None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
The Palace of Westminster will need to be repaired whether or not it remains the home of Parliament.
A permanent move to another city doesn't take away the need to repair the existing buildings
Why would it need to be repaired if it's no longer home of Parliament.
But the cost of repairing an empty building is X or Y times cheaper than doing repairs when the building is being used.
Because it is a major historic landmark. It is iconic and an important part of our national heritage.
The idea of it being allowed to slowly disintegrate or even be demolished would be cultural vandalism
As Andrea Leadsome said in a recent article about the refurb (and she is in charge of it) “the Houses of Parliament is one of the most famous buildings in the world, like the Taj Mahal, it is also a World Heritage site, it belongs to humanity, but it is our job to look after it, however awkward”
Hard to argue with that
If you compile a list of the ten most iconic, instantly recognisable buildings in the world Westminster is on there
Rough list:
Pyramids Parthenon Tower of Pisa Taj Mahal Empire State Bldg Eiffel Tower Palace of Westminster Sydney Opera House Burj
Number ten can be disputed between Stonehenge, Statue of Liberty, The Pantheon, Hagia Sophia, Gobekli Tepe (should be top of the top ten really), Notre Dame, St Basil’s Cathedral, et al, depending on your definition of “building”
No Colloseum?!
Good one, yes. Clean forgot. That’s the tenth
The White House? I know it isn't exactly imposing, but still...
The White House isn't even in the top two most significant landmarks in its own country. Both the Statue of Liberty and Golden Gate Bridge are surely higher.
Neither of them are buildings, are they?
Although the Eiffel Tower isn't really a building either, being pedantic.
Yeah, if you're restricting yourself to buildings, the Eiffel Tower has to go, and Stonehenge wouldn't qualify either.
She has more ministerial experience than either Cameron or Blair had when they became PM. She is slightly younger than Cameron was and a bit younger than Blair.
Is it because she’s a woman she’s “inexperienced”, or because she isn’t Public School / Oxford educated?
That's extremely misleading. Cameron didn't have ministerial experience, of course, but he had (with Osborne) oodles of experience at the centre of events as a SPAD, and he had five years of LOTO experience before becoming PM. He'd also surrounded himself with an excellent team which spent a lot of effort learning about how to do government. He was extremely well prepared for office, as was Blair, who also spent his time as a shadow minister and then LOTO very wisely.
That's completely different from being catapulted into the PM position from a minor role whilst the party is in government.
Yeah. LOTO has far more in common with being PM than running a major ministry imo.
None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
The Palace of Westminster will need to be repaired whether or not it remains the home of Parliament.
A permanent move to another city doesn't take away the need to repair the existing buildings
Why would it need to be repaired if it's no longer home of Parliament.
But the cost of repairing an empty building is X or Y times cheaper than doing repairs when the building is being used.
Because it is a major historic landmark. It is iconic and an important part of our national heritage.
The idea of it being allowed to slowly disintegrate or even be demolished would be cultural vandalism
Currently the Government is trying to avoid spending £2bn future proofing the Manchester end of HS2..
Agreed.
I wonder what would be the cost of preservation if it were empty, and Parliament moved elsewhere ? I would guess you could easily halve that £22bn, even allowing for creating a modern replacement. (which would also be far cheaper to run and easier to work in).
Why don’t they just move to County Hall for a decade: that is a large, noble and dignified building, within eyesight of the Palace of W, right opposite on the river, meaning there would be minimal need for shifting things apart from people
For a few million they could literally rebuild the green benches inside, if that’s what they want
Isn't it a hotel now (Marriott?).
And an aquarium. But I’m sure a hundred mill would entice them to leave
The sums being bruited about in terms of revamping the Houses of P are so insane £100m seems like peanuts
Like you I find them hard to believe, and I am sure it would be cheaper if they just moved everyone out for 10 years
County Hall is a good idea. Which means they won't do it and it will be a shambles for the next decade.
Edit: or, if they get a particularly free market free-marketeer they could have "The Houses of Parliament. Brought to you by The Marriott Group".
While there's been much focus on Kemi's views on wokeness and the trans issues, there's been less focus on her promise to abandon net zero, roll back the state, cut education expenditure and so on.
I can see her winning the Tory membership over. I'm less persuaded that abandoning net zero and rolling back the state so drastically will win over the typical floating voter.
I am completely unpersuaded that someone with so little senior ministerial experience will win. She stood in order to get a Cabinet post, not to win. It will be easy for a Sunak or a Truss to say, "The UK is facing many big challenges, you need someone with experience."
If the Right want a better candidate than Truss (and Truss seems terrible to me), then I suggest they work out who it is quickly, but they pick someone a bit more senior!
Assuming he does win the vote (which he won't), how does it actually achieve his aim of getting a new PM more quickly?
In the same way that Callaghan remained as PM after he lost the VONC in 1979, Johnson would remain as PM.
The process to elect a new leader of the Conservative Party is already underway and any general election, the timing of which would still be set by the current administration and so would see a polling date set for later in September.
So nothing in his cunning plan would achieve the result he seeks. Who is advising Starmer???
He wants all the Tories who so openly and publicly blew up Johnson to give him their confidence. That's all. Will look great on a leaflet apparently.
They wouldn't be. They would be giving confidence to the governing party.
Nope. Every leaflet will have the MP and all the quotes where they have supported the crook.
So it's nothing more than playing party politics?
I am shocked, shocked, to discover politics going on in the Houses of Parliament.
Indeed. If the parties were reversed, all the lefties would be denouncing the Tories for doing it...
While there's been much focus on Kemi's views on wokeness and the trans issues, there's been less focus on her promise to abandon net zero, roll back the state, cut education expenditure and so on.
I can see her winning the Tory membership over. I'm less persuaded that abandoning net zero and rolling back the state so drastically will win over the typical floating voter.
I want the Tories removed a long long way from office. Whichever candidate they select as PM. But it is encouraging to think that people like Badenoch can actually be a serious contender for *the Tories*.
The threat to Labour is simple. She is far more confident, articulate and sane that so many of the various prominent BAME equivalents are in Labour. A black woman who is a successful migrant saying lets cut the crap and focus on people's priorities goes way beyond what Labour can offer.
And all that despite not ever having benefited from a single quota or "all-X" shortlist, eh?
She is benefitting from a (mostly) idiots shortlist at present.
While there's been much focus on Kemi's views on wokeness and the trans issues, there's been less focus on her promise to abandon net zero, roll back the state, cut education expenditure and so on.
I can see her winning the Tory membership over. I'm less persuaded that abandoning net zero and rolling back the state so drastically will win over the typical floating voter.
I think her Net Zero position is that it needs to be in lock-step with other major economies otherwise it has little effect on climate but severely damages UK. That is a realistic, numerate analysis.
It's not - we could use a sprint to Net Zero to build up expertise and skills we can use around the world in the post net zero future.
Our current problem is a lack of productivity - one source of productivity comes from world class knowledge which allows us to do things better than others.
There is also the disruptive effect - the transition to electric cars offers a chance to kick the existing car manufactures off their thrones, for example.
You want to cry? When the remake of the Italian Job was made in 2003, some of the minis were converted to electric drive (fumes in tunnels issue), by the custom auto-electrifiers in LA. The resulting cars had astonishing performance and fair bit of range - being custom, they cost a lot. The makers of the Mini were offered a chance to look at the result - they refused on the grounds that electric cars weren't interesting....
The gliders fro the original Tesla Roadsters were made by Lotus. When it was suggested, internally, that Lotus launch it's own electric sports car using the knowledge gained the people who suggested it were asked to leave the company. Now, https://www.lotuscars.com/en-GB/evija/
None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
The Palace of Westminster will need to be repaired whether or not it remains the home of Parliament.
A permanent move to another city doesn't take away the need to repair the existing buildings
Why would it need to be repaired if it's no longer home of Parliament.
But the cost of repairing an empty building is X or Y times cheaper than doing repairs when the building is being used.
Because it is a major historic landmark. It is iconic and an important part of our national heritage.
The idea of it being allowed to slowly disintegrate or even be demolished would be cultural vandalism
As Andrea Leadsome said in a recent article about the refurb (and she is in charge of it) “the Houses of Parliament is one of the most famous buildings in the world, like the Taj Mahal, it is also a World Heritage site, it belongs to humanity, but it is our job to look after it, however awkward”
Hard to argue with that
If you compile a list of the ten most iconic, instantly recognisable buildings in the world Westminster is on there
Rough list:
Pyramids Parthenon Tower of Pisa Taj Mahal Empire State Bldg Eiffel Tower Palace of Westminster Sydney Opera House Burj
Number ten can be disputed between Stonehenge, Statue of Liberty, The Pantheon, Hagia Sophia, Gobekli Tepe (should be top of the top ten really), Notre Dame, St Basil’s Cathedral, et al, depending on your definition of “building”
No Colloseum?!
Good one, yes. Clean forgot. That’s the tenth
The White House? I know it isn't exactly imposing, but still...
The White House isn't even in the top two most significant landmarks in its own country. Both the Statue of Liberty and Golden Gate Bridge are surely higher.
Neither of them are buildings, are they?
Although the Eiffel Tower isn't really a building either, being pedantic.
As for Westminster - there was a huge scandal over crap building stone being used in it which deteriorated absurdly quickly. I forget the details but geologists were called in and the exterior all had to be replaced IIRC.
Assuming he does win the vote (which he won't), how does it actually achieve his aim of getting a new PM more quickly?
In the same way that Callaghan remained as PM after he lost the VONC in 1979, Johnson would remain as PM.
The process to elect a new leader of the Conservative Party is already underway and any general election, the timing of which would still be set by the current administration and so would see a polling date set for later in September.
So nothing in his cunning plan would achieve the result he seeks. Who is advising Starmer???
He wants all the Tories who so openly and publicly blew up Johnson to give him their confidence. That's all. Will look great on a leaflet apparently.
They wouldn't be. They would be giving confidence to the governing party.
Nope. Every leaflet will have the MP and all the quotes where they have supported the crook.
So it's nothing more than playing party politics?
I am shocked, shocked, to discover politics going on in the Houses of Parliament.
Indeed. If the parties were reversed, all the lefties would be denouncing the Tories for doing it...
While there's been much focus on Kemi's views on wokeness and the trans issues, there's been less focus on her promise to abandon net zero, roll back the state, cut education expenditure and so on.
I can see her winning the Tory membership over. I'm less persuaded that abandoning net zero and rolling back the state so drastically will win over the typical floating voter.
I want the Tories removed a long long way from office. Whichever candidate they select as PM. But it is encouraging to think that people like Badenoch can actually be a serious contender for *the Tories*.
The threat to Labour is simple. She is far more confident, articulate and sane that so many of the various prominent BAME equivalents are in Labour. A black woman who is a successful migrant saying lets cut the crap and focus on people's priorities goes way beyond what Labour can offer.
And all that despite not ever having benefited from a single quota or "all-X" shortlist, eh?
