Remember November when Ukraine launched a missile that landed in Poland where it killed two people. Ukraine said Russia did it. In fact it was Ukraine that did it.
Today Russian missiles crossed Moldovan airspace. That's according to the Moldovan government. Think of that what you will. Ukraine, however, said the missiles also crossed Romanian airspace.
Romania said they didn't do any such thing.
Romania is a NATO member. Probably most people there would like to see the back of the Zelensky government.
As for Moldova, the government there fell today. Reuters tight-lippedly call it a "pro-western" government. What could they be suggesting?
More than 70% of Romanians believe that Russia is to blame for the war in Ukraine, and more than half believe that Ukraine will win, according to an INSCOP poll.
87.3% of Romanians agree with the statement: “Russian leaders should be convicted of war crimes in Ukraine”, 7.7% disagree and 4.9% do not know or do not answer.
The Lib Dems are also staring at a REALLY bad general election, when they would normally hope to benefit from Tory travails
I do not understand their inertia. The tactical move for them is obvious. Come out, loud and proud, as the party of Rejoin the EU immediately (after another referendum). There are enough hardcore Remoaners in southern England and the like to win them quite a few seats, indeed Remoaners tempted by Starmer might vote tactically for the LDs in the hope that they can pressure him towards Rejoin in a hung parliament
What the F are they playing at? This would also bring them much needed attention
It is amazing to me that no UK party is going out there swinging for the Rejoin vote, when the polls are clearly showing Brexit remorse
That's an interesting idea but we need to get more precise with the language on this now. After nearly 7 years you can't be both a Remoaner and a Rejoiner. A Remoaner is passive, pissed off, backwards looking; a Rejoiner is head up, future facing, active.
I avoid analogies as a rule, they're overdone in punditry and can easily slide into a silliness that helps no-one (eg Brexit is like changing a nappy), but a good way to illustrate what I mean here is to imagine your dog has shat on the carpet.
In which case you can (i) sit there looking at it, grumbling at the mess, castigating the dog and yourself for failing to train it properly; or (ii) you can screw that for a game of soldiers and go, "right, let's get this cleared up!" and then think about getting a goldfish.
Option (i) is Remoaning. Option (ii) is the can-do spirit of Rejoin.
I'm a Remoaner btw. I'm still slumped in my chair gazing at the steaming pile of doo doo, chuntering how it shouldn't have happened, "why oh why oh why", unable (yet) to get up and do anything about it. But one day (and I'll let everyone know when this happens) I'll snap out of this and then I'll be a Remoaner no more. I'll be a Rejoiner.
The thing is you and I didn't want the dog in the first place. Indeed, we raised some questions of what would happen to the cream carpets and the reasonably nice furniture. But we were overruled by our other half and their parents. This sort of thing happens, and is one of the spices of life. But they're not cleaning the mess up either, and sometimes hint that it's our fault for not training the dog properly.
And the worst of it? It's getting to the point where we probably could phone up Battersea Dog's Home and ask them to take Nigel the Bulldog away. But we'd feel like utter scumbags for doing that. At least today we would...
‘you and I didn’t want the dog in the first place’
=
‘These people never wanted to be parents in the first place”
Brexit = Baby remains the greatest analogy in the history of PB - maybe in the history of humanity. We can only hope that one day the immortal @SeanT might one day *Rejoin* pb
The analogy falls down because having a baby isn't that difficult and is a source of joy and fulfillment to the parents from day one. I'd say that Brexit is more like having a shit, one that turns out to be an unflushable turd. All that strain, followed by a bad smell and lingering embarrassment.
This is why, like all of us, you don’t write for the most prestigious magazine in the world
Did you get a gig with the Atlantic ? Congrats.
The Spectator is a weekly British magazine on politics, culture, and current affairs.[1] It was first published in July 1828,[2] making it the oldest surviving weekly magazine in the world.[3]
In 2020, The Spectator became both the longest-lived current affairs magazine in history[6] and the first magazine ever to publish 10,000 issues.
Look at just a partial list of contributors
I went all through it thinking it was a Where’s Wally exercise: Sean Thomas under the pseudonym Leon of the Knappers Gazette. 🤷♀️
Remember November when Ukraine launched a missile that landed in Poland where it killed two people. Ukraine said Russia did it. In fact it was Ukraine that did it.
Today Russian missiles crossed Moldovan airspace. That's according to the Moldovan government. Think of that what you will. Ukraine, however, said the missiles also crossed Romanian airspace.
Romania said they didn't do any such thing.
Romania is a NATO member. Probably most people there would like to see the back of the Zelensky government.
As for Moldova, the government there fell today. Reuters tight-lippedly call it a "pro-western" government. What could they be suggesting?
I don't know about anyone else, but I haven't a clue what point you are trying to make.
Last year the government in Moldova said that the protests that called on it to resign were the work of pro-Russian elements. Today the government resigned.
I'm no Moldova head but that Reuters article seems to be preparing audiences for the line that Russia has a lot of influence inside Moldova. It will be interesting to see what the incoming government says (and does). The poor b*stards may be told they have to choose between the EU and Russia - one or the other. Told by the EU, that is. And perhaps they have already chosen. This is the kind of cr*p that once manifested in Kiev.
No, the crap that happened in Kiev was Russia preventing an economic association with the EU. And then a mass uprising because Russia's puppet ordered armed police to shoot at unarmed protesters. An act so heinous even the pro-Russian party abandoned him.
The reason countries from Estonia to Ukraine abandon Russia is because is a shit country that oppresses and drains any country under its domination. No-one that isn't in the web of corruption wants anything to do with it. Its in the criminal, exploitative culture of the place. Ever since the Duchy of Muscovy started selling out its fellow Rus states to curry favor with Mongolian overlords.
The Lib Dems are also staring at a REALLY bad general election, when they would normally hope to benefit from Tory travails
I do not understand their inertia. The tactical move for them is obvious. Come out, loud and proud, as the party of Rejoin the EU immediately (after another referendum). There are enough hardcore Remoaners in southern England and the like to win them quite a few seats, indeed Remoaners tempted by Starmer might vote tactically for the LDs in the hope that they can pressure him towards Rejoin in a hung parliament
What the F are they playing at? This would also bring them much needed attention
It is amazing to me that no UK party is going out there swinging for the Rejoin vote, when the polls are clearly showing Brexit remorse
That's an interesting idea but we need to get more precise with the language on this now. After nearly 7 years you can't be both a Remoaner and a Rejoiner. A Remoaner is passive, pissed off, backwards looking; a Rejoiner is head up, future facing, active.
I avoid analogies as a rule, they're overdone in punditry and can easily slide into a silliness that helps no-one (eg Brexit is like changing a nappy), but a good way to illustrate what I mean here is to imagine your dog has shat on the carpet.
In which case you can (i) sit there looking at it, grumbling at the mess, castigating the dog and yourself for failing to train it properly; or (ii) you can screw that for a game of soldiers and go, "right, let's get this cleared up!" and then think about getting a goldfish.
Option (i) is Remoaning. Option (ii) is the can-do spirit of Rejoin.
I'm a Remoaner btw. I'm still slumped in my chair gazing at the steaming pile of doo doo, chuntering how it shouldn't have happened, "why oh why oh why", unable (yet) to get up and do anything about it. But one day (and I'll let everyone know when this happens) I'll snap out of this and then I'll be a Remoaner no more. I'll be a Rejoiner.
The thing is you and I didn't want the dog in the first place. Indeed, we raised some questions of what would happen to the cream carpets and the reasonably nice furniture. But we were overruled by our other half and their parents. This sort of thing happens, and is one of the spices of life. But they're not cleaning the mess up either, and sometimes hint that it's our fault for not training the dog properly.
And the worst of it? It's getting to the point where we probably could phone up Battersea Dog's Home and ask them to take Nigel the Bulldog away. But we'd feel like utter scumbags for doing that. At least today we would...
‘you and I didn’t want the dog in the first place’
=
‘These people never wanted to be parents in the first place”
Brexit = Baby remains the greatest analogy in the history of PB - maybe in the history of humanity. We can only hope that one day the immortal @SeanT might one day *Rejoin* pb
The analogy falls down because having a baby isn't that difficult and is a source of joy and fulfillment to the parents from day one. I'd say that Brexit is more like having a shit, one that turns out to be an unflushable turd. All that strain, followed by a bad smell and lingering embarrassment.
This is why, like all of us, you don’t write for the most prestigious magazine in the world
Most prestigious magazine in the world? [Coughs modestly] Actually, I did write a few articles for Linux Journal. Not within the past decade though, I will give you that.
Tried to get a paper into Nature once. It ended up several rungs down the ladder in a still excellent journal. Never had a chance as it was some random jawbone of yet another hominid from East Africa...
Ah yes... I also have a Nature paper. Two actually. Well, they're in Pediatric Research but the article URL is under nature.com
That's great. I also have 2 things published. First was at the age of 15 - a letter in the Daily Express which they liked so much they printed it under the title Young Voice Of Britain. There was then a gap of around 20 years before I emerged again with quite a dense piece called "Buy or Build?" in International Securities Lending. Nothing since.
Daily Express?!
Were you a young Tory along the lines of Hague? Or was the Express different then? Or was it accompanied by an editorial on all that was wrong with the Young Voice Of Britain?
ETA: And what was the conclusion for the second piece? Buy? Build? And were you right?
Ah yes, The Express, my parents fault, but the letter was a devastating takedown of what I furiously described as the 'politics of greed'. This, I said, was far worse than the 'politics of envy' they kept banging on about. Pretty decent argument I made. Gone downhill since. I got £10 for my efforts along with a sardonic little 'ho ho ho' note telling me they expected that to go to Africa. My mum still has it. The letter, I mean, not the tenner. Forgot what I spent that on.
The other one, I said "Build" and was completely wrong. It's now accepted that you Buy and tinker unless there's some massive sensitivity issue. I was guilty of pushing a corporate line - we were building and spending shedloads. Big 'jobs for mates' enterprise scheme, it was. Course you often see things clearer looking back than at the time. At the time I thought it made sense. I wonder if you still get lots of money indiscriminately sprayed around in the City? I'd be pleasantly surprised if not.
Own a house, work in the private sector, earn very well and I am a hard worker.
Yet the Tories continue to drift away from me. One day this will cause them a lot of problems, that day will yet come.
I'm never going to be a Tory, but working in the financial sector I am surrounded by people who are, who used to be or who should be (and it may surprise some to learn that I get on with them very well). From talking to them it's clear that the Tories have lost much of their natural support in the last few years. It's similar to what one hears on here, but from people who are much less politically engaged, and thus rather more representative of the population a whole.
Brexit started it off and the Tories have continued destroying all the work Cameron did.
I know people think Johnson's party was more "in touch" but their obsession with trans people, the EU and immigrants just doesn't resonate with my/our folk. They're losing them by going on about this nonsense. And they've now shredded their economic credentials too.
The Tory Party will rediscover Cameron/Blair at some point. But they are going to have to lose and lose big - and long term that is what is needed. It saved Labour.
Johnson, even May got a higher voteshare than Cameron ever did.
Even Corbyn got a higher voteshare in 2017 than Blair did in 2005.
Blair 1997 and 2001 was unbeatable but it was all downhill from there.
Cameron managed most seats in a hung parliament in 2010, scraped a majority in 2015 but lost lots of votes to UKIP then too, with Farage's party getting 12% of the vote
So it turns out there is a local posh-ish canteen which will deliver to my hotel a superb prawn laksa, Kyoto seaweed salad, Taiwanese hot soup dumplings and tremendous won ton, for £12. Door to hotel door in 35 minutes, after a couple of clicks on an iPhone: ie the perfect amount of time to have two G&Ts on the moonlit rooftop bar then go collect your food
Bangkok in Jan-Feb is, verily, a kind of earthly paradise
And now I get to watch “The Boys” with a nice bottle of 19 crimes. This, here, is mmmmmmmBOP
Had some 19 crimes last night and will have some tonight, excellent wine. Not tempted by the one with coffee mind you.
19 crimes is a remarkable wine for the price. It’s not St Henri Shiraz or a Supertuscan, but for the money you pay: yay
I dunno how the aussies do it. But it is a godsend in a country like Thailand where the tax on wine is insane. I used to fret over wines thrice the price (here in Bangkok). Now I just buy 19 crimes and I know it will always be jolly good and I know it will only cost me £11
I tried a bottle a couple of weeks ago when home alone, inspired by the recommendations emanating from South East Asia.
I also thought it was a good solid wine, balanced with decent fruit and not too jammy. Worth saying there are others of similar quality for the same sort of price, including some supermarket own label particularly from South Africa (where the exchange rate helps) and Southern France.
I find it's easier to get good mid-quality red wines from the new world for under a tenner than white wines. Some SA Chenin gets there but otherwise the cheaper whites tend to be a bit more variable whereas cheap whites from specific European regions are a bit easier to predict.
