Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
Boris spent his popularity on partying, wallpaper and groping.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
I suspect a tax cut for rich foreigners in central London isn't high on vote winning measures.
VAT Free shopping used to be a big draw for non-EU visitors, but the PM (when Chancellor) decided to scrap it completely rather than extend it to EU countries after we left.
Almost every other country that imposes VAT, allows refunds for goods that are being permanently exported. Shops, especially high-end shops, will be losing a fortune as people choose to visit somewhere else rather than UK.
A reduction in visitor numbers, also costs the Treasury the VAT on the items they consume when in the UK.
The idea that there would be a significant boost to the UK economy by extra tourists coming so that they can buy imported designer tat at a slightly low price seems doubtful.
And a government offering a tax cut for rich tourists when many voters are suffering from inflation is not going to happen.
This is especially true when we currently have a government which is already damaged on 'one rule for you and another rule for us' grounds.
Do you think that people would be happy having to pay VAT on clothes at ASDA when a tourist doesn't at Harrods ?
We should want the world’s rich people to visit the UK, and spend like bandits when they visit. Tourism is brilliant for the economy, and the VAT anomaly simply makes the UK a more expensive place to go shopping.
Real-world example. I want to buy a bike, a Brompton, costs around £1,000 + VAT. That means that it’s currently £1,050 in Dubai, and £1,200 in London.
If I visit London from Dubai, and I can buy the bike for £1,000, I’m going to buy it in London, if I have to pay £1,200, I’ll buy it in Dubai and the UK retailer will miss out on the sale.
The UK retail sector has been on its knees since the pandemic, and short-sighted thinking from the government is making the situation worse for them.
Perhaps I don’t just want a bike, perhaps I might also pick up a new iPhone, some clothes and some jewellery for my wife while I’m there. Maybe we go to Paris instead of London, they still have VAT-free shopping there.
In fact, perhaps rich Brits will start going on shopping holidays to Paris, or perhaps department stores will set up in Calais, like the old booze shops used to. All money lost to the UK retail sector.
There are conservatives and radicals in both parties.
Corbyn, Johnson, Truss are radicals. Starmer, Major, Brown, May are conservatives. Blair & Thatcher a bit of both, depending on the topic and their mood. Perhaps being able to please both was what made them both electorally very popular.
Not quite sure where Sunak fits to be honest. Probably conservative more than radical but leading a party still dominated by radicals.
It has little to do with left or right imo.
I found Corbyn conservative
In what sense?
Always turning the clock back to tired hackneyed ideas. Nothing really new.
I agree. He was very Conservative, very little radical at all.
I suspect a tax cut for rich foreigners in central London isn't high on vote winning measures.
VAT Free shopping used to be a big draw for non-EU visitors, but the PM (when Chancellor) decided to scrap it completely rather than extend it to EU countries after we left.
Almost every other country that imposes VAT, allows refunds for goods that are being permanently exported. Shops, especially high-end shops, will be losing a fortune as people choose to visit somewhere else rather than UK.
A reduction in visitor numbers, also costs the Treasury the VAT on the items they consume when in the UK.
The idea that there would be a significant boost to the UK economy by extra tourists coming so that they can buy imported designer tat at a slightly low price seems doubtful.
To be fair, Bicester Village is a massive tourist draw, and its entire shtick is imported designer tat at a slightly low price.
But I agree that whatever the economics of it, the optics are so bad that it’s a non-starter.
Not to mention that the concept of encouraging rich people to fly around the world so that they can pay less tax on designer tat purchases is environmentally unsound.
Talking of columnists/commentators with far too much to say for themselves I still often go back and have a good laugh at this masterpiece from the absurd Andrew Neil from 23rd September 2023 - singing the praises of the mini-budget.
Why anyone, anywhere, takes Neil seriously after he wrote this column is beyond me 😂
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
I suspect a tax cut for rich foreigners in central London isn't high on vote winning measures.
VAT Free shopping used to be a big draw for non-EU visitors, but the PM (when Chancellor) decided to scrap it completely rather than extend it to EU countries after we left.
Almost every other country that imposes VAT, allows refunds for goods that are being permanently exported. Shops, especially high-end shops, will be losing a fortune as people choose to visit somewhere else rather than UK.
A reduction in visitor numbers, also costs the Treasury the VAT on the items they consume when in the UK.
The idea that there would be a significant boost to the UK economy by extra tourists coming so that they can buy imported designer tat at a slightly low price seems doubtful.
And a government offering a tax cut for rich tourists when many voters are suffering from inflation is not going to happen.
This is especially true when we currently have a government which is already damaged on 'one rule for you and another rule for us' grounds.
Do you think that people would be happy having to pay VAT on clothes at ASDA when a tourist doesn't at Harrods ?
We should want the world’s rich people to visit the UK, and spend like bandits when they visit. Tourism is brilliant for the economy, and the VAT anomaly simply makes the UK a more expensive place to go shopping.
Real-world example. I want to buy a bike, a Brompton, costs around £1,000 + VAT. That means that it’s currently £1,050 in Dubai, and £1,200 in London.
If I visit London from Dubai, and I can buy the bike for £1,000, I’m going to buy it in London, if I have to pay £1,200, I’ll buy it in Dubai and the UK retailer will miss out on the sale.
The UK retail sector has been on its knees since the pandemic, and short-sighted thinking from the government is making the situation worse for them.
Perhaps I don’t just want a bike, perhaps I might also pick up a new iPhone, some clothes and some jewellery for my wife while I’m there. Maybe we go to Paris instead of London, they still have VAT-free shopping there.
In fact, perhaps rich Brits will start going on shopping holidays to Paris, or perhaps department stores will set up in Calais, like the old booze shops used to. All money lost to the UK retail sector.
Isn't UK VAT is due on personal items imported to the UK ?
"no way on Earth are the Tories polling under a third of the popular vote"
It would be interesting to know what you think the Tories would have to do to merit that.
I mean, that the last three or four Tories leaders haven't done already.
The Conservative Party merits being set on fire and thrown down a thousand foot mineshaft, immediately followed by a lengthy pour of quick setting cement. This does not mean it's going to happen. Even John Major in 1997 managed about 31% of the vote, and we're dealing with an older electorate and a grey porridge of a Labour Opposition this time around.
Besides, I know I keep coming back to this point ad nauseam, but it's only because I think it's very important: not nearly everyone is suffering from the current socio-economic car crash. There's a large cohort of Boomer homeowners - bought dirt cheap council houses under Thatcher, benefit from older style occupational pensions as well as the triple lock, altogether very comfortable - for whom the Conservatives have delivered in spades. Older Gen-Xers, who also managed to get on the property ladder when it was still fairly easy to do so, are coasting towards their own gold-plated retirements, and are looking forward to receiving both their triple locked pensions and enormous inheritances over the next 10-15 years, will also feel not wholly unsympathetic towards they who made all of this possible.