That's not really true. She benefited from the Cameron era policy of boosting candidates from minority groups, a policy which was extremely successful incidentally even if attacked at the time by trad Tories.
Right, but that was much more about expanding the funnel into the pipeline rather than fiddling the pipeline itself, wasn't it?
The interesting thing is she is going for the “I have integrity, this is what I believe and what I want to do. You might disagree with it but I’ll be honest with you” angle. Which no-one has really tried to play since Thatcher.
A curious tactic in the internet age, where spin and media relations is all pervasive. But possibly another reason why people are finding her refreshing.
Corbyn played it and did quite well in 2017.
A good point Nick. Though that came unstuck in 2019. The opponent made the difference there, I think.
The formerly normal aspiration to settle and start a family is out of reach for swathes of young people. A fundamental compact between conservative principles, and the party that is supposed to represent them, has been broken.
Britain tends to think of itself as an equal partner to countries such as France, the Netherlands and Germany in terms of incomes and living standards. This is a collective fantasy, which hasn’t been true for well over a decade. The reality shouldn’t be shocking, yet it remains so: Britain’s incomes and living standards have fallen far behind what were its peer nations only 15 years ago. “Across European countries, only households in Greece and Cyprus saw a worse performance between 2007 and 2018 than the UK,” found the Resolution Foundation.
Because the reality is that Britain’s national religion is no longer Anglican Christianity. It isn’t even the NHS. It is Pensionerism. Britain is a care home with a navy.
Yet all attempts to reform this growth-killing inequity end in failure, such is the strength of the homeowner-pensioner lobby.
Without Brexit to focus on, the Government has lost its sense of purpose. The next leader must be a strategist, cerebral, and yet still a salesman. Someone who recognises that there’s more to winning than winning itself, and declinist managerialism — that a far greater prize is changing peoples’ lives and your country, for the better.
None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
The Palace of Westminster will need to be repaired whether or not it remains the home of Parliament.
A permanent move to another city doesn't take away the need to repair the existing buildings
Why would it need to be repaired if it's no longer home of Parliament.
But the cost of repairing an empty building is X or Y times cheaper than doing repairs when the building is being used.
Because it is a major historic landmark. It is iconic and an important part of our national heritage.
The idea of it being allowed to slowly disintegrate or even be demolished would be cultural vandalism
As Andrea Leadsome said in a recent article about the refurb (and she is in charge of it) “the Houses of Parliament is one of the most famous buildings in the world, like the Taj Mahal, it is also a World Heritage site, it belongs to humanity, but it is our job to look after it, however awkward”
Hard to argue with that
If you compile a list of the ten most iconic, instantly recognisable buildings in the world Westminster is on there
Rough list:
Pyramids Parthenon Tower of Pisa Taj Mahal Empire State Bldg Eiffel Tower Palace of Westminster Sydney Opera House Burj
Number ten can be disputed between Stonehenge, Statue of Liberty, The Pantheon, Hagia Sophia, Gobekli Tepe (should be top of the top ten really), Notre Dame, St Basil’s Cathedral, et al, depending on your definition of “building”
No Colloseum?!
Good one, yes. Clean forgot. That’s the tenth
The White House? I know it isn't exactly imposing, but still...
The Kremlin...
Surely you mean St Basil's Cathedral? I'm not 100% sure I'd even recognise the Kremlin (probably would but wouldn't be confident).
St Basil's is clearly what you'd show in a film to establish you're in Moscow, just as the Houses of Parliament says London, the Eiffel Tower says Paris etc.
Assuming he does win the vote (which he won't), how does it actually achieve his aim of getting a new PM more quickly?
In the same way that Callaghan remained as PM after he lost the VONC in 1979, Johnson would remain as PM.
The process to elect a new leader of the Conservative Party is already underway and any general election, the timing of which would still be set by the current administration and so would see a polling date set for later in September.
So nothing in his cunning plan would achieve the result he seeks. Who is advising Starmer???
He wants all the Tories who so openly and publicly blew up Johnson to give him their confidence. That's all. Will look great on a leaflet apparently.
They wouldn't be. They would be giving confidence to the governing party.
Nope. Every leaflet will have the MP and all the quotes where they have supported the crook.
So it's nothing more than playing party politics?
I am shocked, shocked, to discover politics going on in the Houses of Parliament.
Indeed. If the parties were reversed, all the lefties would be denouncing the Tories for doing it...
FWIW, I think it's a silly stunt. Not sure whether I quailfy as a lefty though (my current position is preferring Starmer to be the PM after the next GE, but I may modify that depending on the next Con leader and their actions)
She has more ministerial experience than either Cameron or Blair had when they became PM. She is slightly younger than Cameron was and a bit younger than Blair.
Is it because she’s a woman she’s “inexperienced”, or because she isn’t Public School / Oxford educated?
That's extremely misleading. Cameron didn't have ministerial experience, of course, but he had (with Osborne) oodles of experience at the centre of events as a SPAD, and he had five years of LOTO experience before becoming PM. He'd also surrounded himself with an excellent team which spent a lot of effort learning about how to do government. He was extremely well prepared for office, as was Blair, who also spent his time as a shadow minister and then LOTO very wisely.
That's completely different from being catapulted into the PM position from a minor role whilst the party is in government.
A lot would depend on her team and her attitude to it. A return to cabinet government is long overdue in my opinion. Decline then almost dead by end of New Labour. The a few slight resuscitations and relapses with no vital signs at a all under Johnson.
While there's been much focus on Kemi's views on wokeness and the trans issues, there's been less focus on her promise to abandon net zero, roll back the state, cut education expenditure and so on.
I can see her winning the Tory membership over. I'm less persuaded that abandoning net zero and rolling back the state so drastically will win over the typical floating voter.
I am completely unpersuaded that someone with so little senior ministerial experience will win. She stood in order to get a Cabinet post, not to win. It will be easy for a Sunak or a Truss to say, "The UK is facing many big challenges, you need someone with experience."
If the Right want a better candidate than Truss (and Truss seems terrible to me), then I suggest they work out who it is quickly, but they pick someone a bit more senior!
If the final decision was made by MPs she wouldn't have a pray.
However, the final decision is made by Tory Party members and it's very easy to question their sanity.
Assuming he does win the vote (which he won't), how does it actually achieve his aim of getting a new PM more quickly?
In the same way that Callaghan remained as PM after he lost the VONC in 1979, Johnson would remain as PM.
The process to elect a new leader of the Conservative Party is already underway and any general election, the timing of which would still be set by the current administration and so would see a polling date set for later in September.
So nothing in his cunning plan would achieve the result he seeks. Who is advising Starmer???
He wants all the Tories who so openly and publicly blew up Johnson to give him their confidence. That's all. Will look great on a leaflet apparently.
They wouldn't be. They would be giving confidence to the governing party.
Nope. Every leaflet will have the MP and all the quotes where they have supported the crook.
So it's nothing more than playing party politics?
Never understand that point. What else are political parties supposed to play?
If you believe them, they're supposed to think about the good of the country...
How does having a VONC harm the country? As opposed to, say, weeks with the government on hold while we play politics with a leadership election?
Assuming he does win the vote (which he won't), how does it actually achieve his aim of getting a new PM more quickly?
In the same way that Callaghan remained as PM after he lost the VONC in 1979, Johnson would remain as PM.
The process to elect a new leader of the Conservative Party is already underway and any general election, the timing of which would still be set by the current administration and so would see a polling date set for later in September.
So nothing in his cunning plan would achieve the result he seeks. Who is advising Starmer???
He wants all the Tories who so openly and publicly blew up Johnson to give him their confidence. That's all. Will look great on a leaflet apparently.
It is also a tactic that disrupts the 24/7 media Confest.
Starmer gets the headlines for a day or two, and can point the finger and say "look, they are insisting on keeping the discredited Johnson in Downing Street for another few months while the country goes to the dogs" after he inevitably loses the vote.
Julie Bindel @bindelj I would rather give Donald Trump a massage than vote Tory, but if you want to know who I'd back to be the next PM? @KemiBadenoch all the way. She has her head screwed on. Only real grown up in the room. Save your breath telling me what she believes/has done that you don't like.
We could be at the start of something truly extraordinary here. Imagine the reverberations around the world if KB became the next PM.
If (big IF) Kemi were to win this I do think it will be enough of a change for the Conservatives that it probably resets the dial once again and people will view it as an entirely new government despite Con being in power for 12 years.
A Kemi government would neuter "time for a change" and would likely be a big problem for Labour...
The next PM is going to be one of Rishi, Penny, Liz or Kemi.
Kemi is the “they’ve gone nuts” option. The wildcard option. Some might even say the irresponsible option, given her lack of experience. Personally, I think she needs more experience, I think at the moment she is too green.
But there has to be a chance that she could do it. It’s a small chance, but there is the tantalising grain of something exciting building around her, and you never know where momentum might lead….
She has more ministerial experience than either Cameron or Blair had when they became PM. She is slightly younger than Cameron was and a bit younger than Blair.
Is it because she’s a woman she’s “inexperienced”, or because she isn’t Public School / Oxford educated?
It’s one thing stepping into the LOTO and having a few years run up into becoming PM and becoming PM from being a junior minister. LOTO gives you experience in media scrutiny, ‘cabinet’ and party management and policy development. There is a reason why traditionally parties have only placed FS/CoE/HS holders into the prime ministership in government…
It has nothing to do with her gender or education.
Gordon Brown was Chancellor for years before becoming Labour leader and PM, and it still didn't stop him from being utterly unsuited to the job of party leader and PM. Ditto Theresa May.
Were they unsuited to the job of party leader and PM, or merely just not very successful ones when it came to election time?
I can take the point that neither will go down as amazing Prime Ministers, but I’m not sure that necessarily correlates with being able to do the job itself.
When the White House was extensively renovated during the Truman Administration - IIRC after leg of Margaret Truman's piano poked through the floor - the President & family moved out for the duration across the street to Blair House.
She has more ministerial experience than either Cameron or Blair had when they became PM. She is slightly younger than Cameron was and a bit younger than Blair.
Is it because she’s a woman she’s “inexperienced”, or because she isn’t Public School / Oxford educated?
That's extremely misleading. Cameron didn't have ministerial experience, of course, but he had (with Osborne) oodles of experience at the centre of events as a SPAD, and he had five years of LOTO experience before becoming PM. He'd also surrounded himself with an excellent team which spent a lot of effort learning about how to do government. He was extremely well prepared for office, as was Blair, who also spent his time as a shadow minister and then LOTO very wisely.
That's completely different from being catapulted into the PM position from a minor role whilst the party is in government.
A lot would depend on her team and her attitude to it. A return to cabinet government is long overdue in my opinion. Decline then almost dead by end of New Labour. The a few slight resuscitations and relapses with no vital signs at a all under Johnson.
Very hard to build up an effective team when three quarters of those in it think they should be leader instead of you, and the other quarter think someone else should be.
None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
The Palace of Westminster will need to be repaired whether or not it remains the home of Parliament.
