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Sunak’s response to the private GP question made things worse – politicalbetting.com
Sunak’s response to the private GP question made things worse – politicalbetting.com
It was on Sunday that this interview first went out and yet the issue that it raises is still causing problems for Number 10. I wouldn’t be surprised if Starmer chooses to bring it up at PMQs.
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He has publicly insulted the NHS, his execution is being scheduled.
Of course, those presidents may not "embody the nation", so it depends on whether having a monarch embodying the nation is a good thing or not. Iceland, for example, has never had a monarchy and gets by OK
I'm not convinced by the claim that Britain was the "only major European nation that avoided having a Fascist or Communist leader by 1940" by HYUFD. Even for such a small sample size it doesn't seem to check out:
Italy - monarchy - became first fascist country
Germany - republic - became fascist country
Britain - monarchy - no fascist or communist leader
France - republic - no fascist or communist leader (at least not until defeat by Germany)
Russia - monarchy became communist dictatorship.
Italy banned male members of the House of Savoy from even entering the country until 2002 they had such a bad experience with their constitutional monarchy.
The King has chosen France for his first state visit, with his arrival planned for March 27 on a trip expected to help restore ties frayed since Brexit, according to French media.
President Macron’s aides said he greatly appreciated Charles’s acceptance of his invitation. The late Queen completed five state visits to France, more than any other country.
“It’s an extremely strong symbol because it will be the first official visit by Charles III,” an adviser to Macron told Le Parisien newspaper. “The event will be happening when the King is not yet crowned, which shows that France is a priority for him.”
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/king-chooses-france-for-first-state-visit-9d00d63t0
British troops dispatched to Japan could face death by hanging if they are convicted of capital crimes, under a defence agreement to be signed tomorrow by Rishi Sunak and Fumio Kishida, the Japanese prime minister.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/british-troops-guilty-of-crimes-in-japan-could-be-hanged-m2m236zwl
The motion submitted by Keir Starmer’s party for the opposition day debate on Wednesday is drafted to push the charitable status scheme that many private schools enjoy to be investigated, as the party attempts to shift the political focus on to education.
It comes as the party released fresh statistics highlighting the state of teaching staff, with Labour analysis of official figures from the Department for Education revealing that there were 36,262 teachers who left the profession in 2020/21, compared with only 34,394 starters on initial teacher training, leaving a shortfall of 1,868.
Labour’s motion seeks to create a new House of Commons select committee on the fair taxation of schools and education standards to investigate reforming the tax benefits enjoyed by private schools and investing the proceeds on a new national excellence programme.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/jan/11/labour-look-to-force-vote-on-ending-private-schools-tax-breaks
Nevertheless, I do think @Gallowgate has a point when he says Sunak's problem isn't necessarily his wealth but how he wears it.
He had three routes with integrity. One was to use the NHS while he was a high profile politician. One was to come up with a solid explanation, as OGH has done above. The third was to not enter politics. Not choosing any of those does make him look like a worse person.
And if he had to go down this path, he should have said "personal matter" not "private matter".
Like for the orthodox church everyday Russians could project their emotions and loyalties onto him rather than a nefarious president.
It is the green card all over again.
He should have had the nous on getting ahead of it all with a decency media strategy.
In Sunak's defence being so wealthy during a recession/cost of living crisis was always going to present challenges.
If British servicemen commit capital crimes when training in Texas, are they at risk of execution?
Rafael Behr's latest piece on Sunak is rather good. Tldr; he's f*cked.
In this experiment, we manipulated what men believed about their own penis size, relative to others. We gave them false information, stating that the average penis size was larger than it in fact is, reasoning that, on average, these males will feel that relatively and subjectively their own penis was smaller; compared to those told that the average penis size was smaller than true average. We then asked them to rate how much they would like to own a sports car. These facts and questions were buried amongst other items giving information and asking for product ratings, so that our hypothesis was masked from participants. We found that males, and males over 30 in particular, rated sports cars as more desirable when they were made to feel that they had a small penis.
https://psyarxiv.com/uy7ph/download
In my experience UK forces tend to be more thieves than rapists (US) or outright killers (Australians) so the probability of one getting a trip to the gallows is remote.