We also have to remember that the electoral system itself favours the two large parties, because most voters who passionately hate one of the main parties will vote negatively for the other, even if they think it is rubbish, because they view the alternative as even worse. There's a substantial number of Never Labour voters out there, and the polarising effects of Brexit and the Corbyn experiment will have increased their numbers.
We may still be getting polls coming out with outrageous shares like Lab 51, Con 24, but come a GE the likelihood of anything like that is surely remote in the extreme?
I suspect a tax cut for rich foreigners in central London isn't high on vote winning measures.
VAT Free shopping used to be a big draw for non-EU visitors, but the PM (when Chancellor) decided to scrap it completely rather than extend it to EU countries after we left.
Almost every other country that imposes VAT, allows refunds for goods that are being permanently exported. Shops, especially high-end shops, will be losing a fortune as people choose to visit somewhere else rather than UK.
A reduction in visitor numbers, also costs the Treasury the VAT on the items they consume when in the UK.
The idea that there would be a significant boost to the UK economy by extra tourists coming so that they can buy imported designer tat at a slightly low price seems doubtful.
And a government offering a tax cut for rich tourists when many voters are suffering from inflation is not going to happen.
This is especially true when we currently have a government which is already damaged on 'one rule for you and another rule for us' grounds.
Do you think that people would be happy having to pay VAT on clothes at ASDA when a tourist doesn't at Harrods ?
We should want the world’s rich people to visit the UK, and spend like bandits when they visit. Tourism is brilliant for the economy, and the VAT anomaly simply makes the UK a more expensive place to go shopping.
Real-world example. I want to buy a bike, a Brompton, costs around £1,000 + VAT. That means that it’s currently £1,050 in Dubai, and £1,200 in London.
If I visit London from Dubai, and I can buy the bike for £1,000, I’m going to buy it in London, if I have to pay £1,200, I’ll buy it in Dubai and the UK retailer will miss out on the sale.
The UK retail sector has been on its knees since the pandemic, and short-sighted thinking from the government is making the situation worse for them.
Perhaps I don’t just want a bike, perhaps I might also pick up a new iPhone, some clothes and some jewellery for my wife while I’m there. Maybe we go to Paris instead of London, they still have VAT-free shopping there.
In fact, perhaps rich Brits will start going on shopping holidays to Paris, or perhaps department stores will set up in Calais, like the old booze shops used to. All money lost to the UK retail sector.
Isn't UK VAT is due on personal items imported to the UK ?
I suspect a tax cut for rich foreigners in central London isn't high on vote winning measures.
VAT Free shopping used to be a big draw for non-EU visitors, but the PM (when Chancellor) decided to scrap it completely rather than extend it to EU countries after we left.
Almost every other country that imposes VAT, allows refunds for goods that are being permanently exported. Shops, especially high-end shops, will be losing a fortune as people choose to visit somewhere else rather than UK.
A reduction in visitor numbers, also costs the Treasury the VAT on the items they consume when in the UK.
The idea that there would be a significant boost to the UK economy by extra tourists coming so that they can buy imported designer tat at a slightly low price seems doubtful.
And a government offering a tax cut for rich tourists when many voters are suffering from inflation is not going to happen.
This is especially true when we currently have a government which is already damaged on 'one rule for you and another rule for us' grounds.
Do you think that people would be happy having to pay VAT on clothes at ASDA when a tourist doesn't at Harrods ?
We should want the world’s rich people to visit the UK, and spend like bandits when they visit. Tourism is brilliant for the economy, and the VAT anomaly simply makes the UK a more expensive place to go shopping.
Real-world example. I want to buy a bike, a Brompton, costs around £1,000 + VAT. That means that it’s currently £1,050 in Dubai, and £1,200 in London.
If I visit London from Dubai, and I can buy the bike for £1,000, I’m going to buy it in London, if I have to pay £1,200, I’ll buy it in Dubai and the UK retailer will miss out on the sale.
The UK retail sector has been on its knees since the pandemic, and short-sighted thinking from the government is making the situation worse for them.
Perhaps I don’t just want a bike, perhaps I might also pick up a new iPhone, some clothes and some jewellery for my wife while I’m there. Maybe we go to Paris instead of London, they still have VAT-free shopping there.
In fact, perhaps rich Brits will start going on shopping holidays to Paris, or perhaps department stores will set up in Calais, like the old booze shops used to. All money lost to the UK retail sector.
Isn't UK VAT is due on personal items imported to the UK ?
I suspect a tax cut for rich foreigners in central London isn't high on vote winning measures.
VAT Free shopping used to be a big draw for non-EU visitors, but the PM (when Chancellor) decided to scrap it completely rather than extend it to EU countries after we left.
Almost every other country that imposes VAT, allows refunds for goods that are being permanently exported. Shops, especially high-end shops, will be losing a fortune as people choose to visit somewhere else rather than UK.
A reduction in visitor numbers, also costs the Treasury the VAT on the items they consume when in the UK.
The idea that there would be a significant boost to the UK economy by extra tourists coming so that they can buy imported designer tat at a slightly low price seems doubtful.
And a government offering a tax cut for rich tourists when many voters are suffering from inflation is not going to happen.
This is especially true when we currently have a government which is already damaged on 'one rule for you and another rule for us' grounds.
Do you think that people would be happy having to pay VAT on clothes at ASDA when a tourist doesn't at Harrods ?
We should want the world’s rich people to visit the UK, and spend like bandits when they visit. Tourism is brilliant for the economy, and the VAT anomaly simply makes the UK a more expensive place to go shopping.
Real-world example. I want to buy a bike, a Brompton, costs around £1,000 + VAT. That means that it’s currently £1,050 in Dubai, and £1,200 in London.
If I visit London from Dubai, and I can buy the bike for £1,000, I’m going to buy it in London, if I have to pay £1,200, I’ll buy it in Dubai and the UK retailer will miss out on the sale.
The UK retail sector has been on its knees since the pandemic, and short-sighted thinking from the government is making the situation worse for them.
Perhaps I don’t just want a bike, perhaps I might also pick up a new iPhone, some clothes and some jewellery for my wife while I’m there. Maybe we go to Paris instead of London, they still have VAT-free shopping there.
In fact, perhaps rich Brits will start going on shopping holidays to Paris, or perhaps department stores will set up in Calais, like the old booze shops used to. All money lost to the UK retail sector.
Well eek has already done the last
But as I said initially the idea that a government which already has 'one rule for you and another rule for us' issues is going to give a tax cut to rich foreign tourists so that they can fly around the world to boost profits at Harrods would be 'politically brave'.