A permanent move to another city doesn't take away the need to repair the existing buildings
Why would it need to be repaired if it's no longer home of Parliament.
But the cost of repairing an empty building is X or Y times cheaper than doing repairs when the building is being used.
Because it is a major historic landmark. It is iconic and an important part of our national heritage.
The idea of it being allowed to slowly disintegrate or even be demolished would be cultural vandalism
Currently the Government is trying to avoid spending £2bn future proofing the Manchester end of HS2..
Agreed.
I wonder what would be the cost of preservation if it were empty, and Parliament moved elsewhere ? I would guess you could easily halve that £22bn, even allowing for creating a modern replacement. (which would also be far cheaper to run and easier to work in).
Why don’t they just move to County Hall for a decade: that is a large, noble and dignified building, within eyesight of the Palace of W, right opposite on the river, meaning there would be minimal need for shifting things apart from people
For a few million they could literally rebuild the green benches inside, if that’s what they want
Seems apt: ...County Hall is the site of businesses and attractions, including the Sea Life London Aquarium and Shrek's Adventure London...
The formerly normal aspiration to settle and start a family is out of reach for swathes of young people. A fundamental compact between conservative principles, and the party that is supposed to represent them, has been broken.
Britain tends to think of itself as an equal partner to countries such as France, the Netherlands and Germany in terms of incomes and living standards. This is a collective fantasy, which hasn’t been true for well over a decade. The reality shouldn’t be shocking, yet it remains so: Britain’s incomes and living standards have fallen far behind what were its peer nations only 15 years ago. “Across European countries, only households in Greece and Cyprus saw a worse performance between 2007 and 2018 than the UK,” found the Resolution Foundation.
Because the reality is that Britain’s national religion is no longer Anglican Christianity. It isn’t even the NHS. It is Pensionerism. Britain is a care home with a navy.
Yet all attempts to reform this growth-killing inequity end in failure, such is the strength of the homeowner-pensioner lobby.
Without Brexit to focus on, the Government has lost its sense of purpose. The next leader must be a strategist, cerebral, and yet still a salesman. Someone who recognises that there’s more to winning than winning itself, and declinist managerialism — that a far greater prize is changing peoples’ lives and your country, for the better.
Replace council tax with a wealth tax based on market value of the property.
The formerly normal aspiration to settle and start a family is out of reach for swathes of young people. A fundamental compact between conservative principles, and the party that is supposed to represent them, has been broken.
Britain tends to think of itself as an equal partner to countries such as France, the Netherlands and Germany in terms of incomes and living standards. This is a collective fantasy, which hasn’t been true for well over a decade. The reality shouldn’t be shocking, yet it remains so: Britain’s incomes and living standards have fallen far behind what were its peer nations only 15 years ago. “Across European countries, only households in Greece and Cyprus saw a worse performance between 2007 and 2018 than the UK,” found the Resolution Foundation.
Because the reality is that Britain’s national religion is no longer Anglican Christianity. It isn’t even the NHS. It is Pensionerism. Britain is a care home with a navy.
Yet all attempts to reform this growth-killing inequity end in failure, such is the strength of the homeowner-pensioner lobby.
Without Brexit to focus on, the Government has lost its sense of purpose. The next leader must be a strategist, cerebral, and yet still a salesman. Someone who recognises that there’s more to winning than winning itself, and declinist managerialism — that a far greater prize is changing peoples’ lives and your country, for the better.
The interesting thing is she is going for the “I have integrity, this is what I believe and what I want to do. You might disagree with it but I’ll be honest with you” angle. Which no-one has really tried to play since Thatcher.
A curious tactic in the internet age, where spin and media relations is all pervasive. But possibly another reason why people are finding her refreshing.
And on the grounds that people need to get to the capital, it's more normal for the capital to be somewhere central, rather than tucked away right down in the bottom corner.
Really? If anything, it seems more normal for a capital to be tucked into one corner of the country, not least because capitals were often initially chosen for water connectivity and/or countries went out and acquired vast swathes of territory after picking them. Berlin, Copenhagen, Vienna, the Hague, Lisbon, Bern, Stockholm, Oslo, Helsinki, Athens, Bucharest, Sofia, Moscow (and of course St Petersburg originally), Ottawa, Washington DC, Havana, New Delhi, Beijing, Buenos Aires, Baku, Damascus, Kabul, Tunis, Algiers...
Hah yes. Good list
Moreover, the capitals that are more geographically central are often deeply unpopular, sometimes because they are contrived
Washington DC manages to be both. Stuck out on one edge of the country and deeply unpopular because it is contrived.
Anti capital city that isn't large enough to be a major city in its own right will struggle. Manchester is probably big enough to be okay, but making somewhere like York the capital would ruin the place.
As you say the important bit is the size of the existing city - that leaves you with a choice of Birmingham or Manchester and Birmingham is sadly just too close to London for it to work...
She has more ministerial experience than either Cameron or Blair had when they became PM. She is slightly younger than Cameron was and a bit younger than Blair.
Is it because she’s a woman she’s “inexperienced”, or because she isn’t Public School / Oxford educated?
That's extremely misleading. Cameron didn't have ministerial experience, of course, but he had (with Osborne) oodles of experience at the centre of events as a SPAD, and he had five years of LOTO experience before becoming PM. He'd also surrounded himself with an excellent team which spent a lot of effort learning about how to do government. He was extremely well prepared for office, as was Blair, who also spent his time as a shadow minister and then LOTO very wisely.
That's completely different from being catapulted into the PM position from a minor role whilst the party is in government.
A lot would depend on her team and her attitude to it. A return to cabinet government is long overdue in my opinion. Decline then almost dead by end of New Labour. The a few slight resuscitations and relapses with no vital signs at a all under Johnson.
Very hard to build up an effective team when three quarters of those in it think they should be leader instead of you, and the other quarter think someone else should be.
True bit isn't that true of all governments at all times?
None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
The Palace of Westminster will need to be repaired whether or not it remains the home of Parliament.
A permanent move to another city doesn't take away the need to repair the existing buildings
Why would it need to be repaired if it's no longer home of Parliament.
But the cost of repairing an empty building is X or Y times cheaper than doing repairs when the building is being used.
Because it is a major historic landmark. It is iconic and an important part of our national heritage.
The idea of it being allowed to slowly disintegrate or even be demolished would be cultural vandalism
Currently the Government is trying to avoid spending £2bn future proofing the Manchester end of HS2..
Agreed.
I wonder what would be the cost of preservation if it were empty, and Parliament moved elsewhere ? I would guess you could easily halve that £22bn, even allowing for creating a modern replacement. (which would also be far cheaper to run and easier to work in).
Why don’t they just move to County Hall for a decade: that is a large, noble and dignified building, within eyesight of the Palace of W, right opposite on the river, meaning there would be minimal need for shifting things apart from people
For a few million they could literally rebuild the green benches inside, if that’s what they want
Isn't it a hotel now (Marriott?).
And an aquarium. But I’m sure a hundred mill would entice them to leave
The sums being bruited about in terms of revamping the Houses of P are so insane £100m seems like peanuts
Like you I find them hard to believe, and I am sure it would be cheaper if they just moved everyone out for 10 years
Taking over Methodist Central Hall would work too. Fairly handy.
If more space was needed, The Excel centre has plenty of space and smaller rooms.
"I’m still feeling confident about my £20 Sunak bet placed in November 2019 when I got 250/1 with Ladbrokes"
You're entitled to be. Who could have imagined the Tories would line up such a list of donkeys after three years in power.
All Richi has to do is stay on his feet for another few days and it's a stroll. He could even afford to tell a porkie like he did this morning without any fears at all.
Not one of the donkies seemed to realise that a USP shared with ten other is not a USP but a speedy route to defeat
Assuming he does win the vote (which he won't), how does it actually achieve his aim of getting a new PM more quickly?
In the same way that Callaghan remained as PM after he lost the VONC in 1979, Johnson would remain as PM.
The process to elect a new leader of the Conservative Party is already underway and any general election, the timing of which would still be set by the current administration and so would see a polling date set for later in September.
So nothing in his cunning plan would achieve the result he seeks. Who is advising Starmer???
He wants all the Tories who so openly and publicly blew up Johnson to give him their confidence. That's all. Will look great on a leaflet apparently.
They wouldn't be. They would be giving confidence to the governing party.
Nope. Every leaflet will have the MP and all the quotes where they have supported the crook.
So it's nothing more than playing party politics?
Never understand that point. What else are political parties supposed to play?
SF are holding a confidence motion in the government in Ireland this week. It's very unlikely to pass, but it's the sort of harrying operation of a government that an Opposition ought to do.
While there's been much focus on Kemi's views on wokeness and the trans issues, there's been less focus on her promise to abandon net zero, roll back the state, cut education expenditure and so on.
I can see her winning the Tory membership over. I'm less persuaded that abandoning net zero and rolling back the state so drastically will win over the typical floating voter.
I want the Tories removed a long long way from office. Whichever candidate they select as PM. But it is encouraging to think that people like Badenoch can actually be a serious contender for *the Tories*.
The threat to Labour is simple. She is far more confident, articulate and sane that so many of the various prominent BAME equivalents are in Labour. A black woman who is a successful migrant saying lets cut the crap and focus on people's priorities goes way beyond what Labour can offer.
And all that despite not ever having benefited from a single quota or "all-X" shortlist, eh?
That's not really true. She benefited from the Cameron era policy of boosting candidates from minority groups, a policy which was extremely successful incidentally even if attacked at the time by trad Tories.
Right, but that was much more about expanding the funnel into the pipeline rather than fiddling the pipeline itself, wasn't it?
The A list policy was pretty much fiddling the pipeline, although she wasn't on the A list, I think, and indeed didn't actually become an MP until 2017 having first stood in 2010. I think she benefited indirectly from the A List policy which helped to convince the Tories that they could do well looking beyond the usual candidate profile. But she wasn't a direct beneficiary of it.
When the White House was extensively renovated during the Truman Administration - IIRC after leg of Margaret Truman's piano poked through the floor - the President & family moved out for the duration across the street to Blair House.
She has more ministerial experience than either Cameron or Blair had when they became PM. She is slightly younger than Cameron was and a bit younger than Blair.
Is it because she’s a woman she’s “inexperienced”, or because she isn’t Public School / Oxford educated?
That's extremely misleading. Cameron didn't have ministerial experience, of course, but he had (with Osborne) oodles of experience at the centre of events as a SPAD, and he had five years of LOTO experience before becoming PM. He'd also surrounded himself with an excellent team which spent a lot of effort learning about how to do government. He was extremely well prepared for office, as was Blair, who also spent his time as a shadow minister and then LOTO very wisely.
That's completely different from being catapulted into the PM position from a minor role whilst the party is in government.
A lot would depend on her team and her attitude to it. A return to cabinet government is long overdue in my opinion. Decline then almost dead by end of New Labour. The a few slight resuscitations and relapses with no vital signs at a all under Johnson.