I also don't really see a difference between 'personal matter" not "private matter". What is it?
And as an aside, journalists asking such questions should also state whether they do.
"It takes 4 years to build a ship but 400 years to build a tradition."
-- Admiral of the Fleet A. B. Cunningham
https://twitter.com/EmmanuelMacron/status/1571748606230634497
https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/144164/response/354022/attach/html/3/RFI20130013 final response.pdf.html
Journalists are on the NHS.
For what it is worth, I also doubt this will have much long term impact. Voters expect Prime Ministers, especially Tory ones, to be a bit posh.
I think things like this matter much more than the soup kitchen conversation, which I still think was a lot of fuss about nothing; it makes him look like Davos man.
It's actually not *that* easy a question to answer... what counts as private healthcare?
When I chipped my tooth and paid extra to have it fixed and be the same colour... is that going private?
And you don't use the phrase "private matter" when the question is private healthcare. It echoes the accusation you are trying to avoid. Most politicians get that sort of thing out of their system in the doomed run at a hopeless seat that Rishi didn't do.
He really is very very inexperienced for a front line politician.
It is only a "scandal" because his government has provoked a strike with nurses and has MPs now blaming the nurses for the strikes. I would suggest though that Sunak has a much wider issue which was highlighted by his idiot flight from London to Dirty Leeds.
We are in the midst of a winter of discontent where the industrial action is increasing not decreasing in England. Not only is the government refusing to face into the myriad issues in schools, hospitals, trains, border points, courts etc etc, it thinks that it should double down and solve the problem by outlawing the strikes.
Flying to Leeds - which by the time you get to and from the airport is slower than the train - tells everyone that he knows the service is unusable. On a non-strike day. On an operator that isn't beset with the DfT meddling that has ruined the likes of Avanti. So it isn't "why is the PM evading a question about a private doctor". Its "why are the elite breaking public services for all of us then rubbing our faces in it by avoiding the mess we have to put up with."
479 pages but learnt lots of new things about 1950s/1960s Cuba, America and Russia in it - including how easy it would have been to miscalculate - and there are some interesting lessons for the present day and Ukraine as well.
Chief amongst them: Russia craves respect and tends to dial the rhetoric and fear up to 11, but secretly knows it is outclassed, and the US top brass are ridiculously gung-ho.
I really don't understand your point about 'private matter'. Having a private GP is not illegal, and is a private matter.
The clown thought saying his father was a Doctor and his mother had a chain of chemists made him one of eth plebs who knew all about the struggles. Seems he has no empathy , tin ears and no heart.
'We'll hail them and tell them to stop!'
'Will you hail them in Russian or in English?'
'How the hell would I know? I guess we'll hail them in English.'
'What if you hail them in English and they don't speak English?'
'We'll fire a shot across their bows!'
'And if that doesn't stop them?'
'We'll put a shot through their rudder!'*
'And what would happen to the ship?'
'Well, its engine might miss a bit, it might catch fire..'
'Well, I have news for you Admiral. We are not trying to start a war. There will be NO shots fired at ANY Russian ship!'
*Not an expert, but based on what I know of naval gunnery of the period the idea that a shell could reliably hit the rudder of a moving vessel always struck me as highly optimistic.
I mean, would matters have been noticeably worse during the pandemic if say, Gibb and Williamson had been hors de combat waiting for surgery for 18 months?
The difference between private and personal is about choosing the right word to give the right impression. If you are trying to avoid discussing your use of a private service, don't use private in your answer. It's basic communications wordcraft, and politicians need to be competent at it.
And if you can't cope with the brickbats, don't join the circus.
isn't a difficult question to answer, surely.
You'd have to shoot a dozen schoolkids to make the front page in Texas though, so I doubt many people noticed.