I suspect a tax cut for rich foreigners in central London isn't high on vote winning measures.
VAT Free shopping used to be a big draw for non-EU visitors, but the PM (when Chancellor) decided to scrap it completely rather than extend it to EU countries after we left.
Almost every other country that imposes VAT, allows refunds for goods that are being permanently exported. Shops, especially high-end shops, will be losing a fortune as people choose to visit somewhere else rather than UK.
A reduction in visitor numbers, also costs the Treasury the VAT on the items they consume when in the UK.
The idea that there would be a significant boost to the UK economy by extra tourists coming so that they can buy imported designer tat at a slightly low price seems doubtful.
And a government offering a tax cut for rich tourists when many voters are suffering from inflation is not going to happen.
This is especially true when we currently have a government which is already damaged on 'one rule for you and another rule for us' grounds.
Do you think that people would be happy having to pay VAT on clothes at ASDA when a tourist doesn't at Harrods ?
We should want the world’s rich people to visit the UK, and spend like bandits when they visit. Tourism is brilliant for the economy, and the VAT anomaly simply makes the UK a more expensive place to go shopping.
Real-world example. I want to buy a bike, a Brompton, costs around £1,000 + VAT. That means that it’s currently £1,050 in Dubai, and £1,200 in London.
If I visit London from Dubai, and I can buy the bike for £1,000, I’m going to buy it in London, if I have to pay £1,200, I’ll buy it in Dubai and the UK retailer will miss out on the sale.
The UK retail sector has been on its knees since the pandemic, and short-sighted thinking from the government is making the situation worse for them.
Perhaps I don’t just want a bike, perhaps I might also pick up a new iPhone, some clothes and some jewellery for my wife while I’m there. Maybe we go to Paris instead of London, they still have VAT-free shopping there.
In fact, perhaps rich Brits will start going on shopping holidays to Paris, or perhaps department stores will set up in Calais, like the old booze shops used to. All money lost to the UK retail sector.
Isn't UK VAT is due on personal items imported to the UK ?
It is, certainly on mail/internet order, and on carrying them into the UK. There is an allowance, but not a huge one.
I suspect a tax cut for rich foreigners in central London isn't high on vote winning measures.
VAT Free shopping used to be a big draw for non-EU visitors, but the PM (when Chancellor) decided to scrap it completely rather than extend it to EU countries after we left.
Almost every other country that imposes VAT, allows refunds for goods that are being permanently exported. Shops, especially high-end shops, will be losing a fortune as people choose to visit somewhere else rather than UK.
A reduction in visitor numbers, also costs the Treasury the VAT on the items they consume when in the UK.
The idea that there would be a significant boost to the UK economy by extra tourists coming so that they can buy imported designer tat at a slightly low price seems doubtful.
To be fair, Bicester Village is a massive tourist draw, and its entire shtick is imported designer tat at a slightly low price.
But I agree that whatever the economics of it, the optics are so bad that it’s a non-starter.
Not to mention that the concept of encouraging rich people to fly around the world so that they can pay less tax on designer tat purchases is environmentally unsound.
And promoted by the same people who would take enormous offence at a celeb flying around the world for some cause they disagree with.
Talking of columnists/commentators with far too much to say for themselves I still often go back and have a good laugh at this masterpiece from the absurd Andrew Neil from 23rd September 2023 - singing the praises of the mini-budget.
Why anyone, anywhere, takes Neil seriously after he wrote this column is beyond me 😂
Thanks! I see that one of his insights was that the British economy would be rebalanced by increasing the 'My friend went to London and all I got was this lousy T-shirt' sales.
I've already explained how the cut in the 45 per cent top income tax rate could be self-financing. Allowing foreign tourists to shop VAT-free could bring in a lot more visitors and, with them, a lot more taxable spending power.
I suppose one way to deal with the red Tory patter is to lean right into it.
Keith can say what he likes but the problem will be taking the Labour Party with him. Blair managed to do New Labour after changing the party fundamentally including a lot of their MPs.
In the 2024 parliament Starmer will have to put up with a lot of the MP's elected under Jezza in 2017 and 2019 and unlike Blair, who had a 180 seat majority, Starmer will be lucky if he has any majority at all.
Very quickly Starmers government will be doing daily "hand to hand combat" just to stay afloat IMO... The next Parliament is not going to be a happy one.
I agree. The Conservatives losing more than half their 2019 vote in an actual GE doesn't really feel credible. We are still in the midterms, and much of the vote is on strike and making it's displeasure known.
But, it's tactical voting that might get Labour to a majority, even if this does recover.
I am keeping balanced on both outcomes with 295-345 seats +/- 10% being my central forecast at this stage.
That's what I would do if I were punting on this.
Mike's right, and his advice is sound, but there's another relevant opinion here. It's Peter Kellner's dictum that those who don't know don't vote. Even if tactical voting doesn't take the Tories down, stay-at-homes might.
So I might make that margin for error bigger if I were you, CR. Or.....
I would follow another piece of advice from the legendary punter Alan Potts:
'No bet is no problem'.
Yes, that's a fair point Peter.
So 295-345 is a center point of 320.
Shift that 10% up and we get a center point of 352, with an upper range of 377 in your 50 spread. That leaves Others with 273, and a Labour majority of 104.
Shift it 10% down and we get a lower range of 263, which is Labour short by 63.
That's quite a spread for a single apparently narrow prediction!
(It's also 8am on a Saturday so I'm quite willing to believe I've overlooked some maths!)
Yes, I'm not looking to impress anyone here by a crystal ball prediction 18 months ahead. I have no idea what the election result will be, and nor does anyone else, so I am calibrating my betting accordingly.
I will refine it more in the last 2-3 months. But even then it's very easy for 20-30 seats to go the "wrong" way because plenty will hinge on just a few hundred votes and tactical voting, or not, which is impossible to predict with any certainty.
Since my main objective is to generate a tax-free profit that comfortably beats ISAs and the equity markets, I will hedge my bets if I feel I need to do so!
Why DO we ban them as a matter of interest? Is it to stop pro-Kremlin war propaganda being posted here?
There are a few impressionable types who might be swayed back to their pre-invasion of Ukraine pro-Putin ways.
Ah ok. Yes there has been rather less 'Putin is spot on about the weak woke west' punditry since he had the temerity to launch an unprovoked bloody war. It's about the only benefit I can think of.
