The swing in Chester of 14% to Labour was actually better for the Tories than the 18% swing to Labour in the latest YouGov poll yesterday.
So while not a great result for the Tories and good for Labour it was actually not as disastrous for Sunak as some of the latest polls would suggest
Glad I am not alone in seeing this “disaster for the Tories” as completely over hyped. It’s just not there in the pseudological facts.
1) mid term by elections your voters don’t come out. You can get results just like this even when national polls are much closer together. 1b) Chester Turnout usually 75% plus, and history in seat points towards a labour seat not strong Tory one, how does anyone prove votes have switched here not just stay at home? Without switchers there is argument Labour is underperforming in real votes compared to polls, Labour underperforming turning polls into real votes with switchers, as they certainly have in real votes throughout 2022 have they not? This Labour under performance in real elections v polls, was the second main take out from 2022 locals, after main take out of Lib Dem better than expected performance. 2) did Tories give their voters reason for protest against them though by staying home? As they have told the world their Tory predecessors in recent Tory cabinets have broken the asylum system and made mistakes which crashed the economy, they sure have given voters a reason to give them a mid term slap. Have they not? But with two years to come out of mid term and build to election, what does this result actually say about what is certain to happen at that next General Election?
I dont think anyone seriously believes the next GE will follow the current polls. There will be shy Tories (though fewer than under Truss), and undecideds switching back, but the polls show Labour sitting on a pretty decent cushion.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
Not a good reason for the overwhelming majority who wonder why the wealthiest parents enjoy a tax break that is leaving money on the table when their taxes are going to go up and their kids' schools are facing cutbacks. 'Class War' might've worked as a message if this was just Labour making a tax grab out of the blue. It doesn't when part of the Conservative message is one where everyone needs to make sacrifices - as effectively becomes 'everyone needs to make sacrifices except those who can spend £20,000+ a year to give their kid a perceived advantage'.
FWIW I think it's possible that Labour have made a mistake if they are serious about the VAT thing on schools. Not because it's wrong - schools should only have charity status if they are genuinely open to all on a needs blind basis, which very few could do - but because the policy takes on a massive establishment who, without publicising it, exclusively use these institutions. This includes vast numbers of the elite left and liberal establishment as well as centre-right and non-aligned.
This is a fantastically powerful lobby, with huge amounts of deniable power.
Private school are more non-profit organisations than charities I would say. If they were treated as limited companies and therefore liable to corporation tax I'm not sure how much they would raise cus every one I'm familiar with (the non-fancy ones - they are not all Etons) is skint.
What on earth are they spending all their money on ? Fees have gone up by miles over inflation since forever. I know my old school is in deep financial trouble - they pissed all our fees up the wall on a mahoosive heated indoor swimming pool.
A fair point. Do nothing and many will fade away through lack of funds. Overseas pupil numbers are likely to be down for some who rely on China for boarding numbers. The major asset tends to be the site.
Pretty much a waste of energy in fighting over VAT charges when there is little benefit in the policy. Unless you are completely moronic and think the rich kids parents won't employ additional tutoring to get Theodora and Humphry the best results in the state school the have to attend, thus enhancing the chances of a place at a good Uni as they have excelled at a state school, not at a privileged fee paying establishment.
I like the sound of this new Labour policy already...even though I frankly think it's treating the symptom not the cause.
I think it s a worry for Labour. It isn't new, novel or imaginative. It is a rehash from how many years and how many times ago? Great if it raises a bit of cash, but the gross contribution will be far less than the net contribution if more private schools close. I also think it potentially has the unintended consequence that you highlighted, as you venture forth into tuition of the thick rich.
Unreadable / unjustifiably praised book/author list: Part 1
1.The two biographies of Churchill by Martin Gilbert (one long laundry list of everything Churchill ever did with no attempt to put into context or analyse) and Roy Jenkins: insufferably self-regarding and pompous. 2. Martin Amis 3. Kingsley Amis: parts of Lucky Jim were quite funny but only because no-one else made jokes in books in the 1950s and after that he became a Self-Important Saloon Bar Bore. 4. Hilary Mantel - unreadable. 5. Dickens - also unreadable. Vanity Fair, by contrast, is one of the best novels ever written...
Neither of the last two are unreadable, it's just that you don't care for them. It's true that Dickens wasn't great at writing women, but I don't think he's exclusively a male preserve; my daughter likes his novels. Agree about 1-3, and Vanity Fair.
It is v rare for me not to finish a book. With Dickens I cannot get past chapter 1. Mantel: I could not finish Wolf Hall. Her style is deeply annoying and she managed to make Tudor politics boring. Hugely overrated. IMO.
I like Elizabeth Gaskell and George Eliot and Brontë. So dunno what it is about Dickens.
Perhaps that you don't like books which aren't very interested in women ? That's true of Mantel's trilogy, too.
Since the cricket is a bit dull I'll tell you why Mantel gets my goat.
She can write very well. Some of her descriptive passages are beautiful. She also researches thoroughly and knows her history. In Wolf Hall she was writing about a particularly interesting peiod of history, one I know quite well and enjoy reading about, whether its a contrarian view or not.
So why did I give up on it after 150 pages (and like Cyclefree I rarely fail to finish a book)?
It is written in the 'past in the present'. Cockneys use this mode a lot - 'So I goes in the pub and I sees this geezer....' - and it does have a certain dramatic effect, but only if used sparingly. A whole book written in it is simply tedious.
She uses personal pronouns in the most peculiar way which means that at certain points she has to clarify who she is referring to - e.g. 'He, Moore, came in....' Such stylistic quirks are so common throughout the text that you finish up paying more attention to them than the narrative.
You have to wonder what the point of all this weirdness is. I suspect her readers - and she is enormously popular - mistake it for Art. Or maybe the aim is to stand out from all the other writers of this type of novel. I think if she didn't do it, she would be a perfectly readable but ordinary writer of historic fiction. As it is she is deeply irrating, not least for the reason that this highly artificial and contrived rubbish sells like hot cakes, whilst equally capable writers with less of a penchant for self-publicity are ignored.
She is the Agatha Christie of historical novels - a mediocrity who got herself promoted way above her merit.
I think you either find the effort to adjust your reading to the steam of consciousness style is worthwhile, or you don't. That's a matter of taste rather than right or wrong, I think. It's not Agatha Christie, that's for sure.
In a perhaps similar manner, some found large parts of Iain M Bank's Feersum Endjinn unreadable. Others enjoyed it.
I am surprised at some of the criticism for Christie on here. I'm not going to claim that she wrote glorious prose, but the mystery that she created was superb - the plots are excellent. I wonder if the haters have read many of the books?
I find myself in strong disagreement with both Cyclefree and PtP on this. Dickens, Mantel and Christie are all excellent reads. The only author I have ever really struggled with was Virginia Woolfe, in part because of her stream of consciousness style and in part because of her whole literary ethos.
Mantel is superb. I love Dickens but for some reason I find my tolerance for reading his very long books varies a lot, some are certainly a lot more gripping than others. Great Expectations is a phenomenally good book. I've never given Woolfe a go. Patrick Hamilton, whose play Gaslight gave us the term gaslighting, is an unappreciated star from the same kind of era, although interest in his work seems to be growing again.
What is unsaid in interviews matters quite a lot. Wes Streeting this morning on Today R4 had no intention of answering the question: Given that 12% of GDP is spent on health care currently what do Labour think would be the right amount?
Focus on this question would be a good political discipline, and not just for Labour.
To be fair, it is a stupid question. Nonetheless, if Radio 4 is intent on asking it, a response should be prepared.
Not quite so stupid. It gets discussed in relation to defence and development in particular and is an excellent discipline politically. The answer can't be zero, and can't be 100%. There are international comparisons to be made; and the poor old voter will be better informed about allocation of finite resource to the potentially unlimited demand.
To govern is to choose. Expenditure plans expressed as % of GDP is a magnificent measure of choices for a future government, because of its simplicity.
Labour have an interesting political/strategy choice about whether to reveal a little of the approach they will take. I think they will stick to attacks and sunlit uplands. Still, given the nature of problems in the UK at the moment it would be nice to have a clue from Labour; especially as I plan to vote for them....
I don't think there's ANY case for disclosing policy (or even privately deciding on policy) nearly 2 years before a likely election. As a leftie I'd like a bit more sizzle ("A fairer society", that sort of thing) but even I don't expect a steak at present, and it would also annoy members of all kinds if the leadership suddenly came out with amazing new policies without discussion.
This is the time for serious background work (and I know some is going on), plus a few token items like VAT on private schools to keep in the news. Some more concrete indications will come in the September conference, and actual policies in 2024.
It cannot be a coincidence that we get a bit of VAT sizzling in the week prior to a Westminster by-election, which then goes heavily in Labour's favour. Seems like something of a test to me...
The VAT on Private education showed that Labour are finally getting their act together. As Nick implies the policy does nothing in itself except remind voters that they are still against privilege and in case anyone had forgotten that's what Rishi and everything about him reeks of. I imagine his personal PR company gave Labour's new agency a quiet pat on the back for that one.
I'd have been sorely disappointed in Starmer if he hadn't felt able to include even this mildest of left-tinged policies. I imagine it polls well with target voters because nothing will come out of Labour between now and the election that doesn't.
The swing in Chester of 14% to Labour was actually better for the Tories than the 18% swing to Labour in the latest YouGov poll yesterday.
So while not a great result for the Tories and good for Labour it was actually not as disastrous for Sunak as some of the latest polls would suggest
Glad I am not alone in seeing this “disaster for the Tories” as completely over hyped. It’s just not there in the pseudological facts.
1) mid term by elections your voters don’t come out. You can get results just like this even when national polls are much closer together. 1b) Chester Turnout usually 75% plus, and history in seat points towards a labour seat not strong Tory one, how does anyone prove votes have switched here not just stay at home? Without switchers there is argument Labour is underperforming in real votes compared to polls, Labour underperforming turning polls into real votes with switchers, as they certainly have in real votes throughout 2022 have they not? This Labour under performance in real elections v polls, was the second main take out from 2022 locals, after main take out of Lib Dem better than expected performance. 2) did Tories give their voters reason for protest against them though by staying home? As they have told the world their Tory predecessors in recent Tory cabinets have broken the asylum system and made mistakes which crashed the economy, they sure have given voters a reason to give them a mid term slap. Have they not? But with two years to come out of mid term and build to election, what does this result actually say about what is certain to happen at that next General Election?
This it's just staying at home in by-elections narrative means nothing is wrong doesn't fit historically.
Echibit A: That 1994 Dudley West by-election, the greatest Con-Lab swing since WW2, and one of the augers of a Blair PMship.
Numerically, the Labour vote went DOWN from 28,940 to 28,400. Yes, Labour lost votes.
So. setting a bar for Labour to actually put on numerical votes in a by-election - I just don't know if it has ever happened.
What is unsaid in interviews matters quite a lot. Wes Streeting this morning on Today R4 had no intention of answering the question: Given that 12% of GDP is spent on health care currently what do Labour think would be the right amount?
Focus on this question would be a good political discipline, and not just for Labour.
To be fair, it is a stupid question. Nonetheless, if Radio 4 is intent on asking it, a response should be prepared.
Not quite so stupid. It gets discussed in relation to defence and development in particular and is an excellent discipline politically. The answer can't be zero, and can't be 100%. There are international comparisons to be made; and the poor old voter will be better informed about allocation of finite resource to the potentially unlimited demand.
To govern is to choose. Expenditure plans expressed as % of GDP is a magnificent measure of choices for a future government, because of its simplicity.
Labour have an interesting political/strategy choice about whether to reveal a little of the approach they will take. I think they will stick to attacks and sunlit uplands. Still, given the nature of problems in the UK at the moment it would be nice to have a clue from Labour; especially as I plan to vote for them....
I don't think there's ANY case for disclosing policy (or even privately deciding on policy) nearly 2 years before a likely election. As a leftie I'd like a bit more sizzle ("A fairer society", that sort of thing) but even I don't expect a steak at present, and it would also annoy members of all kinds if the leadership suddenly came out with amazing new policies without discussion.
This is the time for serious background work (and I know some is going on), plus a few token items like VAT on private schools to keep in the news. Some more concrete indications will come in the September conference, and actual policies in 2024.
It cannot be a coincidence that we get a bit of VAT sizzling in the week prior to a Westminster by-election, which then goes heavily in Labour's favour. Seems like something of a test to me...
The VAT on Private education showed that Labour are finally getting their act together. As Nick implies the policy does nothing in itself except remind voters that they are still against privilege and in case anyone had forgotten that's what Rishi and everything about him reeks of. I imagine his personal PR company gave Labour's new agency a quiet pat on the back for that one.
What is the realpolitik though? Surely those who feel strongly against private schools already vote Labour? This proposal risks driving both socially liberal and ethnic minority private school parents into voting Conservative.
"Chris Whitty warns Britain faces 'prolonged period' of excess deaths not caused by Covid due to collateral effects of lockdown
Chief Medical Officer said heart disease and cancer cases were missed in Covid Comments came in a 'technical report' published on the pandemic challenges Warned speed of vaccine development could lull UK into false sense security"
It will help Sunak a lot in next couple of years to get all this stuff out in the media and out the way asap.
There is a lot of interesting things coming out now. Hindsight makes any lockdown look stupid versus look how many deaths and long covid came from it with lockdowns. Hancock promises to reveal all the fights, the mistakes, the crazy planning such as throw open the prison doors. He has a book out. “Tie my kangaroo testicles down sport”.
All those PBers who refused to watch I’m a celebrity because they wouldn’t get anything - belly laughs or insights - there was definitely both this time.
You know Kwasi Kwarteng is doing the Strictly Christmas Special?
It wasn't lockdown that closed down cancer and cardiac units. They were very busy with covid cases. It was the pandemic, not lockdown.
Why are you saying cancer treatments stopped? You saying it was impossible to have kept key treatment and diagnosis such as cancer going during the pandemic?
It’s true things like that stopped isn’t it? But did it really have to, or was a great mistake made?
Known cancers were treated, but lots of routine stuff stopped and a lot of new diagnoses come that way.
Like I said, it wasn't stopped as a policy, it was stopped by disease. Our specialist breast unit was full of covid respiratory patients for example.
@MoonRabbit see this clip of Chris Whitty on the subject at a committee hearing at the time.
But the take out from Whitty and yourself is “the pandemic forced this, there was no choice.” It was not policy decision, it was not taking eye off the ball, there was absolutely no choice or option in the matter. Is that fair to say is the take out?
And it is also fair that this should be questioned, not just nodded through as fact?
And it’s actually questioned with a simple question - could more not have been done to keep cancer diagnosis and treatment going?
Simple question, lots to consider. Were Nightingales under used when specialist breast units were full of covid respiratory patients for example?
Simple question, lots to consider, to get to the bottom line if it was policy decisions and mistakes what killed people, not all the blame on the pandemic.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
Not a good reason for the overwhelming majority who wonder why the wealthiest parents enjoy a tax break that is leaving money on the table when their taxes are going to go up and their kids' schools are facing cutbacks. 'Class War' might've worked as a message if this was just Labour making a tax grab out of the blue. It doesn't when part of the Conservative message is one where everyone needs to make sacrifices - as effectively becomes 'everyone needs to make sacrifices except those who can spend £20,000+ a year to give their kid a perceived advantage'.
FWIW I think it's possible that Labour have made a mistake if they are serious about the VAT thing on schools. Not because it's wrong - schools should only have charity status if they are genuinely open to all on a needs blind basis, which very few could do - but because the policy takes on a massive establishment who, without publicising it, exclusively use these institutions. This includes vast numbers of the elite left and liberal establishment as well as centre-right and non-aligned.
This is a fantastically powerful lobby, with huge amounts of deniable power.
Private school are more non-profit organisations than charities I would say. If they were treated as limited companies and therefore liable to corporation tax I'm not sure how much tax they would pay cus every one I'm familiar with (the non-fancy ones - they are not all Etons) is skint.
I send my daughters to private schools.
The biggest difference, is not just the class sizes. But the pastoral care and education tailored to the individual. For example - just the other day people were talking about SENS. At both schools, they train the staff and employ specialists.
The specialists at both schools do free work in the local state schools - x hours a week.
Altogether, both schools do more charitable work than many so called charities.
One has just reached the target of 25% of intake on 100% bursaries, paid for out of an American style foundation.
I wonder if this is part of the "bonfire of EU regulation" the Tories are planning:
COUNCIL DIRECTIVE 2006/112/EC
of 28 November 2006 on the common system of value added tax.....