Remember November when Ukraine launched a missile that landed in Poland where it killed two people. Ukraine said Russia did it. In fact it was Ukraine that did it.
Today Russian missiles crossed Moldovan airspace. That's according to the Moldovan government. Think of that what you will. Ukraine, however, said the missiles also crossed Romanian airspace.
Romania said they didn't do any such thing.
Romania is a NATO member. Probably most people there would like to see the back of the Zelensky government.
As for Moldova, the government there fell today. Reuters tight-lippedly call it a "pro-western" government. What could they be suggesting?
I don't know about anyone else, but I haven't a clue what point you are trying to make.
Last year the government in Moldova said that the protests that called on it to resign were the work of pro-Russian elements. Today the government resigned.
I'm no Moldova head but that Reuters article seems to be preparing audiences for the line that Russia has a lot of influence inside Moldova. It will be interesting to see what the incoming government says (and does). The poor b*stards may be told they have to choose between the EU and Russia - one or the other. Told by the EU, that is. And perhaps they have already chosen. This is the kind of cr*p that once manifested in Kiev.
No, the crap that happened in Kiev was Russia preventing an economic association with the EU. And then a mass uprising because Russia's puppet ordered armed police to shoot at unarmed protesters. An act so heinous even the pro-Russian party abandoned him.
The reason countries from Estonia to Ukraine abandon Russia is because is a shit country that oppresses and drains any country under its domination. No-one that isn't in the web of corruption wants anything to do with it. Its in the criminal, exploitative culture of the place. Ever since the Duchy of Muscovy started selling out its fellow Rus states to curry favor with Mongolian overlords.
It's a real shame. I used to enjoy visiting Moscow a few years ago. Fun city, great architecture, welcoming colleagues and even occasionally some nice weather. But then they kept progressively ratcheting up the rogue statishness and the shadows started to lengthen. There were always major corruption problems and international mischief of course, but it's just gradually become more and more egregious with every passing year.
I am so glad Novara Media are no longer relevant. They are Putin's puppets.
As Owen Jones has said, there is nothing left wing about allowing nations to be conquered and subjugated by oppressors. Not all of that faction get that. It's amazing how so many Corbynites think that supporting one nation defending itself counts as warmongering.
It's like they've never once considered some things might be justified to fight for.
Remember November when Ukraine launched a missile that landed in Poland where it killed two people. Ukraine said Russia did it. In fact it was Ukraine that did it.
Today Russian missiles crossed Moldovan airspace. That's according to the Moldovan government. Think of that what you will. Ukraine, however, said the missiles also crossed Romanian airspace.
Romania said they didn't do any such thing.
Romania is a NATO member. Probably most people there would like to see the back of the Zelensky government.
As for Moldova, the government there fell today. Reuters tight-lippedly call it a "pro-western" government. What could they be suggesting?
I don't know about anyone else, but I haven't a clue what point you are trying to make.
The Lib Dems are also staring at a REALLY bad general election, when they would normally hope to benefit from Tory travails
I do not understand their inertia. The tactical move for them is obvious. Come out, loud and proud, as the party of Rejoin the EU immediately (after another referendum). There are enough hardcore Remoaners in southern England and the like to win them quite a few seats, indeed Remoaners tempted by Starmer might vote tactically for the LDs in the hope that they can pressure him towards Rejoin in a hung parliament
What the F are they playing at? This would also bring them much needed attention
It is amazing to me that no UK party is going out there swinging for the Rejoin vote, when the polls are clearly showing Brexit remorse
That's an interesting idea but we need to get more precise with the language on this now. After nearly 7 years you can't be both a Remoaner and a Rejoiner. A Remoaner is passive, pissed off, backwards looking; a Rejoiner is head up, future facing, active.
I avoid analogies as a rule, they're overdone in punditry and can easily slide into a silliness that helps no-one (eg Brexit is like changing a nappy), but a good way to illustrate what I mean here is to imagine your dog has shat on the carpet.
In which case you can (i) sit there looking at it, grumbling at the mess, castigating the dog and yourself for failing to train it properly; or (ii) you can screw that for a game of soldiers and go, "right, let's get this cleared up!" and then think about getting a goldfish.
Option (i) is Remoaning. Option (ii) is the can-do spirit of Rejoin.
I'm a Remoaner btw. I'm still slumped in my chair gazing at the steaming pile of doo doo, chuntering how it shouldn't have happened, "why oh why oh why", unable (yet) to get up and do anything about it. But one day (and I'll let everyone know when this happens) I'll snap out of this and then I'll be a Remoaner no more. I'll be a Rejoiner.
The thing is you and I didn't want the dog in the first place. Indeed, we raised some questions of what would happen to the cream carpets and the reasonably nice furniture. But we were overruled by our other half and their parents. This sort of thing happens, and is one of the spices of life. But they're not cleaning the mess up either, and sometimes hint that it's our fault for not training the dog properly.
And the worst of it? It's getting to the point where we probably could phone up Battersea Dog's Home and ask them to take Nigel the Bulldog away. But we'd feel like utter scumbags for doing that. At least today we would...
‘you and I didn’t want the dog in the first place’
=
‘These people never wanted to be parents in the first place”
Brexit = Baby remains the greatest analogy in the history of PB - maybe in the history of humanity. We can only hope that one day the immortal @SeanT might one day *Rejoin* pb
The analogy falls down because having a baby isn't that difficult and is a source of joy and fulfillment to the parents from day one. I'd say that Brexit is more like having a shit, one that turns out to be an unflushable turd. All that strain, followed by a bad smell and lingering embarrassment.
This is why, like all of us, you don’t write for the most prestigious magazine in the world
Remember November when Ukraine launched a missile that landed in Poland where it killed two people. Ukraine said Russia did it. In fact it was Ukraine that did it.
Today Russian missiles crossed Moldovan airspace. That's according to the Moldovan government. Think of that what you will. Ukraine, however, said the missiles also crossed Romanian airspace.
Romania said they didn't do any such thing.
Romania is a NATO member. Probably most people there would like to see the back of the Zelensky government.
As for Moldova, the government there fell today. Reuters tight-lippedly call it a "pro-western" government. What could they be suggesting?
I don't know about anyone else, but I haven't a clue what point you are trying to make.
"Putin good, West bad".
Usually provocoteurs go for a 'there is no such thing as good' instead, as if all places not being perfect means they are all problems of the same scale.
Via @Omnisis, On 9-10 February, Changes w/ 3 February.
LLG 61%. But it's really noticeable how wide the minority party spread is between pollsters. Here the Lib Dems are on 2.5x the vote share of Green. In some other polls they're level pegging or the Greens are ahead. And REF is ranging from 3% to about 9%.
Remember November when Ukraine launched a missile that landed in Poland where it killed two people. Ukraine said Russia did it. In fact it was Ukraine that did it.
Today Russian missiles crossed Moldovan airspace. That's according to the Moldovan government. Think of that what you will. Ukraine, however, said the missiles also crossed Romanian airspace.
Romania said they didn't do any such thing.
Romania is a NATO member. Probably most people there would like to see the back of the Zelensky government.
As for Moldova, the government there fell today. Reuters tight-lippedly call it a "pro-western" government. What could they be suggesting?
I don't know about anyone else, but I haven't a clue what point you are trying to make.
"Putin good, West bad".
Usually provocoteurs go for a 'there is no such thing as good' instead, as if all places not being perfect means they are all problems of the same scale.
I think our friend is worried that Putin's Mighty Weapon(s) are looking a bit tiny and unimpressive.
Remember November when Ukraine launched a missile that landed in Poland where it killed two people. Ukraine said Russia did it. In fact it was Ukraine that did it.
Today Russian missiles crossed Moldovan airspace. That's according to the Moldovan government. Think of that what you will. Ukraine, however, said the missiles also crossed Romanian airspace.
Romania said they didn't do any such thing.
Romania is a NATO member. Probably most people there would like to see the back of the Zelensky government.
As for Moldova, the government there fell today. Reuters tight-lippedly call it a "pro-western" government. What could they be suggesting?
I don't know about anyone else, but I haven't a clue what point you are trying to make.
"Putin good, West bad".
The point is clearly that the "pro-western" government has been toppled and rightly replaced with one which recognises its close kinship and belonging to Russia. If you look at the article...
President Maia Sandu accepted Prime Minister's Natalia Gavrilita's resignation and nominated 48-year-old presidential aide and former interior minister Dorin Recean to replace her.
Recean, who is expected to quickly win parliamentary approval, said he would press on with Moldova's bid to join the European Union and revive the economy
Via @Omnisis, On 9-10 February, Changes w/ 3 February.
LLG 61%. But it's really noticeable how wide the minority party spread is between pollsters. Here the Lib Dems are on 2.5x the vote share of Green. In some other polls they're level pegging or the Greens are ahead. And REF is ranging from 3% to about 9%.
And for REF 3% is probably too high and 9% is nuts.
Remember November when Ukraine launched a missile that landed in Poland where it killed two people. Ukraine said Russia did it. In fact it was Ukraine that did it.
Today Russian missiles crossed Moldovan airspace. That's according to the Moldovan government. Think of that what you will. Ukraine, however, said the missiles also crossed Romanian airspace.
Romania said they didn't do any such thing.
Romania is a NATO member. Probably most people there would like to see the back of the Zelensky government.
As for Moldova, the government there fell today. Reuters tight-lippedly call it a "pro-western" government. What could they be suggesting?
I don't know about anyone else, but I haven't a clue what point you are trying to make.
"Putin good, West bad".
Usually provocoteurs go for a 'there is no such thing as good' instead, as if all places not being perfect means they are all problems of the same scale.
I think our friend is worried that Putin's Mighty Weapon(s) are looking a bit tiny and unimpressive.
Ah, is that what GPW stands for - "Giant Putin Weapons"?
So it turns out there is a local posh-ish canteen which will deliver to my hotel a superb prawn laksa, Kyoto seaweed salad, Taiwanese hot soup dumplings and tremendous won ton, for £12. Door to hotel door in 35 minutes, after a couple of clicks on an iPhone: ie the perfect amount of time to have two G&Ts on the moonlit rooftop bar then go collect your food
Bangkok in Jan-Feb is, verily, a kind of earthly paradise
And now I get to watch “The Boys” with a nice bottle of 19 crimes. This, here, is mmmmmmmBOP
Had some 19 crimes last night and will have some tonight, excellent wine. Not tempted by the one with coffee mind you.
19 crimes is a remarkable wine for the price. It’s not St Henri Shiraz or a Supertuscan, but for the money you pay: yay
I dunno how the aussies do it. But it is a godsend in a country like Thailand where the tax on wine is insane. I used to fret over wines thrice the price (here in Bangkok). Now I just buy 19 crimes and I know it will always be jolly good and I know it will only cost me £11
I got mine on offer yesterday at £7.49 a bully bargain for sure.
So it turns out there is a local posh-ish canteen which will deliver to my hotel a superb prawn laksa, Kyoto seaweed salad, Taiwanese hot soup dumplings and tremendous won ton, for £12. Door to hotel door in 35 minutes, after a couple of clicks on an iPhone: ie the perfect amount of time to have two G&Ts on the moonlit rooftop bar then go collect your food
Bangkok in Jan-Feb is, verily, a kind of earthly paradise
And now I get to watch “The Boys” with a nice bottle of 19 crimes. This, here, is mmmmmmmBOP
Had some 19 crimes last night and will have some tonight, excellent wine. Not tempted by the one with coffee mind you.
My neighbours glass bin is full of this wine. I will have to give it a go. A couple of my colleagues at work love it too.
Taz, you should , great wine for the price and often you get offers in the supermarket. Great labelling as well.
Be some squeaky bums in the SNP high reaches tonight, he is one of the slavering acolytes. Shredders will eb working and phones being lost etc, lots of "I don't recall that " being practiced.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Much more difficult to get a 10% swing when you already have over 50% of the vote, mind.
A cross-party group of MPs is poised to issue a “stern” report about Richard Sharp’s appointment as BBC chairman, after it was alleged he acted as an “introduction agency” to help facilitate an £800,000 loan to Boris Johnson.
The digital, culture, media and sport select committee is to publish its conclusions on Sunday, after a two-hour grilling of Sharp about his role as a go-between with Sam Blyth, Johnson’s distant cousin, and Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, before No 10 gave him the job overseeing the BBC in 2021.
Two committee members have indicated that the group will rebuke Sharp for his failure to disclose his role in the loan during the selection process.
“The mood among the group was for the report to be tough,” said one. “There was disappointment not only about his failure to declare this important information but also by his testimony and refusal to accept that he had done anything wrong. It was the wrong approach for him to take.”
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Much more difficult to get a 10% swing when you already have over 50% of the vote, mind.
I'm not sure that argument totally washes though.