But for the benefit of us voters, it was "Donnez-moi un break".
https://twitter.com/ablspacesystems/status/1613037809287462913/photo/1
Although this may show it did not get much further:
https://twitter.com/shaggrugg/status/1612957462621212673
Space is hard. Which makes the feats of ULA and SpaceX all the more impressive.
I think it fine to say he uses a Private GP. Everyone expects it to be the case, and any use of an NHS one would just be virtue signalling, like when Cameron caught Ryanair for his holiday.
He just needs to emphasise that he is in the privileged position of being able to do so, and wants an equally good service for everyone else via the public system. That is pretty much what he would say for schools.
Starmer should play the ball (the collapse in NHS emergency services) not the man.
So why isn't it working? In part because the public either don't blame the strikers or are openly supportive. And in part because the Tories look so ham-fisted. Several clips doing the round on social media of Tory MPs saying the most stupid things. The "teachers are Bolsheviks!!!" comment by Jonathan Gullis was so dumb that the MP sat just behind him was visibly incredulous as he foamed on.
And the latest scheme, to make striking illegal? There will be a concentration and co-ordination of strikes as the railways managed last week to just shut things down. Which is bound to piss people off, but when the government are already seen as cack-handed and support is with the strikers this seems like a perilous path to take. We still talk about Labour's Winter of Discontent nearly 45 years on. The Tories want their own version to be talked about in the 2060s as a reason not to vote for them?
(I have a slight speech defect. There are good teachers. Then there is that one...)
My conclusion from this is that yes, of course he has a private GP. He's probably never even given it a thought, it's what people in his position do.
Why on earth a PM needs a private GP is unfathomable; I remain unconvinced that any PM would struggle to get an excellent NHS GP service. Perhaps by going private he is able to retain that long-lost tradition of having a family doctor who actually knows you?
Tories support private healthcare so there is no hypocrisy, it would be a bigger problem for Labour PMs as Labour tend to support an NHS monopoly
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2023/01/08/rishi-sunak-refuses-three-times-say-uses-private-healthcare/
France is directly ruled by the Royal family - see the Treaty of Troyes.
So it’s a home visit.
Thank you, Jessop. That brought me a smile this morning, and reminded me of my own French teacher who once remarked that my French accent was better than my English....'although that's not saying a lot.'
It's not a full Ratner-ing of the NHS, but it's in the same ballpark.
I don't have a problem with rich people using private medicine, or schooling, or the like. If they didn't, it wouldn't help me one jot, and would probably amount to little more than virtue signalling.
Denial was clumsy though. There were plenty of good straightforward answers he could have given, all starting with 'Yes'.
Kruschev was also a realist and he got what he wanted - the Jupiter missiles removed from Turkey. As for Fidel and Che Guevara - mad as a box of frogs, the pair of them.
France admittedly was invaded to force Fascism on it but 42% of French voted for Le Pen last year so France may have a Fascist President by mid 2027 anyway. The US republic too has already had Trump who while not strictly Fascist is in many respects far right.
The rest were all constitutional monarchies ie the UK and Commonwealth realms and Sweden. So constitutional monarchy beats republics as resisting Fascism or Communism.
Not to mention of course that most Latin American republics had Fascist leaders by 1940 (with Cuba becoming Communist later).
And for all his other talents, it doesn't look like he's good choosing what to say or how to say it.
'Borismania' is back: Was this the start of his comeback tour? https://twitter.com/joncraig/status/1613089489689141248/photo/1
He is much better talking about policy specifics and detail to be fair, although his government don't do detail well, so he may be leader of the wrong party at the wrong time.
He has trips to Australia, Canada and NZ planned anyway and the Prince and Princess of Wales are due in Australia likely next year too and they are more popular there than the King and Queen Consort
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/royals/king-charles-planning-royal-familys-28300476
https://amp.abc.net.au/article/100909176
I gained respect for JFK but he was a good politician too (not always a compliment). He and Kruschev were the adults in the room. Fortunately for us.