Article 132
1. Member States shall exempt the following transactions: (a)....
(i) the provision of children's or young people's education, school or university education, vocational training or retraining, including the supply of services and of goods closely related thereto, by bodies governed by public law having such as their aim or by other organisations recognised by the Member State concerned as having similar objects;
(j) tuition given privately by teachers and covering school or university education;
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
Not a good reason for the overwhelming majority who wonder why the wealthiest parents enjoy a tax break that is leaving money on the table when their taxes are going to go up and their kids' schools are facing cutbacks. 'Class War' might've worked as a message if this was just Labour making a tax grab out of the blue. It doesn't when part of the Conservative message is one where everyone needs to make sacrifices - as effectively becomes 'everyone needs to make sacrifices except those who can spend £20,000+ a year to give their kid a perceived advantage'.
FWIW I think it's possible that Labour have made a mistake if they are serious about the VAT thing on schools. Not because it's wrong - schools should only have charity status if they are genuinely open to all on a needs blind basis, which very few could do - but because the policy takes on a massive establishment who, without publicising it, exclusively use these institutions. This includes vast numbers of the elite left and liberal establishment as well as centre-right and non-aligned.
This is a fantastically powerful lobby, with huge amounts of deniable power.
Private school are more non-profit organisations than charities I would say. If they were treated as limited companies and therefore liable to corporation tax I'm not sure how much tax they would pay cus every one I'm familiar with (the non-fancy ones - they are not all Etons) is skint.
I send my daughter ms to private schools.
The biggest difference, is not just the class sizes. But the pastoral care and education tailored to the individual. For example - just the other day people were talking about SENS. At both schools, they train the staff and employ specialists.
The specialists at both schools do free work in the local state schools - x hours a week.
Altogether, both schools do more charitable work than many so called charities.
One has just reached the target of 25% of intake on 100% bursaries, paid for out of an American style foundation.
Got to say I think you will find that's the exception rather than the rule.
The swing in Chester of 14% to Labour was actually better for the Tories than the 18% swing to Labour in the latest YouGov poll yesterday.
So while not a great result for the Tories and good for Labour it was actually not as disastrous for Sunak as some of the latest polls would suggest
Glad I am not alone in seeing this “disaster for the Tories” as completely over hyped. It’s just not there in the pseudological facts.
1) mid term by elections your voters don’t come out. You can get results just like this even when national polls are much closer together. 1b) Chester Turnout usually 75% plus, and history in seat points towards a labour seat not strong Tory one, how does anyone prove votes have switched here not just stay at home? Without switchers there is argument Labour is underperforming in real votes compared to polls, Labour underperforming turning polls into real votes with switchers, as they certainly have in real votes throughout 2022 have they not? This Labour under performance in real elections v polls, was the second main take out from 2022 locals, after main take out of Lib Dem better than expected performance. 2) did Tories give their voters reason for protest against them though by staying home? As they have told the world their Tory predecessors in recent Tory cabinets have broken the asylum system and made mistakes which crashed the economy, they sure have given voters a reason to give them a mid term slap. Have they not? But with two years to come out of mid term and build to election, what does this result actually say about what is certain to happen at that next General Election?
This it's just staying at home in by-elections narrative means nothing is wrong doesn't fit historically.
Echibit A: That 1994 Dudley West by-election, the greatest Con-Lab swing since WW2, and one of the augers of a Blair PMship.
Numerically, the Labour vote went DOWN from 28,940 to 28,400. Yes, Labour lost votes.
So. setting a bar for Labour to actually put on numerical votes in a by-election - I just don't know if it has ever happened.
I think you are basically coming to conclusion we can’t draw clear conclusions from mid term by election exactly what will happen two years later, thanks for your support in this.
The bottom line being, how much is it a partys vote staying home in real votes, when polls suggest swings based on vote transfers
Hint. Polls don’t clearly show swings - they are stuffed with don’t know won’t say.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
I don't think the CJEU would have had anything to do with it.
It isn't an assault on parents to remove a tax exemption, unpleasant as it may be. Whether it is wise is another matter.
We need to live within our means. If we are serious about doing so, a lot of tax exemptions and favouring of particular groups will need to go.
- Remove all VAT exemptions, for instance, including on food. - NI on all income. - No triple lock. - CGT on primary residences. - Limit the exemptions from inheritance tax. - Increased council tax bands at the top end in every part of the country. - Make people use their savings (including their home) to pay for end of life care - that's what rainy day savings are for. - Cut back on tax credits. If private school parents are not to be subsidised why should shitty employers be? - Limit pension tax relief. - Remove non-dom status. If you live here, you pay your taxes.
And so on.
I can hear the howls of complaint already.
We are not serious about living within our means and earning our way in the world.
I don't think Labour is. And the Tories are currently only interested in governing for greedy grifters like the Lady (Jesus!) Mones of this world.
Funny, when I was growing up, living within your means meant spending less not earning more - which is what you are telling the country to do with almost every one of your tax rises.
Why no emphasis on the Government spending less taxpayer's money rather than just forever increasing the tax burden?
Oh and a 20% increase in tax on the poorest and most vulnerable - which is what your VAT proposals entail - is not exactly progressive.
Because no government is going to say it will spend less on pensions or less on the NHS.
Not to mention government ministers, of every political persuasion, want to spend more as it makes them feel more important and makes them more popular.
I agree with you entirely. But I would hope that commentators on here - who don't have to appeal to the public in the way our politicians do - were a little more considered in their suggestions and more open to both sides of the 'living within ones means' debate rather than just continually positing tax rises which, eventually, become just as unsustainable in the public eye as some claim service cuts to be.
There are many tax changes we should make in the name of fairness and spreading the lo0ad - non doms, NI on all income etc. But at the moment these are being posited merely as increases in the tax burden with no thought being given to reducing the size of the state and what it does. It is yet another of those ponzi schemes which will eventually collapse.
What is unsaid in interviews matters quite a lot. Wes Streeting this morning on Today R4 had no intention of answering the question: Given that 12% of GDP is spent on health care currently what do Labour think would be the right amount?
Focus on this question would be a good political discipline, and not just for Labour.
To be fair, it is a stupid question. Nonetheless, if Radio 4 is intent on asking it, a response should be prepared.
Not quite so stupid. It gets discussed in relation to defence and development in particular and is an excellent discipline politically. The answer can't be zero, and can't be 100%. There are international comparisons to be made; and the poor old voter will be better informed about allocation of finite resource to the potentially unlimited demand.
To govern is to choose. Expenditure plans expressed as % of GDP is a magnificent measure of choices for a future government, because of its simplicity.
Labour have an interesting political/strategy choice about whether to reveal a little of the approach they will take. I think they will stick to attacks and sunlit uplands. Still, given the nature of problems in the UK at the moment it would be nice to have a clue from Labour; especially as I plan to vote for them....
I don't think there's ANY case for disclosing policy (or even privately deciding on policy) nearly 2 years before a likely election. As a leftie I'd like a bit more sizzle ("A fairer society", that sort of thing) but even I don't expect a steak at present, and it would also annoy members of all kinds if the leadership suddenly came out with amazing new policies without discussion.
This is the time for serious background work (and I know some is going on), plus a few token items like VAT on private schools to keep in the news. Some more concrete indications will come in the September conference, and actual policies in 2024.
It cannot be a coincidence that we get a bit of VAT sizzling in the week prior to a Westminster by-election, which then goes heavily in Labour's favour. Seems like something of a test to me...
The VAT on Private education showed that Labour are finally getting their act together. As Nick implies the policy does nothing in itself except remind voters that they are still against privilege and in case anyone had forgotten that's what Rishi and everything about him reeks of. I imagine his personal PR company gave Labour's new agency a quiet pat on the back for that one.
What is the realpolitik though? Surely those who feel strongly against private schools already vote Labour? This proposal risks driving both socially liberal and ethnic minority private school parents into voting Conservative.
The realpolitik has to be money. You announce tax policy to pay for improvements, because voters switch to you because they want improvements delivered. In this sense VAT on private education is clearly a stupid gimmick which costs Labour votes, and builds trouble head for a Labour government if this is height of their creativity and thinking.
even at Labours best estimate it nets treasury £1.7bn, to prove how pathetic the game Labour are playing a reminder the current education budget is £100bn. And what about the obvious inherent vice of it not being paid at all nowhere near 1.7bn but creates new government costs instead as children switch to state schooling? At the moment is the better scenario of the wealthy subsidising education with their own money rather than dumping those costs on the state.
Labours great money tree from ending non Dom status is even more economically illiterate. ending non Dom status supposedly nets only about £3.2bn. There’s estimated 68,300 non doms actually paying £8bn in tax each year - what Labour don’t tell you the nom doms can so easily leave Britain once non Dom status axed , so Starmer doesn’t get the 3.2bn, and not the 8bn either, the policy actually makes the exchequer poorer.
Economically illiterate Labour think we are stupid.
"Chris Whitty warns Britain faces 'prolonged period' of excess deaths not caused by Covid due to collateral effects of lockdown
Chief Medical Officer said heart disease and cancer cases were missed in Covid Comments came in a 'technical report' published on the pandemic challenges Warned speed of vaccine development could lull UK into false sense security"
It will help Sunak a lot in next couple of years to get all this stuff out in the media and out the way asap.
There is a lot of interesting things coming out now. Hindsight makes any lockdown look stupid versus look how many deaths and long covid came from it with lockdowns. Hancock promises to reveal all the fights, the mistakes, the crazy planning such as throw open the prison doors. He has a book out. “Tie my kangaroo testicles down sport”.
All those PBers who refused to watch I’m a celebrity because they wouldn’t get anything - belly laughs or insights - there was definitely both this time.
You know Kwasi Kwarteng is doing the Strictly Christmas Special?
It wasn't lockdown that closed down cancer and cardiac units. They were very busy with covid cases. It was the pandemic, not lockdown.
Why are you saying cancer treatments stopped? You saying it was impossible to have kept key treatment and diagnosis such as cancer going during the pandemic?
It’s true things like that stopped isn’t it? But did it really have to, or was a great mistake made?
Known cancers were treated, but lots of routine stuff stopped and a lot of new diagnoses come that way.
Like I said, it wasn't stopped as a policy, it was stopped by disease. Our specialist breast unit was full of covid respiratory patients for example.
@MoonRabbit see this clip of Chris Whitty on the subject at a committee hearing at the time.
But the take out from Whitty and yourself is “the pandemic forced this, there was no choice.” It was not policy decision, it was not taking eye off the ball, there was absolutely no choice or option in the matter. Is that fair to say is the take out?
And it is also fair that this should be questioned, not just nodded through as fact?
And it’s actually questioned with a simple question - could more not have been done to keep cancer diagnosis and treatment going?
Simple question, lots to consider. Were Nightingales under used when specialist breast units were full of covid respiratory patients for example?
Simple question, lots to consider, to get to the bottom line if it was policy decisions and mistakes what killed people, not all the blame on the pandemic.
"there was no choice" is rather reminiscent of Pilate.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
Not a good reason for the overwhelming majority who wonder why the wealthiest parents enjoy a tax break that is leaving money on the table when their taxes are going to go up and their kids' schools are facing cutbacks. 'Class War' might've worked as a message if this was just Labour making a tax grab out of the blue. It doesn't when part of the Conservative message is one where everyone needs to make sacrifices - as effectively becomes 'everyone needs to make sacrifices except those who can spend £20,000+ a year to give their kid a perceived advantage'.
FWIW I think it's possible that Labour have made a mistake if they are serious about the VAT thing on schools. Not because it's wrong - schools should only have charity status if they are genuinely open to all on a needs blind basis, which very few could do - but because the policy takes on a massive establishment who, without publicising it, exclusively use these institutions. This includes vast numbers of the elite left and liberal establishment as well as centre-right and non-aligned.
This is a fantastically powerful lobby, with huge amounts of deniable power.
Private school are more non-profit organisations than charities I would say. If they were treated as limited companies and therefore liable to corporation tax I'm not sure how much tax they would pay cus every one I'm familiar with (the non-fancy ones - they are not all Etons) is skint.
I send my daughter ms to private schools.
The biggest difference, is not just the class sizes. But the pastoral care and education tailored to the individual. For example - just the other day people were talking about SENS. At both schools, they train the staff and employ specialists.
The specialists at both schools do free work in the local state schools - x hours a week.
Altogether, both schools do more charitable work than many so called charities.
One has just reached the target of 25% of intake on 100% bursaries, paid for out of an American style foundation.
Got to say I think you will find that's the exception rather than the rule.
They are both pretty high end schools - though, being in London, they don’t have the really over the top facilities. No space.
Some “charities” spend less than 10% of turnover on their charitable object. A school would trivially meet that by providing sports facilities for free to local state schools.
One charity I used to know spent nothing on charity. They lobbied to get money from governments, in order to lobby governments to get money….
Unreadable / unjustifiably praised book/author list: Part 1
1.The two biographies of Churchill by Martin Gilbert (one long laundry list of everything Churchill ever did with no attempt to put into context or analyse) and Roy Jenkins: insufferably self-regarding and pompous. 2. Martin Amis 3. Kingsley Amis: parts of Lucky Jim were quite funny but only because no-one else made jokes in books in the 1950s and after that he became a Self-Important Saloon Bar Bore. 4. Hilary Mantel - unreadable. 5. Dickens - also unreadable. Vanity Fair, by contrast, is one of the best novels ever written...
Neither of the last two are unreadable, it's just that you don't care for them. It's true that Dickens wasn't great at writing women, but I don't think he's exclusively a male preserve; my daughter likes his novels. Agree about 1-3, and Vanity Fair.
It is v rare for me not to finish a book. With Dickens I cannot get past chapter 1. Mantel: I could not finish Wolf Hall. Her style is deeply annoying and she managed to make Tudor politics boring. Hugely overrated. IMO.
I like Elizabeth Gaskell and George Eliot and Brontë. So dunno what it is about Dickens.
Perhaps that you don't like books which aren't very interested in women ? That's true of Mantel's trilogy, too.
Since the cricket is a bit dull I'll tell you why Mantel gets my goat.
She can write very well. Some of her descriptive passages are beautiful. She also researches thoroughly and knows her history. In Wolf Hall she was writing about a particularly interesting peiod of history, one I know quite well and enjoy reading about, whether its a contrarian view or not.
So why did I give up on it after 150 pages (and like Cyclefree I rarely fail to finish a book)?
It is written in the 'past in the present'. Cockneys use this mode a lot - 'So I goes in the pub and I sees this geezer....' - and it does have a certain dramatic effect, but only if used sparingly. A whole book written in it is simply tedious.
She uses personal pronouns in the most peculiar way which means that at certain points she has to clarify who she is referring to - e.g. 'He, Moore, came in....' Such stylistic quirks are so common throughout the text that you finish up paying more attention to them than the narrative.
You have to wonder what the point of all this weirdness is. I suspect her readers - and she is enormously popular - mistake it for Art. Or maybe the aim is to stand out from all the other writers of this type of novel. I think if she didn't do it, she would be a perfectly readable but ordinary writer of historic fiction. As it is she is deeply irrating, not least for the reason that this highly artificial and contrived rubbish sells like hot cakes, whilst equally capable writers with less of a penchant for self-publicity are ignored.
She is the Agatha Christie of historical novels - a mediocrity who got herself promoted way above her merit.
I think you either find the effort to adjust your reading to the steam of consciousness style is worthwhile, or you don't. That's a matter of taste rather than right or wrong, I think. It's not Agatha Christie, that's for sure.
In a perhaps similar manner, some found large parts of Iain M Bank's Feersum Endjinn unreadable. Others enjoyed it.
I am surprised at some of the criticism for Christie on here. I'm not going to claim that she wrote glorious prose, but the mystery that she created was superb - the plots are excellent. I wonder if the haters have read many of the books?
Agree. And there are thirty plus that are outstandingly good entertainment. And, BTW, the classic (1974) version of Orient Express is a really rare example of a film that is better than the book.
Problem I have with this one is that I know the plot too well.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
I don't think the CJEU would have had anything to do with it.
It isn't an assault on parents to remove a tax exemption, unpleasant as it may be. Whether it is wise is another matter.
We need to live within our means. If we are serious about doing so, a lot of tax exemptions and favouring of particular groups will need to go.
- Remove all VAT exemptions, for instance, including on food. - NI on all income. - No triple lock. - CGT on primary residences. - Limit the exemptions from inheritance tax. - Increased council tax bands at the top end in every part of the country. - Make people use their savings (including their home) to pay for end of life care - that's what rainy day savings are for. - Cut back on tax credits. If private school parents are not to be subsidised why should shitty employers be? - Limit pension tax relief. - Remove non-dom status. If you live here, you pay your taxes.
And so on.
I can hear the howls of complaint already.
We are not serious about living within our means and earning our way in the world.
I don't think Labour is. And the Tories are currently only interested in governing for greedy grifters like the Lady (Jesus!) Mones of this world.
Funny, when I was growing up, living within your means meant spending less not earning more - which is what you are telling the country to do with almost every one of your tax rises.
Why no emphasis on the Government spending less taxpayer's money rather than just forever increasing the tax burden?