Very hard to build up an effective team when three quarters of those in it think they should be leader instead of you, and the other quarter think someone else should be.
True bit isn't that true of all governments at all times?
Yes, but it is much reduced if the leader has a serious track record, rather than being a Kemi-come-lately.
Assuming he does win the vote (which he won't), how does it actually achieve his aim of getting a new PM more quickly?
In the same way that Callaghan remained as PM after he lost the VONC in 1979, Johnson would remain as PM.
The process to elect a new leader of the Conservative Party is already underway and any general election, the timing of which would still be set by the current administration and so would see a polling date set for later in September.
So nothing in his cunning plan would achieve the result he seeks. Who is advising Starmer???
He wants all the Tories who so openly and publicly blew up Johnson to give him their confidence. That's all. Will look great on a leaflet apparently.
They wouldn't be. They would be giving confidence to the governing party.
Nope. Every leaflet will have the MP and all the quotes where they have supported the crook.
So it's nothing more than playing party politics?
I am shocked, shocked, to discover politics going on in the Houses of Parliament.
Indeed. If the parties were reversed, all the lefties would be denouncing the Tories for doing it...
And you'd be defending them?
No, I'd be pointing out that if the parties were reversed, the Tories would be denouncing them for doing it...
Julie Bindel @bindelj I would rather give Donald Trump a massage than vote Tory, but if you want to know who I'd back to be the next PM? @KemiBadenoch all the way. She has her head screwed on. Only real grown up in the room. Save your breath telling me what she believes/has done that you don't like.
We could be at the start of something truly extraordinary here. Imagine the reverberations around the world if KB became the next PM.
If (big IF) Kemi were to win this I do think it will be enough of a change for the Conservatives that it probably resets the dial once again and people will view it as an entirely new government despite Con being in power for 12 years.
A Kemi government would neuter "time for a change" and would likely be a big problem for Labour...
The next PM is going to be one of Rishi, Penny, Liz or Kemi.
Kemi is the “they’ve gone nuts” option. The wildcard option. Some might even say the irresponsible option, given her lack of experience. Personally, I think she needs more experience, I think at the moment she is too green.
But there has to be a chance that she could do it. It’s a small chance, but there is the tantalising grain of something exciting building around her, and you never know where momentum might lead….
She has more ministerial experience than either Cameron or Blair had when they became PM. She is slightly younger than Cameron was and a bit younger than Blair.
Is it because she’s a woman she’s “inexperienced”, or because she isn’t Public School / Oxford educated?
It’s one thing stepping into the LOTO and having a few years run up into becoming PM and becoming PM from being a junior minister. LOTO gives you experience in media scrutiny, ‘cabinet’ and party management and policy development. There is a reason why traditionally parties have only placed FS/CoE/HS holders into the prime ministership in government…
It has nothing to do with her gender or education.
Gordon Brown was Chancellor for years before becoming Labour leader and PM, and it still didn't stop him from being utterly unsuited to the job of party leader and PM. Ditto Theresa May.
Were they unsuited to the job of party leader and PM, or merely just not very successful ones when it came to election time?
I can take the point that neither will go down as amazing Prime Ministers, but I’m not sure that necessarily correlates with being able to do the job itself.
Absolutely, it was quite clear that both Brown and May were not team players when they were senior Cabinent Ministers and would be unsuited to the job of leader and PM.
None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
The Palace of Westminster will need to be repaired whether or not it remains the home of Parliament.
A permanent move to another city doesn't take away the need to repair the existing buildings
Why would it need to be repaired if it's no longer home of Parliament.
But the cost of repairing an empty building is X or Y times cheaper than doing repairs when the building is being used.
Because it is a major historic landmark. It is iconic and an important part of our national heritage.
The idea of it being allowed to slowly disintegrate or even be demolished would be cultural vandalism
Currently the Government is trying to avoid spending £2bn future proofing the Manchester end of HS2..
Agreed.
I wonder what would be the cost of preservation if it were empty, and Parliament moved elsewhere ? I would guess you could easily halve that £22bn, even allowing for creating a modern replacement. (which would also be far cheaper to run and easier to work in).
Why don’t they just move to County Hall for a decade: that is a large, noble and dignified building, within eyesight of the Palace of W, right opposite on the river, meaning there would be minimal need for shifting things apart from people
For a few million they could literally rebuild the green benches inside, if that’s what they want
Isn't it a hotel now (Marriott?).
And an aquarium. But I’m sure a hundred mill would entice them to leave
The sums being bruited about in terms of revamping the Houses of P are so insane £100m seems like peanuts
Like you I find them hard to believe, and I am sure it would be cheaper if they just moved everyone out for 10 years
Taking over Methodist Central Hall would work too. Fairly handy.
If more space was needed, The Excel centre has plenty of space and smaller rooms.
There’s the QEII Centre too. Loads of space around if they actually look for it.
The problem is everyone is scared of making the decision to waste billions on looking after the politicians themselves stop the buildings falling down and bring them up to modern standards.
The youngest people to become Prime Minister since the 18th century were Cameron and Blair, both a bit over 43 and a half. (Major was the next youngest in the 20th century at 47.) Badenoch turned 42 in January. So, were she to become PM, it would break records, but she wouldn't be much younger than Cameron or Blair.
However, she hasn't held the same positions of seniority. They'd both been LOTO. Major had been Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Assuming he does win the vote (which he won't), how does it actually achieve his aim of getting a new PM more quickly?
In the same way that Callaghan remained as PM after he lost the VONC in 1979, Johnson would remain as PM.
The process to elect a new leader of the Conservative Party is already underway and any general election, the timing of which would still be set by the current administration and so would see a polling date set for later in September.
So nothing in his cunning plan would achieve the result he seeks. Who is advising Starmer???
He wants all the Tories who so openly and publicly blew up Johnson to give him their confidence. That's all. Will look great on a leaflet apparently.
They wouldn't be. They would be giving confidence to the governing party.
Nope. Every leaflet will have the MP and all the quotes where they have supported the crook.
So it's nothing more than playing party politics?
Never understand that point. What else are political parties supposed to play?
If you believe them, they're supposed to think about the good of the country...
How does having a VONC harm the country? As opposed to, say, weeks with the government on hold while we play politics with a leadership election?
It wastes a day of Commons time that could be used on something else - and even if successful it wouldn't change a single thing.
The formerly normal aspiration to settle and start a family is out of reach for swathes of young people. A fundamental compact between conservative principles, and the party that is supposed to represent them, has been broken.
Britain tends to think of itself as an equal partner to countries such as France, the Netherlands and Germany in terms of incomes and living standards. This is a collective fantasy, which hasn’t been true for well over a decade. The reality shouldn’t be shocking, yet it remains so: Britain’s incomes and living standards have fallen far behind what were its peer nations only 15 years ago. “Across European countries, only households in Greece and Cyprus saw a worse performance between 2007 and 2018 than the UK,” found the Resolution Foundation.
Because the reality is that Britain’s national religion is no longer Anglican Christianity. It isn’t even the NHS. It is Pensionerism. Britain is a care home with a navy.
Yet all attempts to reform this growth-killing inequity end in failure, such is the strength of the homeowner-pensioner lobby.
Without Brexit to focus on, the Government has lost its sense of purpose. The next leader must be a strategist, cerebral, and yet still a salesman. Someone who recognises that there’s more to winning than winning itself, and declinist managerialism — that a far greater prize is changing peoples’ lives and your country, for the better.
There’s a similar article in the FT: the new decline of Britain
The graphs are quite shocking in how UK median income is falling behind, even as we do OK-ish on GDP per capita (suggesting rising inequality)
Moreover, the turning point in all the graphs is the Great Financial Crisis, not Brexit. Up to 2008 the UK was steaming ahead and even overtaking all west European peers, in 2008 we stumbled and fell, and have never recovered
Something happened in 2008. The easy answer is we borrowed too much and when credit was squeezed, ouch. But that is true of many countries. What was particular to Britain that changed in 2008?
While there's been much focus on Kemi's views on wokeness and the trans issues, there's been less focus on her promise to abandon net zero, roll back the state, cut education expenditure and so on.
I can see her winning the Tory membership over. I'm less persuaded that abandoning net zero and rolling back the state so drastically will win over the typical floating voter.
I want the Tories removed a long long way from office. Whichever candidate they select as PM. But it is encouraging to think that people like Badenoch can actually be a serious contender for *the Tories*.
The threat to Labour is simple. She is far more confident, articulate and sane that so many of the various prominent BAME equivalents are in Labour. A black woman who is a successful migrant saying lets cut the crap and focus on people's priorities goes way beyond what Labour can offer.
And all that despite not ever having benefited from a single quota or "all-X" shortlist, eh?
That's not really true. She benefited from the Cameron era policy of boosting candidates from minority groups, a policy which was extremely successful incidentally even if attacked at the time by trad Tories.
Right, but that was much more about expanding the funnel into the pipeline rather than fiddling the pipeline itself, wasn't it?
None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
The Palace of Westminster will need to be repaired whether or not it remains the home of Parliament.
A permanent move to another city doesn't take away the need to repair the existing buildings
Why would it need to be repaired if it's no longer home of Parliament.
But the cost of repairing an empty building is X or Y times cheaper than doing repairs when the building is being used.
Because it is a major historic landmark. It is iconic and an important part of our national heritage.
The idea of it being allowed to slowly disintegrate or even be demolished would be cultural vandalism
Currently the Government is trying to avoid spending £2bn future proofing the Manchester end of HS2..
Agreed.
I wonder what would be the cost of preservation if it were empty, and Parliament moved elsewhere ? I would guess you could easily halve that £22bn, even allowing for creating a modern replacement. (which would also be far cheaper to run and easier to work in).
Why don’t they just move to County Hall for a decade: that is a large, noble and dignified building, within eyesight of the Palace of W, right opposite on the river, meaning there would be minimal need for shifting things apart from people
For a few million they could literally rebuild the green benches inside, if that’s what they want
Isn't it a hotel now (Marriott?).
And an aquarium. But I’m sure a hundred mill would entice them to leave
The sums being bruited about in terms of revamping the Houses of P are so insane £100m seems like peanuts
Like you I find them hard to believe, and I am sure it would be cheaper if they just moved everyone out for 10 years
Taking over Methodist Central Hall would work too. Fairly handy.
If more space was needed, The Excel centre has plenty of space and smaller rooms.
There’s the QEII Centre too. Loads of space around if they actually look for it.
The problem is everyone is scared of making the decision to waste billions on looking after the politicians themselves stop the buildings falling down and bring them up to modern standards.
Another issue is that you need 2 suitable sized venues. Which was why Gove was so in favour of moving the Lords elsewhere (York from memory) for a few years
And on the grounds that people need to get to the capital, it's more normal for the capital to be somewhere central, rather than tucked away right down in the bottom corner.
