Major, Hague, IDS, Howard, Cameron, May and Boris in my time, I support whoever the Tory leader is. I have never voted Labour at a general election unlike you either.
However there is no guarantee removing Johnson gets a centrist PM, MPs might put Hunt or Sunak and Patel as the final 2 to members with members voting for Patel, so we get PM Priti and a vote on restoration of the death penalty and an ultra hard asylum policy. Who knows?
You voted Plaid
Can we not forgive HYUFD and forget one bizarre youthful incident?
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
Brady - and I think your figures are not far out but a rebellion of that size would result in his resignation fairly quickly even if the1922 have to change their rules
It should do. But consider the Thatcher precedent. In her case, it took the Cabinet and a spouse with a hinterland to tell her that the game was up. Which she then had the class to accept.
If Boris wins with a bare majority, or even a decisive one like 187-172, who is there to tell him that it's time to go? Who will be listened to?
One reason Thatcher hesitated was the expressions of support from local parties coming into Downing Street.
The MPs were the ones who removed her. She was still quite popular with the wider party.
Johnson cannot count on that, I think.
Telegraph reported yesterday he has lost the grass root constituencies
It's more significant if Boris has lost The Telegraph. Partly for the ongoing brouhaha, but also for BoJo's value post-Premiership. If he becomes less popular as he hangs on, that's going to cost him.
They should at least get a Jimmy Savile impersonator to announce this.
I learned recently that ‘nonce’ is an acronym. It comes from Wakefield Prison. For their own safety, child sex offenders aren’t allowed mix with the general prison population, so their cells were marked ‘Not on normal courtyard exercise’.
Betting question - is there a market for the the number of votes against Johnson, if Grady gets the letters?
My guess is that there will be double the number letters as votes against, as a floor. That is, if Grady gets 54 letters, it will be 110 votes against. Minimum.
At least that. What HY and Dorries don't seem to get is that the momentum is building visibly day by day now. This wasn't "they need to act, they keep making excuses why they won't". This is people submitting letters and speaking in openly very critical terms each and every day.
And that was before Parliament broke up for the Lets Boo Boris festival. Tory MPs - even lickspittle worms like Duguid - have gone home. And if he turns up to see his people in Fraserburgh today they aren't going to be saying "good old Boris". When fruitcakes and loonies like Desmond Swayne or Peter Bone go and meet people, they are going to have to be profoundly selective to only hear the "good old Boris" messages they insist are all people are saying.
What they miss is that the more we are assured that everyone in Wellingborough is cheering the boss on, the more we know they are not. Its like their response to the cost of living crisis - deny, patronise, sneer - you can only tell people black is white for so long before they realise it isn't, and then start thinking you are delusional in still saying it is. That is the choice for Tory MPs.
What you don't get is the momentum for change is driven by non Tories like you when only Tories get to decide who the PM is until the next general election. So any opinions of non Tories are irrelevant and the polling is clear most Tory voters and members want Johnson to stay.
Fortunately you are about to find 54+ conservative mps are about to bring your hero crashing down to earth and they have the conservative party's reputation and future in their hands
Each and every one of them are the real conservatives who will ultimately see your hero out of office
They have my full support and are the path to me re-joining the party and campaigning to win the next GE
You can always join RUK or whoever they are as you do seem suited to one another
However there is no guarantee removing Johnson gets a centrist PM, MPs might put Hunt or Sunak and Patel as the final 2 to members with members voting for Patel, so we get PM Priti and a vote on restoration of the death penalty and an ultra hard asylum policy. Who knows?
PM Priti would be relatively benign. She might want to transform the country into something similar to that depicted in Jack London's "Iron Heel" but she so's staggeringly incompetent she wouldn't be able to realise any of her authoritarian fantasies.
Comments
I think we are a point when Boris needs to just soak up some of the vitriol and grumpiness for a while. The Tories will probably need to change leader before the next election, but as Saint Augustine would say, not yet.
* of course if I was wrong about this he should certainly resign today.
Learn something every day on here!