Oh and a 20% increase in tax on the poorest and most vulnerable - which is what your VAT proposals entail - is not exactly progressive.
Because no government is going to say it will spend less on pensions or less on the NHS.
Not to mention government ministers, of every political persuasion, want to spend more as it makes them feel more important and makes them more popular.
I agree with you entirely. But I would hope that commentators on here - who don't have to appeal to the public in the way our politicians do - were a little more considered in their suggestions and more open to both sides of the 'living within ones means' debate rather than just continually positing tax rises which, eventually, become just as unsustainable in the public eye as some claim service cuts to be.
There are many tax changes we should make in the name of fairness and spreading the lo0ad - non doms, NI on all income etc. But at the moment these are being posited merely as increases in the tax burden with no thought being given to reducing the size of the state and what it does. It is yet another of those ponzi schemes which will eventually collapse.
Yes. The discussions must not get confused on PB. There is discussion of reality, facts, policy, priorities, the effect of lobbying and vested interest, real differences etc, on the one hand; and OTOH there is PR, advertising, hatreds, who is up and who is down, the distortions and convolutions required to win votes, stay in power etc.
For betting purposes understanding both is essential. In order to avoid insanity and vacuity the two need to be separated intellectually.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
Not a good reason for the overwhelming majority who wonder why the wealthiest parents enjoy a tax break that is leaving money on the table when their taxes are going to go up and their kids' schools are facing cutbacks. 'Class War' might've worked as a message if this was just Labour making a tax grab out of the blue. It doesn't when part of the Conservative message is one where everyone needs to make sacrifices - as effectively becomes 'everyone needs to make sacrifices except those who can spend £20,000+ a year to give their kid a perceived advantage'.
FWIW I think it's possible that Labour have made a mistake if they are serious about the VAT thing on schools. Not because it's wrong - schools should only have charity status if they are genuinely open to all on a needs blind basis, which very few could do - but because the policy takes on a massive establishment who, without publicising it, exclusively use these institutions. This includes vast numbers of the elite left and liberal establishment as well as centre-right and non-aligned.
This is a fantastically powerful lobby, with huge amounts of deniable power.
Private school are more non-profit organisations than charities I would say. If they were treated as limited companies and therefore liable to corporation tax I'm not sure how much tax they would pay cus every one I'm familiar with (the non-fancy ones - they are not all Etons) is skint.
I send my daughter ms to private schools.
The biggest difference, is not just the class sizes. But the pastoral care and education tailored to the individual. For example - just the other day people were talking about SENS. At both schools, they train the staff and employ specialists.
The specialists at both schools do free work in the local state schools - x hours a week.
Altogether, both schools do more charitable work than many so called charities.
One has just reached the target of 25% of intake on 100% bursaries, paid for out of an American style foundation.
Got to say I think you will find that's the exception rather than the rule.
I don't think it is the exception. My wife works for a trust which runs both private and state schools. There is quite a lot that the state schools are only able to do because of cross-transfer of skills and resources from the private schools.
Frankly, as a parent of children at state schools, from an entirely personal perspective, I can see only downsides: it will get even harder to get my kids into decent state schools as the pressure on them increases. Yes, it's conceivable that raising VAT on school fees will raise more money for the exchequer, but 1) a significant amount (all?) of that will be eaten up funding state places for children dropping out of the private sector, 2) will any really go to improving the lot of state pupils? - or will it just end up getting swallowed into the maw of government?, and 3) the money raised isn't just hanging around doing nothing: it would otherwise be spent on things which grow the economy. Tax may be necessary to keep the economy going, but you aren't just magicking that money out of nowhere - the fact that people no longer have that money (even people you dislike as a category like people giving their children private education) means that that money is no longer spent in the economy.
Basically, it's a policy like 45% top rate of tax: it's there for no reason except showing who your enemies are.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
Pratchett lived about 20 miles from me, and the Chalk is essentially Salisbury Plain, where I grew up and still live. So for me the descriptions of the chalk are of home.
The swing in Chester of 14% to Labour was actually better for the Tories than the 18% swing to Labour in the latest YouGov poll yesterday.
So while not a great result for the Tories and good for Labour it was actually not as disastrous for Sunak as some of the latest polls would suggest
Glad I am not alone in seeing this “disaster for the Tories” as completely over hyped. It’s just not there in the pseudological facts.
1) mid term by elections your voters don’t come out. You can get results just like this even when national polls are much closer together. 1b) Chester Turnout usually 75% plus, and history in seat points towards a labour seat not strong Tory one, how does anyone prove votes have switched here not just stay at home? Without switchers there is argument Labour is underperforming in real votes compared to polls, Labour underperforming turning polls into real votes with switchers, as they certainly have in real votes throughout 2022 have they not? This Labour under performance in real elections v polls, was the second main take out from 2022 locals, after main take out of Lib Dem better than expected performance. 2) did Tories give their voters reason for protest against them though by staying home? As they have told the world their Tory predecessors in recent Tory cabinets have broken the asylum system and made mistakes which crashed the economy, they sure have given voters a reason to give them a mid term slap. Have they not? But with two years to come out of mid term and build to election, what does this result actually say about what is certain to happen at that next General Election?
This it's just staying at home in by-elections narrative means nothing is wrong doesn't fit historically.
Echibit A: That 1994 Dudley West by-election, the greatest Con-Lab swing since WW2, and one of the augers of a Blair PMship.
Numerically, the Labour vote went DOWN from 28,940 to 28,400. Yes, Labour lost votes.
So. setting a bar for Labour to actually put on numerical votes in a by-election - I just don't know if it has ever happened.
I think you are basically coming to conclusion we can’t draw clear conclusions from mid term by election exactly what will happen two years later, thanks for your support in this.
The bottom line being, how much is it a partys vote staying home in real votes, when polls suggest swings based on vote transfers
Hint. Polls don’t clearly show swings - they are stuffed with don’t know won’t say.
I wouldn't say that. By-elections are indicative rather than predictive and overstate the swings likely to be seen in a GE - a little for Labour, a lot for LD.
But t you seem to be going to the extreme that they carry no useful information, and that's not right either - this does show Labour in a good position and the Tories in a poor one.
The evidence of polls (good for Labour), approval ratings (decent for Labour), and by and local elections (by elections good, local elections lagging a bit for Labour*) and the non-electoral political weather (bad for Tories) need to be considered in the round when trying to read an upcoming GE.
This doesn't feel like 2015 (which I called correctly on late PB evidence).
* I wonder if locally Labour still suffer a fracturing of its local vote from the swing to Corbyn and back again displacing centrists and lefties successively. Personally, I was a consistent Labour LE voter up until 2015, but with a strong Green local option I switched to them in Corbyn's leadership and have never returned LE-wise even though I'm back in the GE fold.
As a result, I'm not sure how heavily to weigh local election Labour underperformance.
Unreadable / unjustifiably praised book/author list: Part 1
1.The two biographies of Churchill by Martin Gilbert (one long laundry list of everything Churchill ever did with no attempt to put into context or analyse) and Roy Jenkins: insufferably self-regarding and pompous. 2. Martin Amis 3. Kingsley Amis: parts of Lucky Jim were quite funny but only because no-one else made jokes in books in the 1950s and after that he became a Self-Important Saloon Bar Bore. 4. Hilary Mantel - unreadable. 5. Dickens - also unreadable. Vanity Fair, by contrast, is one of the best novels ever written...
Neither of the last two are unreadable, it's just that you don't care for them. It's true that Dickens wasn't great at writing women, but I don't think he's exclusively a male preserve; my daughter likes his novels. Agree about 1-3, and Vanity Fair.
It is v rare for me not to finish a book. With Dickens I cannot get past chapter 1. Mantel: I could not finish Wolf Hall. Her style is deeply annoying and she managed to make Tudor politics boring. Hugely overrated. IMO.
I like Elizabeth Gaskell and George Eliot and Brontë. So dunno what it is about Dickens.
Perhaps that you don't like books which aren't very interested in women ? That's true of Mantel's trilogy, too.
Since the cricket is a bit dull I'll tell you why Mantel gets my goat.
She can write very well. Some of her descriptive passages are beautiful. She also researches thoroughly and knows her history. In Wolf Hall she was writing about a particularly interesting peiod of history, one I know quite well and enjoy reading about, whether its a contrarian view or not.
So why did I give up on it after 150 pages (and like Cyclefree I rarely fail to finish a book)?
It is written in the 'past in the present'. Cockneys use this mode a lot - 'So I goes in the pub and I sees this geezer....' - and it does have a certain dramatic effect, but only if used sparingly. A whole book written in it is simply tedious.
She uses personal pronouns in the most peculiar way which means that at certain points she has to clarify who she is referring to - e.g. 'He, Moore, came in....' Such stylistic quirks are so common throughout the text that you finish up paying more attention to them than the narrative.
You have to wonder what the point of all this weirdness is. I suspect her readers - and she is enormously popular - mistake it for Art. Or maybe the aim is to stand out from all the other writers of this type of novel. I think if she didn't do it, she would be a perfectly readable but ordinary writer of historic fiction. As it is she is deeply irrating, not least for the reason that this highly artificial and contrived rubbish sells like hot cakes, whilst equally capable writers with less of a penchant for self-publicity are ignored.
She is the Agatha Christie of historical novels - a mediocrity who got herself promoted way above her merit.
I think you either find the effort to adjust your reading to the steam of consciousness style is worthwhile, or you don't. That's a matter of taste rather than right or wrong, I think. It's not Agatha Christie, that's for sure.
In a perhaps similar manner, some found large parts of Iain M Bank's Feersum Endjinn unreadable. Others enjoyed it.
I am surprised at some of the criticism for Christie on here. I'm not going to claim that she wrote glorious prose, but the mystery that she created was superb - the plots are excellent. I wonder if the haters have read many of the books?
Agree. And there are thirty plus that are outstandingly good entertainment. And, BTW, the classic (1974) version of Orient Express is a really rare example of a film that is better than the book.
Problem I have with this one is that I know the plot too well.
True. But it is so good it can even survive that. And watch it with someone under 25 who have never seen it before and has never read the (or indeed, being young, any) book.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me" is a very good motto to live by IMO.
Well I think we have a framework within which slander and libel can and can't operate, and I'm broadly comfortable with it. But 'where are your antecedents from?' seems to fall a long way short of anything which deserves more than a private moan.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
Not a good reason for the overwhelming majority who wonder why the wealthiest parents enjoy a tax break that is leaving money on the table when their taxes are going to go up and their kids' schools are facing cutbacks. 'Class War' might've worked as a message if this was just Labour making a tax grab out of the blue. It doesn't when part of the Conservative message is one where everyone needs to make sacrifices - as effectively becomes 'everyone needs to make sacrifices except those who can spend £20,000+ a year to give their kid a perceived advantage'.
FWIW I think it's possible that Labour have made a mistake if they are serious about the VAT thing on schools. Not because it's wrong - schools should only have charity status if they are genuinely open to all on a needs blind basis, which very few could do - but because the policy takes on a massive establishment who, without publicising it, exclusively use these institutions. This includes vast numbers of the elite left and liberal establishment as well as centre-right and non-aligned.
This is a fantastically powerful lobby, with huge amounts of deniable power.
Private school are more non-profit organisations than charities I would say. If they were treated as limited companies and therefore liable to corporation tax I'm not sure how much tax they would pay cus every one I'm familiar with (the non-fancy ones - they are not all Etons) is skint.
I send my daughter ms to private schools.
The biggest difference, is not just the class sizes. But the pastoral care and education tailored to the individual. For example - just the other day people were talking about SENS. At both schools, they train the staff and employ specialists.
The specialists at both schools do free work in the local state schools - x hours a week.
Altogether, both schools do more charitable work than many so called charities.
One has just reached the target of 25% of intake on 100% bursaries, paid for out of an American style foundation.
Got to say I think you will find that's the exception rather than the rule.
They are both pretty high end schools - though, being in London, they don’t have the really over the top facilities. No space.
Some “charities” spend less than 10% of turnover on their charitable object. A school would trivially meet that by providing sports facilities for free to local state schools.
One charity I used to know spent nothing on charity. They lobbied to get money from governments, in order to lobby governments to get money….
You’d think basic accounting requirements & some policy on grants would prevent this kind of thing. If a charity fails to spend (say) 80% of it’s income on actually delivering it’s professed purpose, then it shouldn’t get a single government grant.
Is the real problem is that a charity can have something vague like “raising awareness” as its purpose, which means lobbying for more cash to pay more lobbiests to “raise awareness” with politicians counts as valid expenditure?
Unreadable / unjustifiably praised book/author list: Part 1
1.The two biographies of Churchill by Martin Gilbert (one long laundry list of everything Churchill ever did with no attempt to put into context or analyse) and Roy Jenkins: insufferably self-regarding and pompous. 2. Martin Amis 3. Kingsley Amis: parts of Lucky Jim were quite funny but only because no-one else made jokes in books in the 1950s and after that he became a Self-Important Saloon Bar Bore. 4. Hilary Mantel - unreadable. 5. Dickens - also unreadable. Vanity Fair, by contrast, is one of the best novels ever written...
Neither of the last two are unreadable, it's just that you don't care for them. It's true that Dickens wasn't great at writing women, but I don't think he's exclusively a male preserve; my daughter likes his novels. Agree about 1-3, and Vanity Fair.
It is v rare for me not to finish a book. With Dickens I cannot get past chapter 1. Mantel: I could not finish Wolf Hall. Her style is deeply annoying and she managed to make Tudor politics boring. Hugely overrated. IMO.
I like Elizabeth Gaskell and George Eliot and Brontë. So dunno what it is about Dickens.
Perhaps that you don't like books which aren't very interested in women ? That's true of Mantel's trilogy, too.
Since the cricket is a bit dull I'll tell you why Mantel gets my goat.
She can write very well. Some of her descriptive passages are beautiful. She also researches thoroughly and knows her history. In Wolf Hall she was writing about a particularly interesting peiod of history, one I know quite well and enjoy reading about, whether its a contrarian view or not.
So why did I give up on it after 150 pages (and like Cyclefree I rarely fail to finish a book)?
It is written in the 'past in the present'. Cockneys use this mode a lot - 'So I goes in the pub and I sees this geezer....' - and it does have a certain dramatic effect, but only if used sparingly. A whole book written in it is simply tedious.
She uses personal pronouns in the most peculiar way which means that at certain points she has to clarify who she is referring to - e.g. 'He, Moore, came in....' Such stylistic quirks are so common throughout the text that you finish up paying more attention to them than the narrative.
You have to wonder what the point of all this weirdness is. I suspect her readers - and she is enormously popular - mistake it for Art. Or maybe the aim is to stand out from all the other writers of this type of novel. I think if she didn't do it, she would be a perfectly readable but ordinary writer of historic fiction. As it is she is deeply irrating, not least for the reason that this highly artificial and contrived rubbish sells like hot cakes, whilst equally capable writers with less of a penchant for self-publicity are ignored.
She is the Agatha Christie of historical novels - a mediocrity who got herself promoted way above her merit.
I think you either find the effort to adjust your reading to the steam of consciousness style is worthwhile, or you don't. That's a matter of taste rather than right or wrong, I think. It's not Agatha Christie, that's for sure.
In a perhaps similar manner, some found large parts of Iain M Bank's Feersum Endjinn unreadable. Others enjoyed it.
I am surprised at some of the criticism for Christie on here. I'm not going to claim that she wrote glorious prose, but the mystery that she created was superb - the plots are excellent. I wonder if the haters have read many of the books?
I agree. I read loads in my late teens. Some are very good indeed: The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Crooked House, Endless Night, Then There Were None ...
Agatha Christie is a superb writer whose books are among the best in her chosen genre. You have to turn a blind eye to some of her prejudices, which are very much on display in her books, though.
Yes, but she was of her time. Brought up in a large country house with all the servants etc. Served in the 1st War as a nurse, so its hard not to expect her to be more racist and class bound than a modern author. And yet if you dig into the stories, almost everyone has dark secrets to hide.
One of the favourite possibly true, possibly not true pranks I've heard about is this. Someone sends out 100 anonymous letters to people, all saying 'Flee at once, all is discovered', and a few people do actually flee. I am sure this is probably not true, but it emphasizes that lots of people do carry dark secrets.
I missed laying Uruguay at 1.86 for today's match against Ghana because I was trying to be clever and looking for 1.84. Price is now 1.98. I still think it's a lay.
The swing in Chester of 14% to Labour was actually better for the Tories than the 18% swing to Labour in the latest YouGov poll yesterday.
So while not a great result for the Tories and good for Labour it was actually not as disastrous for Sunak as some of the latest polls would suggest
Glad I am not alone in seeing this “disaster for the Tories” as completely over hyped. It’s just not there in the pseudological facts.