Really? If anything, it seems more normal for a capital to be tucked into one corner of the country, not least because capitals were often initially chosen for water connectivity and/or countries went out and acquired vast swathes of territory after picking them. Berlin, Copenhagen, Vienna, the Hague, Lisbon, Bern, Stockholm, Oslo, Helsinki, Athens, Bucharest, Sofia, Moscow (and of course St Petersburg originally), Ottawa, Washington DC, Havana, New Delhi, Beijing, Buenos Aires, Baku, Damascus, Kabul, Tunis, Algiers...
Hah yes. Good list
Moreover, the capitals that are more geographically central are often deeply unpopular, sometimes because they are contrived
Madrid is not contrived (at least not in modern times).
Spanish geography dictated a central capital because you always need to go through the middle from one periphery to another (sailing took/takes too long).
While there's been much focus on Kemi's views on wokeness and the trans issues, there's been less focus on her promise to abandon net zero, roll back the state, cut education expenditure and so on.
I can see her winning the Tory membership over. I'm less persuaded that abandoning net zero and rolling back the state so drastically will win over the typical floating voter.
I am completely unpersuaded that someone with so little senior ministerial experience will win. She stood in order to get a Cabinet post, not to win. It will be easy for a Sunak or a Truss to say, "The UK is facing many big challenges, you need someone with experience."
If the Right want a better candidate than Truss (and Truss seems terrible to me), then I suggest they work out who it is quickly, but they pick someone a bit more senior!
There is another important consideration that points towards the need to go with experience. Boris Johnson will be hovering in the wings, waiting for his successor to screw up and offer him a path back to power. Going with someone with limited experience in a big job would carry a huge risk of allowing Johnson back in.
None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
The Palace of Westminster will need to be repaired whether or not it remains the home of Parliament.
A permanent move to another city doesn't take away the need to repair the existing buildings
Why would it need to be repaired if it's no longer home of Parliament.
But the cost of repairing an empty building is X or Y times cheaper than doing repairs when the building is being used.
Because it is a major historic landmark. It is iconic and an important part of our national heritage.
The idea of it being allowed to slowly disintegrate or even be demolished would be cultural vandalism
As Andrea Leadsome said in a recent article about the refurb (and she is in charge of it) “the Houses of Parliament is one of the most famous buildings in the world, like the Taj Mahal, it is also a World Heritage site, it belongs to humanity, but it is our job to look after it, however awkward”
Hard to argue with that
If you compile a list of the ten most iconic, instantly recognisable buildings in the world Westminster is on there
Rough list:
Pyramids Parthenon Tower of Pisa Taj Mahal Empire State Bldg Eiffel Tower Palace of Westminster Sydney Opera House Burj
Number ten can be disputed between Stonehenge, Statue of Liberty, The Pantheon, Hagia Sophia, Gobekli Tepe (should be top of the top ten really), Notre Dame, St Basil’s Cathedral, et al, depending on your definition of “building”
No Colloseum?!
Good one, yes. Clean forgot. That’s the tenth
The White House? I know it isn't exactly imposing, but still...
The White House isn't even in the top two most significant landmarks in its own country. Both the Statue of Liberty and Golden Gate Bridge are surely higher.
If we are going bridge then the Forth (Railway) Bridge or Sydney Harbour Bridge win that game, surely? The Golden Gate is hardly a unique structure.
I can understand not including the White House on architectural merit but it is at least instantly recognisable.
If nobody has to live in the building, then The Great Wall of China should should maybe get a mention too?
While there's been much focus on Kemi's views on wokeness and the trans issues, there's been less focus on her promise to abandon net zero, roll back the state, cut education expenditure and so on.
I can see her winning the Tory membership over. I'm less persuaded that abandoning net zero and rolling back the state so drastically will win over the typical floating voter.
I want the Tories removed a long long way from office. Whichever candidate they select as PM. But it is encouraging to think that people like Badenoch can actually be a serious contender for *the Tories*.
The threat to Labour is simple. She is far more confident, articulate and sane that so many of the various prominent BAME equivalents are in Labour. A black woman who is a successful migrant saying lets cut the crap and focus on people's priorities goes way beyond what Labour can offer.
And all that despite not ever having benefited from a single quota or "all-X" shortlist, eh?
That's not really true. She benefited from the Cameron era policy of boosting candidates from minority groups, a policy which was extremely successful incidentally even if attacked at the time by trad Tories.
Right, but that was much more about expanding the funnel into the pipeline rather than fiddling the pipeline itself, wasn't it?
It was effectively a quota.
You and I appear to have different understandings of the meaning of the word "quota".
Assuming he does win the vote (which he won't), how does it actually achieve his aim of getting a new PM more quickly?
In the same way that Callaghan remained as PM after he lost the VONC in 1979, Johnson would remain as PM.
The process to elect a new leader of the Conservative Party is already underway and any general election, the timing of which would still be set by the current administration and so would see a polling date set for later in September.
So nothing in his cunning plan would achieve the result he seeks. Who is advising Starmer???
He wants all the Tories who so openly and publicly blew up Johnson to give him their confidence. That's all. Will look great on a leaflet apparently.
They wouldn't be. They would be giving confidence to the governing party.
Nope. Every leaflet will have the MP and all the quotes where they have supported the crook.
So it's nothing more than playing party politics?
Never understand that point. What else are political parties supposed to play?
If you believe them, they're supposed to think about the good of the country...
How does having a VONC harm the country? As opposed to, say, weeks with the government on hold while we play politics with a leadership election?
In addition to the well known Norway debate, there was a further VONC in July 1942. It makes interesting reading:
The formerly normal aspiration to settle and start a family is out of reach for swathes of young people. A fundamental compact between conservative principles, and the party that is supposed to represent them, has been broken.
Britain tends to think of itself as an equal partner to countries such as France, the Netherlands and Germany in terms of incomes and living standards. This is a collective fantasy, which hasn’t been true for well over a decade. The reality shouldn’t be shocking, yet it remains so: Britain’s incomes and living standards have fallen far behind what were its peer nations only 15 years ago. “Across European countries, only households in Greece and Cyprus saw a worse performance between 2007 and 2018 than the UK,” found the Resolution Foundation.
Because the reality is that Britain’s national religion is no longer Anglican Christianity. It isn’t even the NHS. It is Pensionerism. Britain is a care home with a navy.
Yet all attempts to reform this growth-killing inequity end in failure, such is the strength of the homeowner-pensioner lobby.
Without Brexit to focus on, the Government has lost its sense of purpose. The next leader must be a strategist, cerebral, and yet still a salesman. Someone who recognises that there’s more to winning than winning itself, and declinist managerialism — that a far greater prize is changing peoples’ lives and your country, for the better.
There’s a similar article in the FT: the new decline of Britain
The graphs are quite shocking in how UK median income is falling behind, even as we do OK-ish on GDP per capita (suggesting rising inequality)
Moreover, the turning point in all the graphs is the Great Financial Crisis, not Brexit. Up to 2008 the UK was steaming ahead and even overtaking all west European peers, in 2008 we stumbled and fell, and have never recovered
Something happened in 2008. The easy answer is we borrowed too much and when credit was squeezed, ouch. But that is true of many countries. What was particular to Britain that changed in 2008?
We didn't have a proper crash in house prices but instead Brown/Darling and then Cameron/Osborne propped up the market with ever more schemes to increase lending.
Comparing to last time may give some hints on Hunt's pending support, though I've no time to check - e.g. I suspect Roger Gale will go for him again.
Looks like Sunak, Mordaunt, Truss, Braverman, Badenoch, Tugendhat and maybe Hunt and/or Zahawi and/or Javid will clear the first ballot, so we may still have 9 candidates. Still think it'll be Sunak/Truss in the end.
None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
The Palace of Westminster will need to be repaired whether or not it remains the home of Parliament.
A permanent move to another city doesn't take away the need to repair the existing buildings
Why would it need to be repaired if it's no longer home of Parliament.
But the cost of repairing an empty building is X or Y times cheaper than doing repairs when the building is being used.
Because it is a major historic landmark. It is iconic and an important part of our national heritage.
The idea of it being allowed to slowly disintegrate or even be demolished would be cultural vandalism
As Andrea Leadsome said in a recent article about the refurb (and she is in charge of it) “the Houses of Parliament is one of the most famous buildings in the world, like the Taj Mahal, it is also a World Heritage site, it belongs to humanity, but it is our job to look after it, however awkward”
Hard to argue with that
If you compile a list of the ten most iconic, instantly recognisable buildings in the world Westminster is on there
Rough list:
Pyramids Parthenon Tower of Pisa Taj Mahal Empire State Bldg Eiffel Tower Palace of Westminster Sydney Opera House Burj
Number ten can be disputed between Stonehenge, Statue of Liberty, The Pantheon, Hagia Sophia, Gobekli Tepe (should be top of the top ten really), Notre Dame, St Basil’s Cathedral, et al, depending on your definition of “building”
No Colloseum?!
Good one, yes. Clean forgot. That’s the tenth
The White House? I know it isn't exactly imposing, but still...
The White House isn't even in the top two most significant landmarks in its own country. Both the Statue of Liberty and Golden Gate Bridge are surely higher.
If we are going bridge then the Forth (Railway) Bridge or Sydney Harbour Bridge win that game, surely? The Golden Gate is hardly a unique structure.
I can understand not including the White House on architectural merit but it is at least instantly recognisable.
If nobody has to live in the building, then The Great Wall of China should should maybe get a mention too?
The Golden Gate Bridge is more identifying of its country than Sydney Harbour Bridge - I'm thinking in terms of what would appear in establishing shots in films or TV series. SHB would be shown but it's the Opera House which is identifying.
None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
The Palace of Westminster will need to be repaired whether or not it remains the home of Parliament.
A permanent move to another city doesn't take away the need to repair the existing buildings
Why would it need to be repaired if it's no longer home of Parliament.
But the cost of repairing an empty building is X or Y times cheaper than doing repairs when the building is being used.
Because it is a major historic landmark. It is iconic and an important part of our national heritage.
The idea of it being allowed to slowly disintegrate or even be demolished would be cultural vandalism
As Andrea Leadsome said in a recent article about the refurb (and she is in charge of it) “the Houses of Parliament is one of the most famous buildings in the world, like the Taj Mahal, it is also a World Heritage site, it belongs to humanity, but it is our job to look after it, however awkward”
Hard to argue with that
If you compile a list of the ten most iconic, instantly recognisable buildings in the world Westminster is on there
Rough list:
Pyramids Parthenon Tower of Pisa Taj Mahal Empire State Bldg Eiffel Tower Palace of Westminster Sydney Opera House Burj
Number ten can be disputed between Stonehenge, Statue of Liberty, The Pantheon, Hagia Sophia, Gobekli Tepe (should be top of the top ten really), Notre Dame, St Basil’s Cathedral, et al, depending on your definition of “building”
No Colloseum?!
Good one, yes. Clean forgot. That’s the tenth
The White House? I know it isn't exactly imposing, but still...
The White House isn't even in the top two most significant landmarks in its own country. Both the Statue of Liberty and Golden Gate Bridge are surely higher.