The worst thing the family can do, again IIRC, is to move an elderly resident from one care setting to another.
“Given that it looks as though Tory MPs are waiting till after the June 23rd by elections to happen”
Apologise for being controversial, but what have you seen and hear Mike that makes you say that with such confidence? I can’t find any evidence they are waiting, the impression I have is it’s out of control, out of control in the sense of they can submit letters quietly but they seem to want the world to know they are are distancing themselves from Boris.
My idea is if they wanted extra votes to perhaps squeak over a line, waiting for by election losses could be that. But it might not be as coordinated as your “ Given that it looks as though Tory MPs are waiting till after the June 23rd by elections to happen” statement, it’s more having reflected on things since not just the Gray Report but Boris appalling reaction to it, such as his unconvincing interview with mumsnet that’s the driving it. Besides, if Boris MPs still want Boris, they will point to by election losses mid term that are won back at generals elections, so no big deal wouldn’t they?.
Very impressive from Ian Byrne MP in the debate.
So the anti Johnsonites can whinge as much as they want but only Tory Mzps and Tory members like me get to choose our PM until the next general election in 2024 thanks to the Tory landslide of 2019 and Johnson will not be removed unless clear polling evidence of an alternative leader leading Starmer, which there isn't.
Hunt is a former Foreign Secretary, Truss is Foreign Secretary, Patel is Home Secretary the idea the public don't know who the top ranked Tories are beyond Johnson is a pathetic excuse
It's a good half mile between the station entrances. That's 15 minutes but only between the station entrances. Then you have to add in the time to get through the barriers at New Street and then up to the station entrance, which in my experience can be quite a long time, and then quite a bit of time again at Curzon Street. Any sane person is going to allow themselves at least 30 minutes to get across town in total. Probably a bit more if you're in possession of an HS2 ticket costing an arm and a leg and want to make sure you're not going to have a sliding doors moment.... I said 30 minutes but it could be more.
And even now it's only 1 hour 23 minutes from New Street to Euston. Check the timetable. Probably 1 hour 20 minutes or less by the 2030s with the next generation of trains.* So that's a 35 minute difference between the claimed 45 minute HS2 journey time (which might yet prove to be as unreliable as their financial claims).
So that's 5 minutes saving, at most, at the the cost of the effort and stress of having to leg it across town and pay a lot more for the privilege.
*Edit. I am a tad reluctant to accept your point that the people of Wolverhampton should learn to live with crap slower trains replacing their current fast trains, as the price of bailing out HS2.
A Hunt Tugenhat type is a radical change back to Cameron conservatism.
A Patel Dorries type is further radical change down the authoritarian path.
A Javid/Zahawi/Barclay/Wallace is a march back from spin to competence.
Raab gives us neither the spin nor the competence.
God knows what we get from Truss.
Sunak and Gove seem the only ones to keep us on a similar political path.
If Boris wins with a bare majority, or even a decisive one like 187-172, who is there to tell him that it's time to go? Who will be listened to?
I just want to throw my arms around her and give her a big hug like she’s my own Nan.
In 1990 you wouldn't be asking people favourability questions because that would cost the modern equivalent of £2-4000 a question...
By next summer there may be more options and choices available but right now a new leader is simply going to be tarnished with all this.
What will change is the kit the Ukrainians have to throw into counter-attacks. The Ukrainians might well agree a ceasefire only when Russian troops are forced back to the border. They might reasonably expect a culmination to change into a rout, when the twentieth Russian forces face twenty-first century hardware. Russian long-range demolition only works if they have the longer reach. When Ukraine has the longer reach, that artillery is getting out of there....
If she's still around.
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-11-25-mn-7462-story.html.
Before the first ballot too a Mail poll had the Thatcher led Tories trailing Kinnock Labour in key marginal seats that would all be saved if Heseltine became Tory leader.
https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/opinion/columnists/richard-heller-how-i-helped-stir-mps-rebellion-ended-era-1867352
There is no such polling showing Hunt, Sunak, Patel, Truss, Raab, Wallace etc leading Starmer Labour now
The trouble in the case is the quantity of toxins Johnson is excreting himself. Leave him in place for another year and the situation may well be beyond repair.