Labour got barely half of the votes they got in the same seat in 2019. Where were the other half plus all the new converts?
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Much more difficult to get a 10% swing when you already have over 50% of the vote, mind.
This is where uniform swing runs out of steam. A more sophisticated model will show how 10% here translates to an average swing nationwide.
A cross-party group of MPs is poised to issue a “stern” report about Richard Sharp’s appointment as BBC chairman, after it was alleged he acted as an “introduction agency” to help facilitate an £800,000 loan to Boris Johnson.
The digital, culture, media and sport select committee is to publish its conclusions on Sunday, after a two-hour grilling of Sharp about his role as a go-between with Sam Blyth, Johnson’s distant cousin, and Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, before No 10 gave him the job overseeing the BBC in 2021.
Two committee members have indicated that the group will rebuke Sharp for his failure to disclose his role in the loan during the selection process.
“The mood among the group was for the report to be tough,” said one. “There was disappointment not only about his failure to declare this important information but also by his testimony and refusal to accept that he had done anything wrong. It was the wrong approach for him to take.”
So it turns out there is a local posh-ish canteen which will deliver to my hotel a superb prawn laksa, Kyoto seaweed salad, Taiwanese hot soup dumplings and tremendous won ton, for £12. Door to hotel door in 35 minutes, after a couple of clicks on an iPhone: ie the perfect amount of time to have two G&Ts on the moonlit rooftop bar then go collect your food
Bangkok in Jan-Feb is, verily, a kind of earthly paradise
And now I get to watch “The Boys” with a nice bottle of 19 crimes. This, here, is mmmmmmmBOP
Had some 19 crimes last night and will have some tonight, excellent wine. Not tempted by the one with coffee mind you.
19 crimes is a remarkable wine for the price. It’s not St Henri Shiraz or a Supertuscan, but for the money you pay: yay
I dunno how the aussies do it. But it is a godsend in a country like Thailand where the tax on wine is insane. I used to fret over wines thrice the price (here in Bangkok). Now I just buy 19 crimes and I know it will always be jolly good and I know it will only cost me £11
I tried a bottle a couple of weeks ago when home alone, inspired by the recommendations emanating from South East Asia.
I also thought it was a good solid wine, balanced with decent fruit and not too jammy. Worth saying there are others of similar quality for the same sort of price, including some supermarket own label particularly from South Africa (where the exchange rate helps) and Southern France.
I find it's easier to get good mid-quality red wines from the new world for under a tenner than white wines. Some SA Chenin gets there but otherwise the cheaper whites tend to be a bit more variable whereas cheap whites from specific European regions are a bit easier to predict.
I generally don’t buy 19 crimes in London. Just because there is so much choice in London. But i still like to keep a few bottles in my flat as ‘this’ll do nicely’ wine. Nothing special or expensive, but absolutely reliable, drinkable and mmm
In Bangkok it is a lifesaver for a boozer like me. They now stock it in 7-11s and at £11 a pop it is better than anything equivalent. Jacobs creek is £13-15 and notably worse, everything else remotely drinkable is £20 and also unreliable
The Lib Dems are also staring at a REALLY bad general election, when they would normally hope to benefit from Tory travails
I do not understand their inertia. The tactical move for them is obvious. Come out, loud and proud, as the party of Rejoin the EU immediately (after another referendum). There are enough hardcore Remoaners in southern England and the like to win them quite a few seats, indeed Remoaners tempted by Starmer might vote tactically for the LDs in the hope that they can pressure him towards Rejoin in a hung parliament
What the F are they playing at? This would also bring them much needed attention
It is amazing to me that no UK party is going out there swinging for the Rejoin vote, when the polls are clearly showing Brexit remorse
That's an interesting idea but we need to get more precise with the language on this now. After nearly 7 years you can't be both a Remoaner and a Rejoiner. A Remoaner is passive, pissed off, backwards looking; a Rejoiner is head up, future facing, active.
I avoid analogies as a rule, they're overdone in punditry and can easily slide into a silliness that helps no-one (eg Brexit is like changing a nappy), but a good way to illustrate what I mean here is to imagine your dog has shat on the carpet.
In which case you can (i) sit there looking at it, grumbling at the mess, castigating the dog and yourself for failing to train it properly; or (ii) you can screw that for a game of soldiers and go, "right, let's get this cleared up!" and then think about getting a goldfish.
Option (i) is Remoaning. Option (ii) is the can-do spirit of Rejoin.
I'm a Remoaner btw. I'm still slumped in my chair gazing at the steaming pile of doo doo, chuntering how it shouldn't have happened, "why oh why oh why", unable (yet) to get up and do anything about it. But one day (and I'll let everyone know when this happens) I'll snap out of this and then I'll be a Remoaner no more. I'll be a Rejoiner.
The thing is you and I didn't want the dog in the first place. Indeed, we raised some questions of what would happen to the cream carpets and the reasonably nice furniture. But we were overruled by our other half and their parents. This sort of thing happens, and is one of the spices of life. But they're not cleaning the mess up either, and sometimes hint that it's our fault for not training the dog properly.
And the worst of it? It's getting to the point where we probably could phone up Battersea Dog's Home and ask them to take Nigel the Bulldog away. But we'd feel like utter scumbags for doing that. At least today we would...
‘you and I didn’t want the dog in the first place’
=
‘These people never wanted to be parents in the first place”
Brexit = Baby remains the greatest analogy in the history of PB - maybe in the history of humanity. We can only hope that one day the immortal @SeanT might one day *Rejoin* pb
The analogy falls down because having a baby isn't that difficult and is a source of joy and fulfillment to the parents from day one. I'd say that Brexit is more like having a shit, one that turns out to be an unflushable turd. All that strain, followed by a bad smell and lingering embarrassment.
Post-natal depression is not uncommon, and can be particularly difficult to deal with because you're supposed to be happy about having a baby.
Will the Brexit baby blues pass?
I'd say they lifted when it became clear we'd get vaccinated before most of Europe. If we just stick at steadily choosing to do the right thing for the UK, and diverging sensibly where necessary, those types of advantages will occur more frequently. It seems to me actually very hard work to be as shit at being out of the EU as we are at the moment.
We were vaccinated before most of the rest of Europe because we have (probably) the best pharma industry in Europe. The vaccine "thing" is the Brexit apologists only argument and it is as vacuous and nonsensical as their lying bus slogan.
Nah that's utter rubbish. You are just trying to rewrite history to suit your own agenda. You are claiming that various EU countries just sat around refusing to authorise vaccines because they wanted to? They did it because, in spite of what the rules might have said about emergency approvals, the EU were desperate to have a united front on vaccines and acted on that basis.
There is an excellent article from Politico.eu about this which is worth reading as it sets out just what went so wrong with the EU vaccine response.
"Countries can’t just follow the U.K.’s lead by unilaterally authorizing vaccines purchased by the EU — doses purchased by Brussels can only be released after they get the EMA’s signoff, according to the agreement. So even though Budapest tried to make a point by green-lighting the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab, it won’t get any shots before the rest of the bloc."
This weeks polling average based on published polls from YouGov, Omnisis, Techne, Deltapoll, PeoplePolling and Redfield & Wilton.
Small dip by the conservatives; let's see what next week brings - half term holidays for some.
Baxtered on new boundaries.
Lab 474 Con 88 SNP 47 LD 18.
Labour majority of 298.
Those are quite ginormous figures which we have become somewhat inured to.
Yes, there's an assumption something like that won't happen but maybe the chance of it is greater than people think. That's how I'm starting to feel anyway. I have an old bad short on Lab majority and I wish there was a liquid market on the size of it. I've identified this as my route out of trouble - buying it - but it'll only work if a suitable market goes up while the assumption it's unlikely is still in place.
This weeks polling average based on published polls from YouGov, Omnisis, Techne, Deltapoll, PeoplePolling and Redfield & Wilton.
Small dip by the conservatives; let's see what next week brings - half term holidays for some.
Baxtered on new boundaries.
Lab 474 Con 88 SNP 47 LD 18.
Labour majority of 298.
Those are quite ginormous figures which we have become somewhat inured to.
But, they are also hokum. You are Baxtering mid-term polls outside of a GE campaign.
There are a lot of people who will put a clothes peg on their noses and vote Tory to hobble an overwhelming Labour victory, if that's what looks likely to happen.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
But as Mike makes clear in the thread header it is difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from a Labour victory in a very safe Labour seat. Claiming the swing is not big enough is not really valid when Labour already had over 50% of the vote.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
This was a principal opposition party held seat by election.
In the 2005 there were two of these (if you exclude the vanity by election of David Davis)
First there was Bromley & Chislehurst
Tory vote went down by 11.1% and Labour went down by 11.6%
The other one was Henley.
The Tories went up 3.4% and Labour went down by 15.6%
The Lib Dems are also staring at a REALLY bad general election, when they would normally hope to benefit from Tory travails
I do not understand their inertia. The tactical move for them is obvious. Come out, loud and proud, as the party of Rejoin the EU immediately (after another referendum). There are enough hardcore Remoaners in southern England and the like to win them quite a few seats, indeed Remoaners tempted by Starmer might vote tactically for the LDs in the hope that they can pressure him towards Rejoin in a hung parliament
What the F are they playing at? This would also bring them much needed attention
It is amazing to me that no UK party is going out there swinging for the Rejoin vote, when the polls are clearly showing Brexit remorse
That's an interesting idea but we need to get more precise with the language on this now. After nearly 7 years you can't be both a Remoaner and a Rejoiner. A Remoaner is passive, pissed off, backwards looking; a Rejoiner is head up, future facing, active.
I avoid analogies as a rule, they're overdone in punditry and can easily slide into a silliness that helps no-one (eg Brexit is like changing a nappy), but a good way to illustrate what I mean here is to imagine your dog has shat on the carpet.
In which case you can (i) sit there looking at it, grumbling at the mess, castigating the dog and yourself for failing to train it properly; or (ii) you can screw that for a game of soldiers and go, "right, let's get this cleared up!" and then think about getting a goldfish.
Option (i) is Remoaning. Option (ii) is the can-do spirit of Rejoin.
I'm a Remoaner btw. I'm still slumped in my chair gazing at the steaming pile of doo doo, chuntering how it shouldn't have happened, "why oh why oh why", unable (yet) to get up and do anything about it. But one day (and I'll let everyone know when this happens) I'll snap out of this and then I'll be a Remoaner no more. I'll be a Rejoiner.
The thing is you and I didn't want the dog in the first place. Indeed, we raised some questions of what would happen to the cream carpets and the reasonably nice furniture. But we were overruled by our other half and their parents. This sort of thing happens, and is one of the spices of life. But they're not cleaning the mess up either, and sometimes hint that it's our fault for not training the dog properly.
And the worst of it? It's getting to the point where we probably could phone up Battersea Dog's Home and ask them to take Nigel the Bulldog away. But we'd feel like utter scumbags for doing that. At least today we would...
‘you and I didn’t want the dog in the first place’
=
‘These people never wanted to be parents in the first place”
Brexit = Baby remains the greatest analogy in the history of PB - maybe in the history of humanity. We can only hope that one day the immortal @SeanT might one day *Rejoin* pb
The analogy falls down because having a baby isn't that difficult and is a source of joy and fulfillment to the parents from day one. I'd say that Brexit is more like having a shit, one that turns out to be an unflushable turd. All that strain, followed by a bad smell and lingering embarrassment.
Post-natal depression is not uncommon, and can be particularly difficult to deal with because you're supposed to be happy about having a baby.
Will the Brexit baby blues pass?
I'd say they lifted when it became clear we'd get vaccinated before most of Europe. If we just stick at steadily choosing to do the right thing for the UK, and diverging sensibly where necessary, those types of advantages will occur more frequently. It seems to me actually very hard work to be as shit at being out of the EU as we are at the moment.
We were vaccinated before most of the rest of Europe because we have (probably) the best pharma industry in Europe. The vaccine "thing" is the Brexit apologists only argument and it is as vacuous and nonsensical as their lying bus slogan.
Nah that's utter rubbish. You are just trying to rewrite history to suit your own agenda. You are claiming that various EU countries just sat around refusing to authorise vaccines because they wanted to? They did it because, in spite of what the rules might have said about emergency approvals, the EU were desperate to have a united front on vaccines and acted on that basis.
There is an excellent article from Politico.eu about this which is worth reading as it sets out just what went so wrong with the EU vaccine response.
"Countries can’t just follow the U.K.’s lead by unilaterally authorizing vaccines purchased by the EU — doses purchased by Brussels can only be released after they get the EMA’s signoff, according to the agreement. So even though Budapest tried to make a point by green-lighting the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab, it won’t get any shots before the rest of the bloc."