The main sense I get from Casino is "this is what I think, I am right, so if you don't think this you must be wrong". Followed by "you still don't agree with me? You must be MAD"
It is very clear and simple - the polls and the locals show the way to a ruthless ABC vote. If that continues to be the public's driver, and they carry this out at the GE then not only do Labour win, they do so with a comfortable majority. Whats more they will find scores of friendlies on the opposition bench (LDs, Greens, Alliance etc) giving them a very comfortable majority to drive through the kind of reforms that will make the pro-Golliwog types cry.
Swingback to the Tories is absolutely possible, made more possible if Labour do something really dumb or something mad sticks in the throat during campaigning (such as "or a coalition of chaos with Ed Milliband"). Possible, but as long as the Tories fixate on winning only the votes of the racist and/or stupid and repel their previous core vote, surely they are doomed.
Perhaps Sunak needs to do a Major. Put up or shut up. Challenge the Boris lobby to take him out or do one. Deselect the worst offenders. And then have Hunt do retail politics Tory style. That could win back the voters who otherwise have gone and won't come back for 24.
You confuse my personal politics (where I have strong views) with my betting.
I don't. You'd be well advised to read my betting posts in that guise, because I bet to win money- not back my "team".
Talking of columnists/commentators with far too much to say for themselves I still often go back and have a good laugh at this masterpiece from the absurd Andrew Neil from 23rd September 2023 - singing the praises of the mini-budget.
Why anyone, anywhere, takes Neil seriously after he wrote this column is beyond me 😂
Thanks! I see that one of his insights was that the British economy would be rebalanced by increasing the 'My friend went to London and all I got was this lousy T-shirt' sales.
I've already explained how the cut in the 45 per cent top income tax rate could be self-financing. Allowing foreign tourists to shop VAT-free could bring in a lot more visitors and, with them, a lot more taxable spending power.
Opportunity missed.
I see this exact subject was being independently discussed elsewhere on this thread. I didn't realize that giving tax breaks to foreign tourists was such a totemic issue for the British right.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
Which is why Brexit has pissed off so many natural Conservatives. Totally silly idea with radical dogma and poorly thought through.
The Conservatives won't recover until they repent of Brexitism.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
I don't count myself as being particularly radical. I would like to see a rebalancing of taxation away from earned incomes and towards assets, but I'm not confiscatory. I want capital gains taxed fairly, not preferentially when compared with earnings. I want reasonable levels of taxation to be imposed on the country's immense store of property wealth, especially given how skewed home ownership is towards older people who also consume such a large share of the Government's resources. I don't think that the positions I espouse would look too out of place in the platform of a European social democratic movement.
The problem, of course, is that Britain isn't a typical European country. We labour under the cumulative burden of a stagnant, rotting economy that revolves around bricks and mortar rather than productive activity, allied to the fact that the people who make the most demands upon the state also control most of the wealth and expect not to be asked to give any of it up.
There are simply too many voters with too much to lose from a regime of land value taxes and higher extraction from capital gains and inheritances. Labour is too frightened of upsetting the well-off, and low and middle earners have seen their wages squeezed until they have nothing left to give, so all it has left to offer politically is tinkering around the edges (exhibit A: its hypothetical energy windfall tax to pay for the capping of council tax for a year.) It's a very small-c conservative platform, which puts most of the burden of delivering meaningful change on administrative reform. Well, ministers can draft all the new laws and regulations that they like, but it's going to do bugger all to alleviate poverty, facilitate economic development or repair the crumbling edifice of the state.
I'm afraid that the likelihood of the next Government spending inordinate amounts of time trying to decide what to replace the House of Lords with, and debating what fresh powers it does or does not want to ship off to Scotland - whilst more children die of respiratory disease in mouldy houses, and property becomes every more scarce and ever more pricey - is rather high.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
Change can also be voluntary or forced.
If its a voluntary change its usually important that things are thought and planned properly. Failure to do so can lead to failure even if the idea is good.
A forced change, even if its through negative factors, can be good - for example I've reduced my utility energy consumption by about 20%. Something I'll likely continue even if prices fell back to previous levels.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
Change can also be voluntary or forced.
If its a voluntary change its usually important that things are thought and planned properly. Failure to do so can lead to failure even if the idea is good.
A forced change, even if its through negative factors, can be good - for example I've reduced my utility energy consumption by about 20%. Something I'll likely continue even if prices fell back to previous levels.
Isn't the latter more about the market forcing a change to your approach, and how sometimes that can drive innovation?
I can't say I'm a fan of any form of forced change, but I do agree some nudges can, sometimes, have positive effects - charging for plastic bags, for example.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
This may of course be true. But the first point in order of priority for a few million usually Tory voters is that there is an overwhelming case for not having another Tory government in 2024.
In 1997 (when I continued to vote Tory BTW) there was a reasonable case against the government, and an outstanding Labour leader. They won by a mile.
This time Labour is not outstanding. No-one is. It is not a golden age for heroes. The best way of dealing with your point is for Labour to form a government with LD help. This may well happen.
There are only two parties who can lead a government. Once the nation has decided 'Time for a change' the options number precisely One. One more than North Korea, but enough. But Sir Keir needs to revisit his Lords proposal and the votes for children plan.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
To be honest I find it hard to get too anxious about SKS. Its a fair bet that even if the forthcoming Labour government is more radical than they want to let on (and they could hardly be less) blundering incompetence, bureaucratic ineptitude and the overwhelming inertia this country excels at will make it very hard to achieve anything.
Scotland: what's going on with the ferry company Caledonian MacBrayne? Just as the tourist season is taking off, they're not selling any tickets for three days. Absolutely no ticket sales, whether online or in person or over the phone, for sailing on any of their 20+ routes. Are they about to go into administration or something? Have they been told to nail their tills shut? Never heard anything like this before with such a large public transport monopoly.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
Which is why Brexit has pissed off so many natural Conservatives. Totally silly idea with radical dogma and poorly thought through.
The Conservatives won't recover until they repent of Brexitism.
I knew someone would respond (in seconds) with Brexit.
That conflicted across the principle because many Conservatives thought it was riskier to stay because of the radical change that they felt would inevitably come, which was also against their values. If you believe in conserving national sovereignty and independence, and not steadily creeping towards a federal Europe, you won't have had a problem with this.
Too many seem to miss this and focus just on the economic disruption, more often than not because they themselves aren't Conservatives.
The only unConservative bit, in my view, was in the response to the vote itself, which became too dogmatic.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
I don't think that in practice it really means that at all. I think it means laissez faire. In the current climate that means things are going to change beyond all recognition in the next decade or two. If politicians are adopting that policy thoughtlessly, then it's not at all like Conservatism has been historically. In fact it's almost the antithesis of Conservatism. It's abolishing the past in favour of whatever random future is most beneficial to short-sighted big business. If the Tory right think that's Conservatism they're even more stupid than I thought - though admittedly the depths of their stupidity are almost unfathomable.