On Saturday, Tory party strategists were also buoyed by the performance of the London stock exchange, which soared at Friday’s close because of hopes for closer British cooperation with Europe as the Thatcher era ends.
British investors were expressing confidence that either Heseltine, 57, Hurd, 60, or Major, 47, would be good news for business and would forge better ties with Europe and reduce interest rates.
Macron is now blaming it on ‘social media’
No, me neither
https://twitter.com/f_desouche/status/1533021680200720384?s=21&t=StVnzHhUdx1F6bmMYQskFA
As for New Street, I use it regularly. Three minutes max to get out. And the same the other end, and trains will be leaving for London every 4-5 minutes so there’s no need to worry about timings.
If you’d looked below you would have seen I addressed the point about slower trains. I’m not sure tbh how even if they were slower that would be worse than the appalling delays New Street and the WCML south of Rugby cause now.
I think your post says more about your reflexive dislike of HS2 than anything else.
The polling you are referring to - I won’t use strong words like bogus, perhaps fantasy - but don’t reflect the reality of how voters would see someone after they are crowned, after the rigours of the contest, all the oxygen of publicity, authority and backing they would get with the crown. And the ditching of unpopular policies and comical cabinet appointments.
More importantly truth is Boris has the advantage of the crown right now but is polling right down with them not way above them. For Boris, it’s all gone Richard II. To many mistakes made, impression set in stone. No way back.
Surely HY you would think about your leadership vote this summer on something more than a fantasy poll from polling company? You would listen to their programme, how they actually manage the rigours of the contest, the debates, the interviews?
I will go further HY. You are definitely not voting Javid, the polls you quote seem oblivious to the inherent vice of his past tax dodging we may only have a small part of the iceberg. And remember moment he was ambushed by anti vaxxer and was stumped so turned to the medical team for help was so rubbish?
It’s about carrying out due diligence and finding inherent vice isn’t it - so it doesn’t quickly go pair shaped after the initial poll bounce. After that and the crowing your fantasy polls show a different result when it’s all for real. But it’s your own political instinct that has to work out how long the bounce lasts for when the person is PM for real.
You'll be re-assured.
So on that basis there is little evidence removing Johnson makes a difference and maybe only Wallace would do better. Though of course if Johnson is removed you might even get a harder right PM like Patel or Truss or Raab now if they got to the final 2 and told the members what they want to hear, there is no guarantee it would be PM Wallace or Hunt or Sunak
The rule of law is of course enforced by our court system and the massive structure of civil and criminal law which is highly developed in this country. Government's job is to obey its demands and be accountable to it. Government, in many forms, is in court every sitting day doing exactly that.
Melted into the ether like the boos for Boris.
He can go as an unpopular arse or he can cling on and become properly despised. A boogeyman for the century. A scumbag, a scoundrel, a real shit.
Go on Wednesday Boris. You get to be a day better than Brown. For the pre pandemic chuckles only you get that. A day better than the Gorgon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86Bq4FzSSIE
Each and every one of them are the real conservatives who will ultimately see your hero out of office
They have my full support and are the path to me re-joining the party and campaigning to win the next GE
You can always join RUK or whoever they are as you do seem suited to one another
https://twitter.com/stephenblanchar/status/1532957354832044033/photo/1
The MPs were the ones who removed her. She was still quite popular with the wider party.
Johnson cannot count on that, I think.
We know nothing of the road not travelled.
However there is no guarantee removing Johnson gets a centrist PM, MPs might put Hunt or Sunak and Patel as the final 2 to members with members voting for Patel, so we get PM Priti and a vote on restoration of the death penalty and an ultra hard asylum policy. Who knows?
You talk such laughable nonsense with that arrogant haughty tone that only true PC-voting Tories can pull off.
Outstanding analysis of where we are now
Ref Alasdaire Milne
Trafalgar Square evacuated
Every day’s a school day.