Which means that Europhiles' claims that the UK in the EU could have had an independent vaccine programme are technically true, it would only have been the case if the UK wanted to use vaccines that the EU wasn't - which would have meant Russian and Chinese vaccines.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
But as Mike makes clear in the thread header it is difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from a Labour victory in a very safe Labour seat. Claiming the swing is not big enough is not really valid when Labour already had over 50% of the vote.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Much more difficult to get a 10% swing when you already have over 50% of the vote, mind.
This is where uniform swing runs out of steam. A more sophisticated model will show how 10% here translates to an average swing nationwide.
Two straws in the wind;
1 The Britain Elects MRP got the score pretty much bang on;
So it turns out there is a local posh-ish canteen which will deliver to my hotel a superb prawn laksa, Kyoto seaweed salad, Taiwanese hot soup dumplings and tremendous won ton, for £12. Door to hotel door in 35 minutes, after a couple of clicks on an iPhone: ie the perfect amount of time to have two G&Ts on the moonlit rooftop bar then go collect your food
Bangkok in Jan-Feb is, verily, a kind of earthly paradise
And now I get to watch “The Boys” with a nice bottle of 19 crimes. This, here, is mmmmmmmBOP
Had some 19 crimes last night and will have some tonight, excellent wine. Not tempted by the one with coffee mind you.
19 crimes is a remarkable wine for the price. It’s not St Henri Shiraz or a Supertuscan, but for the money you pay: yay
I dunno how the aussies do it. But it is a godsend in a country like Thailand where the tax on wine is insane. I used to fret over wines thrice the price (here in Bangkok). Now I just buy 19 crimes and I know it will always be jolly good and I know it will only cost me £11
I tried a bottle a couple of weeks ago when home alone, inspired by the recommendations emanating from South East Asia.
I also thought it was a good solid wine, balanced with decent fruit and not too jammy. Worth saying there are others of similar quality for the same sort of price, including some supermarket own label particularly from South Africa (where the exchange rate helps) and Southern France.
I find it's easier to get good mid-quality red wines from the new world for under a tenner than white wines. Some SA Chenin gets there but otherwise the cheaper whites tend to be a bit more variable whereas cheap whites from specific European regions are a bit easier to predict.
I generally don’t buy 19 crimes in London. Just because there is so much choice in London. But i still like to keep a few bottles in my flat as ‘this’ll do nicely’ wine. Nothing special or expensive, but absolutely reliable, drinkable and mmm
In Bangkok it is a lifesaver for a boozer like me. They now stock it in 7-11s and at £11 a pop it is better than anything equivalent. Jacobs creek is £13-15 and notably worse, everything else remotely drinkable is £20 and also unreliable
Thai wine taxes are insane
It's a bit sweet for my tastes. But that's very personal. It's quaffable and cheap.
A cross-party group of MPs is poised to issue a “stern” report about Richard Sharp’s appointment as BBC chairman, after it was alleged he acted as an “introduction agency” to help facilitate an £800,000 loan to Boris Johnson.
The digital, culture, media and sport select committee is to publish its conclusions on Sunday, after a two-hour grilling of Sharp about his role as a go-between with Sam Blyth, Johnson’s distant cousin, and Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, before No 10 gave him the job overseeing the BBC in 2021.
Two committee members have indicated that the group will rebuke Sharp for his failure to disclose his role in the loan during the selection process.
“The mood among the group was for the report to be tough,” said one. “There was disappointment not only about his failure to declare this important information but also by his testimony and refusal to accept that he had done anything wrong. It was the wrong approach for him to take.”
I only saw clips of the grilling, but as was not unusual in these situations the man came across as an idiot. People who fail to disclose glaringly obvious potential conflicts - of the should have as well as could have variety - always try to make it seem like they have the memories of goldfish, or that it was all far too complicated for them to realise they should disclose things.
It very rarely is. Everyone in that situation knows when in doubt disclose, and to say you didn't know or didn't get how it looks is to declare yourself an utter fool.
Brexit started it off and the Tories have continued destroying all the work Cameron did.
I know people think Johnson's party was more "in touch" but their obsession with trans people, the EU and immigrants just doesn't resonate with my/our folk. They're losing them by going on about this nonsense. And they've now shredded their economic credentials too.
The Tory Party will rediscover Cameron/Blair at some point. But they are going to have to lose and lose big - and long term that is what is needed. It saved Labour.
You could take countless statements by New Labour ministers and put them in the mouths of Suella Braverman or Priti Patel, and they would generate a cacophony of outrage about how far we've supposedly fallen.
ID Cards….90 day detention….Cash point fines….gulags for slags….maybe we shouldn’t give them ideas by reminding them of Labour policies….
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Much more difficult to get a 10% swing when you already have over 50% of the vote, mind.
I'm not sure that argument totally washes though.
Labour got barely half of the votes they got in the same seat in 2019. Where were the other half plus all the new converts?
Hmm.
Yes but. Comparable seats in the 2005-10 Parliament are not the ones you quote, but Conservative held ones.
This weeks polling average based on published polls from YouGov, Omnisis, Techne, Deltapoll, PeoplePolling and Redfield & Wilton.
Small dip by the conservatives; let's see what next week brings - half term holidays for some.
Baxtered on new boundaries.
Lab 474 Con 88 SNP 47 LD 18.
Labour majority of 298.
Those are quite ginormous figures which we have become somewhat inured to.
But, they are also hokum. You are Baxtering mid-term polls outside of a GE campaign.
There are a lot of people who will put a clothes peg on their noses and vote Tory to hobble an overwhelming Labour victory, if that's what looks likely to happen.
That could be true, but you present it as though a solid rule.
Yes, this is midterm, but it is pretty bad even though it is midterm. It's also midterm 13 years in.
And I question the assumption that people will likely hold their noses to hobble an overwhelming victory - some people think that is what happened in 2017, but it certainly didn't happen in 2019 even though the polls at least were clear it would be a big win. So it definitely doesn't always happen.
A cross-party group of MPs is poised to issue a “stern” report about Richard Sharp’s appointment as BBC chairman, after it was alleged he acted as an “introduction agency” to help facilitate an £800,000 loan to Boris Johnson.
The digital, culture, media and sport select committee is to publish its conclusions on Sunday, after a two-hour grilling of Sharp about his role as a go-between with Sam Blyth, Johnson’s distant cousin, and Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, before No 10 gave him the job overseeing the BBC in 2021.
Two committee members have indicated that the group will rebuke Sharp for his failure to disclose his role in the loan during the selection process.
“The mood among the group was for the report to be tough,” said one. “There was disappointment not only about his failure to declare this important information but also by his testimony and refusal to accept that he had done anything wrong. It was the wrong approach for him to take.”
Never mind Sharp*, what was Simon Case - civil servant, Cabinet Secretary, and Head of the Home Civil Service - doing getting involved in arranging loans for Johnson?
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
But as Mike makes clear in the thread header it is difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from a Labour victory in a very safe Labour seat. Claiming the swing is not big enough is not really valid when Labour already had over 50% of the vote.
Yes, I'm not convinced.
Labour got a much bigger swing in the Newham North East by-election in 1994, and they already had 58% of the vote. Same in the Dagenham by-election in the same year. Same in Bradford South. Same in Barking. All safe Labour seats.
There's a bit of wishful/herd thinking going on here.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
But as Mike makes clear in the thread header it is difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from a Labour victory in a very safe Labour seat. Claiming the swing is not big enough is not really valid when Labour already had over 50% of the vote.
Very safe? The result was Lab 52%, Con 36% in 2019.
This weeks polling average based on published polls from YouGov, Omnisis, Techne, Deltapoll, PeoplePolling and Redfield & Wilton.
Small dip by the conservatives; let's see what next week brings - half term holidays for some.
Baxtered on new boundaries.
Lab 474 Con 88 SNP 47 LD 18.
Labour majority of 298.
Those are quite ginormous figures which we have become somewhat inured to.
But, they are also hokum. You are Baxtering mid-term polls outside of a GE campaign.
There are a lot of people who will put a clothes peg on their noses and vote Tory to hobble an overwhelming Labour victory, if that's what looks likely to happen.
That could be true, but you present it as though a solid rule.
Yes, this is midterm, but it is pretty bad even though it is midterm. It's also midterm 13 years in.
And I question the assumption that people will likely hold their noses to hobble an overwhelming victory - some people think that is what happened in 2017, but it certainly didn't happen in 2019 even though the polls at least were clear it would be a big win. So it definitely doesn't always happen.
I don't.
I'm providing an alternative view on here, which is being heavily challenged because it goes against the consensus and people fear there's something in it.
There's more evidence for my view from past elections than there is for the idea that the whole centre-right coalition will simply give up, disappear and acquiesce in a Labour landslide.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Much more difficult to get a 10% swing when you already have over 50% of the vote, mind.
I'm not sure that argument totally washes though.
Labour got barely half of the votes they got in the same seat in 2019. Where were the other half plus all the new converts?
Hmm.
Yes but. Comparable seats in the 2005-10 Parliament are not the ones you quote, but Conservative held ones.
OK, I've now given a few examples from the 1992-1997 parliament.
I now expect to be told those are all different too because Reasons.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
But as Mike makes clear in the thread header it is difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from a Labour victory in a very safe Labour seat. Claiming the swing is not big enough is not really valid when Labour already had over 50% of the vote.
Very safe? The result was Lab 52%, Con 36% in 2019.
In the context of 2019 being the biggest Tory win in over 30 years, yes it was very safe.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
This was a principal opposition party held seat by election.
In the 2005 there were two of these (if you exclude the vanity by election of David Davis)
First there was Bromley & Chislehurst
Tory vote went down by 11.1% and Labour went down by 11.6%
The other one was Henley.
The Tories went up 3.4% and Labour went down by 15.6%
Yes, I completely agree that your case looks much better if you exclude all the seats that don't support it.
I'm interested in the betting.
I'm not seeing the evidence for a landslide and I might even think about my Labour majority position again off the back of this.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Which is the plan imo. A core vote strategy aimed not at winning but on coming a solid second. That way you avoid a gamechanging collapse, protect your Big Two status, and it's only a matter of time before you get back in again. Could be quite a long time, since certain things and people need to be faced and dealt with, but what's a decade or so in the long run of things. Question is will it work? What does True Blue + Hard Brexit add up to? Is it enough? I don't know.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
But as Mike makes clear in the thread header it is difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from a Labour victory in a very safe Labour seat. Claiming the swing is not big enough is not really valid when Labour already had over 50% of the vote.
Very safe? The result was Lab 52%, Con 36% in 2019.
The herd simply can't handle the argument.
Hence the defensive likes for those posts they think are refuting it.
This weeks polling average based on published polls from YouGov, Omnisis, Techne, Deltapoll, PeoplePolling and Redfield & Wilton.
Small dip by the conservatives; let's see what next week brings - half term holidays for some.
Baxtered on new boundaries.
Lab 474 Con 88 SNP 47 LD 18.
Labour majority of 298.
Those are quite ginormous figures which we have become somewhat inured to.
But, they are also hokum. You are Baxtering mid-term polls outside of a GE campaign.
There are a lot of people who will put a clothes peg on their noses and vote Tory to hobble an overwhelming Labour victory, if that's what looks likely to happen.
That could be true, but you present it as though a solid rule.
Yes, this is midterm, but it is pretty bad even though it is midterm. It's also midterm 13 years in.
And I question the assumption that people will likely hold their noses to hobble an overwhelming victory - some people think that is what happened in 2017, but it certainly didn't happen in 2019 even though the polls at least were clear it would be a big win. So it definitely doesn't always happen.
Yes. It's tricky to find a comparison with the next election. The problems in comparing with past decades include:
The Tory base is both altering shape, becoming less of a base and gives the appearance of not being united behind a rational and defensible ideology or understanding of the world.
We are in post-Brexit land. Both previous post Brexit elections have been weird in well remembered ways and hopefully unrepeatable ways. The next will be by far the most 'normal' of the post Brexit elections, a place we have never been before.
There is no Jezza, Boris, Blair or Maggie anywhere in sight.
What will voters do? No idea, except that 'Time For A Change' is the winning slogan. So the Tories won't win. Beyond that....
They haven't been Labour "as long as anyone can remember". West Lancs was Tory from 1983 to 1992 and Stretford used to be Tory (Winston Churchill the younger).
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Much more difficult to get a 10% swing when you already have over 50% of the vote, mind.
I'm not sure that argument totally washes though.
Labour got barely half of the votes they got in the same seat in 2019. Where were the other half plus all the new converts?
Hmm.
Yes but. Comparable seats in the 2005-10 Parliament are not the ones you quote, but Conservative held ones.
OK, I've now given a few examples from the 1992-1997 parliament.
I now expect to be told those are all different too because Reasons.
Not at all. We are having a civilised, evidenced disagreement about the import of a minor by election. At least to my mind. Who is correct will only come out in time.