Scotland: what's going on with the ferry company Caledonian MacBrayne? Just as the tourist season is taking off, they're not selling any tickets for three days. Absolutely no ticket sales for sailing on any of their 20+ routes. Are they about to go into administration or something? Have they been told to nail their tills shut? Never heard anything like this before with such a large public transport monopoly.
CalMac are saying this is planned downtime for scheduled maintenance. But of course this is Scotland. So wait and see.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
The Tories haven't been very conservative since Thatcher. The Cult of Thatcher is very radical, and we can see the current government is always raging against what it identifies as "the blob" that is standing in the way of its attempts to institute year zero style reforms.
There's precious little appreciation of what is right about the country, or of trying to nurture and encourage gradual improvements. There's a very strong sense of them and us, and if you're not one of us then you're one of them, the anti-growth coalition, the blob, enemies of all that is good and right.
I'm naturally quite a cautious person. I find it more instinctive to identify potential problems with suggestions for change. So that sounds quite conservative, but I've always supported rather radical left-wing politics because I can see so much that needs fixing, and so much that doesn't feel like it should be hard to fix.
Most of what I've seen from the Tories over the decades has been the desire to trash the things that I think work at least a bit, and make the things that have gone wrong even worse. If I'd grown up in an era when the Tories were actually more conservative, I don't think I'd now be so reflexively anti-Tory.
Scotland: what's going on with the ferry company Caledonian MacBrayne? Just as the tourist season is taking off, they're not selling any tickets for three days. Absolutely no ticket sales for sailing on any of their 20+ routes. Are they about to go into administration or something? Have they been told to nail their tills shut? Never heard anything like this before with such a large public transport monopoly.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
I do hope Tory strategists go with that line of attack.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
The “extra” VAT on luxury goods is often cited as a reason why Chinese tourism to London is so much lower than to Paris.
Once again, Brexit means making hard choices about how we earn our living. It strikes me that this isn’t even a hard choice.
Yep, there is low hanging fruit and stuff that actually falls off into a convenient basket. We need to do everything we can to boost exports. Its a complete no brainer.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
I don't think that in practice it really means that at all. I think it means laissez faire. In the current climate that means things are going to change beyond all recognition in the next decade or two. If politicians are adopting that policy thoughtlessly, then it's not at all like Conservatism has been historically. In fact it's almost the antithesis of Conservatism. It's abolishing the past in favour of whatever random future is most beneficial to short-sighted big business. If the Tory right think that's Conservatism they're even more stupid than I thought - though admittedly the depths of their stupidity are almost unfathomable.
Conservatism both in people and theory terms contains a multitude of contradictions. In a sense the EU has illustrated this perfectly. There is the Conservative business case - pro EU, Majorite, pragmatic, money making; then there is the socially Conservative case - sovereign, nation, constitution, small scale, hierarchical, the 'little platoons' of Edmund Burke.
(The left and centre left are just as split. But this is less seen because they have not been in power.)
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
I do hope Tory strategists go with that line of attack.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
After the the government's record 2015 - now, taking that approach in a campaign would be a brave move.
And of course by "brave", I mean "utterly mad". It would be laughed off stage in less time than it takes to ban a Russian troll here.
The “extra” VAT on luxury goods is often cited as a reason why Chinese tourism to London is so much lower than to Paris.
Once again, Brexit means making hard choices about how we earn our living. It strikes me that this isn’t even a hard choice.
Yep, there is low hanging fruit and stuff that actually falls off into a convenient basket. We need to do everything we can to boost exports. Its a complete no brainer.
It really is an electoral no brainer - you'd need to have no brains to miss how damaging it would be.
As to economics its very doubtful.
What isn't doubtful is that rich people who do a lot of international travel think its a wonderful idea.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
Which is why Brexit has pissed off so many natural Conservatives. Totally silly idea with radical dogma and poorly thought through.
The Conservatives won't recover until they repent of Brexitism.
I knew someone would respond (in seconds) with Brexit.
That conflicted across the principle because many Conservatives thought it was riskier to stay because of the radical change that they felt would inevitably come, which was also against their values. If you believe in conserving national sovereignty and independence, and not steadily creeping towards a federal Europe, you won't have had a problem with this.
Too many seem to miss this and focus just on the economic disruption, more often than not because they themselves aren't Conservatives.
The only unConservative bit, in my view, was in the response to the vote itself, which became too dogmatic.
When I go to Tesco later I'll see if they'll accept sovereignty to pay my bills.....
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Liz, despite being loony, got one big thing right. Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
Which is why Brexit has pissed off so many natural Conservatives. Totally silly idea with radical dogma and poorly thought through.
The Conservatives won't recover until they repent of Brexitism.
I knew someone would respond (in seconds) with Brexit.
That conflicted across the principle because many Conservatives thought it was riskier to stay because of the radical change that they felt would inevitably come, which was also against their values. If you believe in conserving national sovereignty and independence, and not steadily creeping towards a federal Europe, you won't have had a problem with this.
Too many seem to miss this and focus just on the economic disruption, more often than not because they themselves aren't Conservatives.
The only unConservative bit, in my view, was in the response to the vote itself, which became too dogmatic.
Well, Brexit and its economic consequences is why the Red Wall thinks this government has failed, and why the Blue Wall hates it too. It won the 2019 election but will lose the 2024 one.
Brexit is the political monkeys paw. You get what you wish for and regret it very quickly.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
There’s an argument you can’t really assess her after only a few weeks, and she wasn’t given a chance.
She would have enthused the Tory base and voters with her proper Toryism. She stood up to leaky Sue and sacked her.
Scotland: what's going on with the ferry company Caledonian MacBrayne? Just as the tourist season is taking off, they're not selling any tickets for three days. Absolutely no ticket sales for sailing on any of their 20+ routes. Are they about to go into administration or something? Have they been told to nail their tills shut? Never heard anything like this before with such a large public transport monopoly.
CalMac are saying this is planned downtime for scheduled maintenance. But of course this is Scotland. So wait and see.
CalMac is a wholly owned subsidiary of David MacBrayne Ltd which in turn is wholly owned by the Scottish government. Administration therefore seems unlikely. Mind bending incompetence, of course, is a given.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
The Tories haven't been very conservative since Thatcher. The Cult of Thatcher is very radical, and we can see the current government is always raging against what it identifies as "the blob" that is standing in the way of its attempts to institute year zero style reforms.
You're confusing expressions of frustration by MPs and commentators with actual policy. When did we last see policies from the Tories that were in any way radical? What we've actually had is New Labour in aspic - we may have complaints about 'the Blob', but the march of the blob has continued apace. What actual 'anti-Blob' reforms can you point to?