1) mid term by elections your voters don’t come out. You can get results just like this even when national polls are much closer together. 1b) Chester Turnout usually 75% plus, and history in seat points towards a labour seat not strong Tory one, how does anyone prove votes have switched here not just stay at home? Without switchers there is argument Labour is underperforming in real votes compared to polls, Labour underperforming turning polls into real votes with switchers, as they certainly have in real votes throughout 2022 have they not? This Labour under performance in real elections v polls, was the second main take out from 2022 locals, after main take out of Lib Dem better than expected performance. 2) did Tories give their voters reason for protest against them though by staying home? As they have told the world their Tory predecessors in recent Tory cabinets have broken the asylum system and made mistakes which crashed the economy, they sure have given voters a reason to give them a mid term slap. Have they not? But with two years to come out of mid term and build to election, what does this result actually say about what is certain to happen at that next General Election?
I dont think anyone seriously believes the next GE will follow the current polls. There will be shy Tories (though fewer than under Truss), and undecideds switching back, but the polls show Labour sitting on a pretty decent cushion.
Not picking Adil Rashid looks a bit mystifying to me, Joe Root probably going to end up bowling about 60 overs. Big game for Leach I think. Is Will Jacks a bone fide spinner ?
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
I don't think the CJEU would have had anything to do with it.
It isn't an assault on parents to remove a tax exemption, unpleasant as it may be. Whether it is wise is another matter.
We need to live within our means. If we are serious about doing so, a lot of tax exemptions and favouring of particular groups will need to go.
- Remove all VAT exemptions, for instance, including on food. - NI on all income. - No triple lock. - CGT on primary residences. - Limit the exemptions from inheritance tax. - Increased council tax bands at the top end in every part of the country. - Make people use their savings (including their home) to pay for end of life care - that's what rainy day savings are for. - Cut back on tax credits. If private school parents are not to be subsidised why should shitty employers be? - Limit pension tax relief. - Remove non-dom status. If you live here, you pay your taxes.
And so on.
I can hear the howls of complaint already.
We are not serious about living within our means and earning our way in the world.
I don't think Labour is. And the Tories are currently only interested in governing for greedy grifters like the Lady (Jesus!) Mones of this world.
Funny, when I was growing up, living within your means meant spending less not earning more - which is what you are telling the country to do with almost every one of your tax rises.
Why no emphasis on the Government spending less taxpayer's money rather than just forever increasing the tax burden?
Oh and a 20% increase in tax on the poorest and most vulnerable - which is what your VAT proposals entail - is not exactly progressive.
While I wait for the hairdresser to perform his magic, let me say that I agree that we need to do both. We have a deficit and an enormous debt burden.
But no-one wants to confront the issue of what to cut back on and everyone wants tax increases on others and not themselves.
Until we get past that we'll get nowhere.
I just threw some stuff out from the top of my head. Feel free to come back with your ideas for what you would cut.
"Chris Whitty warns Britain faces 'prolonged period' of excess deaths not caused by Covid due to collateral effects of lockdown
Chief Medical Officer said heart disease and cancer cases were missed in Covid Comments came in a 'technical report' published on the pandemic challenges Warned speed of vaccine development could lull UK into false sense security"
It will help Sunak a lot in next couple of years to get all this stuff out in the media and out the way asap.
There is a lot of interesting things coming out now. Hindsight makes any lockdown look stupid versus look how many deaths and long covid came from it with lockdowns. Hancock promises to reveal all the fights, the mistakes, the crazy planning such as throw open the prison doors. He has a book out. “Tie my kangaroo testicles down sport”.
All those PBers who refused to watch I’m a celebrity because they wouldn’t get anything - belly laughs or insights - there was definitely both this time.
You know Kwasi Kwarteng is doing the Strictly Christmas Special?
It wasn't lockdown that closed down cancer and cardiac units. They were very busy with covid cases. It was the pandemic, not lockdown.
Why are you saying cancer treatments stopped? You saying it was impossible to have kept key treatment and diagnosis such as cancer going during the pandemic?
It’s true things like that stopped isn’t it? But did it really have to, or was a great mistake made?
Known cancers were treated, but lots of routine stuff stopped and a lot of new diagnoses come that way.
Like I said, it wasn't stopped as a policy, it was stopped by disease. Our specialist breast unit was full of covid respiratory patients for example.
@MoonRabbit see this clip of Chris Whitty on the subject at a committee hearing at the time.
But the take out from Whitty and yourself is “the pandemic forced this, there was no choice.” It was not policy decision, it was not taking eye off the ball, there was absolutely no choice or option in the matter. Is that fair to say is the take out?
And it is also fair that this should be questioned, not just nodded through as fact?
And it’s actually questioned with a simple question - could more not have been done to keep cancer diagnosis and treatment going?
Simple question, lots to consider. Were Nightingales under used when specialist breast units were full of covid respiratory patients for example?
Simple question, lots to consider, to get to the bottom line if it was policy decisions and mistakes what killed people, not all the blame on the pandemic.
"there was no choice" is rather reminiscent of Pilate.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
I think Douglas Adams made very clever use of the English language.
Unreadable / unjustifiably praised book/author list: Part 1
1.The two biographies of Churchill by Martin Gilbert (one long laundry list of everything Churchill ever did with no attempt to put into context or analyse) and Roy Jenkins: insufferably self-regarding and pompous. 2. Martin Amis 3. Kingsley Amis: parts of Lucky Jim were quite funny but only because no-one else made jokes in books in the 1950s and after that he became a Self-Important Saloon Bar Bore. 4. Hilary Mantel - unreadable. 5. Dickens - also unreadable. Vanity Fair, by contrast, is one of the best novels ever written...
Neither of the last two are unreadable, it's just that you don't care for them. It's true that Dickens wasn't great at writing women, but I don't think he's exclusively a male preserve; my daughter likes his novels. Agree about 1-3, and Vanity Fair.
It is v rare for me not to finish a book. With Dickens I cannot get past chapter 1. Mantel: I could not finish Wolf Hall. Her style is deeply annoying and she managed to make Tudor politics boring. Hugely overrated. IMO.
I like Elizabeth Gaskell and George Eliot and Brontë. So dunno what it is about Dickens.
Perhaps that you don't like books which aren't very interested in women ? That's true of Mantel's trilogy, too.
Since the cricket is a bit dull I'll tell you why Mantel gets my goat.
She can write very well. Some of her descriptive passages are beautiful. She also researches thoroughly and knows her history. In Wolf Hall she was writing about a particularly interesting peiod of history, one I know quite well and enjoy reading about, whether its a contrarian view or not.
So why did I give up on it after 150 pages (and like Cyclefree I rarely fail to finish a book)?
It is written in the 'past in the present'. Cockneys use this mode a lot - 'So I goes in the pub and I sees this geezer....' - and it does have a certain dramatic effect, but only if used sparingly. A whole book written in it is simply tedious.
She uses personal pronouns in the most peculiar way which means that at certain points she has to clarify who she is referring to - e.g. 'He, Moore, came in....' Such stylistic quirks are so common throughout the text that you finish up paying more attention to them than the narrative.
You have to wonder what the point of all this weirdness is. I suspect her readers - and she is enormously popular - mistake it for Art. Or maybe the aim is to stand out from all the other writers of this type of novel. I think if she didn't do it, she would be a perfectly readable but ordinary writer of historic fiction. As it is she is deeply irrating, not least for the reason that this highly artificial and contrived rubbish sells like hot cakes, whilst equally capable writers with less of a penchant for self-publicity are ignored.
She is the Agatha Christie of historical novels - a mediocrity who got herself promoted way above her merit.
I think you either find the effort to adjust your reading to the steam of consciousness style is worthwhile, or you don't. That's a matter of taste rather than right or wrong, I think. It's not Agatha Christie, that's for sure.
In a perhaps similar manner, some found large parts of Iain M Bank's Feersum Endjinn unreadable. Others enjoyed it.
I am surprised at some of the criticism for Christie on here. I'm not going to claim that she wrote glorious prose, but the mystery that she created was superb - the plots are excellent. I wonder if the haters have read many of the books?
I agree. I read loads in my late teens. Some are very good indeed: The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Crooked House, Endless Night, Then There Were None ...
Agatha Christie is a superb writer whose books are among the best in her chosen genre. You have to turn a blind eye to some of her prejudices, which are very much on display in her books, though.
Yes, but she was of her time. Brought up in a large country house with all the servants etc. Served in the 1st War as a nurse, so its hard not to expect her to be more racist and class bound than a modern author. And yet if you dig into the stories, almost everyone has dark secrets to hide.
One of the favourite possibly true, possibly not true pranks I've heard about is this. Someone sends out 100 anonymous letters to people, all saying 'Flee at once, all is discovered', and a few people do actually flee. I am sure this is probably not true, but it emphasizes that lots of people do carry dark secrets.
Yes - it's a while since I read any Christie - but my recollection is that while she reflected the prejudices of her day and class, she didn't seem to support those prejudices: the most sympathetic characters were always the outsiders.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
Not a good reason for the overwhelming majority who wonder why the wealthiest parents enjoy a tax break that is leaving money on the table when their taxes are going to go up and their kids' schools are facing cutbacks. 'Class War' might've worked as a message if this was just Labour making a tax grab out of the blue. It doesn't when part of the Conservative message is one where everyone needs to make sacrifices - as effectively becomes 'everyone needs to make sacrifices except those who can spend £20,000+ a year to give their kid a perceived advantage'.
FWIW I think it's possible that Labour have made a mistake if they are serious about the VAT thing on schools. Not because it's wrong - schools should only have charity status if they are genuinely open to all on a needs blind basis, which very few could do - but because the policy takes on a massive establishment who, without publicising it, exclusively use these institutions. This includes vast numbers of the elite left and liberal establishment as well as centre-right and non-aligned.
This is a fantastically powerful lobby, with huge amounts of deniable power.
Private school are more non-profit organisations than charities I would say. If they were treated as limited companies and therefore liable to corporation tax I'm not sure how much tax they would pay cus every one I'm familiar with (the non-fancy ones - they are not all Etons) is skint.
I send my daughter ms to private schools.
The biggest difference, is not just the class sizes. But the pastoral care and education tailored to the individual. For example - just the other day people were talking about SENS. At both schools, they train the staff and employ specialists.
The specialists at both schools do free work in the local state schools - x hours a week.
Altogether, both schools do more charitable work than many so called charities.
One has just reached the target of 25% of intake on 100% bursaries, paid for out of an American style foundation.
Got to say I think you will find that's the exception rather than the rule.
I don't think it is the exception. My wife works for a trust which runs both private and state schools. There is quite a lot that the state schools are only able to do because of cross-transfer of skills and resources from the private schools.
Frankly, as a parent of children at state schools, from an entirely personal perspective, I can see only downsides: it will get even harder to get my kids into decent state schools as the pressure on them increases. Yes, it's conceivable that raising VAT on school fees will raise more money for the exchequer, but 1) a significant amount (all?) of that will be eaten up funding state places for children dropping out of the private sector, 2) will any really go to improving the lot of state pupils? - or will it just end up getting swallowed into the maw of government?, and 3) the money raised isn't just hanging around doing nothing: it would otherwise be spent on things which grow the economy. Tax may be necessary to keep the economy going, but you aren't just magicking that money out of nowhere - the fact that people no longer have that money (even people you dislike as a category like people giving their children private education) means that that money is no longer spent in the economy.
Basically, it's a policy like 45% top rate of tax: it's there for no reason except showing who your enemies are.
My eldest daughter goes to a state sixth form that has a relationship with a leading London private school. The contributions that the private school makes are so pathetically grudging it's almost laughable. An example - the college does DofE gold award by piggy backing on the school's programme - but only gets 5 places. At her old school there were places for everyone. The school cancels classes for the college and doesn't even inform the college students, so sometimes they've gone in on a Saturday to find the gates closed, no explanation. It's very much a poor relations model, with the sixth form expected to bow and scrape in gratitude for the scraps thrown their way.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
Pratchett lived about 20 miles from me, and the Chalk is essentially Salisbury Plain, where I grew up and still live. So for me the descriptions of the chalk are of home.
It's wonderful, isn't it? And it certainly, more than any other landscape he describes, feels like the author describing home. (I had tentatively placed it slightly further north, in the Cotswolds - albeit in a pre-gentrifiation Cotswolds - but happy to be corrected). Lancre, meanwhile, I had always placed in an exaggerated version of the geography of the Lake District though with the character of the Yorkshire Dales. The only thing which took me aback in the animated version of Wyrd Sisters, was that the witches had west country, rather than north country accents.
Unreadable / unjustifiably praised book/author list: Part 1
1.The two biographies of Churchill by Martin Gilbert (one long laundry list of everything Churchill ever did with no attempt to put into context or analyse) and Roy Jenkins: insufferably self-regarding and pompous. 2. Martin Amis 3. Kingsley Amis: parts of Lucky Jim were quite funny but only because no-one else made jokes in books in the 1950s and after that he became a Self-Important Saloon Bar Bore. 4. Hilary Mantel - unreadable. 5. Dickens - also unreadable. Vanity Fair, by contrast, is one of the best novels ever written...
Neither of the last two are unreadable, it's just that you don't care for them. It's true that Dickens wasn't great at writing women, but I don't think he's exclusively a male preserve; my daughter likes his novels. Agree about 1-3, and Vanity Fair.
It is v rare for me not to finish a book. With Dickens I cannot get past chapter 1. Mantel: I could not finish Wolf Hall. Her style is deeply annoying and she managed to make Tudor politics boring. Hugely overrated. IMO.
I like Elizabeth Gaskell and George Eliot and Brontë. So dunno what it is about Dickens.
Perhaps that you don't like books which aren't very interested in women ? That's true of Mantel's trilogy, too.
Since the cricket is a bit dull I'll tell you why Mantel gets my goat.
She can write very well. Some of her descriptive passages are beautiful. She also researches thoroughly and knows her history. In Wolf Hall she was writing about a particularly interesting peiod of history, one I know quite well and enjoy reading about, whether its a contrarian view or not.
So why did I give up on it after 150 pages (and like Cyclefree I rarely fail to finish a book)?
It is written in the 'past in the present'. Cockneys use this mode a lot - 'So I goes in the pub and I sees this geezer....' - and it does have a certain dramatic effect, but only if used sparingly. A whole book written in it is simply tedious.
She uses personal pronouns in the most peculiar way which means that at certain points she has to clarify who she is referring to - e.g. 'He, Moore, came in....' Such stylistic quirks are so common throughout the text that you finish up paying more attention to them than the narrative.
You have to wonder what the point of all this weirdness is. I suspect her readers - and she is enormously popular - mistake it for Art. Or maybe the aim is to stand out from all the other writers of this type of novel. I think if she didn't do it, she would be a perfectly readable but ordinary writer of historic fiction. As it is she is deeply irrating, not least for the reason that this highly artificial and contrived rubbish sells like hot cakes, whilst equally capable writers with less of a penchant for self-publicity are ignored.
She is the Agatha Christie of historical novels - a mediocrity who got herself promoted way above her merit.
I think you either find the effort to adjust your reading to the steam of consciousness style is worthwhile, or you don't. That's a matter of taste rather than right or wrong, I think. It's not Agatha Christie, that's for sure.
In a perhaps similar manner, some found large parts of Iain M Bank's Feersum Endjinn unreadable. Others enjoyed it.
I am surprised at some of the criticism for Christie on here. I'm not going to claim that she wrote glorious prose, but the mystery that she created was superb - the plots are excellent. I wonder if the haters have read many of the books?
I find myself in strong disagreement with both Cyclefree and PtP on this. Dickens, Mantel and Christie are all excellent reads. The only author I have ever really struggled with was Virginia Woolfe, in part because of her stream of consciousness style and in part because of her whole literary ethos.
Dickens is variable I find. Doesn't matter - you start with his best work (Great Expectations) and go from there. Christie is useful literature, you might say. Reliable writing that is not at all challenging, is everywhere and is of a higher standard than other books people, including myself, might read instead. I haven't read any Mantel.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
Not a good reason for the overwhelming majority who wonder why the wealthiest parents enjoy a tax break that is leaving money on the table when their taxes are going to go up and their kids' schools are facing cutbacks. 'Class War' might've worked as a message if this was just Labour making a tax grab out of the blue. It doesn't when part of the Conservative message is one where everyone needs to make sacrifices - as effectively becomes 'everyone needs to make sacrifices except those who can spend £20,000+ a year to give their kid a perceived advantage'.
FWIW I think it's possible that Labour have made a mistake if they are serious about the VAT thing on schools. Not because it's wrong - schools should only have charity status if they are genuinely open to all on a needs blind basis, which very few could do - but because the policy takes on a massive establishment who, without publicising it, exclusively use these institutions. This includes vast numbers of the elite left and liberal establishment as well as centre-right and non-aligned.
This is a fantastically powerful lobby, with huge amounts of deniable power.