The Lib Dems are also staring at a REALLY bad general election, when they would normally hope to benefit from Tory travails
I do not understand their inertia. The tactical move for them is obvious. Come out, loud and proud, as the party of Rejoin the EU immediately (after another referendum). There are enough hardcore Remoaners in southern England and the like to win them quite a few seats, indeed Remoaners tempted by Starmer might vote tactically for the LDs in the hope that they can pressure him towards Rejoin in a hung parliament
What the F are they playing at? This would also bring them much needed attention
It is amazing to me that no UK party is going out there swinging for the Rejoin vote, when the polls are clearly showing Brexit remorse
That's an interesting idea but we need to get more precise with the language on this now. After nearly 7 years you can't be both a Remoaner and a Rejoiner. A Remoaner is passive, pissed off, backwards looking; a Rejoiner is head up, future facing, active.
I avoid analogies as a rule, they're overdone in punditry and can easily slide into a silliness that helps no-one (eg Brexit is like changing a nappy), but a good way to illustrate what I mean here is to imagine your dog has shat on the carpet.
In which case you can (i) sit there looking at it, grumbling at the mess, castigating the dog and yourself for failing to train it properly; or (ii) you can screw that for a game of soldiers and go, "right, let's get this cleared up!" and then think about getting a goldfish.
Option (i) is Remoaning. Option (ii) is the can-do spirit of Rejoin.
I'm a Remoaner btw. I'm still slumped in my chair gazing at the steaming pile of doo doo, chuntering how it shouldn't have happened, "why oh why oh why", unable (yet) to get up and do anything about it. But one day (and I'll let everyone know when this happens) I'll snap out of this and then I'll be a Remoaner no more. I'll be a Rejoiner.
The thing is you and I didn't want the dog in the first place. Indeed, we raised some questions of what would happen to the cream carpets and the reasonably nice furniture. But we were overruled by our other half and their parents. This sort of thing happens, and is one of the spices of life. But they're not cleaning the mess up either, and sometimes hint that it's our fault for not training the dog properly.
And the worst of it? It's getting to the point where we probably could phone up Battersea Dog's Home and ask them to take Nigel the Bulldog away. But we'd feel like utter scumbags for doing that. At least today we would...
‘you and I didn’t want the dog in the first place’
=
‘These people never wanted to be parents in the first place”
Brexit = Baby remains the greatest analogy in the history of PB - maybe in the history of humanity. We can only hope that one day the immortal @SeanT might one day *Rejoin* pb
The analogy falls down because having a baby isn't that difficult and is a source of joy and fulfillment to the parents from day one. I'd say that Brexit is more like having a shit, one that turns out to be an unflushable turd. All that strain, followed by a bad smell and lingering embarrassment.
Post-natal depression is not uncommon, and can be particularly difficult to deal with because you're supposed to be happy about having a baby.
Will the Brexit baby blues pass?
I'd say they lifted when it became clear we'd get vaccinated before most of Europe. If we just stick at steadily choosing to do the right thing for the UK, and diverging sensibly where necessary, those types of advantages will occur more frequently. It seems to me actually very hard work to be as shit at being out of the EU as we are at the moment.
We were vaccinated before most of the rest of Europe because we have (probably) the best pharma industry in Europe. The vaccine "thing" is the Brexit apologists only argument and it is as vacuous and nonsensical as their lying bus slogan.
Nah that's utter rubbish. You are just trying to rewrite history to suit your own agenda. You are claiming that various EU countries just sat around refusing to authorise vaccines because they wanted to? They did it because, in spite of what the rules might have said about emergency approvals, the EU were desperate to have a united front on vaccines and acted on that basis.
There is an excellent article from Politico.eu about this which is worth reading as it sets out just what went so wrong with the EU vaccine response.
"Countries can’t just follow the U.K.’s lead by unilaterally authorizing vaccines purchased by the EU — doses purchased by Brussels can only be released after they get the EMA’s signoff, according to the agreement. So even though Budapest tried to make a point by green-lighting the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab, it won’t get any shots before the rest of the bloc."
Honestly Richard, did you read that article?
"France and Spain separately began talks with Moderna, according to the Commission official. By mid-April, Paris and Berlin started negotiating together to buy vaccines, according to an Elysée official.
EU27 health ministers signed off on a Commission plan to buy on their behalf on June 12. But the Franco-German initiative continued to press forward, having invited the Netherlands and Italy to join their buyers’ club. "
Granted, France and Germany decided ultimately to stop their 'Inclusive Vaccine Alliance' and join in with the EU scheme but there was no necessity to do that, no compulsion.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Which is the plan imo. A core vote strategy aimed not at winning but on coming a solid second. That way you avoid a gamechanging collapse, protect your Big Two status, and it's only a matter of time before you get back in again. Could be quite a long time, since certain things and people need to be faced and dealt with, but what's a decade or so in the long run of things. Question is will it work? What does True Blue + Hard Brexit add up to? Is it enough? I don't know.
Its absolutely the plan.
When you can't win, you play De-fence.
It's what Hague did in 2001 and I suspect what Rishi will do too. He will get reamed for it on here and in the chatterati press, with most supporters keeping their heads down, but it's how he ensures he gets some votes (rather than none at all) and the Conservative Party lives to fight another day.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Much more difficult to get a 10% swing when you already have over 50% of the vote, mind.
I'm not sure that argument totally washes though.
Labour got barely half of the votes they got in the same seat in 2019. Where were the other half plus all the new converts?
Hmm.
Yes but. Comparable seats in the 2005-10 Parliament are not the ones you quote, but Conservative held ones.
OK, I've now given a few examples from the 1992-1997 parliament.
I now expect to be told those are all different too because Reasons.
Not at all. We are having a civilised, evidenced disagreement about the import of a minor by election. At least to my mind. Who is correct will only come out in time.
FWIW, you may be right and I may well be wrong.
But, I can promise you I am reviewing my betting positions of the back of this.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Which is the plan imo. A core vote strategy aimed not at winning but on coming a solid second. That way you avoid a gamechanging collapse, protect your Big Two status, and it's only a matter of time before you get back in again. Could be quite a long time, since certain things and people need to be faced and dealt with, but what's a decade or so in the long run of things. Question is will it work? What does True Blue + Hard Brexit add up to? Is it enough? I don't know.
I think they would do better to rally the base they have lost - the Christian Democrat One Nation centrists who believe in social democratic capitalist democracy.
Sadly the leadership of that group - good people on the whole - spent decades made the error of failing to shape the EU in ways that the UK could unitedly rally round and their excellent general ideology can't yet find its way back to political coherence.
Sunak could and should be their flag bearer. SKS is in fact the nearest thing there is.
The Lib Dems are also staring at a REALLY bad general election, when they would normally hope to benefit from Tory travails
I do not understand their inertia. The tactical move for them is obvious. Come out, loud and proud, as the party of Rejoin the EU immediately (after another referendum). There are enough hardcore Remoaners in southern England and the like to win them quite a few seats, indeed Remoaners tempted by Starmer might vote tactically for the LDs in the hope that they can pressure him towards Rejoin in a hung parliament
What the F are they playing at? This would also bring them much needed attention
It is amazing to me that no UK party is going out there swinging for the Rejoin vote, when the polls are clearly showing Brexit remorse
That's an interesting idea but we need to get more precise with the language on this now. After nearly 7 years you can't be both a Remoaner and a Rejoiner. A Remoaner is passive, pissed off, backwards looking; a Rejoiner is head up, future facing, active.
I avoid analogies as a rule, they're overdone in punditry and can easily slide into a silliness that helps no-one (eg Brexit is like changing a nappy), but a good way to illustrate what I mean here is to imagine your dog has shat on the carpet.
In which case you can (i) sit there looking at it, grumbling at the mess, castigating the dog and yourself for failing to train it properly; or (ii) you can screw that for a game of soldiers and go, "right, let's get this cleared up!" and then think about getting a goldfish.
Option (i) is Remoaning. Option (ii) is the can-do spirit of Rejoin.
I'm a Remoaner btw. I'm still slumped in my chair gazing at the steaming pile of doo doo, chuntering how it shouldn't have happened, "why oh why oh why", unable (yet) to get up and do anything about it. But one day (and I'll let everyone know when this happens) I'll snap out of this and then I'll be a Remoaner no more. I'll be a Rejoiner.
The thing is you and I didn't want the dog in the first place. Indeed, we raised some questions of what would happen to the cream carpets and the reasonably nice furniture. But we were overruled by our other half and their parents. This sort of thing happens, and is one of the spices of life. But they're not cleaning the mess up either, and sometimes hint that it's our fault for not training the dog properly.
And the worst of it? It's getting to the point where we probably could phone up Battersea Dog's Home and ask them to take Nigel the Bulldog away. But we'd feel like utter scumbags for doing that. At least today we would...
‘you and I didn’t want the dog in the first place’
=
‘These people never wanted to be parents in the first place”
Brexit = Baby remains the greatest analogy in the history of PB - maybe in the history of humanity. We can only hope that one day the immortal @SeanT might one day *Rejoin* pb
The analogy falls down because having a baby isn't that difficult and is a source of joy and fulfillment to the parents from day one. I'd say that Brexit is more like having a shit, one that turns out to be an unflushable turd. All that strain, followed by a bad smell and lingering embarrassment.
Post-natal depression is not uncommon, and can be particularly difficult to deal with because you're supposed to be happy about having a baby.
Will the Brexit baby blues pass?
I'd say they lifted when it became clear we'd get vaccinated before most of Europe. If we just stick at steadily choosing to do the right thing for the UK, and diverging sensibly where necessary, those types of advantages will occur more frequently. It seems to me actually very hard work to be as shit at being out of the EU as we are at the moment.
We were vaccinated before most of the rest of Europe because we have (probably) the best pharma industry in Europe. The vaccine "thing" is the Brexit apologists only argument and it is as vacuous and nonsensical as their lying bus slogan.
Nah that's utter rubbish. You are just trying to rewrite history to suit your own agenda. You are claiming that various EU countries just sat around refusing to authorise vaccines because they wanted to? They did it because, in spite of what the rules might have said about emergency approvals, the EU were desperate to have a united front on vaccines and acted on that basis.
There is an excellent article from Politico.eu about this which is worth reading as it sets out just what went so wrong with the EU vaccine response.
"Countries can’t just follow the U.K.’s lead by unilaterally authorizing vaccines purchased by the EU — doses purchased by Brussels can only be released after they get the EMA’s signoff, according to the agreement. So even though Budapest tried to make a point by green-lighting the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab, it won’t get any shots before the rest of the bloc."
Honestly Richard, did you read that article?
"France and Spain separately began talks with Moderna, according to the Commission official. By mid-April, Paris and Berlin started negotiating together to buy vaccines, according to an Elysée official.
EU27 health ministers signed off on a Commission plan to buy on their behalf on June 12. But the Franco-German initiative continued to press forward, having invited the Netherlands and Italy to join their buyers’ club. "
Granted, France and Germany decided ultimately to stop their 'Inclusive Vaccine Alliance' and join in with the EU scheme but there was no necessity to do that, no compulsion.
If there was no necessity ir compulsion, why did they do it? Doing so was clearly a shit idea.
They haven't been Labour "as long as anyone can remember". West Lancs was Tory from 1983 to 1992 and Stretford used to be Tory (Winston Churchill the younger).
They haven't been Labour "as long as anyone can remember". West Lancs was Tory from 1983 to 1992 and Stretford used to be Tory (Winston Churchill the younger).
Was Stretford Tory? Davyhulme certainly was. But the boundaries were very different, I think? Both West Lancs and Stretford(/Davyhulme) are the inverse of Leigh and Newcastle under Lyme - they have had a long term drift to the left.
The Lib Dems are also staring at a REALLY bad general election, when they would normally hope to benefit from Tory travails
I do not understand their inertia. The tactical move for them is obvious. Come out, loud and proud, as the party of Rejoin the EU immediately (after another referendum). There are enough hardcore Remoaners in southern England and the like to win them quite a few seats, indeed Remoaners tempted by Starmer might vote tactically for the LDs in the hope that they can pressure him towards Rejoin in a hung parliament
What the F are they playing at? This would also bring them much needed attention
It is amazing to me that no UK party is going out there swinging for the Rejoin vote, when the polls are clearly showing Brexit remorse
That's an interesting idea but we need to get more precise with the language on this now. After nearly 7 years you can't be both a Remoaner and a Rejoiner. A Remoaner is passive, pissed off, backwards looking; a Rejoiner is head up, future facing, active.
I avoid analogies as a rule, they're overdone in punditry and can easily slide into a silliness that helps no-one (eg Brexit is like changing a nappy), but a good way to illustrate what I mean here is to imagine your dog has shat on the carpet.
In which case you can (i) sit there looking at it, grumbling at the mess, castigating the dog and yourself for failing to train it properly; or (ii) you can screw that for a game of soldiers and go, "right, let's get this cleared up!" and then think about getting a goldfish.