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
I don't think that in practice it really means that at all. I think it means laissez faire. In the current climate that means things are going to change beyond all recognition in the next decade or two. If politicians are adopting that policy thoughtlessly, then it's not at all like Conservatism has been historically. In fact it's almost the antithesis of Conservatism. It's abolishing the past in favour of whatever random future is most beneficial to short-sighted big business. If the Tory right think that's Conservatism they're even more stupid than I thought - though admittedly the depths of their stupidity are almost unfathomable.
Conservatism both in people and theory terms contains a multitude of contradictions. In a sense the EU has illustrated this perfectly. There is the Conservative business case - pro EU, Majorite, pragmatic, money making; then there is the socially Conservative case - sovereign, nation, constitution, small scale, hierarchical, the 'little platoons' of Edmund Burke.
(The left and centre left are just as split. But this is less seen because they have not been in power.)
I'm sure Conservatism does contain a multitude of contradictions.
But in relation to the technological issues that are now paramount, the ideal of keeping everything as much as possible the same is becoming completely incompatible with the ideal of letting big business do whatever is most profitable.
It would be (a bit) reassuring if the advocates of "Conservatism" here showed a glimmering of awareness of that dichotomy, and (a bit more) reassuring if any of them - on reflection - realised that "laissez faire" is not at all a good idea in present circumstances.
Thatcher was the least "conservative" Tory there has ever been. She was the opposite of conservative.
Well she thought she was reviving 'Victorian virtues'. Unfortunately the christian teaching of that period fell on deaf ears in the late 20th century. I also think that the global market of the late 20th century was a much more destabilising one than what Robert Peel opened us up to in the 1840s whereby greengrocers like Alfred Roberts would be able to sell Jamaican fruit etc.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
There’s an argument you can’t really assess her after only a few weeks, and she wasn’t given a chance.
She would have enthused the Tory base and voters with her proper Toryism. She stood up to leaky Sue and sacked her.
There’s an argument Truss wasn’t doing any harm.
an argument refuted by real world events. Remember she was wandering around doped-up on gods know what for the last few weeks of her time in charge.
Thatcher was the least "conservative" Tory there has ever been. She was the opposite of conservative.
The same person can be a conservative or a radical depending on the circumstances.
Thatcher's radicalism in the 1980s was partly a response to the UK's problems in the 1970s.
She would have been much more conservative in the 1990s because, in her opinion, there would no longer have been the problems requiring radical change.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
To be honest I find it hard to get too anxious about SKS. Its a fair bet that even if the forthcoming Labour government is more radical than they want to let on (and they could hardly be less) blundering incompetence, bureaucratic ineptitude and the overwhelming inertia this country excels at will make it very hard to achieve anything.
Well, there is that. He will still be able to pass a budget and thump us with tax with ease, though.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Liz, despite being loony, got one big thing right. Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
Right. That would be why economic growth is the unquestioned mantra of every elected politician in this country.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
There’s an argument you can’t really assess her after only a few weeks, and she wasn’t given a chance.
She would have enthused the Tory base and voters with her proper Toryism. She stood up to leaky Sue and sacked her.
There’s an argument Truss wasn’t doing any harm.
It's obviously her own fault for not realising that the energy subsidies would affect the reception of her other plans, but it's a shame we don't have the counterfactual where she didn't need to intervene in the market.
The thing the next Labour Government must not do is re-open Brexit.
Brexit was a terrible mistake - but like the water companies that should never have been sold off - we simply cannot do this again. There are new challenges we must face.
Labour will only win by looking forwards. We must see more of that from SKS.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
The Tories haven't been very conservative since Thatcher. The Cult of Thatcher is very radical, and we can see the current government is always raging against what it identifies as "the blob" that is standing in the way of its attempts to institute year zero style reforms.
You're confusing expressions of frustration by MPs and commentators with actual policy. When did we last see policies from the Tories that were in any way radical? What we've actually had is New Labour in aspic - we may have complaints about 'the Blob', but the march of the blob has continued apace. What actual 'anti-Blob' reforms can you point to?
Mr Blobby not been since much since the late nineties. Care to define what on earth the Blob actually is? If its anything the beholder doesnt like, then no, governments can't successfully get rid of it, as its in the eye of the perpetually grumpy beholder.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
Cheer up, flag shagging may become a protected characteristic.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
After the the government's record 2015 - now, taking that approach in a campaign would be a brave move.
And of course by "brave", I mean "utterly mad". It would be laughed off stage in less time than it takes to ban a Russian troll here.
I'm not arguing for an electoral strategy here, I will leave that to savvier brains than mine, but I think its true.
The biggest impact we'll probably see is - absent an economic miracle- Starmer's votint coalition rapidly splintering once he takes office.
He will end up disappointing a lot of people who thought he was on their side but will realise they've been taken for mugs.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Liz, despite being loony, got one big thing right. Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
Right. That would be why economic growth is the unquestioned mantra of every elected politician in this country.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Liz, despite being loony, got one big thing right. Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
I agree. UK economic policy since 2010 has been all about repairing our tax base from the consequences of the GFC and the wall of money that financial services used to throw at the public coffers.13 years on and we have still not managed it, mainly because we have been thrown off course by Covid and Ukraine. If we are to have the public services we collectively believe we deserve we need more profitable businesses in this country generating tax. And yet our political classes rarely even discuss the issue. For them, our current businesses are no more than geese waiting to be plucked.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
The Tories haven't been very conservative since Thatcher. The Cult of Thatcher is very radical, and we can see the current government is always raging against what it identifies as "the blob" that is standing in the way of its attempts to institute year zero style reforms.
You're confusing expressions of frustration by MPs and commentators with actual policy. When did we last see policies from the Tories that were in any way radical? What we've actually had is New Labour in aspic - we may have complaints about 'the Blob', but the march of the blob has continued apace. What actual 'anti-Blob' reforms can you point to?
The proposal to withdraw from the ECHR - which was written by British judges, and you'd expect to be something championed by conservatives - is the most obvious anti-conservative policy (though it does and is resurrected so often that I'm not sure if it's currently still policy).
The recent policing reforms, which dilute the ancient liberties of the English people, is, again, also obvious.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Liz, despite being loony, got one big thing right. Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
Right. That would be why economic growth is the unquestioned mantra of every elected politician in this country.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
I do hope Tory strategists go with that line of attack.
Well, on the polling "don't know" is the largest word that comes up with SKS, so it would have some resonance.