If we are going bridge then the Forth (Railway) Bridge or Sydney Harbour Bridge win that game, surely? The Golden Gate is hardly a unique structure.
I can understand not including the White House on architectural merit but it is at least instantly recognisable.
If nobody has to live in the building, then The Great Wall of China should should maybe get a mention too?
The formerly normal aspiration to settle and start a family is out of reach for swathes of young people. A fundamental compact between conservative principles, and the party that is supposed to represent them, has been broken.
Britain tends to think of itself as an equal partner to countries such as France, the Netherlands and Germany in terms of incomes and living standards. This is a collective fantasy, which hasn’t been true for well over a decade. The reality shouldn’t be shocking, yet it remains so: Britain’s incomes and living standards have fallen far behind what were its peer nations only 15 years ago. “Across European countries, only households in Greece and Cyprus saw a worse performance between 2007 and 2018 than the UK,” found the Resolution Foundation.
Because the reality is that Britain’s national religion is no longer Anglican Christianity. It isn’t even the NHS. It is Pensionerism. Britain is a care home with a navy.
Yet all attempts to reform this growth-killing inequity end in failure, such is the strength of the homeowner-pensioner lobby.
Without Brexit to focus on, the Government has lost its sense of purpose. The next leader must be a strategist, cerebral, and yet still a salesman. Someone who recognises that there’s more to winning than winning itself, and declinist managerialism — that a far greater prize is changing peoples’ lives and your country, for the better.
There’s a similar article in the FT: the new decline of Britain
The graphs are quite shocking in how UK median income is falling behind, even as we do OK-ish on GDP per capita (suggesting rising inequality)
Moreover, the turning point in all the graphs is the Great Financial Crisis, not Brexit. Up to 2008 the UK was steaming ahead and even overtaking all west European peers, in 2008 we stumbled and fell, and have never recovered
Something happened in 2008. The easy answer is we borrowed too much and when credit was squeezed, ouch. But that is true of many countries. What was particular to Britain that changed in 2008?
We didn't have a proper crash in house prices but instead Brown/Darling and then Cameron/Osborne propped up the market with ever more schemes to increase lending.
Equally we also have a vastly different housing market since the last crash
1) in a lot of places, prices are set not on local wages (i.e. what people have saved or can borrow) but on what the market rent is. 2) Housing stock has not kept up with population growth only where it has have house prices stayed level.
She has more ministerial experience than either Cameron or Blair had when they became PM. She is slightly younger than Cameron was and a bit younger than Blair.
Is it because she’s a woman she’s “inexperienced”, or because she isn’t Public School / Oxford educated?
That's extremely misleading. Cameron didn't have ministerial experience, of course, but he had (with Osborne) oodles of experience at the centre of events as a SPAD, and he had five years of LOTO experience before becoming PM. He'd also surrounded himself with an excellent team which spent a lot of effort learning about how to do government. He was extremely well prepared for office, as was Blair, who also spent his time as a shadow minister and then LOTO very wisely.
That's completely different from being catapulted into the PM position from a minor role whilst the party is in government.
A lot would depend on her team and her attitude to it. A return to cabinet government is long overdue in my opinion. Decline then almost dead by end of New Labour. The a few slight resuscitations and relapses with no vital signs at a all under Johnson.
Very hard to build up an effective team when three quarters of those in it think they should be leader instead of you, and the other quarter think someone else should be.
True bit isn't that true of all governments at all times?
Yes, but it is much reduced if the leader has a serious track record, rather than being a Kemi-come-lately.
That is a fair point. She is probably a riskier candidate than some. If she avoids being Home Secretary a good bet for next leader but one?
While there's been much focus on Kemi's views on wokeness and the trans issues, there's been less focus on her promise to abandon net zero, roll back the state, cut education expenditure and so on.
I can see her winning the Tory membership over. I'm less persuaded that abandoning net zero and rolling back the state so drastically will win over the typical floating voter.
I want the Tories removed a long long way from office. Whichever candidate they select as PM. But it is encouraging to think that people like Badenoch can actually be a serious contender for *the Tories*.
The threat to Labour is simple. She is far more confident, articulate and sane that so many of the various prominent BAME equivalents are in Labour. A black woman who is a successful migrant saying lets cut the crap and focus on people's priorities goes way beyond what Labour can offer.
And all that despite not ever having benefited from a single quota or "all-X" shortlist, eh?
That's not really true. She benefited from the Cameron era policy of boosting candidates from minority groups, a policy which was extremely successful incidentally even if attacked at the time by trad Tories.
Right, but that was much more about expanding the funnel into the pipeline rather than fiddling the pipeline itself, wasn't it?
It was effectively a quota.
You and I appear to have different understandings of the meaning of the word "quota".
Cameron said the candidate list should have a certain minimum number of people from various underrepresented groups, including ethnic minorities. Requiring a set to have a minimum from a certain group sounds like a quota to me.
None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
The Palace of Westminster will need to be repaired whether or not it remains the home of Parliament.
A permanent move to another city doesn't take away the need to repair the existing buildings
Why would it need to be repaired if it's no longer home of Parliament.
But the cost of repairing an empty building is X or Y times cheaper than doing repairs when the building is being used.
Because it is a major historic landmark. It is iconic and an important part of our national heritage.
The idea of it being allowed to slowly disintegrate or even be demolished would be cultural vandalism
As Andrea Leadsome said in a recent article about the refurb (and she is in charge of it) “the Houses of Parliament is one of the most famous buildings in the world, like the Taj Mahal, it is also a World Heritage site, it belongs to humanity, but it is our job to look after it, however awkward”
Hard to argue with that
If you compile a list of the ten most iconic, instantly recognisable buildings in the world Westminster is on there
Rough list:
Pyramids Parthenon Tower of Pisa Taj Mahal Empire State Bldg Eiffel Tower Palace of Westminster Sydney Opera House Burj
Number ten can be disputed between Stonehenge, Statue of Liberty, The Pantheon, Hagia Sophia, Gobekli Tepe (should be top of the top ten really), Notre Dame, St Basil’s Cathedral, et al, depending on your definition of “building”
No Colloseum?!
Good one, yes. Clean forgot. That’s the tenth
The White House? I know it isn't exactly imposing, but still...
The White House isn't even in the top two most significant landmarks in its own country. Both the Statue of Liberty and Golden Gate Bridge are surely higher.
Neither of them are buildings, are they?
Although the Eiffel Tower isn't really a building either, being pedantic.
As for Westminster - there was a huge scandal over crap building stone being used in it which deteriorated absurdly quickly. I forget the details but geologists were called in and the exterior all had to be replaced IIRC.
Ha! I'm quite familiar with Anston Stones from surveying the SSSI.
I'd never consider the Magnesian Limestone as a good building stone really. All the older houses constructed from it show significant signs of erosion. It has a nice warm Cotswold-like colour and it suits village houses which don't have the same structural requirements as a major landmark.
One problem with replacing Westminster Palace, even temporarily, is that it is utterly enormous in terms of area 112,476 m2
Bucks Palace is 77,000, British Museum 99,000.
It's no Palace of the Parliament, Hofburg or Louvre but it is bigger than anywhere else in the UK.
Having said that do we need 112,476 m2 of floor space for parliament or could we get by with less.
A few extra dozen square metres to give all the MPs a seat (and preferably desk) would be a good start, as there is plainly so much scope for deletion.
The formerly normal aspiration to settle and start a family is out of reach for swathes of young people. A fundamental compact between conservative principles, and the party that is supposed to represent them, has been broken.
Britain tends to think of itself as an equal partner to countries such as France, the Netherlands and Germany in terms of incomes and living standards. This is a collective fantasy, which hasn’t been true for well over a decade. The reality shouldn’t be shocking, yet it remains so: Britain’s incomes and living standards have fallen far behind what were its peer nations only 15 years ago. “Across European countries, only households in Greece and Cyprus saw a worse performance between 2007 and 2018 than the UK,” found the Resolution Foundation.
Because the reality is that Britain’s national religion is no longer Anglican Christianity. It isn’t even the NHS. It is Pensionerism. Britain is a care home with a navy.
Yet all attempts to reform this growth-killing inequity end in failure, such is the strength of the homeowner-pensioner lobby.
Without Brexit to focus on, the Government has lost its sense of purpose. The next leader must be a strategist, cerebral, and yet still a salesman. Someone who recognises that there’s more to winning than winning itself, and declinist managerialism — that a far greater prize is changing peoples’ lives and your country, for the better.
There’s a similar article in the FT: the new decline of Britain
The graphs are quite shocking in how UK median income is falling behind, even as we do OK-ish on GDP per capita (suggesting rising inequality)
Moreover, the turning point in all the graphs is the Great Financial Crisis, not Brexit. Up to 2008 the UK was steaming ahead and even overtaking all west European peers, in 2008 we stumbled and fell, and have never recovered
Something happened in 2008. The easy answer is we borrowed too much and when credit was squeezed, ouch. But that is true of many countries. What was particular to Britain that changed in 2008?
We didn't have a proper crash in house prices but instead Brown/Darling and then Cameron/Osborne propped up the market with ever more schemes to increase lending.
It's more that our financial services industry was proportionately far bigger than anyone else's and produced a much greater proportion of government funds by way of tax. We lost huge numbers of really well paid jobs and we have not replaced them which has driven median income down in a somewhat exaggerated fashion. Those who have remained in work have done ok but the loss of the cream at the top has driven down the averages.
I cycle a lot, commute to work (15 miles mostly off road, but with about 5 miles on road in a combination of 20, 30 and 40mph limits).
20mph - I never overtake moving cars (it's asking for trouble) so I reduce my speed as required. I will overtake stationary traffic if there is space and it looks safe to do so
30mph - I'm comfortable with this as a car speed when cycling. It's easy enough to signal and manouevre in for e.g. right turns as the speed differential is not too great
40mph - Not comfortable in heavy traffic if there's any need for manouevres. My 40mph stretch is on a quiet road so the right turn I have to make (with a long filter lane) is fine. I changed my route to avoid a right turn on another 40mph road with heavy traffic and virtually no filter lane.
I don't think we need blanket 20mph zones. I'd rather see better enforcement of existing 30mph limits. Or, better still, much better cycle lanes, preferably separated from roads, but certainly with plenty of space for a car to overtake without having to change lane.
(My average speed commuting is about 15mph, including stops for traffic lights etc, I'm cruising at around 18mph generally, so that clearly influences my view. If I was travelling at 10mph, I might find 30mph more intimidating)
None of the leadership contenders seems to be talking about levelling up. Focus seems to be on shrinking the state, which helps London and the SE. Have the Tories given up on the Red Wall, or do they hope that going large on Chicks with Dicks will obscure the abandonment of levelling up as a policy objective?
That isn't going to work when I suspect the Labour manifesto will feature HS2E, NPR and quite possibly given the state of Parliament a plan to move Parliament to Manchester
* Can't really be Birmingham for reasons and as others have pointed out if you move it to a small place it will total dominate the town / city but would leave whole piles of things in London.