Option (i) is Remoaning. Option (ii) is the can-do spirit of Rejoin.
I'm a Remoaner btw. I'm still slumped in my chair gazing at the steaming pile of doo doo, chuntering how it shouldn't have happened, "why oh why oh why", unable (yet) to get up and do anything about it. But one day (and I'll let everyone know when this happens) I'll snap out of this and then I'll be a Remoaner no more. I'll be a Rejoiner.
The thing is you and I didn't want the dog in the first place. Indeed, we raised some questions of what would happen to the cream carpets and the reasonably nice furniture. But we were overruled by our other half and their parents. This sort of thing happens, and is one of the spices of life. But they're not cleaning the mess up either, and sometimes hint that it's our fault for not training the dog properly.
And the worst of it? It's getting to the point where we probably could phone up Battersea Dog's Home and ask them to take Nigel the Bulldog away. But we'd feel like utter scumbags for doing that. At least today we would...
‘you and I didn’t want the dog in the first place’
=
‘These people never wanted to be parents in the first place”
Brexit = Baby remains the greatest analogy in the history of PB - maybe in the history of humanity. We can only hope that one day the immortal @SeanT might one day *Rejoin* pb
The analogy falls down because having a baby isn't that difficult and is a source of joy and fulfillment to the parents from day one. I'd say that Brexit is more like having a shit, one that turns out to be an unflushable turd. All that strain, followed by a bad smell and lingering embarrassment.
Post-natal depression is not uncommon, and can be particularly difficult to deal with because you're supposed to be happy about having a baby.
Will the Brexit baby blues pass?
I'd say they lifted when it became clear we'd get vaccinated before most of Europe. If we just stick at steadily choosing to do the right thing for the UK, and diverging sensibly where necessary, those types of advantages will occur more frequently. It seems to me actually very hard work to be as shit at being out of the EU as we are at the moment.
We were vaccinated before most of the rest of Europe because we have (probably) the best pharma industry in Europe. The vaccine "thing" is the Brexit apologists only argument and it is as vacuous and nonsensical as their lying bus slogan.
Nah that's utter rubbish. You are just trying to rewrite history to suit your own agenda. You are claiming that various EU countries just sat around refusing to authorise vaccines because they wanted to? They did it because, in spite of what the rules might have said about emergency approvals, the EU were desperate to have a united front on vaccines and acted on that basis.
There is an excellent article from Politico.eu about this which is worth reading as it sets out just what went so wrong with the EU vaccine response.
"Countries can’t just follow the U.K.’s lead by unilaterally authorizing vaccines purchased by the EU — doses purchased by Brussels can only be released after they get the EMA’s signoff, according to the agreement. So even though Budapest tried to make a point by green-lighting the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab, it won’t get any shots before the rest of the bloc."
Honestly Richard, did you read that article?
"France and Spain separately began talks with Moderna, according to the Commission official. By mid-April, Paris and Berlin started negotiating together to buy vaccines, according to an Elysée official.
EU27 health ministers signed off on a Commission plan to buy on their behalf on June 12. But the Franco-German initiative continued to press forward, having invited the Netherlands and Italy to join their buyers’ club. "
Granted, France and Germany decided ultimately to stop their 'Inclusive Vaccine Alliance' and join in with the EU scheme but there was no necessity to do that, no compulsion.
If there was no necessity ir compulsion, why did they do it? Doing so was clearly a shit idea.
You'd have to ask them but I assume: 1. They wanted to support EU cohesion and 2. Maybe felt they'd get a better deal with a the EU acting as a bloc.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
But as Mike makes clear in the thread header it is difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from a Labour victory in a very safe Labour seat. Claiming the swing is not big enough is not really valid when Labour already had over 50% of the vote.
Yes, I'm not convinced.
Labour got a much bigger swing in the Newham North East by-election in 1994, and they already had 58% of the vote. Same in the Dagenham by-election in the same year. Same in Bradford South. Same in Barking. All safe Labour seats.
There's a bit of wishful/herd thinking going on here.
That's interesting. I wonder whether those seats were trending Labour though? They sound like the kind of inner city seats where Labour's vote was going up year on year owing to shifting demographics. Three of them are in London. Also, wasn't the W Lancs result pretty much bang in line with the MRP polling pointing to a big Labour win? I'm not trying to dismiss your argument, just kicking the tyres.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Much more difficult to get a 10% swing when you already have over 50% of the vote, mind.
I'm not sure that argument totally washes though.
Labour got barely half of the votes they got in the same seat in 2019. Where were the other half plus all the new converts?
Hmm.
Yes but. Comparable seats in the 2005-10 Parliament are not the ones you quote, but Conservative held ones.
OK, I've now given a few examples from the 1992-1997 parliament.
I now expect to be told those are all different too because Reasons.
Not at all. We are having a civilised, evidenced disagreement about the import of a minor by election. At least to my mind. Who is correct will only come out in time.
Philosophically, we will never know who is 'correct' today because... 'events, dear boy, events'.
By which I mean Casino could be correct that the West Lancs 10% swing doesn't meant a Labour landslide, even if (say, because Sunak goes from bad to worse) Labour do end up winning a landslide.
This weeks polling average based on published polls from YouGov, Omnisis, Techne, Deltapoll, PeoplePolling and Redfield & Wilton.
Small dip by the conservatives; let's see what next week brings - half term holidays for some.
Baxtered on new boundaries.
Lab 474 Con 88 SNP 47 LD 18.
Labour majority of 298.
Those are quite ginormous figures which we have become somewhat inured to.
But, they are also hokum. You are Baxtering mid-term polls outside of a GE campaign.
There are a lot of people who will put a clothes peg on their noses and vote Tory to hobble an overwhelming Labour victory, if that's what looks likely to happen.
That could be true, but you present it as though a solid rule.
Yes, this is midterm, but it is pretty bad even though it is midterm. It's also midterm 13 years in.
And I question the assumption that people will likely hold their noses to hobble an overwhelming victory - some people think that is what happened in 2017, but it certainly didn't happen in 2019 even though the polls at least were clear it would be a big win. So it definitely doesn't always happen.
2017 was a rare case in which two amazing things happened: the Tories, during the race, turned round and started running the other way for no obvious reason. It was a Trussite victory for a bonkers plan over ordinary basic political cunning and tactics. And secondly a passive aggressive fellow traveller with Stalinists hit by accident a celeb button.
By which time normal people wanted neither to win and sanity to return. SFAICS only the Friends of Stalin's Fellow Travellers went to the polls without holding their noses.
No-one won, and the return to sanity is, as infant teachers say, working towards Level l.
In 2024 the voters will want a winner. There is currently available a decent fairly centrist chap who in all probability won't order boat loads of refugees to be machine gunned in the water, and isn't a friend of Stalin. May our luck hold.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
But as Mike makes clear in the thread header it is difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from a Labour victory in a very safe Labour seat. Claiming the swing is not big enough is not really valid when Labour already had over 50% of the vote.
Very safe? The result was Lab 52%, Con 36% in 2019.
The herd simply can't handle the argument.
Hence the defensive likes for those posts they think are refuting it.
Without looking under the bonnet of the MRP, I don't know. But if I had to guess...
Some demographics (older working people) have swung a lot from Con to Lab since 2019. Others haven't. The young and poor haven't, because they were insanely left-leaning already. Retired homeowners have largely stayed loyal to the Conservatives, because all this stuff hasn't really hurt them.
So maybe W Lancs didn't swing because the voters aren't swingers. I'm not saying this is what's happened, but it wouldn't be crazy.
Only a 5.5% swing to Labour in a Lab safe seat, 39% turnout. All while Labour were 20 - 30% ahead in the polls.
Of course at the next election Labour barely scraped a majority... of 179.
In those far off days Hemsworth was a seat where there was already no-one left to vote Tory, so not much to swing; and the few who did so vote kept very quiet about it.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
But as Mike makes clear in the thread header it is difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from a Labour victory in a very safe Labour seat. Claiming the swing is not big enough is not really valid when Labour already had over 50% of the vote.
Very safe? The result was Lab 52%, Con 36% in 2019.
The herd simply can't handle the argument.
Hence the defensive likes for those posts they think are refuting it.
Without looking under the bonnet of the MRP, I don't know. But if I had to guess...
Some demographics (older working people) have swung a lot from Con to Lab since 2019. Others haven't. The young and poor haven't, because they were insanely left-leaning already. Retired homeowners have largely stayed loyal to the Conservatives, because all this stuff hasn't really hurt them.
So maybe W Lancs didn't swing because the voters aren't swingers. I'm not saying this is what's happened, but it wouldn't be crazy.
W Lancs doesn't swing much because of its composition. It has areas which vote like Liverpool. And areas which vote like rural N Lancs. There are more of the former than latter, so it is a Labour seat.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Much more difficult to get a 10% swing when you already have over 50% of the vote, mind.
I'm not sure that argument totally washes though.
Labour got barely half of the votes they got in the same seat in 2019. Where were the other half plus all the new converts?
Hmm.
Yes but. Comparable seats in the 2005-10 Parliament are not the ones you quote, but Conservative held ones.
OK, I've now given a few examples from the 1992-1997 parliament.
I now expect to be told those are all different too because Reasons.
Not at all. We are having a civilised, evidenced disagreement about the import of a minor by election. At least to my mind. Who is correct will only come out in time.
Philosophically, we will never know who is 'correct' today because... 'events, dear boy, events'.
By which I mean Casino could be correct that the West Lancs 10% swing doesn't meant a Labour landslide, even if (say, because Sunak goes from bad to worse) Labour do end up winning a landslide.
And vice versa of course.
West Lancs. has trended Labour, since the 1980’s. The Conservatives won it in 1987, when they had a similar national lead to 2019. In the latter election they were 16% adrift.
The demographics ought to favour the Conservatives, being an older, very white, semi-rural electorate. My guess is it’s because of the pull of Merseyside, which just shifts further left with each election. It would be a Tory seat, if it were located in the West Midlands or Yorkshire.
This could help the Tories. I know how much childcare costs impacts so many voters.
The Treasury is considering a proposal to massively expand free childcare to one- and two-year-olds in England in a move that would cost billions at the spring budget.
Department for Education officials have submitted a plan for a free 30-hours-a-week entitlement for working parents of children aged nine months to three years, after being asked to work up options by the Treasury.
Other options include offering a smaller number of free hours for two-year-olds, an offer of 10 free hours for disadvantaged one-year-olds, and adjusting the ratios for childcare providers to allow adults to look after more children.
It comes after Labour signalled it would make a transformational offer to parents at the next election, with the shadow education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, pledging a modern childcare system that works from the end of parental leave until the end of primary school.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Which is the plan imo. A core vote strategy aimed not at winning but on coming a solid second. That way you avoid a gamechanging collapse, protect your Big Two status, and it's only a matter of time before you get back in again. Could be quite a long time, since certain things and people need to be faced and dealt with, but what's a decade or so in the long run of things. Question is will it work? What does True Blue + Hard Brexit add up to? Is it enough? I don't know.
Its absolutely the plan.
When you can't win, you play De-fence.
It's what Hague did in 2001 and I suspect what Rishi will do too. He will get reamed for it on here and in the chatterati press, with most supporters keeping their heads down, but it's how he ensures he gets some votes (rather than none at all) and the Conservative Party lives to fight another day.
Unless RefUK overtakes the Tories as the main party of the right, under FPTP the Conservatives will always live to fight another day
This could help the Tories. I know how much childcare costs impacts so many voters.
The Treasury is considering a proposal to massively expand free childcare to one- and two-year-olds in England in a move that would cost billions at the spring budget.
Department for Education officials have submitted a plan for a free 30-hours-a-week entitlement for working parents of children aged nine months to three years, after being asked to work up options by the Treasury.
Other options include offering a smaller number of free hours for two-year-olds, an offer of 10 free hours for disadvantaged one-year-olds, and adjusting the ratios for childcare providers to allow adults to look after more children.
It comes after Labour signalled it would make a transformational offer to parents at the next election, with the shadow education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, pledging a modern childcare system that works from the end of parental leave until the end of primary school.
Truss's proposals to reduce the mandatory ratio of children to carers nearer to the level of many other European countries was a far more effective and less costly way to improve the affordability of childcare, and was dropped for reasons of pure petty spite as far as I can make out.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
But as Mike makes clear in the thread header it is difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from a Labour victory in a very safe Labour seat. Claiming the swing is not big enough is not really valid when Labour already had over 50% of the vote.
Very safe? The result was Lab 52%, Con 36% in 2019.
The herd simply can't handle the argument.
Hence the defensive likes for those posts they think are refuting it.
Without looking under the bonnet of the MRP, I don't know. But if I had to guess...