Won't make much difference though. I suspect the electorate just want the Tories out and don't much care who else it is, or why, as long as it's someone else.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
Ok but when I said 'radical' there I meant change, shaking things up. I'm not expecting a pivot to socialism or ultra-progressive social reform that's going to leave the floating voters of middle England feeling shocked or conned. My 'comrade' reference was a good-hearted little josh at 'pigeon' who to his great credit is not only less hostile to Labour now but is actively looking for some pro-worker radicalism from them.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
The Tories haven't been very conservative since Thatcher. The Cult of Thatcher is very radical, and we can see the current government is always raging against what it identifies as "the blob" that is standing in the way of its attempts to institute year zero style reforms.
You're confusing expressions of frustration by MPs and commentators with actual policy. When did we last see policies from the Tories that were in any way radical? What we've actually had is New Labour in aspic - we may have complaints about 'the Blob', but the march of the blob has continued apace. What actual 'anti-Blob' reforms can you point to?
Mr Blobby not been since much since the late nineties. Care to define what on earth the Blob actually is? If its anything the beholder doesnt like, then no, governments can't successfully get rid of it, as its in the eye of the perpetually grumpy beholder.
The Blob is inertia in human form.
It exists, in different shapes and sizes, in every country and every organisation.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
I don't think that in practice it really means that at all. I think it means laissez faire. In the current climate that means things are going to change beyond all recognition in the next decade or two. If politicians are adopting that policy thoughtlessly, then it's not at all like Conservatism has been historically. In fact it's almost the antithesis of Conservatism. It's abolishing the past in favour of whatever random future is most beneficial to short-sighted big business. If the Tory right think that's Conservatism they're even more stupid than I thought - though admittedly the depths of their stupidity are almost unfathomable.
Conservatism both in people and theory terms contains a multitude of contradictions. In a sense the EU has illustrated this perfectly. There is the Conservative business case - pro EU, Majorite, pragmatic, money making; then there is the socially Conservative case - sovereign, nation, constitution, small scale, hierarchical, the 'little platoons' of Edmund Burke.
(The left and centre left are just as split. But this is less seen because they have not been in power.)
I'm sure Conservatism does contain a multitude of contradictions.
But in relation to the technological issues that are now paramount, the ideal of keeping everything as much as possible the same is becoming completely incompatible with the ideal of letting big business do whatever is most profitable.
It would be (a bit) reassuring if the advocates of "Conservatism" here showed a glimmering of awareness of that dichotomy, and (a bit more) reassuring if any of them - on reflection - realised that "laissez faire" is not at all a good idea in present circumstances.
You are correct that 'laissez fare' economics has its limits - but it always has. Adam Smith himself warned of the power of corporations, and stressed the need for Governments to break up monopolies etc.
However, your prescription of what is needed from Government is wrong. Huge corporations actually like high taxes and regulation. They are barriers to entry for smaller companies, so they eliminate competition for the big boys. A positive Government would reduce the barriers to entry for smaller players - for example, raise the VAT threshold for smaller companies, whilst opposing anti-competitive activity in big corporations. What our Government and many like them do is the opposite.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Liz, despite being loony, got one big thing right. Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
Right. That would be why economic growth is the unquestioned mantra of every elected politician in this country.
It really isn’t.
It is so.
Green Party is a sufficient counterexample, in at least one important sense of 'economic growth' - which they do question, at least in its nature.
Edit: and add the Scottish Green Party, too. That's two parties.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
Cheer up, flag shagging may become a protected characteristic.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Liz, despite being loony, got one big thing right. Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
I agree. UK economic policy since 2010 has been all about repairing our tax base from the consequences of the GFC and the wall of money that financial services used to throw at the public coffers.13 years on and we have still not managed it, mainly because we have been thrown off course by Covid and Ukraine. If we are to have the public services we collectively believe we deserve we need more profitable businesses in this country generating tax. And yet our political classes rarely even discuss the issue. For them, our current businesses are no more than geese waiting to be plucked.
You missed Brexit, which I contend is one of the things that threw the UK off course, and which also created a weird omertà in which the suppression of economic truth became standard practice.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
Which is why Brexit has pissed off so many natural Conservatives. Totally silly idea with radical dogma and poorly thought through.
The Conservatives won't recover until they repent of Brexitism.
I knew someone would respond (in seconds) with Brexit.
That conflicted across the principle because many Conservatives thought it was riskier to stay because of the radical change that they felt would inevitably come, which was also against their values. If you believe in conserving national sovereignty and independence, and not steadily creeping towards a federal Europe, you won't have had a problem with this.
Too many seem to miss this and focus just on the economic disruption, more often than not because they themselves aren't Conservatives.
The only unConservative bit, in my view, was in the response to the vote itself, which became too dogmatic.
When I go to Tesco later I'll see if they'll accept sovereignty to pay my bills.....
The money saved in EU fees (which we have now stopped paying) is only too real, and under the current circumstances that's a huge economic boon. Unfortunately, the current Government seems intent on finding ways to piss away that saving.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
Cheer up, flag shagging may become a protected characteristic.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
Cheer up, flag shagging may become a protected characteristic.
Oh? What number on the gender list is that, then?
1690
Wonder if it's the same gender as the person who keeps flagging up Dialup as off topic.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
I don't think that in practice it really means that at all. I think it means laissez faire. In the current climate that means things are going to change beyond all recognition in the next decade or two. If politicians are adopting that policy thoughtlessly, then it's not at all like Conservatism has been historically. In fact it's almost the antithesis of Conservatism. It's abolishing the past in favour of whatever random future is most beneficial to short-sighted big business. If the Tory right think that's Conservatism they're even more stupid than I thought - though admittedly the depths of their stupidity are almost unfathomable.
Conservatism both in people and theory terms contains a multitude of contradictions. In a sense the EU has illustrated this perfectly. There is the Conservative business case - pro EU, Majorite, pragmatic, money making; then there is the socially Conservative case - sovereign, nation, constitution, small scale, hierarchical, the 'little platoons' of Edmund Burke.
(The left and centre left are just as split. But this is less seen because they have not been in power.)
I'm sure Conservatism does contain a multitude of contradictions.
But in relation to the technological issues that are now paramount, the ideal of keeping everything as much as possible the same is becoming completely incompatible with the ideal of letting big business do whatever is most profitable.
It would be (a bit) reassuring if the advocates of "Conservatism" here showed a glimmering of awareness of that dichotomy, and (a bit more) reassuring if any of them - on reflection - realised that "laissez faire" is not at all a good idea in present circumstances.
You are correct that 'laissez fare' economics has its limits - but it always has. Adam Smith himself warned of the power of corporations, and stressed the need for Governments to break up monopolies etc.
However, your prescription of what is needed from Government is wrong. Huge corporations actually like high taxes and regulation. They are barriers to entry for smaller companies, so they eliminate competition for the big boys. A positive Government would reduce the barriers to entry for smaller players - for example, raise the VAT threshold for smaller companies, whilst opposing anti-competitive activity in big corporations. What our Government and many like them do is the opposite.