Private school are more non-profit organisations than charities I would say. If they were treated as limited companies and therefore liable to corporation tax I'm not sure how much tax they would pay cus every one I'm familiar with (the non-fancy ones - they are not all Etons) is skint.
I send my daughter ms to private schools.
The biggest difference, is not just the class sizes. But the pastoral care and education tailored to the individual. For example - just the other day people were talking about SENS. At both schools, they train the staff and employ specialists.
The specialists at both schools do free work in the local state schools - x hours a week.
Altogether, both schools do more charitable work than many so called charities.
One has just reached the target of 25% of intake on 100% bursaries, paid for out of an American style foundation.
Got to say I think you will find that's the exception rather than the rule.
They are both pretty high end schools - though, being in London, they don’t have the really over the top facilities. No space.
Some “charities” spend less than 10% of turnover on their charitable object. A school would trivially meet that by providing sports facilities for free to local state schools.
One charity I used to know spent nothing on charity. They lobbied to get money from governments, in order to lobby governments to get money….
You’d think basic accounting requirements & some policy on grants would prevent this kind of thing. If a charity fails to spend (say) 80% of it’s income on actually delivering it’s professed purpose, then it shouldn’t get a single government grant.
Is the real problem is that a charity can have something vague like “raising awareness” as its purpose, which means lobbying for more cash to pay more lobbiests to “raise awareness” with politicians counts as valid expenditure?
80% would shut down just about every charity. Many of the big ones spend a fraction of that on actual charity work.
In the case of the charity I am talking of, it raised money to hold conferences in just out-of-season luxury holiday destinations. Book a hotel and the VIPs get to spend a week or so “working” on a Caribbean island (say) - paid for by the charity. The conferences were about the charitable object. And raising money for the next junket.
The extremely repellent couple who ran it had a large house in London, with his-and-hers Range Rovers parked on the drive.
The swing in Chester of 14% to Labour was actually better for the Tories than the 18% swing to Labour in the latest YouGov poll yesterday.
So while not a great result for the Tories and good for Labour it was actually not as disastrous for Sunak as some of the latest polls would suggest
Glad I am not alone in seeing this “disaster for the Tories” as completely over hyped. It’s just not there in the pseudological facts.
1) mid term by elections your voters don’t come out. You can get results just like this even when national polls are much closer together. 1b) Chester Turnout usually 75% plus, and history in seat points towards a labour seat not strong Tory one, how does anyone prove votes have switched here not just stay at home? Without switchers there is argument Labour is underperforming in real votes compared to polls, Labour underperforming turning polls into real votes with switchers, as they certainly have in real votes throughout 2022 have they not? This Labour under performance in real elections v polls, was the second main take out from 2022 locals, after main take out of Lib Dem better than expected performance. 2) did Tories give their voters reason for protest against them though by staying home? As they have told the world their Tory predecessors in recent Tory cabinets have broken the asylum system and made mistakes which crashed the economy, they sure have given voters a reason to give them a mid term slap. Have they not? But with two years to come out of mid term and build to election, what does this result actually say about what is certain to happen at that next General Election?
I dont think anyone seriously believes the next GE will follow the current polls. There will be shy Tories (though fewer than under Truss), and undecideds switching back, but the polls show Labour sitting on a pretty decent cushion.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
I think Douglas Adams made very clever use of the English language.
Yes, he did: I'd say Adam's writing was better, though Pratchett's plotting was better. Practchett was also considerably more prolific! For one of the twentieth century's most highly regarded writers, Adams' output was tiny. I read a biography of him once: he said that while many writers claimed to suffer from writers' block, even those who suffered from writers' block marvelled at the extent of his writers' block, the lengths he would go to to put off the moment of sitting down to write something, and the sheer pain that writing caused him. I rather fear that if I were a writer I'd be in that camp, rather than in the 'isn't writing fun' camp of Pratchett.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
I've said it before and I'll say it again. The first chapter of "Going Postal", about a confidence trickster in a condemned cell awaiting execution is one of the finest pieces of comic writing I've ever read. Pity that Sky screwed up their dramatisation, but I guess you're always better off sticking wit your own imagination rather than somebody else's interpretation.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
Not a good reason for the overwhelming majority who wonder why the wealthiest parents enjoy a tax break that is leaving money on the table when their taxes are going to go up and their kids' schools are facing cutbacks. 'Class War' might've worked as a message if this was just Labour making a tax grab out of the blue. It doesn't when part of the Conservative message is one where everyone needs to make sacrifices - as effectively becomes 'everyone needs to make sacrifices except those who can spend £20,000+ a year to give their kid a perceived advantage'.
FWIW I think it's possible that Labour have made a mistake if they are serious about the VAT thing on schools. Not because it's wrong - schools should only have charity status if they are genuinely open to all on a needs blind basis, which very few could do - but because the policy takes on a massive establishment who, without publicising it, exclusively use these institutions. This includes vast numbers of the elite left and liberal establishment as well as centre-right and non-aligned.
This is a fantastically powerful lobby, with huge amounts of deniable power.
Private school are more non-profit organisations than charities I would say. If they were treated as limited companies and therefore liable to corporation tax I'm not sure how much tax they would pay cus every one I'm familiar with (the non-fancy ones - they are not all Etons) is skint.
I send my daughter ms to private schools.
The biggest difference, is not just the class sizes. But the pastoral care and education tailored to the individual. For example - just the other day people were talking about SENS. At both schools, they train the staff and employ specialists.
The specialists at both schools do free work in the local state schools - x hours a week.
Altogether, both schools do more charitable work than many so called charities.
One has just reached the target of 25% of intake on 100% bursaries, paid for out of an American style foundation.
Got to say I think you will find that's the exception rather than the rule.
They are both pretty high end schools - though, being in London, they don’t have the really over the top facilities. No space.
Some “charities” spend less than 10% of turnover on their charitable object. A school would trivially meet that by providing sports facilities for free to local state schools.
One charity I used to know spent nothing on charity. They lobbied to get money from governments, in order to lobby governments to get money….
You’d think basic accounting requirements & some policy on grants would prevent this kind of thing. If a charity fails to spend (say) 80% of it’s income on actually delivering it’s professed purpose, then it shouldn’t get a single government grant.
Is the real problem is that a charity can have something vague like “raising awareness” as its purpose, which means lobbying for more cash to pay more lobbiests to “raise awareness” with politicians counts as valid expenditure?
80% would shut down just about every charity. Many of the big ones spend a fraction of that on actual charity work.
Must admit that I’m failing to see the problem here. If you can’t spend 80% of your income on actual charitable work then you’re not a charity, you’re a grift in charitable drag.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
I've said it before and I'll say it again. The first chapter of "Going Postal", about a confidence trickster in a condemned cell awaiting execution is one of the finest pieces of comic writing I've ever read. Pity that Sky screwed up their dramatisation, but I guess you're always better off sticking wit your own imagination rather than somebody else's interpretation.
It's worth looking out Channel 4's animation of Wyrd Sisters. The quality of the animation is 'charming' rather than 'beautiful' or 'accomplished' but it's very faithful to the books. Two hours well spent.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
I think Douglas Adams made very clever use of the English language.
Yes, he did: I'd say Adam's writing was better, though Pratchett's plotting was better. Practchett was also considerably more prolific! For one of the twentieth century's most highly regarded writers, Adams' output was tiny. I read a biography of him once: he said that while many writers claimed to suffer from writers' block, even those who suffered from writers' block marvelled at the extent of his writers' block, the lengths he would go to to put off the moment of sitting down to write something, and the sheer pain that writing caused him. I rather fear that if I were a writer I'd be in that camp, rather than in the 'isn't writing fun' camp of Pratchett.
My favourite Adam's quote.
"I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by."
An Oxford student union official has apologised for her supposedly trans- exclusionary stance after objecting to the abolition of the women’s officer role.
Ellie Greaves, the vice-president for women at Oxford’s student union, put out a statement after a backlash against her comments in The Times.
Regardless, it seems a foolish policy. The union’s explanation for the abolition of the role (that it was created in a time when women couldn’t get full degrees and colleges were segregated) implicitly suggests the role isn’t needed any longer.
I can usually see the value in broadening the scope of equalities work, but not by making it shallower as this does.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
Pratchett lived about 20 miles from me, and the Chalk is essentially Salisbury Plain, where I grew up and still live. So for me the descriptions of the chalk are of home.
It's wonderful, isn't it? And it certainly, more than any other landscape he describes, feels like the author describing home. (I had tentatively placed it slightly further north, in the Cotswolds - albeit in a pre-gentrifiation Cotswolds - but happy to be corrected). Lancre, meanwhile, I had always placed in an exaggerated version of the geography of the Lake District though with the character of the Yorkshire Dales. The only thing which took me aback in the animated version of Wyrd Sisters, was that the witches had west country, rather than north country accents.
Terry Pratchett and Eric Ravilious. Two artists in different mediums who were able to do something incredibly difficult and capture a landscape so that as soon as you saw it you understood.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
I think Douglas Adams made very clever use of the English language.
Yes, he did: I'd say Adam's writing was better, though Pratchett's plotting was better. Practchett was also considerably more prolific! For one of the twentieth century's most highly regarded writers, Adams' output was tiny. I read a biography of him once: he said that while many writers claimed to suffer from writers' block, even those who suffered from writers' block marvelled at the extent of his writers' block, the lengths he would go to to put off the moment of sitting down to write something, and the sheer pain that writing caused him. I rather fear that if I were a writer I'd be in that camp, rather than in the 'isn't writing fun' camp of Pratchett.
There is a reason why Douglas Adams was locked in a guarded (by his editor) hotel room when he needed to write. He could be distracted by absolutely anything and because it was Douglas many people were very happy to help him distract himself.
It's worth comparing Douglas Adam's biographies with Terry Pratchett's recent one. Terry very much regarded writing as his 9 to 5 job. Douglas really wasn't that bothered about writing books once he had money - heck I don't think he was that bothered even before he had money.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me" is a very good motto to live by IMO.
Well I think we have a framework within which slander and libel can and can't operate, and I'm broadly comfortable with it. But 'where are your antecedents from?' seems to fall a long way short of anything which deserves more than a private moan.
This is the hypocrisy I don't get, if "words can never hurt me" is your motto then what's the problem with public moans about abhorrent behaviour?
Or do those words class as sticks and stones for some reason.
Applying a large uniform swing to a seat where the opposition party already starts well ahead is always fraught with peril, because the starting point is well out of line with mean national polling shares. In percentage terms there is a smaller share left for the opposition party to pick up, and a smaller starting share for the governing party to lose. So there's an artificial cap on the swing, in both directions.
Labour picked up 23% of the maximum increase available if it had picked up the vote of every single voter (i.e 11.6% as a share of the 50.4% who didn't vote Labour last time.) The Conservatives' share fell by 42% of their share last time (i.e 15.9% of 38.3%).
Apply that to the national vote shares in GE 2019 and the Conservatives would be left with about 26% of the GB vote and Labour with about 48%.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
Pratchett lived about 20 miles from me, and the Chalk is essentially Salisbury Plain, where I grew up and still live. So for me the descriptions of the chalk are of home.
It's wonderful, isn't it? And it certainly, more than any other landscape he describes, feels like the author describing home. (I had tentatively placed it slightly further north, in the Cotswolds - albeit in a pre-gentrifiation Cotswolds - but happy to be corrected). Lancre, meanwhile, I had always placed in an exaggerated version of the geography of the Lake District though with the character of the Yorkshire Dales. The only thing which took me aback in the animated version of Wyrd Sisters, was that the witches had west country, rather than north country accents.
Terry Pratchett and Eric Ravilious. Two artists in different mediums who were able to do something incredibly difficult and capture a landscape so that as soon as you saw it you understood.
I had never come across Eric Ravilious. I've just looked him up and can see exactly what you mean.
Applying a large uniform swing to a seat where the opposition party already starts well ahead is always fraught with peril, because the starting point is well out of line with mean national polling shares. In percentage terms there is a smaller share left for the opposition party to pick up, and a smaller starting share for the governing party to lose. So there's an artificial cap on the swing, in both directions.
Labour picked up 23% of the maximum increase available if it had picked up the vote of every single voter (i.e 11.6% as a share of the 50.4% who didn't vote Labour last time.) The Conservatives' share fell by 42% of their share last time (i.e 15.9% of 38.3%).
Apply that to the national vote shares in GE 2019 and the Conservatives would be left with about 26% of the GB vote and Labour with about 48%.
So pretty much what the national polls are showing, right?
"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me" is a very good motto to live by IMO.
Well I think we have a framework within which slander and libel can and can't operate, and I'm broadly comfortable with it. But 'where are your antecedents from?' seems to fall a long way short of anything which deserves more than a private moan.
This is the hypocrisy I don't get, if "words can never hurt me" is your motto then what's the problem with public moans about abhorrent behaviour?
Or do those words class as sticks and stones for some reason.
Trying to get people sacked can hurt them if you succeed.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
Bemused by your slightly rocky start comment, even Pratchett's early work is very good.
I was given for Father's Day after he died a collection of his short stories he wrote, pre-Discworld, which I read to my daughter at bedtime. There's been a few of these collections released. Dragons at Crumbling Castle and other stories was one of them, I can't remember the name of the other collection of his work I got the following Father's Day.
Its really interesting to read his early work. Its more child-focused, and its clearly early in his writing, but its also very clearly Pratchett. And what's interesting is that some of the ideas have clear early explorations into the ideas he'd later put into Discworld.
For anyone who is interested in Pratchett's work I'd recommend it as something different to get and read. Its really interesting to read his early work, with a knowledge of what he'd write later.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
I don't think the CJEU would have had anything to do with it.
It isn't an assault on parents to remove a tax exemption, unpleasant as it may be. Whether it is wise is another matter.
We need to live within our means. If we are serious about doing so, a lot of tax exemptions and favouring of particular groups will need to go.
- Remove all VAT exemptions, for instance, including on food. - NI on all income. - No triple lock. - CGT on primary residences. - Limit the exemptions from inheritance tax. - Increased council tax bands at the top end in every part of the country. - Make people use their savings (including their home) to pay for end of life care - that's what rainy day savings are for. - Cut back on tax credits. If private school parents are not to be subsidised why should shitty employers be? - Limit pension tax relief. - Remove non-dom status. If you live here, you pay your taxes.
And so on.
I can hear the howls of complaint already.
We are not serious about living within our means and earning our way in the world.
I don't think Labour is. And the Tories are currently only interested in governing for greedy grifters like the Lady (Jesus!) Mones of this world.
Funny, when I was growing up, living within your means meant spending less not earning more - which is what you are telling the country to do with almost every one of your tax rises.
Why no emphasis on the Government spending less taxpayer's money rather than just forever increasing the tax burden?
Oh and a 20% increase in tax on the poorest and most vulnerable - which is what your VAT proposals entail - is not exactly progressive.
While I wait for the hairdresser to perform his magic, let me say that I agree that we need to do both. We have a deficit and an enormous debt burden.
But no-one wants to confront the issue of what to cut back on and everyone wants tax increases on others and not themselves.
Until we get past that we'll get nowhere.
I just threw some stuff out from the top of my head. Feel free to come back with your ideas for what you would cut.
There is any amount of fat to cut. The problem is that (to clumsily extend a metaphor) to get to it you usually have to cut through useful tissue. The fat is hard to get at.
My #1 cut would be an increase to the state pension age. Every year, we should be pushing the state pensionable age up by 1 month. State pensions were designed to tide people through (on average) the last six years of their lives; they're now having to do around thrice that job).
"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me" is a very good motto to live by IMO.
Well I think we have a framework within which slander and libel can and can't operate, and I'm broadly comfortable with it. But 'where are your antecedents from?' seems to fall a long way short of anything which deserves more than a private moan.
This is the hypocrisy I don't get, if "words can never hurt me" is your motto then what's the problem with public moans about abhorrent behaviour?
Or do those words class as sticks and stones for some reason.
Trying to get people sacked can hurt them if you succeed.
So words can hurt you? 🤔
Then don't say that silly sticks and stones expression then.
Applying a large uniform swing to a seat where the opposition party already starts well ahead is always fraught with peril, because the starting point is well out of line with mean national polling shares. In percentage terms there is a smaller share left for the opposition party to pick up, and a smaller starting share for the governing party to lose. So there's an artificial cap on the swing, in both directions.
Labour picked up 23% of the maximum increase available if it had picked up the vote of every single voter (i.e 11.6% as a share of the 50.4% who didn't vote Labour last time.) The Conservatives' share fell by 42% of their share last time (i.e 15.9% of 38.3%).
Apply that to the national vote shares in GE 2019 and the Conservatives would be left with about 26% of the GB vote and Labour with about 48%.
So pretty much what the national polls are showing, right?
Yes.
What was out of line with the national polls was the very poor showing of the far right, in the form of Reform UK and UKIP. Only 3% between them.