Some demographics (older working people) have swung a lot from Con to Lab since 2019. Others haven't. The young and poor haven't, because they were insanely left-leaning already. Retired homeowners have largely stayed loyal to the Conservatives, because all this stuff hasn't really hurt them.
So maybe W Lancs didn't swing because the voters aren't swingers. I'm not saying this is what's happened, but it wouldn't be crazy.
Yes, suspect the Lab vote in West Lancs is young (Edge Hill university) or poor (Skelmersdale) whereas the Con vote is old and affluent (everywhere else). Wouldn't expect a vast swing from either.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Much more difficult to get a 10% swing when you already have over 50% of the vote, mind.
I'm not sure that argument totally washes though.
Labour got barely half of the votes they got in the same seat in 2019. Where were the other half plus all the new converts?
Hmm.
Yes but. Comparable seats in the 2005-10 Parliament are not the ones you quote, but Conservative held ones.
OK, I've now given a few examples from the 1992-1997 parliament.
I now expect to be told those are all different too because Reasons.
Not at all. We are having a civilised, evidenced disagreement about the import of a minor by election. At least to my mind. Who is correct will only come out in time.
Philosophically, we will never know who is 'correct' today because... 'events, dear boy, events'.
By which I mean Casino could be correct that the West Lancs 10% swing doesn't meant a Labour landslide, even if (say, because Sunak goes from bad to worse) Labour do end up winning a landslide.
And vice versa of course.
West Lancs. has trended Labour, since the 1980’s. The Conservatives won it in 1987, when they had a similar national lead to 2019. In the latter election they were 16% adrift.
The demographics ought to favour the Conservatives, being an older, very white, semi-rural electorate. My guess is it’s because of the pull of Merseyside, which just shifts further left with each election.
Different boundaries though. Skelmersdale votes like Liverpool.
The Lib Dems are also staring at a REALLY bad general election, when they would normally hope to benefit from Tory travails
I do not understand their inertia. The tactical move for them is obvious. Come out, loud and proud, as the party of Rejoin the EU immediately (after another referendum). There are enough hardcore Remoaners in southern England and the like to win them quite a few seats, indeed Remoaners tempted by Starmer might vote tactically for the LDs in the hope that they can pressure him towards Rejoin in a hung parliament
What the F are they playing at? This would also bring them much needed attention
It is amazing to me that no UK party is going out there swinging for the Rejoin vote, when the polls are clearly showing Brexit remorse
That's an interesting idea but we need to get more precise with the language on this now. After nearly 7 years you can't be both a Remoaner and a Rejoiner. A Remoaner is passive, pissed off, backwards looking; a Rejoiner is head up, future facing, active.
I avoid analogies as a rule, they're overdone in punditry and can easily slide into a silliness that helps no-one (eg Brexit is like changing a nappy), but a good way to illustrate what I mean here is to imagine your dog has shat on the carpet.
In which case you can (i) sit there looking at it, grumbling at the mess, castigating the dog and yourself for failing to train it properly; or (ii) you can screw that for a game of soldiers and go, "right, let's get this cleared up!" and then think about getting a goldfish.
Option (i) is Remoaning. Option (ii) is the can-do spirit of Rejoin.
I'm a Remoaner btw. I'm still slumped in my chair gazing at the steaming pile of doo doo, chuntering how it shouldn't have happened, "why oh why oh why", unable (yet) to get up and do anything about it. But one day (and I'll let everyone know when this happens) I'll snap out of this and then I'll be a Remoaner no more. I'll be a Rejoiner.
The thing is you and I didn't want the dog in the first place. Indeed, we raised some questions of what would happen to the cream carpets and the reasonably nice furniture. But we were overruled by our other half and their parents. This sort of thing happens, and is one of the spices of life. But they're not cleaning the mess up either, and sometimes hint that it's our fault for not training the dog properly.
And the worst of it? It's getting to the point where we probably could phone up Battersea Dog's Home and ask them to take Nigel the Bulldog away. But we'd feel like utter scumbags for doing that. At least today we would...
‘you and I didn’t want the dog in the first place’
=
‘These people never wanted to be parents in the first place”
Brexit = Baby remains the greatest analogy in the history of PB - maybe in the history of humanity. We can only hope that one day the immortal @SeanT might one day *Rejoin* pb
The analogy falls down because having a baby isn't that difficult and is a source of joy and fulfillment to the parents from day one. I'd say that Brexit is more like having a shit, one that turns out to be an unflushable turd. All that strain, followed by a bad smell and lingering embarrassment.
Post-natal depression is not uncommon, and can be particularly difficult to deal with because you're supposed to be happy about having a baby.
Will the Brexit baby blues pass?
I'd say they lifted when it became clear we'd get vaccinated before most of Europe. If we just stick at steadily choosing to do the right thing for the UK, and diverging sensibly where necessary, those types of advantages will occur more frequently. It seems to me actually very hard work to be as shit at being out of the EU as we are at the moment.
We were vaccinated before most of the rest of Europe because we have (probably) the best pharma industry in Europe. The vaccine "thing" is the Brexit apologists only argument and it is as vacuous and nonsensical as their lying bus slogan.
Nah that's utter rubbish. You are just trying to rewrite history to suit your own agenda. You are claiming that various EU countries just sat around refusing to authorise vaccines because they wanted to? They did it because, in spite of what the rules might have said about emergency approvals, the EU were desperate to have a united front on vaccines and acted on that basis.
There is an excellent article from Politico.eu about this which is worth reading as it sets out just what went so wrong with the EU vaccine response.
"Countries can’t just follow the U.K.’s lead by unilaterally authorizing vaccines purchased by the EU — doses purchased by Brussels can only be released after they get the EMA’s signoff, according to the agreement. So even though Budapest tried to make a point by green-lighting the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab, it won’t get any shots before the rest of the bloc."
Honestly Richard, did you read that article?
"France and Spain separately began talks with Moderna, according to the Commission official. By mid-April, Paris and Berlin started negotiating together to buy vaccines, according to an Elysée official.
EU27 health ministers signed off on a Commission plan to buy on their behalf on June 12. But the Franco-German initiative continued to press forward, having invited the Netherlands and Italy to join their buyers’ club. "
Granted, France and Germany decided ultimately to stop their 'Inclusive Vaccine Alliance' and join in with the EU scheme but there was no necessity to do that, no compulsion.
If there was no necessity ir compulsion, why did they do it? Doing so was clearly a shit idea.
You'd have to ask them but I assume: 1. They wanted to support EU cohesion and 2. Maybe felt they'd get a better deal with a the EU acting as a bloc.
And, ultimately, it wasn't that stupid an idea. Suppliers would love to play one government off against the other; see PPE in the early days.
Whether it was the right thing in this situation, I don't know. But it wasn't that terrible a plan, and every nation for themselves might not work as well for the UK next time.
This could help the Tories. I know how much childcare costs impacts so many voters.
The Treasury is considering a proposal to massively expand free childcare to one- and two-year-olds in England in a move that would cost billions at the spring budget.
Department for Education officials have submitted a plan for a free 30-hours-a-week entitlement for working parents of children aged nine months to three years, after being asked to work up options by the Treasury.
Other options include offering a smaller number of free hours for two-year-olds, an offer of 10 free hours for disadvantaged one-year-olds, and adjusting the ratios for childcare providers to allow adults to look after more children.
It comes after Labour signalled it would make a transformational offer to parents at the next election, with the shadow education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, pledging a modern childcare system that works from the end of parental leave until the end of primary school.
This could help the Tories. I know how much childcare costs impacts so many voters.
The Treasury is considering a proposal to massively expand free childcare to one- and two-year-olds in England in a move that would cost billions at the spring budget.
Department for Education officials have submitted a plan for a free 30-hours-a-week entitlement for working parents of children aged nine months to three years, after being asked to work up options by the Treasury.
Other options include offering a smaller number of free hours for two-year-olds, an offer of 10 free hours for disadvantaged one-year-olds, and adjusting the ratios for childcare providers to allow adults to look after more children.
It comes after Labour signalled it would make a transformational offer to parents at the next election, with the shadow education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, pledging a modern childcare system that works from the end of parental leave until the end of primary school.
The Sure Start in the next street is just re opening. Course. It's a "Family Hub". Not a Sure Start at all. Not in the slightest.
On dearie me no. Can't possibly admit that the Tories fucked up several year cohorts. Not if they can't afford privakte kindergarten and private school and posh public [sic] schools. That really was a bad decision, and it is jnot much consolation it has been reversed somewhat.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Which is the plan imo. A core vote strategy aimed not at winning but on coming a solid second. That way you avoid a gamechanging collapse, protect your Big Two status, and it's only a matter of time before you get back in again. Could be quite a long time, since certain things and people need to be faced and dealt with, but what's a decade or so in the long run of things. Question is will it work? What does True Blue + Hard Brexit add up to? Is it enough? I don't know.
I think they would do better to rally the base they have lost - the Christian Democrat One Nation centrists who believe in social democratic capitalist democracy.
Sadly the leadership of that group - good people on the whole - spent decades made the error of failing to shape the EU in ways that the UK could unitedly rally round and their excellent general ideology can't yet find its way back to political coherence.
Sunak could and should be their flag bearer. SKS is in fact the nearest thing there is.
It would be a very risky play for this coming GE though. Starmer Labour is close to that and also has Time For A Change going for them. If the Cons go for that and fail, in the process losing support on the harder right, they could be reduced to a rump. Which would be just as painful as it sounds.
I'm slow to catch-up on the West Lancashire by-election news but I'm not sure a 10.5% swing points at a Labour landslide, let alone a Tory wipeout. And turnout was woeful.
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
Which is the plan imo. A core vote strategy aimed not at winning but on coming a solid second. That way you avoid a gamechanging collapse, protect your Big Two status, and it's only a matter of time before you get back in again. Could be quite a long time, since certain things and people need to be faced and dealt with, but what's a decade or so in the long run of things. Question is will it work? What does True Blue + Hard Brexit add up to? Is it enough? I don't know.
Its absolutely the plan.
When you can't win, you play De-fence.
It's what Hague did in 2001 and I suspect what Rishi will do too. He will get reamed for it on here and in the chatterati press, with most supporters keeping their heads down, but it's how he ensures he gets some votes (rather than none at all) and the Conservative Party lives to fight another day.
Unless RefUK overtakes the Tories as the main party of the right, under FPTP the Conservatives will always live to fight another day
This is what I'm driving it. For this GE - and I mean just this one - it's more important for you guys to not leak to the right than slug it out for the middle. Don't you agree?
This could help the Tories. I know how much childcare costs impacts so many voters.
The Treasury is considering a proposal to massively expand free childcare to one- and two-year-olds in England in a move that would cost billions at the spring budget.
Department for Education officials have submitted a plan for a free 30-hours-a-week entitlement for working parents of children aged nine months to three years, after being asked to work up options by the Treasury.
Other options include offering a smaller number of free hours for two-year-olds, an offer of 10 free hours for disadvantaged one-year-olds, and adjusting the ratios for childcare providers to allow adults to look after more children.
It comes after Labour signalled it would make a transformational offer to parents at the next election, with the shadow education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, pledging a modern childcare system that works from the end of parental leave until the end of primary school.
I remember about a decade ago I had two kids under two at nursery. Every day they were both in nursery cost me about £90, which was about as much as I earned in a day after tax. The only reason for me to work was so I still had a job by the time they went to school. Children are pretty much unaffordable for average income earners. I'm not saying this is the solution I'd have chosen, but at least it's A solution, which is more than we've had in the 21st century. Best massively-expensive public spending pledge of my lifetime, if it comes off.
I'm no fan of this iteration of the Conservative Party, nor of Boris Johnson - who I was criticising whilst many on here were still proclaiming him as the next Jesus. I have zero view on Lee Anderson, as I've not been following it. I've also repeatedly said we need a GE soon.
Trying to insinuate that my position on Starmer's stupidity over the curry event is some sort of party-political hit job is way off base. Starmer was wrong to do it, and it's interesting for a reason: it has implications for the sort of PM he'll be.
You are weirdly obsessed with currygate.
The cops investigated. No case to answer. Not guilty. Move on.
Not the whole story though was it. Starmer very astutely raised the stakes with his 'I'll resign if fined' schtick. So the plod had the choice of no case to asnwer vs bringing down the LOTO over a trivial offence, and blinked.
I'm no fan of this iteration of the Conservative Party, nor of Boris Johnson - who I was criticising whilst many on here were still proclaiming him as the next Jesus. I have zero view on Lee Anderson, as I've not been following it. I've also repeatedly said we need a GE soon.
Trying to insinuate that my position on Starmer's stupidity over the curry event is some sort of party-political hit job is way off base. Starmer was wrong to do it, and it's interesting for a reason: it has implications for the sort of PM he'll be.
You are weirdly obsessed with currygate.
The cops investigated. No case to answer. Not guilty. Move on.