Why couldn't it be Birmingham ?
The romantic in me would like Colchester, York or Winchester but none of those will happen.
Too near London especially with HS2 - you would end up with Parliament in Birmingham and most things left where they were.
And the whole point of the change would be to change the focus of the country away from being London centric.
Am I missing something? Since when was it Labour policy to move parliament out of London? It’s a pretty extraordinary move
I didn't say it was policy - but given the state of Parliament it makes sense to firstly have a discussion about it and secondly whether there are votes in it.
And up North knocking London down a peg or 2 is probably worth a fair few votes.
Ah, OK
Phew. I don’t think it will ever happen, nor should it happen; it would be an act of self harm
The UK has one great World City. London. It might be the greatest city on earth, it is easily in the top 5
No other city in the UK is in the top 100 for “greatness”, probably not even Edinburgh (which is exceedingly handsome but too small for greatness)
Taking politics out of London would damage our politics and diminish the city at the same time. Stupid
Top 5 include London, New York, Paris. Where else
Tokyo i reckon, but that’s 4th or 5th, and I’d say Shanghai
It has the absolute swagger of a world city, if you go there. A muscle memory of greatness now returning. The commercial, business and cultural capital of China, the new superpower
And manages to do it without being the political capital.
To be clear, I'm not necessarily advocating moving the capital; I'm thinking out loud. It's a fun thought experiment.
Moving parliament out of London is a total non-starter. Given how our transport networks are built radiating out from the capital, the net increase in transport time from the average constituency would be prohibitive. The only potential alternative is Birmingham, but that is so close to London as to raise the question of why bother. Of course Parliament could be moved permanently out of the Palace of Westminster if that was a lower cost solution than refurbishing the building as a working parliamentary building. Even with the cost of building a new parliament that might be the case.
It's an interesting point. I wonder where in the UK would yield the lowest connectivity times for MPs.
Does London's hub location for rail and air out balance it's non central location.
Plenty would find Birmingham barely better, it would be bad for numerous far southern MPs, for Highland MPs, even for many Northern MPs XC Vs LNER doesn't give the benefit that cutting 100 miles befits.
The formerly normal aspiration to settle and start a family is out of reach for swathes of young people. A fundamental compact between conservative principles, and the party that is supposed to represent them, has been broken.
Britain tends to think of itself as an equal partner to countries such as France, the Netherlands and Germany in terms of incomes and living standards. This is a collective fantasy, which hasn’t been true for well over a decade. The reality shouldn’t be shocking, yet it remains so: Britain’s incomes and living standards have fallen far behind what were its peer nations only 15 years ago. “Across European countries, only households in Greece and Cyprus saw a worse performance between 2007 and 2018 than the UK,” found the Resolution Foundation.
Because the reality is that Britain’s national religion is no longer Anglican Christianity. It isn’t even the NHS. It is Pensionerism. Britain is a care home with a navy.
Yet all attempts to reform this growth-killing inequity end in failure, such is the strength of the homeowner-pensioner lobby.
Without Brexit to focus on, the Government has lost its sense of purpose. The next leader must be a strategist, cerebral, and yet still a salesman. Someone who recognises that there’s more to winning than winning itself, and declinist managerialism — that a far greater prize is changing peoples’ lives and your country, for the better.
There’s a similar article in the FT: the new decline of Britain
The graphs are quite shocking in how UK median income is falling behind, even as we do OK-ish on GDP per capita (suggesting rising inequality)
Moreover, the turning point in all the graphs is the Great Financial Crisis, not Brexit. Up to 2008 the UK was steaming ahead and even overtaking all west European peers, in 2008 we stumbled and fell, and have never recovered
Something happened in 2008. The easy answer is we borrowed too much and when credit was squeezed, ouch. But that is true of many countries. What was particular to Britain that changed in 2008?
We didn't have a proper crash in house prices but instead Brown/Darling and then Cameron/Osborne propped up the market with ever more schemes to increase lending.
It's more that our financial services industry was proportionately far bigger than anyone else's and produced a much greater proportion of government funds by way of tax. We lost huge numbers of really well paid jobs and we have not replaced them which has driven median income down in a somewhat exaggerated fashion. Those who have remained in work have done ok but the loss of the cream at the top has driven down the averages.
Medians don't shift in exaggerated fashions. A mean will if you lose the very highest paid, but medians only change if lots of people have been affected, unless you have a very weird distribution to begin with.
While there's been much focus on Kemi's views on wokeness and the trans issues, there's been less focus on her promise to abandon net zero, roll back the state, cut education expenditure and so on.
I can see her winning the Tory membership over. I'm less persuaded that abandoning net zero and rolling back the state so drastically will win over the typical floating voter.
I want the Tories removed a long long way from office. Whichever candidate they select as PM. But it is encouraging to think that people like Badenoch can actually be a serious contender for *the Tories*.
The threat to Labour is simple. She is far more confident, articulate and sane that so many of the various prominent BAME equivalents are in Labour. A black woman who is a successful migrant saying lets cut the crap and focus on people's priorities goes way beyond what Labour can offer.
And all that despite not ever having benefited from a single quota or "all-X" shortlist, eh?
That's not really true. She benefited from the Cameron era policy of boosting candidates from minority groups, a policy which was extremely successful incidentally even if attacked at the time by trad Tories.
Right, but that was much more about expanding the funnel into the pipeline rather than fiddling the pipeline itself, wasn't it?
It was effectively a quota.
You and I appear to have different understandings of the meaning of the word "quota".
Cameron said the candidate list should have a certain minimum number of people from various underrepresented groups, including ethnic minorities. Requiring a set to have a minimum from a certain group sounds like a quota to me.
I'm really confused now. Badenoch wasn't on the A List and wasn't elected to parliament until two GEs later. So I'm not sure how you're claiming she benefited from a quota. (I also can't find a source for the A List having any quotas, but that's a separate issue.)
The formerly normal aspiration to settle and start a family is out of reach for swathes of young people. A fundamental compact between conservative principles, and the party that is supposed to represent them, has been broken.
Britain tends to think of itself as an equal partner to countries such as France, the Netherlands and Germany in terms of incomes and living standards. This is a collective fantasy, which hasn’t been true for well over a decade. The reality shouldn’t be shocking, yet it remains so: Britain’s incomes and living standards have fallen far behind what were its peer nations only 15 years ago. “Across European countries, only households in Greece and Cyprus saw a worse performance between 2007 and 2018 than the UK,” found the Resolution Foundation.
Because the reality is that Britain’s national religion is no longer Anglican Christianity. It isn’t even the NHS. It is Pensionerism. Britain is a care home with a navy.
Yet all attempts to reform this growth-killing inequity end in failure, such is the strength of the homeowner-pensioner lobby.
Without Brexit to focus on, the Government has lost its sense of purpose. The next leader must be a strategist, cerebral, and yet still a salesman. Someone who recognises that there’s more to winning than winning itself, and declinist managerialism — that a far greater prize is changing peoples’ lives and your country, for the better.
There’s a similar article in the FT: the new decline of Britain
The graphs are quite shocking in how UK median income is falling behind, even as we do OK-ish on GDP per capita (suggesting rising inequality)
Moreover, the turning point in all the graphs is the Great Financial Crisis, not Brexit. Up to 2008 the UK was steaming ahead and even overtaking all west European peers, in 2008 we stumbled and fell, and have never recovered
Something happened in 2008. The easy answer is we borrowed too much and when credit was squeezed, ouch. But that is true of many countries. What was particular to Britain that changed in 2008?
We didn't have a proper crash in house prices but instead Brown/Darling and then Cameron/Osborne propped up the market with ever more schemes to increase lending.
It's more that our financial services industry was proportionately far bigger than anyone else's and produced a much greater proportion of government funds by way of tax. We lost huge numbers of really well paid jobs and we have not replaced them which has driven median income down in a somewhat exaggerated fashion. Those who have remained in work have done ok but the loss of the cream at the top has driven down the averages.
It is also, possibly, a wider secular trend in the West that is slowly spreading
The rot started in the USA where median incomes have been treading water for ages - hence Trump. Then Britain fell into the trap. Hence Brexit. France looks like it is following, as income stagnates…
Assuming he does win the vote (which he won't), how does it actually achieve his aim of getting a new PM more quickly?
In the same way that Callaghan remained as PM after he lost the VONC in 1979, Johnson would remain as PM.
The process to elect a new leader of the Conservative Party is already underway and any general election, the timing of which would still be set by the current administration and so would see a polling date set for later in September.
So nothing in his cunning plan would achieve the result he seeks. Who is advising Starmer???
Don't take it so literally – Labour know they have no chance of the vonc passing. They just want to force the nonentities in the PCP to back Boris, for shits and giggles.
While there's been much focus on Kemi's views on wokeness and the trans issues, there's been less focus on her promise to abandon net zero, roll back the state, cut education expenditure and so on.
I can see her winning the Tory membership over. I'm less persuaded that abandoning net zero and rolling back the state so drastically will win over the typical floating voter.
I want the Tories removed a long long way from office. Whichever candidate they select as PM. But it is encouraging to think that people like Badenoch can actually be a serious contender for *the Tories*.
The threat to Labour is simple. She is far more confident, articulate and sane that so many of the various prominent BAME equivalents are in Labour. A black woman who is a successful migrant saying lets cut the crap and focus on people's priorities goes way beyond what Labour can offer.
And all that despite not ever having benefited from a single quota or "all-X" shortlist, eh?
That's not really true. She benefited from the Cameron era policy of boosting candidates from minority groups, a policy which was extremely successful incidentally even if attacked at the time by trad Tories.
Right, but that was much more about expanding the funnel into the pipeline rather than fiddling the pipeline itself, wasn't it?
It was effectively a quota.
You and I appear to have different understandings of the meaning of the word "quota".
Cameron said the candidate list should have a certain minimum number of people from various underrepresented groups, including ethnic minorities. Requiring a set to have a minimum from a certain group sounds like a quota to me.
I'm really confused now. Badenoch wasn't on the A List and wasn't elected to parliament until two GEs later. So I'm not sure how you're claiming she benefited from a quota. (I also can't find a source for the A List having any quotas, but that's a separate issue.)
My apologies for not explaining all the steps of the thesis.
Cameron used effectively quotas to change the face of the party, as was his explicit intent. Cameron succeeded. He changed the sort of people who became Tory candidates. The point of affirmative action like that is that it changes expectations, so that future intakes are different without needing quotas.
Cameron changed the party. Many of the current leadership candidates directly benefited from that, being on the A list. Badenoch, shortly afterwards, benefited from a party having been changed by Cameron and his approach.
Assuming he does win the vote (which he won't), how does it actually achieve his aim of getting a new PM more quickly?
In the same way that Callaghan remained as PM after he lost the VONC in 1979, Johnson would remain as PM.
The process to elect a new leader of the Conservative Party is already underway and any general election, the timing of which would still be set by the current administration and so would see a polling date set for later in September.