Applying a large uniform swing to a seat where the opposition party already starts well ahead is always fraught with peril, because the starting point is well out of line with mean national polling shares. In percentage terms there is a smaller share left for the opposition party to pick up, and a smaller starting share for the governing party to lose. So there's an artificial cap on the swing, in both directions.
Labour picked up 23% of the maximum increase available if it had picked up the vote of every single voter (i.e 11.6% as a share of the 50.4% who didn't vote Labour last time.) The Conservatives' share fell by 42% of their share last time (i.e 15.9% of 38.3%).
Apply that to the national vote shares in GE 2019 and the Conservatives would be left with about 26% of the GB vote and Labour with about 48%.
And that will apply moreso to Stretford and Urmston.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me" is a very good motto to live by IMO.
Well I think we have a framework within which slander and libel can and can't operate, and I'm broadly comfortable with it. But 'where are your antecedents from?' seems to fall a long way short of anything which deserves more than a private moan.
This is the hypocrisy I don't get, if "words can never hurt me" is your motto then what's the problem with public moans about abhorrent behaviour?
Or do those words class as sticks and stones for some reason.
Trying to get people sacked can hurt them if you succeed.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
Not a good reason for the overwhelming majority who wonder why the wealthiest parents enjoy a tax break that is leaving money on the table when their taxes are going to go up and their kids' schools are facing cutbacks. 'Class War' might've worked as a message if this was just Labour making a tax grab out of the blue. It doesn't when part of the Conservative message is one where everyone needs to make sacrifices - as effectively becomes 'everyone needs to make sacrifices except those who can spend £20,000+ a year to give their kid a perceived advantage'.
FWIW I think it's possible that Labour have made a mistake if they are serious about the VAT thing on schools. Not because it's wrong - schools should only have charity status if they are genuinely open to all on a needs blind basis, which very few could do - but because the policy takes on a massive establishment who, without publicising it, exclusively use these institutions. This includes vast numbers of the elite left and liberal establishment as well as centre-right and non-aligned.
This is a fantastically powerful lobby, with huge amounts of deniable power.
Private school are more non-profit organisations than charities I would say. If they were treated as limited companies and therefore liable to corporation tax I'm not sure how much they would raise cus every one I'm familiar with (the non-fancy ones - they are not all Etons) is skint.
What on earth are they spending all their money on ? Fees have gone up by miles over inflation since forever.
I know my old school is in deep financial trouble - they pissed all our fees up the wall on a mahoosive heated indoor swimming pool.
That’s exactly the issue - they got into an arms race on facilities and ended up pricing their domestic customers out. Changed the culture of many schools.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
I think Douglas Adams made very clever use of the English language.
Yes, he did: I'd say Adam's writing was better, though Pratchett's plotting was better. Practchett was also considerably more prolific! For one of the twentieth century's most highly regarded writers, Adams' output was tiny. I read a biography of him once: he said that while many writers claimed to suffer from writers' block, even those who suffered from writers' block marvelled at the extent of his writers' block, the lengths he would go to to put off the moment of sitting down to write something, and the sheer pain that writing caused him. I rather fear that if I were a writer I'd be in that camp, rather than in the 'isn't writing fun' camp of Pratchett.
My favourite Adam's quote.
"I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by."
Something all authors can appreciate.
Something all builders appreciate too... :-) (as my home extension runs 6 months late.....)
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
Bemused by your slightly rocky start comment, even Pratchett's early work is very good.
I was given for Father's Day after he died a collection of his short stories he wrote, pre-Discworld, which I read to my daughter at bedtime. There's been a few of these collections released. Dragons at Crumbling Castle and other stories was one of them, I can't remember the name of the other collection of his work I got the following Father's Day.
Its really interesting to read his early work. Its more child-focused, and its clearly early in his writing, but its also very clearly Pratchett. And what's interesting is that some of the ideas have clear early explorations into the ideas he'd later put into Discworld.
For anyone who is interested in Pratchett's work I'd recommend it as something different to get and read. Its really interesting to read his early work, with a knowledge of what he'd write later.
Yes, actually, I take it back: his more child-focused stuff is very good in both writing and plotting. I'm thinking of his early Discworld books, and particularly Colour of Magic: the writing is good (though not quite as it would get) but the plotting was some way short in its sophistication of his later work. Still worth reading. But I'd say it was 'Wyrd Sisters' or 'Guards! Guards!' before he really hit his stride.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
I don't think the CJEU would have had anything to do with it.
It isn't an assault on parents to remove a tax exemption, unpleasant as it may be. Whether it is wise is another matter.
We need to live within our means. If we are serious about doing so, a lot of tax exemptions and favouring of particular groups will need to go.
- Remove all VAT exemptions, for instance, including on food. - NI on all income. - No triple lock. - CGT on primary residences. - Limit the exemptions from inheritance tax. - Increased council tax bands at the top end in every part of the country. - Make people use their savings (including their home) to pay for end of life care - that's what rainy day savings are for. - Cut back on tax credits. If private school parents are not to be subsidised why should shitty employers be? - Limit pension tax relief. - Remove non-dom status. If you live here, you pay your taxes.
And so on.
I can hear the howls of complaint already.
We are not serious about living within our means and earning our way in the world.
I don't think Labour is. And the Tories are currently only interested in governing for greedy grifters like the Lady (Jesus!) Mones of this world.
Funny, when I was growing up, living within your means meant spending less not earning more - which is what you are telling the country to do with almost every one of your tax rises.
Why no emphasis on the Government spending less taxpayer's money rather than just forever increasing the tax burden?
Oh and a 20% increase in tax on the poorest and most vulnerable - which is what your VAT proposals entail - is not exactly progressive.
While I wait for the hairdresser to perform his magic, let me say that I agree that we need to do both. We have a deficit and an enormous debt burden.
But no-one wants to confront the issue of what to cut back on and everyone wants tax increases on others and not themselves.
Until we get past that we'll get nowhere.
I just threw some stuff out from the top of my head. Feel free to come back with your ideas for what you would cut.
Plenty of people have come up with things they want to cut back on. The problem is that we can't all agree, but to govern is to choose.
Just of the top of the head, the following is what I would abolish/cut back on.
1: Legalise anything 'victimless'. Tax it, don't spend taxes putting it through the courts etc
2: Abolish the triple lock.
3: Abolish the DWP.
4: Abolish the planning system and appeals etc.
I'm sure I could come up with more if I put my mind to it, and that's just entire things to abolish let alone things to cut. Others would disagree, but again, that's politics and they'll have their own things they'd cut instead. Responsible governance is making your choices and being held to account for it, not refusing to do anything because someone might not like it.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
Not a good reason for the overwhelming majority who wonder why the wealthiest parents enjoy a tax break that is leaving money on the table when their taxes are going to go up and their kids' schools are facing cutbacks. 'Class War' might've worked as a message if this was just Labour making a tax grab out of the blue. It doesn't when part of the Conservative message is one where everyone needs to make sacrifices - as effectively becomes 'everyone needs to make sacrifices except those who can spend £20,000+ a year to give their kid a perceived advantage'.
FWIW I think it's possible that Labour have made a mistake if they are serious about the VAT thing on schools. Not because it's wrong - schools should only have charity status if they are genuinely open to all on a needs blind basis, which very few could do - but because the policy takes on a massive establishment who, without publicising it, exclusively use these institutions. This includes vast numbers of the elite left and liberal establishment as well as centre-right and non-aligned.
This is a fantastically powerful lobby, with huge amounts of deniable power.
Private school are more non-profit organisations than charities I would say. If they were treated as limited companies and therefore liable to corporation tax I'm not sure how much tax they would pay cus every one I'm familiar with (the non-fancy ones - they are not all Etons) is skint.
I send my daughter ms to private schools.
The biggest difference, is not just the class sizes. But the pastoral care and education tailored to the individual. For example - just the other day people were talking about SENS. At both schools, they train the staff and employ specialists.
The specialists at both schools do free work in the local state schools - x hours a week.
Altogether, both schools do more charitable work than many so called charities.
One has just reached the target of 25% of intake on 100% bursaries, paid for out of an American style foundation.
Got to say I think you will find that's the exception rather than the rule.
Incredible achievement to have 25% intake on 100% bursaries. According to the Independent Schools Council, in 2022 there was £480m of means-tested fee assistance and nearly half of those receiving this got more than half of their fees paid.
There are about 550,000 students in private schools, so that's about £870/pupil.... with average fees probably 10-15x that, we could safely say it's a small minority who receive means-tested scholarships.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me" is a very good motto to live by IMO.
Well I think we have a framework within which slander and libel can and can't operate, and I'm broadly comfortable with it. But 'where are your antecedents from?' seems to fall a long way short of anything which deserves more than a private moan.
This is the hypocrisy I don't get, if "words can never hurt me" is your motto then what's the problem with public moans about abhorrent behaviour?
Or do those words class as sticks and stones for some reason.
Trying to get people sacked can hurt them if you succeed.
So words can hurt you? 🤔
Um, no.
So there's nothing wrong with public moans about abhorrent behaviour then?
You're being hypocritical. Either words can have consequences, in which case words can hurt, or they don't, in which case moan away in public.
President Biden has asked leaders of the Democratic National Committee to make South Carolina the nation’s first primary state, followed by New Hampshire and Nevada a week later, and hold subsequent weekly primaries in Georgia and Michigan, according to Democrats briefed on the plans.
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
I don't think the CJEU would have had anything to do with it.
It isn't an assault on parents to remove a tax exemption, unpleasant as it may be. Whether it is wise is another matter.
We need to live within our means. If we are serious about doing so, a lot of tax exemptions and favouring of particular groups will need to go.
- Remove all VAT exemptions, for instance, including on food. - NI on all income. - No triple lock. - CGT on primary residences. - Limit the exemptions from inheritance tax. - Increased council tax bands at the top end in every part of the country. - Make people use their savings (including their home) to pay for end of life care - that's what rainy day savings are for. - Cut back on tax credits. If private school parents are not to be subsidised why should shitty employers be? - Limit pension tax relief. - Remove non-dom status. If you live here, you pay your taxes.
And so on.
I can hear the howls of complaint already.
We are not serious about living within our means and earning our way in the world.
I don't think Labour is. And the Tories are currently only interested in governing for greedy grifters like the Lady (Jesus!) Mones of this world.
Funny, when I was growing up, living within your means meant spending less not earning more - which is what you are telling the country to do with almost every one of your tax rises.
Why no emphasis on the Government spending less taxpayer's money rather than just forever increasing the tax burden?
Oh and a 20% increase in tax on the poorest and most vulnerable - which is what your VAT proposals entail - is not exactly progressive.
While I wait for the hairdresser to perform his magic, let me say that I agree that we need to do both. We have a deficit and an enormous debt burden.
But no-one wants to confront the issue of what to cut back on and everyone wants tax increases on others and not themselves.
Until we get past that we'll get nowhere.
I just threw some stuff out from the top of my head. Feel free to come back with your ideas for what you would cut.
There is any amount of fat to cut. The problem is that (to clumsily extend a metaphor) to get to it you usually have to cut through useful tissue. The fat is hard to get at.
My #1 cut would be an increase to the state pension age. Every year, we should be pushing the state pensionable age up by 1 month. State pensions were designed to tide people through (on average) the last six years of their lives; they're now having to do around thrice that job).
Sooner or later it's going to have to come from pensions, if only to be redistributed to public services on the point of collapse (transport and justice, for example). And the triple lock needs to go.
There's a bigger point around long-term economic planning. IA(definitely)NAE, but an illustrative example could be refocusing health budget - long term - towards primary and social care, keeping people out of hospital for longer and perhaps being a more efficient system (my dad is in and out of hospital at the moment in an extraordinarily inefficient and expensive way; my experience with this and elsewhere is that a lot of the rising healthcare costs comes from embedded institutional ineffectiveness and false economy). Of course, it requires a bit of cultural change as well.
Unreadable / unjustifiably praised book/author list: Part 1
1.The two biographies of Churchill by Martin Gilbert (one long laundry list of everything Churchill ever did with no attempt to put into context or analyse) and Roy Jenkins: insufferably self-regarding and pompous. 2. Martin Amis 3. Kingsley Amis: parts of Lucky Jim were quite funny but only because no-one else made jokes in books in the 1950s and after that he became a Self-Important Saloon Bar Bore. 4. Hilary Mantel - unreadable. 5. Dickens - also unreadable. Vanity Fair, by contrast, is one of the best novels ever written...
Neither of the last two are unreadable, it's just that you don't care for them. It's true that Dickens wasn't great at writing women, but I don't think he's exclusively a male preserve; my daughter likes his novels. Agree about 1-3, and Vanity Fair.
It is v rare for me not to finish a book. With Dickens I cannot get past chapter 1. Mantel: I could not finish Wolf Hall. Her style is deeply annoying and she managed to make Tudor politics boring. Hugely overrated. IMO.
I like Elizabeth Gaskell and George Eliot and Brontë. So dunno what it is about Dickens.
Perhaps that you don't like books which aren't very interested in women ? That's true of Mantel's trilogy, too.
Since the cricket is a bit dull I'll tell you why Mantel gets my goat.
She can write very well. Some of her descriptive passages are beautiful. She also researches thoroughly and knows her history. In Wolf Hall she was writing about a particularly interesting peiod of history, one I know quite well and enjoy reading about, whether its a contrarian view or not.
So why did I give up on it after 150 pages (and like Cyclefree I rarely fail to finish a book)?
It is written in the 'past in the present'. Cockneys use this mode a lot - 'So I goes in the pub and I sees this geezer....' - and it does have a certain dramatic effect, but only if used sparingly. A whole book written in it is simply tedious.
She uses personal pronouns in the most peculiar way which means that at certain points she has to clarify who she is referring to - e.g. 'He, Moore, came in....' Such stylistic quirks are so common throughout the text that you finish up paying more attention to them than the narrative.
You have to wonder what the point of all this weirdness is. I suspect her readers - and she is enormously popular - mistake it for Art. Or maybe the aim is to stand out from all the other writers of this type of novel. I think if she didn't do it, she would be a perfectly readable but ordinary writer of historic fiction. As it is she is deeply irrating, not least for the reason that this highly artificial and contrived rubbish sells like hot cakes, whilst equally capable writers with less of a penchant for self-publicity are ignored.
She is the Agatha Christie of historical novels - a mediocrity who got herself promoted way above her merit.
I think you either find the effort to adjust your reading to the steam of consciousness style is worthwhile, or you don't. That's a matter of taste rather than right or wrong, I think. It's not Agatha Christie, that's for sure.
In a perhaps similar manner, some found large parts of Iain M Bank's Feersum Endjinn unreadable. Others enjoyed it.
I am surprised at some of the criticism for Christie on here. I'm not going to claim that she wrote glorious prose, but the mystery that she created was superb - the plots are excellent. I wonder if the haters have read many of the books?
I agree. I read loads in my late teens. Some are very good indeed: The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Crooked House, Endless Night, Then There Were None ...
Agatha Christie is a superb writer whose books are among the best in her chosen genre. You have to turn a blind eye to some of her prejudices, which are very much on display in her books, though.
Yes, but she was of her time. Brought up in a large country house with all the servants etc. Served in the 1st War as a nurse, so its hard not to expect her to be more racist and class bound than a modern author. And yet if you dig into the stories, almost everyone has dark secrets to hide.
One of the favourite possibly true, possibly not true pranks I've heard about is this. Someone sends out 100 anonymous letters to people, all saying 'Flee at once, all is discovered', and a few people do actually flee. I am sure this is probably not true, but it emphasizes that lots of people do carry dark secrets.
Yes - it's a while since I read any Christie - but my recollection is that while she reflected the prejudices of her day and class, she didn't seem to support those prejudices: the most sympathetic characters were always the outsiders.
All books more than a few years old have to be read in the light of the prejudices of that day. The trickier thing is to read today's literature in the light of the prejudices of our day.
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
Bemused by your slightly rocky start comment, even Pratchett's early work is very good.
I was given for Father's Day after he died a collection of his short stories he wrote, pre-Discworld, which I read to my daughter at bedtime. There's been a few of these collections released. Dragons at Crumbling Castle and other stories was one of them, I can't remember the name of the other collection of his work I got the following Father's Day.
Its really interesting to read his early work. Its more child-focused, and its clearly early in his writing, but its also very clearly Pratchett. And what's interesting is that some of the ideas have clear early explorations into the ideas he'd later put into Discworld.
For anyone who is interested in Pratchett's work I'd recommend it as something different to get and read. Its really interesting to read his early work, with a knowledge of what he'd write later.
Colour of Magic and the Light Fantastic don't really have much plot and feel more like vignettes pegged together. Later works started to have much better plotting.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me" is a very good motto to live by IMO.
Well I think we have a framework within which slander and libel can and can't operate, and I'm broadly comfortable with it. But 'where are your antecedents from?' seems to fall a long way short of anything which deserves more than a private moan.