I love the way brainless Labourites respond to the first mention of something by someone with accusations of obsession. I've answered that below, but I might suggest you up your game a little.
let me ask a little question; a useful one in many circumstances. How would you have responded if it was the other way around? If it had been a Conservative LOTO in the same situation? Come now, be honest.
Surely Durham police would allow justice to run is course and Starmer's vow to resign should have no bearing on the outcome. What was more worrying was a whole raft of young Downing Street interns got multiple fines and it transpired that the Met forgot to investigate Johnson when it came to the more egregious breaches.
I think Johnson should have been investigated by Gray, and the Met was a handy smokescreen to delay the damage of that report, and it worked, if it hadn't been for that pesky Pincher. Sunak was "ambushed by a cake", Johnson was not. All a waste of time in my view. Gray should have felled Johnson, and she might have if it hadn't been for the Met. who should have gone nowhere near it (thanks Cressida!).
Currygate was a partisan diversion concocted by Ivo Delingpole, BigG., the Mail, Express and the Sun, all political foes of Starmer. There was never anything to see, and Durham Police made a poor call by succumbing to these politically partisan actors.
"Surely Durham police would allow justice to run is course and Starmer's vow to resign should have no bearing on the outcome."
If you believe that then I have a bridge... (etc etc)
I do believe that Durham Police followed due process, and I have already contributed to a £63m invisible Garden Bridge thank you.
Comments
More than 70% of Romanians believe that Russia is to blame for the war in Ukraine, and more than half believe that Ukraine will win, according to an INSCOP poll.
87.3% of Romanians agree with the statement: “Russian leaders should be convicted of war crimes in Ukraine”, 7.7% disagree and 4.9% do not know or do not answer.
Better luck next time....
https://twitter.com/every_station/status/1623740404016218114
The cost was £15 million for the station itself, and £42 million when associated works were included.
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2023/02/i-have-stewart-mcdonalds-emails/
The reason countries from Estonia to Ukraine abandon Russia is because is a shit country that oppresses and drains any country under its domination. No-one that isn't in the web of corruption wants anything to do with it. Its in the criminal, exploitative culture of the place. Ever since the Duchy of Muscovy started selling out its fellow Rus states to curry favor with Mongolian overlords.
The other one, I said "Build" and was completely wrong. It's now accepted that you Buy and tinker unless there's some massive sensitivity issue. I was guilty of pushing a corporate line - we were building and spending shedloads. Big 'jobs for mates' enterprise scheme, it was. Course you often see things clearer looking back than at the time. At the time I thought it made sense. I wonder if you still get lots of money indiscriminately sprayed around in the City? I'd be pleasantly surprised if not.
I also thought it was a good solid wine, balanced with decent fruit and not too jammy. Worth saying there are others of similar quality for the same sort of price, including some supermarket own label particularly from South Africa (where the exchange rate helps) and Southern France.
I find it's easier to get good mid-quality red wines from the new world for under a tenner than white wines. Some SA Chenin gets there but otherwise the cheaper whites tend to be a bit more variable whereas cheap whites from specific European regions are a bit easier to predict.
I am so glad Novara Media are no longer relevant. They are Putin's puppets.
Small dip by the conservatives; let's see what next week brings - half term holidays for some.
It's amazing how so many Corbynites think that supporting one nation defending itself counts as warmongering.
It's like they've never once considered some things might be justified to fight for.
LAB: 47% (-1)
CON: 26% (+2)
LDM: 10% (+1)
REF: 8% (+2)
GRN: 4% (-1)
SNP: 4% (=)
Via @Omnisis, On 9-10 February,
Changes w/ 3 February.
https://twitter.com/DanNeidle/status/1624028088022564866?s=20&t=iSdpusjmd_5cv4L6nc9MEg
I don't expect Starmer is hugely upset that one of the party's Corbynite troublemakers is the one under the spotlight.
Lab 474
Con 88
SNP 47
LD 18.
Labour majority of 298.
Those are quite ginormous figures which we have become somewhat inured to.
Interesting article, if a bit of a shameless plug by Rees for his book Hitler and Stalin: The Tyrants and the Second World War
Have any PB-ers read it? Is it any good?
There were bigger swings against Labour in the 2005-2010 Parliament in a variety of by-elections, including Crewe & Nantwich, Norwich North, Sedgefield, and Glasgow East.
I think an awful lot turns on whether the Conservatives can rally their base.
The digital, culture, media and sport select committee is to publish its conclusions on Sunday, after a two-hour grilling of Sharp about his role as a go-between with Sam Blyth, Johnson’s distant cousin, and Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, before No 10 gave him the job overseeing the BBC in 2021.
Two committee members have indicated that the group will rebuke Sharp for his failure to disclose his role in the loan during the selection process.
“The mood among the group was for the report to be tough,” said one. “There was disappointment not only about his failure to declare this important information but also by his testimony and refusal to accept that he had done anything wrong. It was the wrong approach for him to take.”
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/mps-to-condemn-bbc-chief-richard-sharps-appointment-over-link-to-johnson-htd6pqbsl
Labour got barely half of the votes they got in the same seat in 2019. Where were the other half plus all the new converts?
Hmm.
In Bangkok it is a lifesaver for a boozer like me. They now stock it in 7-11s and at £11 a pop it is better than anything equivalent. Jacobs creek is £13-15 and notably worse, everything else remotely drinkable is £20 and also unreliable
Thai wine taxes are ludicrous
There is an excellent article from Politico.eu about this which is worth reading as it sets out just what went so wrong with the EU vaccine response.
https://www.politico.eu/article/europe-coronavirus-vaccine-struggle-pfizer-biontech-astrazeneca/
From the article
"Countries can’t just follow the U.K.’s lead by unilaterally authorizing vaccines purchased by the EU — doses purchased by Brussels can only be released after they get the EMA’s signoff, according to the agreement. So even though Budapest tried to make a point by green-lighting the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab, it won’t get any shots before the rest of the bloc."
There are a lot of people who will put a clothes peg on their noses and vote Tory to hobble an overwhelming Labour victory, if that's what looks likely to happen.
In the 2005 there were two of these (if you exclude the vanity by election of David Davis)
First there was Bromley & Chislehurst
Tory vote went down by 11.1% and Labour went down by 11.6%
The other one was Henley.
The Tories went up 3.4% and Labour went down by 15.6%
1 The Britain Elects MRP got the score pretty much bang on;
https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1623863755284140033
2 Andrew Teale's preview of the seat said it was likely to be fairly unswingy , because of the makeup of the seat;
https://medium.com/britainelects/previewing-the-west-lancashire-parliamentary-by-election-and-the-five-local-by-elections-of-9th-2e0a8416de3
But that's very personal. It's quaffable and cheap.
It very rarely is. Everyone in that situation knows when in doubt disclose, and to say you didn't know or didn't get how it looks is to declare yourself an utter fool.
Yes, this is midterm, but it is pretty bad even though it is midterm. It's also midterm 13 years in.
And I question the assumption that people will likely hold their noses to hobble an overwhelming victory - some people think that is what happened in 2017, but it certainly didn't happen in 2019 even though the polls at least were clear it would be a big win. So it definitely doesn't always happen.
(*Sharp should just resign obvs.)
Labour got a much bigger swing in the Newham North East by-election in 1994, and they already had 58% of the vote. Same in the Dagenham by-election in the same year. Same in Bradford South. Same in Barking. All safe Labour seats.
There's a bit of wishful/herd thinking going on here.
I'm providing an alternative view on here, which is being heavily challenged because it goes against the consensus and people fear there's something in it.
There's more evidence for my view from past elections than there is for the idea that the whole centre-right coalition will simply give up, disappear and acquiesce in a Labour landslide.
I now expect to be told those are all different too because Reasons.
I'm interested in the betting.
I'm not seeing the evidence for a landslide and I might even think about my Labour majority position again off the back of this.
Hence the defensive likes for those posts they think are refuting it.
The Tory base is both altering shape, becoming less of a base and gives the appearance of not being united behind a rational and defensible ideology or understanding of the world.
We are in post-Brexit land. Both previous post Brexit elections have been weird in well remembered ways and hopefully unrepeatable ways. The next will be by far the most 'normal' of the post Brexit elections, a place we have never been before.
There is no Jezza, Boris, Blair or Maggie anywhere in sight.
What will voters do? No idea, except that 'Time For A Change' is the winning slogan. So the Tories won't win. Beyond that....
We are having a civilised, evidenced disagreement about the import of a minor by
election. At least to my mind.
Who is correct will only come out in time.
"France and Spain separately began talks with Moderna, according to the Commission official. By mid-April, Paris and Berlin started negotiating together to buy vaccines, according to an Elysée official.
EU27 health ministers signed off on a Commission plan to buy on their behalf on June 12. But the Franco-German initiative continued to press forward, having invited the Netherlands and Italy to join their buyers’ club. "
Granted, France and Germany decided ultimately to stop their 'Inclusive Vaccine Alliance' and join in with the EU scheme but there was no necessity to do that, no compulsion.
When you can't win, you play De-fence.
It's what Hague did in 2001 and I suspect what Rishi will do too. He will get reamed for it on here and in the chatterati press, with most supporters keeping their heads down, but it's how he ensures he gets some votes (rather than none at all) and the Conservative Party lives to fight another day.
But, I can promise you I am reviewing my betting positions of the back of this.
Sadly the leadership of that group - good people on the whole - spent decades made the error of failing to shape the EU in ways that the UK could unitedly rally round and their excellent general ideology can't yet find its way back to political coherence.
Sunak could and should be their flag bearer. SKS is in fact the nearest thing there is.
Both West Lancs and Stretford(/Davyhulme) are the inverse of Leigh and Newcastle under Lyme - they have had a long term drift to the left.
I wonder whether those seats were trending Labour though? They sound like the kind of inner city seats where Labour's vote was going up year on year owing to shifting demographics. Three of them are in London.
Also, wasn't the W Lancs result pretty much bang in line with the MRP polling pointing to a big Labour win?
I'm not trying to dismiss your argument, just kicking the tyres.
By which I mean Casino could be correct that the West Lancs 10% swing doesn't meant a Labour landslide, even if (say, because Sunak goes from bad to worse) Labour do end up winning a landslide.
And vice versa of course.
By which time normal people wanted neither to win and sanity to return. SFAICS only the Friends of Stalin's Fellow Travellers went to the polls without holding their noses.
No-one won, and the return to sanity is, as infant teachers say, working towards Level l.
In 2024 the voters will want a winner. There is currently available a decent fairly centrist chap who in all probability won't order boat loads of refugees to be machine gunned in the water, and isn't a friend of Stalin. May our luck hold.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Hemsworth_by-election
Only a 5.5% swing to Labour in a Lab safe seat, 39% turnout. All while Labour were 20 - 30% ahead in the polls.
Of course at the next election Labour barely scraped a majority... of 179.
(Edit: see also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Barnsley_East_by-election - similar seat, only a 3% swing to Labour)
Some demographics (older working people) have swung a lot from Con to Lab since 2019. Others haven't. The young and poor haven't, because they were insanely left-leaning already. Retired homeowners have largely stayed loyal to the Conservatives, because all this stuff hasn't really hurt them.
So maybe W Lancs didn't swing because the voters aren't swingers. I'm not saying this is what's happened, but it wouldn't be crazy.
It has areas which vote like Liverpool. And areas which vote like rural N Lancs.
There are more of the former than latter, so it is a Labour seat.
You pays your money, you takes your choice.
Sunak is not Cameron, Starmer is not Ed Miliband.
This is the election if John Smith had faced John Major.
The demographics ought to favour the Conservatives, being an older, very white, semi-rural electorate. My guess is it’s because of the pull of Merseyside, which just shifts further left with each election. It would be a Tory seat, if it were located in the West Midlands or Yorkshire.
The Treasury is considering a proposal to massively expand free childcare to one- and two-year-olds in England in a move that would cost billions at the spring budget.
Department for Education officials have submitted a plan for a free 30-hours-a-week entitlement for working parents of children aged nine months to three years, after being asked to work up options by the Treasury.
Other options include offering a smaller number of free hours for two-year-olds, an offer of 10 free hours for disadvantaged one-year-olds, and adjusting the ratios for childcare providers to allow adults to look after more children.
It comes after Labour signalled it would make a transformational offer to parents at the next election, with the shadow education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, pledging a modern childcare system that works from the end of parental leave until the end of primary school.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/feb/10/treasury-considering-huge-expansion-free-childcare-england
Whether it was the right thing in this situation, I don't know. But it wasn't that terrible a plan, and every nation for themselves might not work as well for the UK next time.
Course. It's a "Family Hub". Not a Sure Start at all. Not in the slightest.
Britain is still falling apart, the U.S. is getting on with its infrastructure bill.
https://massivesci.com/notes/poop-feces-dung-defense-butt-month/