So nothing in his cunning plan would achieve the result he seeks. Who is advising Starmer???
Don't take it so literally – Labour know they have no chance of the vonc passing. They just want to force the nonentities in the PCP to back Boris, for shits and giggles.
What a brilliant way to rebuild trust in politics.
Nicola Sturgeon’s request for the UK’s highest court to give her clarity on the legality of her planned Scottish independence referendum should be rejected, the UK Government has said.
In its initial submission to the Supreme Court, which has been asked to decide the issue, its lawyers argue that the case should be thrown out as premature.
They believe that the decision on the legality of the proposed legislation cannot be made until after it is introduced, scrutinised and passed at Holyrood.
What has the UK government got to fear? Let the legal experts clear that one up seems okay, it will likely take them best part of 15 years.
AIUI, the Lord Advocate had not advised SG on legality yet.
Punting it back to SG forces LA to make a judgement which could be challenged in a Scottish court. Much better optics for team UK.
The Lord Advocate has said
"The Lord Advocate needs to have the necessary degree of confidence that a Bill would be within devolved competence in order to 'clear' such a statement.
“In the present case, the Lord Advocate does not have the necessary degree of confidence."
The major reason that Westminster refurb is so expensive is that it is trying to repurpose a grandiose old building into a modern workplace - complete with IT, Security, AC, Fire supressant, etc - while working around its current inhabitants. Far better to relocate permanently to a modern purposebuilt complex (wherever) and to reinstate the core of Westminster as a tourist attraction. Should be massivley less costly.
One problem with replacing Westminster Palace, even temporarily, is that it is utterly enormous in terms of area 112,476 m2
Bucks Palace is 77,000, British Museum 99,000.
It's no Palace of the Parliament, Hofburg or Louvre but it is bigger than anywhere else in the UK.
Having said that do we need 112,476 m2 of floor space for parliament or could we get by with less.
Considering it is so vast, it is daft that not all MPs can get a seat when the Commons is full!
Churchill insisted on keeping that feature for extra edginess.
I've been, but I don't recall - it's just benches, isn't it? So pesumably the capacity varies with the mean girth of MPs? So if we elect a bunch of skinny whippets we can (partly at least) solve the problem?
Mind you, with some of the recent revelations. I can understand MPs wanting to keep their distance from some other MPs...
Assuming he does win the vote (which he won't), how does it actually achieve his aim of getting a new PM more quickly?
In the same way that Callaghan remained as PM after he lost the VONC in 1979, Johnson would remain as PM.
The process to elect a new leader of the Conservative Party is already underway and any general election, the timing of which would still be set by the current administration and so would see a polling date set for later in September.
So nothing in his cunning plan would achieve the result he seeks. Who is advising Starmer???
He wants all the Tories who so openly and publicly blew up Johnson to give him their confidence. That's all. Will look great on a leaflet apparently.
They wouldn't be. They would be giving confidence to the governing party.
Nope. Every leaflet will have the MP and all the quotes where they have supported the crook.
So it's nothing more than playing party politics?
I am shocked, shocked, to discover politics going on in the Houses of Parliament.
Indeed. If the parties were reversed, all the lefties would be denouncing the Tories for doing it...
It is perfectly allowable to remind the selectorate and the electorate about the volte-face being undertaken by ex-Johnson supporters as they try to "draw a line under" or "move on from" where they were barely a week ago. If I hear anyone else say "we are where we are" I shall.....I shall.... stub my toe!!!
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Edit: or, if they get a particularly free market free-marketeer they could have "The Houses of Parliament. Brought to you by The Marriott Group".
If the Right want a better candidate than Truss (and Truss seems terrible to me), then I suggest they work out who it is quickly, but they pick someone a bit more senior!
You see the same in publishing. Some desperate PR people will say “book X has been translated into over 5 languages!”
So, 6 languages, then
Green / Sustainable Aviation Fuels that needs Government support now in return 2 more factories over the next 10 years...
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jul/04/eiffel-tower-riddled-with-rust-and-in-need-of-repair-leaked-reports-say
But it was at least a temporary prefab.
As for Westminster - there was a huge scandal over crap building stone being used in it which deteriorated absurdly quickly. I forget the details but geologists were called in and the exterior all had to be replaced IIRC.
Edit: Yep, here it is:
https://orpiment.wordpress.com/2015/06/20/the-worst-stone-ever-used-in-the-metropolis-150-years-of-stone-decay-in-the-houses-of-parliament/
The formerly normal aspiration to settle and start a family is out of reach for swathes of young people. A fundamental compact between conservative principles, and the party that is supposed to represent them, has been broken.
Britain tends to think of itself as an equal partner to countries such as France, the Netherlands and Germany in terms of incomes and living standards. This is a collective fantasy, which hasn’t been true for well over a decade. The reality shouldn’t be shocking, yet it remains so: Britain’s incomes and living standards have fallen far behind what were its peer nations only 15 years ago. “Across European countries, only households in Greece and Cyprus saw a worse performance between 2007 and 2018 than the UK,” found the Resolution Foundation.
Because the reality is that Britain’s national religion is no longer Anglican Christianity. It isn’t even the NHS. It is Pensionerism. Britain is a care home with a navy.
Yet all attempts to reform this growth-killing inequity end in failure, such is the strength of the homeowner-pensioner lobby.
Without Brexit to focus on, the Government has lost its sense of purpose. The next leader must be a strategist, cerebral, and yet still a salesman. Someone who recognises that there’s more to winning than winning itself, and declinist managerialism — that a far greater prize is changing peoples’ lives and your country, for the better.
St Basil's is clearly what you'd show in a film to establish you're in Moscow, just as the Houses of Parliament says London, the Eiffel Tower says Paris etc.
However, the final decision is made by Tory Party members and it's very easy to question their sanity.
As opposed to, say, weeks with the government on hold while we play politics with a leadership election?
Starmer gets the headlines for a day or two, and can point the finger and say "look, they are insisting on keeping the discredited Johnson in Downing Street for another few months while the country goes to the dogs" after he inevitably loses the vote.
I can take the point that neither will go down as amazing Prime Ministers, but I’m not sure that necessarily correlates with being able to do the job itself.
...County Hall is the site of businesses and attractions, including the Sea Life London Aquarium and Shrek's Adventure London...
I remember listening to that. McGrath was bowling with four slips and a short leg. And it was the correct field.
Who is it?
If more space was needed, The Excel centre has plenty of space and smaller rooms.
You're entitled to be. Who could have imagined the Tories would line up such a list of donkeys after three years in power.
All Richi has to do is stay on his feet for another few days and it's a stroll. He could even afford to tell a porkie like he did this morning without any fears at all.
Not one of the donkies seemed to realise that a USP shared with ten other is not a USP but a speedy route to defeat
https://conservativehome.com/2022/07/11/next-tory-leader-whos-backing-whom-our-working-list/
The problem is everyone is scared of making the decision to waste billions on looking after the politicians themselves stop the buildings falling down and bring them up to modern standards.
However, she hasn't held the same positions of seniority. They'd both been LOTO. Major had been Chancellor of the Exchequer.
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The graphs are quite shocking in how UK median income is falling behind, even as we do OK-ish on GDP per capita (suggesting rising inequality)
Moreover, the turning point in all the graphs is the Great Financial Crisis, not Brexit. Up to 2008 the UK was steaming ahead and even overtaking all west European peers, in 2008 we stumbled and fell, and have never recovered
Something happened in 2008. The easy answer is we borrowed too much and when credit was squeezed, ouch. But that is true of many countries. What was particular to Britain that changed in 2008?
Sebastian Payne@SebastianEPayne·2m
My favourite fact about the 1922 committee is that it was actually founded in 1923
Spanish geography dictated a central capital because you always need to go through the middle from one periphery to another (sailing took/takes too long).
I can understand not including the White House on architectural merit but it is at least instantly recognisable.
If nobody has to live in the building, then The Great Wall of China should should maybe get a mention too?
Bucks Palace is 77,000, British Museum 99,000.
It's no Palace of the Parliament, Hofburg or Louvre but it is bigger than anywhere else in the UK.
Having said that do we need 112,476 m2 of floor space for parliament or could we get by with less.
https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1942/jul/02/central-direction-of-the-war
Looks like Sunak, Mordaunt, Truss, Braverman, Badenoch, Tugendhat and maybe Hunt and/or Zahawi and/or Javid will clear the first ballot, so we may still have 9 candidates. Still think it'll be Sunak/Truss in the end.
https://twitter.com/GuidoFawkes/status/1546848588562681861?t=IRfetRlPFS8ZxLEMsaNgww&s=19
1) in a lot of places, prices are set not on local wages (i.e. what people have saved or can borrow) but on what the market rent is.
2) Housing stock has not kept up with population growth only where it has have house prices stayed level.
He appears to very stupid - not in a way that makes him inarticulate - but just not able to distinguish woods and trees. Abominable judgment.
I'd never consider the Magnesian Limestone as a good building stone really. All the older houses constructed from it show significant signs of erosion. It has a nice warm Cotswold-like colour and it suits village houses which don't have the same structural requirements as a major landmark.
I cycle a lot, commute to work (15 miles mostly off road, but with about 5 miles on road in a combination of 20, 30 and 40mph limits).
20mph - I never overtake moving cars (it's asking for trouble) so I reduce my speed as required. I will overtake stationary traffic if there is space and it looks safe to do so
30mph - I'm comfortable with this as a car speed when cycling. It's easy enough to signal and manouevre in for e.g. right turns as the speed differential is not too great
40mph - Not comfortable in heavy traffic if there's any need for manouevres. My 40mph stretch is on a quiet road so the right turn I have to make (with a long filter lane) is fine. I changed my route to avoid a right turn on another 40mph road with heavy traffic and virtually no filter lane.
I don't think we need blanket 20mph zones. I'd rather see better enforcement of existing 30mph limits. Or, better still, much better cycle lanes, preferably separated from roads, but certainly with plenty of space for a car to overtake without having to change lane.
(My average speed commuting is about 15mph, including stops for traffic lights etc, I'm cruising at around 18mph generally, so that clearly influences my view. If I was travelling at 10mph, I might find 30mph more intimidating)
The rot started in the USA where median incomes have been treading water for ages - hence Trump. Then Britain fell into the trap. Hence Brexit. France looks like it is following, as income stagnates…
And so on
I'm now all green with £320 winnings if Penny gets it.
How many MPs, Lords and hangars on actually work in Westminster though ?
Cameron used effectively quotas to change the face of the party, as was his explicit intent. Cameron succeeded. He changed the sort of people who became Tory candidates. The point of affirmative action like that is that it changes expectations, so that future intakes are different without needing quotas.
Cameron changed the party. Many of the current leadership candidates directly benefited from that, being on the A list. Badenoch, shortly afterwards, benefited from a party having been changed by Cameron and his approach.
Mind you, with some of the recent revelations. I can understand MPs wanting to keep their distance from some other MPs...