This is the hypocrisy I don't get, if "words can never hurt me" is your motto then what's the problem with public moans about abhorrent behaviour?
Or do those words class as sticks and stones for some reason.
Trying to get people sacked can hurt them if you succeed.
So words can hurt you? 🤔
Um, no.
So there's nothing wrong with public moans about abhorrent behaviour then?
You're being hypocritical. Either words can have consequences, in which case words can hurt, or they don't, in which case moan away in public.
There's a difference between someone saying words that "hurt" emotionally but have no other effect unless the "victim" chooses to let it, and a deliberate attempt to damage someone financially by getting them sacked.
You're not stupid so I know you understand this, so why are you dissembling by pretending that trying to get someone sacked is merely "moaning in public"?
On Mantel, people have set out reasons why stylistically I too have issues with the writing. But even leaving that aside I never got why her works win awards and others don't - I've read a lot of stories of that kind set in that period of history, and other than the quirky style, which you either like or don't, they don't stand out from others of that nature.
Yep, its not really clear. I think there is a fashion for certain authors, and if you are in vogue, the literati rave about you. My favourite opposite of this was Terry Pratchett. Possibly one of our best authors of the last century, certainly sold the most books, and yet sneered at by the 'right sort' until the end, because he wrote fantasy. That the books contained biting satire on many things and espoused a world view as potent as anyones (not unlike the The Doctor's 'Just be kind').
Yes: Pratchett not only plotted brilliantly (after a slightly rocky start, it should be said) and was one of the funniest* writers of the 20th century, but also used language as gloriously as any other writer of the English language. I read his books again and again, and they get better each time. His descriptions of the chalk on which Tiffany Aching lives make me feel homesick for an imaginary place.
*the ability to be funny in writing is often strangely looked down upon. But it's much harder to do than it looks. And as I've always thought: if a story is neither funny nor true, what's the point?
Pratchett lived about 20 miles from me, and the Chalk is essentially Salisbury Plain, where I grew up and still live. So for me the descriptions of the chalk are of home.
It's wonderful, isn't it? And it certainly, more than any other landscape he describes, feels like the author describing home. (I had tentatively placed it slightly further north, in the Cotswolds - albeit in a pre-gentrifiation Cotswolds - but happy to be corrected). Lancre, meanwhile, I had always placed in an exaggerated version of the geography of the Lake District though with the character of the Yorkshire Dales. The only thing which took me aback in the animated version of Wyrd Sisters, was that the witches had west country, rather than north country accents.
Terry Pratchett and Eric Ravilious. Two artists in different mediums who were able to do something incredibly difficult and capture a landscape so that as soon as you saw it you understood.
I’ve always liked Ravilious but had pronounced it in my head with a silent s. I recently heard someone on the radio pronounce it with an s at the end which I now know is correct. Shook me to the very core I can tell you.
Tragic end, though sort of a tribute to his conscientiousness as a war artist.
President Biden has asked leaders of the Democratic National Committee to make South Carolina the nation’s first primary state, followed by New Hampshire and Nevada a week later, and hold subsequent weekly primaries in Georgia and Michigan, according to Democrats briefed on the plans.
Firstly - thanks for that tip! Secondly - this is great... Biden probably the only politician for a while in Dems who doesn't need to worry about Iowa, so it's great to see he's trying to fix this.
Surrey (Sunbury Common & Ashford Common) - LDm GAIN from Con Arun (Arundel & Walberton) - Grn hold King's Lynn & West Norfolk (Gaywood Clock) - Lab hold (unopposed) Norfolk (Gaywood North & Central) - LDm GAIN from Con Southampton (Bitterne) - Lab GAIN from Con Waverley (Chiddingfold & Dunsfold) - LDm GAIN from Con West Lothian (Broxburn, Uphall & Winchburgh) - Lab hold
The swing in Chester of 14% to Labour was actually better for the Tories than the 18% swing to Labour in the latest YouGov poll yesterday.
So while not a great result for the Tories and good for Labour it was actually not as disastrous for Sunak as some of the latest polls would suggest
Glad I am not alone in seeing this “disaster for the Tories” as completely over hyped. It’s just not there in the pseudological facts.
1) mid term by elections your voters don’t come out. You can get results just like this even when national polls are much closer together. 1b) Chester Turnout usually 75% plus, and history in seat points towards a labour seat not strong Tory one, how does anyone prove votes have switched here not just stay at home? Without switchers there is argument Labour is underperforming in real votes compared to polls, Labour underperforming turning polls into real votes with switchers, as they certainly have in real votes throughout 2022 have they not? This Labour under performance in real elections v polls, was the second main take out from 2022 locals, after main take out of Lib Dem better than expected performance. 2) did Tories give their voters reason for protest against them though by staying home? As they have told the world their Tory predecessors in recent Tory cabinets have broken the asylum system and made mistakes which crashed the economy, they sure have given voters a reason to give them a mid term slap. Have they not? But with two years to come out of mid term and build to election, what does this result actually say about what is certain to happen at that next General Election?
This it's just staying at home in by-elections narrative means nothing is wrong doesn't fit historically.
Echibit A: That 1994 Dudley West by-election, the greatest Con-Lab swing since WW2, and one of the augers of a Blair PMship.
Numerically, the Labour vote went DOWN from 28,940 to 28,400. Yes, Labour lost votes.
So. setting a bar for Labour to actually put on numerical votes in a by-election - I just don't know if it has ever happened.
“Thresher” who I admire solely for being relentlessly supercilious and downbeat, is miles apart from our thinking. To copy paste from his piece for Sky
Take these three and the impression it gives.
“There was no flirtation with minor parties, instead many Conservatives appear to have switched directly to Labour.
“The Conservative vote fell by sixteen percentage points and most of that loss went to Labour.”
“Seats such as Macclesfield, Banbury, Basingstoke and Hexham that have been in Tory hands for around a century would fall.”
But it was 31% lower voters than general election turn out, is that missing 31% split neatly between Labour and Tory? To my mind one tribe depressed and staying home on mass and the psephologists should say so, even if it removes some excitement from their journalism and cast doubt on the their science actually being any help.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me" is a very good motto to live by IMO.
Well I think we have a framework within which slander and libel can and can't operate, and I'm broadly comfortable with it. But 'where are your antecedents from?' seems to fall a long way short of anything which deserves more than a private moan.
This is the hypocrisy I don't get, if "words can never hurt me" is your motto then what's the problem with public moans about abhorrent behaviour?
Or do those words class as sticks and stones for some reason.
Trying to get people sacked can hurt them if you succeed.
So words can hurt you? 🤔
Um, no.
So there's nothing wrong with public moans about abhorrent behaviour then?
You're being hypocritical. Either words can have consequences, in which case words can hurt, or they don't, in which case moan away in public.
There's a difference between someone saying words that "hurt" emotionally but have no other effect unless the "victim" chooses to let it, and a deliberate attempt to damage someone financially by getting them sacked.
You're not stupid so I know you understand this, so why are you dissembling by pretending that trying to get someone sacked is merely "moaning in public"?
I'm not stupid you're right and I can see that there is there is no difference and that victims don't simply choose or not choose to let themselves be hurt by words.
Words can have consequences. Those consequences can ultimately include depression, suicidal thoughts, being sacked, or even death.
Being sacked by a long shot isn't the worst of those consequences and if you're ruling out all the other consequences as not caused by words, then you need to rule out sackings as 'sticks and stones' too.
So The Saj is the latest to quit ahead of the mauling. It seems that many of them don't want to go through 1997 Redux only 10x worse.
The only Tory MPs left in the next Parliament, if there are any at all, will be a rancid rump of barely breathing shire gammons and, presumably, a few young things who are prepared to ride out the long, dark winter wilderness years.
So The Saj is the latest to quit ahead of the mauling. It seems that many of them don't want to go through 1997 Redux only 10x worse.
The only Tory MPs left in the next Parliament, if there are any at all, will be a rancid rump of barely breathing shire gammons and, presumably, a few young things who are prepared to ride out the long, dark winter wilderness years.
Hyperbole - 10x worse? What does that even mean? They are going to lose for sure, but I suspect there will be some closing of the gap as the election nears.
"Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me" is a very good motto to live by IMO.
Well I think we have a framework within which slander and libel can and can't operate, and I'm broadly comfortable with it. But 'where are your antecedents from?' seems to fall a long way short of anything which deserves more than a private moan.
This is the hypocrisy I don't get, if "words can never hurt me" is your motto then what's the problem with public moans about abhorrent behaviour?
Or do those words class as sticks and stones for some reason.
Trying to get people sacked can hurt them if you succeed.
So words can hurt you? 🤔
Um, no.
So there's nothing wrong with public moans about abhorrent behaviour then?
You're being hypocritical. Either words can have consequences, in which case words can hurt, or they don't, in which case moan away in public.
There's a difference between someone saying words that "hurt" emotionally but have no other effect unless the "victim" chooses to let it, and a deliberate attempt to damage someone financially by getting them sacked.
You're not stupid so I know you understand this, so why are you dissembling by pretending that trying to get someone sacked is merely "moaning in public"?
I'm not stupid you're right and I can see that there is there is no difference and that victims don't simply choose or not choose to let themselves be hurt by words.
Words can have consequences. Those consequences can ultimately include depression, suicidal thoughts, being sacked, or even death.
Being sacked by a long shot isn't the worst of those consequences and if you're ruling out all the other consequences as not caused by words, then you need to rule out sackings as 'sticks and stones' too.
Let's trim a few words out to make it crystal clear what you are saying.
"Words can have consequences. Those consequences can include death".
Oh dear. Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.
Someone says something nasty to you. OK, that hurts emotionally. No argument there. But do you choose to let it rule you, or do you choose to try to get over it? Only in the former case do you turn yourself into a victim. And even then you aren't justified in trying to get somebody sacked.
Unreadable / unjustifiably praised book/author list: Part 1
1.The two biographies of Churchill by Martin Gilbert (one long laundry list of everything Churchill ever did with no attempt to put into context or analyse) and Roy Jenkins: insufferably self-regarding and pompous. 2. Martin Amis 3. Kingsley Amis: parts of Lucky Jim were quite funny but only because no-one else made jokes in books in the 1950s and after that he became a Self-Important Saloon Bar Bore. 4. Hilary Mantel - unreadable. 5. Dickens - also unreadable. Vanity Fair, by contrast, is one of the best novels ever written...
Neither of the last two are unreadable, it's just that you don't care for them. It's true that Dickens wasn't great at writing women, but I don't think he's exclusively a male preserve; my daughter likes his novels. Agree about 1-3, and Vanity Fair.
It is v rare for me not to finish a book. With Dickens I cannot get past chapter 1. Mantel: I could not finish Wolf Hall. Her style is deeply annoying and she managed to make Tudor politics boring. Hugely overrated. IMO.
I like Elizabeth Gaskell and George Eliot and Brontë. So dunno what it is about Dickens.
Perhaps that you don't like books which aren't very interested in women ? That's true of Mantel's trilogy, too.
Since the cricket is a bit dull I'll tell you why Mantel gets my goat.
She can write very well. Some of her descriptive passages are beautiful. She also researches thoroughly and knows her history. In Wolf Hall she was writing about a particularly interesting peiod of history, one I know quite well and enjoy reading about, whether its a contrarian view or not.
So why did I give up on it after 150 pages (and like Cyclefree I rarely fail to finish a book)?
It is written in the 'past in the present'. Cockneys use this mode a lot - 'So I goes in the pub and I sees this geezer....' - and it does have a certain dramatic effect, but only if used sparingly. A whole book written in it is simply tedious.
She uses personal pronouns in the most peculiar way which means that at certain points she has to clarify who she is referring to - e.g. 'He, Moore, came in....' Such stylistic quirks are so common throughout the text that you finish up paying more attention to them than the narrative.
You have to wonder what the point of all this weirdness is. I suspect her readers - and she is enormously popular - mistake it for Art. Or maybe the aim is to stand out from all the other writers of this type of novel. I think if she didn't do it, she would be a perfectly readable but ordinary writer of historic fiction. As it is she is deeply irrating, not least for the reason that this highly artificial and contrived rubbish sells like hot cakes, whilst equally capable writers with less of a penchant for self-publicity are ignored.
She is the Agatha Christie of historical novels - a mediocrity who got herself promoted way above her merit.
I think you either find the effort to adjust your reading to the steam of consciousness style is worthwhile, or you don't. That's a matter of taste rather than right or wrong, I think. It's not Agatha Christie, that's for sure.
In a perhaps similar manner, some found large parts of Iain M Bank's Feersum Endjinn unreadable. Others enjoyed it.
I am surprised at some of the criticism for Christie on here. I'm not going to claim that she wrote glorious prose, but the mystery that she created was superb - the plots are excellent. I wonder if the haters have read many of the books?
Hate is too strong for me. Dislike would do it, partly because what I read appeared pretty moderate and gave me no incentive to read more, and partly because her popularity seemed to owe more to shrewd self-publicity than literary skill.
I must admit I enjoyed Tne Little Niggers (which was the original unfortunate title of And Then There Were None) but mainly for the plot. I tried some Poirot and short-stories after that but quickly concluded the cake was stale.
So The Saj is the latest to quit ahead of the mauling. It seems that many of them don't want to go through 1997 Redux only 10x worse.
The only Tory MPs left in the next Parliament, if there are any at all, will be a rancid rump of barely breathing shire gammons and, presumably, a few young things who are prepared to ride out the long, dark winter wilderness years.
Hyperbole - 10x worse? What does that even mean? They are going to lose for sure, but I suspect there will be some closing of the gap as the election nears.
Of course not. 50 seats maximum. Heathener has spoken - Heathener knows.
(Of course, if Heathener is wrong, Heathener will disappear without a word.)
Surrey (Sunbury Common & Ashford Common) - LDm GAIN from Con Arun (Arundel & Walberton) - Grn hold King's Lynn & West Norfolk (Gaywood Clock) - Lab hold (unopposed) Norfolk (Gaywood North & Central) - LDm GAIN from Con Southampton (Bitterne) - Lab GAIN from Con Waverley (Chiddingfold & Dunsfold) - LDm GAIN from Con West Lothian (Broxburn, Uphall & Winchburgh) - Lab hold
The only possible one is to prevent a large Labour majority. Governments with large majorities and no effective opposition become complacent, arrogant and hubristic.
We are destined for more years of poor governance.
There's one very good reason to vote Tory, to stop Labour's class warfare on children with VAT changes on private schools.
Another bloody Brexit bonus, the CJEU wouldn't have allowed Labour's assault on parents.
Not a good reason for the overwhelming majority who wonder why the wealthiest parents enjoy a tax break that is leaving money on the table when their taxes are going to go up and their kids' schools are facing cutbacks. 'Class War' might've worked as a message if this was just Labour making a tax grab out of the blue. It doesn't when part of the Conservative message is one where everyone needs to make sacrifices - as effectively becomes 'everyone needs to make sacrifices except those who can spend £20,000+ a year to give their kid a perceived advantage'.
FWIW I think it's possible that Labour have made a mistake if they are serious about the VAT thing on schools. Not because it's wrong - schools should only have charity status if they are genuinely open to all on a needs blind basis, which very few could do - but because the policy takes on a massive establishment who, without publicising it, exclusively use these institutions. This includes vast numbers of the elite left and liberal establishment as well as centre-right and non-aligned.
This is a fantastically powerful lobby, with huge amounts of deniable power.
Private school are more non-profit organisations than charities I would say. If they were treated as limited companies and therefore liable to corporation tax I'm not sure how much tax they would pay cus every one I'm familiar with (the non-fancy ones - they are not all Etons) is skint.
I send my daughter ms to private schools.
The biggest difference, is not just the class sizes. But the pastoral care and education tailored to the individual. For example - just the other day people were talking about SENS. At both schools, they train the staff and employ specialists.
The specialists at both schools do free work in the local state schools - x hours a week.
Altogether, both schools do more charitable work than many so called charities.
One has just reached the target of 25% of intake on 100% bursaries, paid for out of an American style foundation.
Got to say I think you will find that's the exception rather than the rule.
They are both pretty high end schools - though, being in London, they don’t have the really over the top facilities. No space.
Some “charities” spend less than 10% of turnover on their charitable object. A school would trivially meet that by providing sports facilities for free to local state schools.
One charity I used to know spent nothing on charity. They lobbied to get money from governments, in order to lobby governments to get money….
You’d think basic accounting requirements & some policy on grants would prevent this kind of thing. If a charity fails to spend (say) 80% of it’s income on actually delivering it’s professed purpose, then it shouldn’t get a single government grant.
Is the real problem is that a charity can have something vague like “raising awareness” as its purpose, which means lobbying for more cash to pay more lobbiests to “raise awareness” with politicians counts as valid expenditure?
80% would shut down just about every charity. Many of the big ones spend a fraction of that on actual charity work.
Must admit that I’m failing to see the problem here. If you can’t spend 80% of your income on actual charitable work then you’re not a charity, you’re a grift in charitable drag.
Personally I am fine with this idea.
Politically, burning down most of the charity sector would guarantee a firestorm. And hence will never happen
Surrey (Sunbury Common & Ashford Common) - LDm GAIN from Con Arun (Arundel & Walberton) - Grn hold King's Lynn & West Norfolk (Gaywood Clock) - Lab hold (unopposed) Norfolk (Gaywood North & Central) - LDm GAIN from Con Southampton (Bitterne) - Lab GAIN from Con Waverley (Chiddingfold & Dunsfold) - LDm GAIN from Con West Lothian (Broxburn, Uphall & Winchburgh) - Lab hold
Good Week/Bad Week Index
LDm +183 Lab +126 Grn +57 SNP +4 Con -366
Adjusted Seat Value
LDm +3.1 Lab +2.8 Grn +0.9 SNP +0.1 Con -6.1
8.5% swing SNP-> Lab in Broxburn Uphall and Winchburgh on first preferences if my rushed calcs are right. Lab required all 8 rounds of transfers to get over the line, the last being from SCon presumably - well, they are in an informal coalition on the council...
A slight counterpoint on this is that I believe Tory MPs in areas with boundary changes have been given a deadline in December to state intentions in order to deal with selections, particularly where Tory MPs are brought into conflict due to the changes. This has contributed to the flurry of announcements.
That said, some of those calling it a day have been telling. You've got young ones, and those in seats that are looking really tough to defend going. For someone like Javid, he's clearly not a favourite of Sunak's, but there's a credible route to a frontline comeback if the Tories stay in office. But he's 52 and, if the Tories lose badly, he'll realistically be well into his 60s by the time they are back in power. Opposition is a pretty grim slog, and you can see why he'd duck out at this stage, earn a few quid etc. So he's making a decision he may well not be making if Tory prospects looked reasonably good.
Comments
It isn't new, novel or imaginative.
It is a rehash from how many years and how many times ago?
Great if it raises a bit of cash, but the gross contribution will be far less than the net contribution if more private schools close.
I also think it potentially has the unintended consequence that you highlighted, as you venture forth into tuition of the thick rich.
I've never given Woolfe a go. Patrick Hamilton, whose play Gaslight gave us the term gaslighting, is an unappreciated star from the same kind of era, although interest in his work seems to be growing again.
Echibit A: That 1994 Dudley West by-election, the greatest Con-Lab swing since WW2, and one of the augers of a Blair PMship.
Numerically, the Labour vote went DOWN from 28,940 to 28,400. Yes, Labour lost votes.
So. setting a bar for Labour to actually put on numerical votes in a by-election - I just don't know if it has ever happened.
But the take out from Whitty and yourself is “the pandemic forced this, there was no choice.” It was not policy decision, it was not taking eye off the ball, there was absolutely no choice or option in the matter. Is that fair to say is the take out?
And it is also fair that this should be questioned, not just nodded through as fact?
And it’s actually questioned with a simple question - could more not have been done to keep cancer diagnosis and treatment going?
Simple question, lots to consider. Were Nightingales under used when specialist breast units were full of covid respiratory patients for example?
Simple question, lots to consider, to get to the bottom line if it was policy decisions and mistakes what killed people, not all the blame on the pandemic.
The biggest difference, is not just the class sizes. But the pastoral care and education tailored to the individual. For example - just the other day people were talking about SENS. At both schools, they train the staff and employ specialists.
The specialists at both schools do free work in the local state schools - x hours a week.
Altogether, both schools do more charitable work than many so called charities.
One has just reached the target of 25% of intake on 100% bursaries, paid for out of an American style foundation.
COUNCIL DIRECTIVE 2006/112/EC
of 28 November 2006 on the common system of value added tax.....
Article 132
1. Member States shall exempt the following transactions:
(a)....
(i) the provision of children's or young people's education, school or university education, vocational training or retraining, including the supply of services and of goods closely related thereto, by bodies governed by public law having such as their aim or by other organisations recognised by the Member State concerned as having similar objects;
(j) tuition given privately by teachers and covering school or university education;
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2006/112/2022-07-01
25 point lead for Labour ...
Labour 46% (+2)
Conservatives 21% (-3)
Greens 9% (+1)
Lib Dems 7% (-1)
Reform 7% (+2)
SNP 5% (-)
@PeoplePolling Nov 30
The bottom line being, how much is it a partys vote staying home in real votes, when polls suggest swings based on vote transfers
Hint. Polls don’t clearly show swings - they are stuffed with don’t know won’t say.
There are many tax changes we should make in the name of fairness and spreading the lo0ad - non doms, NI on all income etc. But at the moment these are being posited merely as increases in the tax burden with no thought being given to reducing the size of the state and what it does. It is yet another of those ponzi schemes which will eventually collapse.
even at Labours best estimate it nets treasury £1.7bn, to prove how pathetic the game Labour are playing a reminder the current education budget is £100bn. And what about the obvious inherent vice of it not being paid at all nowhere near 1.7bn but creates new government costs instead as children switch to state schooling? At the moment is the better scenario of the wealthy subsidising education with their own money rather than dumping those costs on the state.
Labours great money tree from ending non Dom status is even more economically illiterate. ending non Dom status supposedly nets only about £3.2bn. There’s estimated 68,300 non doms actually paying £8bn in tax each year - what Labour don’t tell you the nom doms can so easily leave Britain once non Dom status axed , so Starmer doesn’t get the 3.2bn, and not the 8bn either, the policy actually makes the exchequer poorer.
Economically illiterate Labour think we are stupid.
There is always a choice.
Some “charities” spend less than 10% of turnover on their charitable object. A school would trivially meet that by providing sports facilities for free to local state schools.
One charity I used to know spent nothing on charity. They lobbied to get money from governments, in order to lobby governments to get money….
The tunnel venture has repeatedly teased local officials with a pledge to ‘solve soul-destroying traffic,’ only to back out
https://www.wsj.com/articles/elon-musk-boring-company-tunnel-traffic-11669658396
For betting purposes understanding both is essential. In order to avoid insanity and vacuity the two need to be separated intellectually.
My wife works for a trust which runs both private and state schools. There is quite a lot that the state schools are only able to do because of cross-transfer of skills and resources from the private schools.
Frankly, as a parent of children at state schools, from an entirely personal perspective, I can see only downsides: it will get even harder to get my kids into decent state schools as the pressure on them increases. Yes, it's conceivable that raising VAT on school fees will raise more money for the exchequer, but 1) a significant amount (all?) of that will be eaten up funding state places for children dropping out of the private sector, 2) will any really go to improving the lot of state pupils? - or will it just end up getting swallowed into the maw of government?, and 3) the money raised isn't just hanging around doing nothing: it would otherwise be spent on things which grow the economy. Tax may be necessary to keep the economy going, but you aren't just magicking that money out of nowhere - the fact that people no longer have that money (even people you dislike as a category like people giving their children private education) means that that money is no longer spent in the economy.
Basically, it's a policy like 45% top rate of tax: it's there for no reason except showing who your enemies are.
https://vote-2012.proboards.com/post/1316865/thread
But t you seem to be going to the extreme that they carry no useful information, and that's not right either - this does show Labour in a good position and the Tories in a poor one.
The evidence of polls (good for Labour), approval ratings (decent for Labour), and by and local elections (by elections good, local elections lagging a bit for Labour*) and the non-electoral political weather (bad for Tories) need to be considered in the round when trying to read an upcoming GE.
This doesn't feel like 2015 (which I called correctly on late PB evidence).
* I wonder if locally Labour still suffer a fracturing of its local vote from the swing to Corbyn and back again displacing centrists and lefties successively. Personally, I was a consistent Labour LE voter up until 2015, but with a strong Green local option I switched to them in Corbyn's leadership and have never returned LE-wise even though I'm back in the GE fold.
As a result, I'm not sure how heavily to weigh local election Labour underperformance.
But 'where are your antecedents from?' seems to fall a long way short of anything which deserves more than a private moan.
Is the real problem is that a charity can have something vague like “raising awareness” as its purpose, which means lobbying for more cash to pay more lobbiests to “raise awareness” with politicians counts as valid expenditure?
One of the favourite possibly true, possibly not true pranks I've heard about is this. Someone sends out 100 anonymous letters to people, all saying 'Flee at once, all is discovered', and a few people do actually flee. I am sure this is probably not true, but it emphasizes that lots of people do carry dark secrets.
Big game for Leach I think.
Is Will Jacks a bone fide spinner ?
But no-one wants to confront the issue of what to cut back on and everyone wants tax increases on others and not themselves.
Until we get past that we'll get nowhere.
I just threw some stuff out from the top of my head. Feel free to come back with your ideas for what you would cut.
Lancre, meanwhile, I had always placed in an exaggerated version of the geography of the Lake District though with the character of the Yorkshire Dales. The only thing which took me aback in the animated version of Wyrd Sisters, was that the witches had west country, rather than north country accents.
Many of the big ones spend a fraction of that on actual charity work.
In the case of the charity I am talking of, it raised money to hold conferences in just out-of-season luxury holiday destinations. Book a hotel and the VIPs get to spend a week or so “working” on a Caribbean island (say) - paid for by the charity. The conferences were about the charitable object. And raising money for the next junket.
The extremely repellent couple who ran it had a large house in London, with his-and-hers Range Rovers parked on the drive.
Practchett was also considerably more prolific! For one of the twentieth century's most highly regarded writers, Adams' output was tiny. I read a biography of him once: he said that while many writers claimed to suffer from writers' block, even those who suffered from writers' block marvelled at the extent of his writers' block, the lengths he would go to to put off the moment of sitting down to write something, and the sheer pain that writing caused him. I rather fear that if I were a writer I'd be in that camp, rather than in the 'isn't writing fun' camp of Pratchett.
"I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by."
Something all authors can appreciate.
I can usually see the value in broadening the scope of equalities work, but not by making it shallower as this does.
It's worth comparing Douglas Adam's biographies with Terry Pratchett's recent one. Terry very much regarded writing as his 9 to 5 job. Douglas really wasn't that bothered about writing books once he had money - heck I don't think he was that bothered even before he had money.
Or do those words class as sticks and stones for some reason.
Labour picked up 23% of the maximum increase available if it had picked up the vote of every single voter (i.e 11.6% as a share of the 50.4% who didn't vote Labour last time.) The Conservatives' share fell by 42% of their share last time (i.e 15.9% of 38.3%).
Apply that to the national vote shares in GE 2019 and the Conservatives would be left with about 26% of the GB vote and Labour with about 48%.
I was given for Father's Day after he died a collection of his short stories he wrote, pre-Discworld, which I read to my daughter at bedtime. There's been a few of these collections released. Dragons at Crumbling Castle and other stories was one of them, I can't remember the name of the other collection of his work I got the following Father's Day.
Its really interesting to read his early work. Its more child-focused, and its clearly early in his writing, but its also very clearly Pratchett. And what's interesting is that some of the ideas have clear early explorations into the ideas he'd later put into Discworld.
For anyone who is interested in Pratchett's work I'd recommend it as something different to get and read. Its really interesting to read his early work, with a knowledge of what he'd write later.
My #1 cut would be an increase to the state pension age. Every year, we should be pushing the state pensionable age up by 1 month. State pensions were designed to tide people through (on average) the last six years of their lives; they're now having to do around thrice that job).
Then don't say that silly sticks and stones expression then.
What was out of line with the national polls was the very poor showing of the far right, in the form of Reform UK and UKIP. Only 3% between them.
But they are kind of stuck now
I'm thinking of his early Discworld books, and particularly Colour of Magic: the writing is good (though not quite as it would get) but the plotting was some way short in its sophistication of his later work.
Still worth reading. But I'd say it was 'Wyrd Sisters' or 'Guards! Guards!' before he really hit his stride.
Just of the top of the head, the following is what I would abolish/cut back on.
1: Legalise anything 'victimless'. Tax it, don't spend taxes putting it through the courts etc
2: Abolish the triple lock.
3: Abolish the DWP.
4: Abolish the planning system and appeals etc.
I'm sure I could come up with more if I put my mind to it, and that's just entire things to abolish let alone things to cut. Others would disagree, but again, that's politics and they'll have their own things they'd cut instead. Responsible governance is making your choices and being held to account for it, not refusing to do anything because someone might not like it.
According to the Independent Schools Council, in 2022 there was £480m of means-tested fee assistance and nearly half of those receiving this got more than half of their fees paid.
There are about 550,000 students in private schools, so that's about £870/pupil.... with average fees probably 10-15x that, we could safely say it's a small minority who receive means-tested scholarships.
https://www.isc.co.uk/media/8444/isc_census_2022.pdf
You're being hypocritical. Either words can have consequences, in which case words can hurt, or they don't, in which case moan away in public.
[Hit escape before the page finishes loading to defeat the paywall.]
There's a bigger point around long-term economic planning. IA(definitely)NAE, but an illustrative example could be refocusing health budget - long term - towards primary and social care, keeping people out of hospital for longer and perhaps being a more efficient system (my dad is in and out of hospital at the moment in an extraordinarily inefficient and expensive way; my experience with this and elsewhere is that a lot of the rising healthcare costs comes from embedded institutional ineffectiveness and false economy). Of course, it requires a bit of cultural change as well.
You're not stupid so I know you understand this, so why are you dissembling by pretending that trying to get someone sacked is merely "moaning in public"?
Tragic end, though sort of a tribute to his conscientiousness as a war artist.
[Hit escape before the page finishes loading to defeat the paywall.]
Firstly - thanks for that tip!
Secondly - this is great... Biden probably the only politician for a while in Dems who doesn't need to worry about Iowa, so it's great to see he's trying to fix this.
https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1598639398702178311
Surrey (Sunbury Common & Ashford Common) - LDm GAIN from Con
Arun (Arundel & Walberton) - Grn hold
King's Lynn & West Norfolk (Gaywood Clock) - Lab hold (unopposed)
Norfolk (Gaywood North & Central) - LDm GAIN from Con
Southampton (Bitterne) - Lab GAIN from Con
Waverley (Chiddingfold & Dunsfold) - LDm GAIN from Con
West Lothian (Broxburn, Uphall & Winchburgh) - Lab hold
Good Week/Bad Week Index
LDm +183
Lab +126
Grn +57
SNP +4
Con -366
Adjusted Seat Value
LDm +3.1
Lab +2.8
Grn +0.9
SNP +0.1
Con -6.1
Take these three and the impression it gives.
“There was no flirtation with minor parties, instead many Conservatives appear to have switched directly to Labour.
“The Conservative vote fell by sixteen percentage points and most of that loss went to Labour.”
“Seats such as Macclesfield, Banbury, Basingstoke and Hexham that have been in Tory hands for around a century would fall.”
But it was 31% lower voters than general election turn out, is that missing 31% split neatly between Labour and Tory? To my mind one tribe depressed and staying home on mass and the psephologists should say so, even if it removes some excitement from their journalism and cast doubt on the their science actually being any help.
https://twitter.com/IanDunt/status/1598642260446412801
Words can have consequences. Those consequences can ultimately include depression, suicidal thoughts, being sacked, or even death.
Being sacked by a long shot isn't the worst of those consequences and if you're ruling out all the other consequences as not caused by words, then you need to rule out sackings as 'sticks and stones' too.
The only Tory MPs left in the next Parliament, if there are any at all, will be a rancid rump of barely breathing shire gammons and, presumably, a few young things who are prepared to ride out the long, dark winter wilderness years.
This is deeper than betting with money. It's entire salaries, livelihoods, careers.
The mass resignations tell you everything.
They know.
"Words can have consequences. Those consequences can include death".
Oh dear. Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.
Someone says something nasty to you. OK, that hurts emotionally. No argument there. But do you choose to let it rule you, or do you choose to try to get over it? Only in the former case do you turn yourself into a victim. And even then you aren't justified in trying to get somebody sacked.
I must admit I enjoyed Tne Little Niggers (which was the original unfortunate title of And Then There Were None) but mainly for the plot. I tried some Poirot and short-stories after that but quickly concluded the cake was stale.
(Of course, if Heathener is wrong, Heathener will disappear without a word.)
So presumably that's what Boris will do.
More generally- aren't Conservative MPs meant to announce their individual intentions by Monday?
Politically, burning down most of the charity sector would guarantee a firestorm. And hence will never happen
That said, some of those calling it a day have been telling. You've got young ones, and those in seats that are looking really tough to defend going. For someone like Javid, he's clearly not a favourite of Sunak's, but there's a credible route to a frontline comeback if the Tories stay in office. But he's 52 and, if the Tories lose badly, he'll realistically be well into his 60s by the time they are back in power. Opposition is a pretty grim slog, and you can see why he'd duck out at this stage, earn a few quid etc. So he's making a decision he may well not be making if Tory prospects looked reasonably good.