My prescription? What's my prescription? I just pointed out something that should be blindingly obvious to anyone with eyes, and you imagine I'm writing "a prescription"?
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
Which is why Brexit has pissed off so many natural Conservatives. Totally silly idea with radical dogma and poorly thought through.
The Conservatives won't recover until they repent of Brexitism.
I knew someone would respond (in seconds) with Brexit.
That conflicted across the principle because many Conservatives thought it was riskier to stay because of the radical change that they felt would inevitably come, which was also against their values. If you believe in conserving national sovereignty and independence, and not steadily creeping towards a federal Europe, you won't have had a problem with this.
Too many seem to miss this and focus just on the economic disruption, more often than not because they themselves aren't Conservatives.
The only unConservative bit, in my view, was in the response to the vote itself, which became too dogmatic.
Well, Brexit and its economic consequences is why the Red Wall thinks this government has failed, and why the Blue Wall hates it too.
Brexit is the political monkeys paw. You get what you wish for and regret it very quickly.
Not quickly enough, though.
But yes, at some point the Conservatives stopped being conservative. Incremental change, think in generations, work out why the fence was put up before you tear it down, that sort of thing. It's not just about Brexit, for all that is totemic. (After all, a conservative approach to being Eurosceptic would have been to take Dave's deal and set it in concrete. It probably would have stuck.)
And then there's Starmer's speech today (there's a link here; https://twitter.com/SpaJw/status/1657353519165321216). Large chunks of it read like the sort of thing that a One Nation Tory of previous generations- Iain Macleod, say, could have said. But it's really hard to see who is standing up for this sort of thing in the current setup.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Liz, despite being loony, got one big thing right. Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
I agree. UK economic policy since 2010 has been all about repairing our tax base from the consequences of the GFC and the wall of money that financial services used to throw at the public coffers.13 years on and we have still not managed it, mainly because we have been thrown off course by Covid and Ukraine. If we are to have the public services we collectively believe we deserve we need more profitable businesses in this country generating tax. And yet our political classes rarely even discuss the issue. For them, our current businesses are no more than geese waiting to be plucked.
So if there's nothing to be gained by being more profitable there's no incentive to be more profitable.
But that also works down the ladder as well.
A prerequisite for greater profitability is for the workers to benefit from so doing.
If all the benefit instead goes to shareholders, or worse to the executive oligarchy, why should workers look to increase profitability ?
Scotland: what's going on with the ferry company Caledonian MacBrayne? Just as the tourist season is taking off, they're not selling any tickets for three days. Absolutely no ticket sales, whether online or in person or over the phone, for sailing on any of their 20+ routes. Are they about to go into administration or something? Have they been told to nail their tills shut? Never heard anything like this before with such a large public transport monopoly.
They're bringing a new booking system online, including e-tickets. They were meant to be doing it a few weeks ago but, understandably, postponed it due to the ongoing clusterfuck with ferry repairs:
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Liz, despite being loony, got one big thing right. Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
I agree. UK economic policy since 2010 has been all about repairing our tax base from the consequences of the GFC and the wall of money that financial services used to throw at the public coffers.13 years on and we have still not managed it, mainly because we have been thrown off course by Covid and Ukraine. If we are to have the public services we collectively believe we deserve we need more profitable businesses in this country generating tax. And yet our political classes rarely even discuss the issue. For them, our current businesses are no more than geese waiting to be plucked.
The total value of residential property in the UK is three times that of the value of all publicly quoted stocks. The equivalent ratio for the US is 1:1.
That one fact tells you everything you need to know about the total failure of the British economic model. It's all about property speculation rather than productive economic activity.
Covid and Ukraine happened to everyone else, so why are we suffering worse? These excuses are a smokescreen. The entire Thatcherite "property owning democracy" has turned out to be nothing more than an oligarchy in which all the power resides with rentiers. There is absolutely no chance of the country thriving under such a dispensation.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Liz, despite being loony, got one big thing right. Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
Right. That would be why economic growth is the unquestioned mantra of every elected politician in this country.
It really isn’t.
It is so.
Green Party is a sufficient counterexample, in at least one important sense of 'economic growth' - which they do question, at least in its nature.
Edit: and add the Scottish Green Party, too. That's two parties.
If the Greens hadn't condemned "austerity", perhaps you might have a point.
But really the Greens are so peripheral, aren't they? If that's the best argument you can come up with in support of this certifiably insance idea that "almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition" were not in support of growth, that tells us something.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
I don't think that in practice it really means that at all. I think it means laissez faire. In the current climate that means things are going to change beyond all recognition in the next decade or two. If politicians are adopting that policy thoughtlessly, then it's not at all like Conservatism has been historically. In fact it's almost the antithesis of Conservatism. It's abolishing the past in favour of whatever random future is most beneficial to short-sighted big business. If the Tory right think that's Conservatism they're even more stupid than I thought - though admittedly the depths of their stupidity are almost unfathomable.
Conservatism both in people and theory terms contains a multitude of contradictions. In a sense the EU has illustrated this perfectly. There is the Conservative business case - pro EU, Majorite, pragmatic, money making; then there is the socially Conservative case - sovereign, nation, constitution, small scale, hierarchical, the 'little platoons' of Edmund Burke.
(The left and centre left are just as split. But this is less seen because they have not been in power.)
I'm sure Conservatism does contain a multitude of contradictions.
But in relation to the technological issues that are now paramount, the ideal of keeping everything as much as possible the same is becoming completely incompatible with the ideal of letting big business do whatever is most profitable.
It would be (a bit) reassuring if the advocates of "Conservatism" here showed a glimmering of awareness of that dichotomy, and (a bit more) reassuring if any of them - on reflection - realised that "laissez faire" is not at all a good idea in present circumstances.
You are correct that 'laissez fare' economics has its limits - but it always has. Adam Smith himself warned of the power of corporations, and stressed the need for Governments to break up monopolies etc.
However, your prescription of what is needed from Government is wrong. Huge corporations actually like high taxes and regulation. They are barriers to entry for smaller companies, so they eliminate competition for the big boys. A positive Government would reduce the barriers to entry for smaller players - for example, raise the VAT threshold for smaller companies, whilst opposing anti-competitive activity in big corporations. What our Government and many like them do is the opposite.
Didn't a Thatcherite cabinet minister carefully delete the bit about not letting businessmen run riot when he edited Wealth of a Nation?
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Liz, despite being loony, got one big thing right. Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
Right. That would be why economic growth is the unquestioned mantra of every elected politician in this country.
It really isn’t.
It is so.
Green Party is a sufficient counterexample, in at least one important sense of 'economic growth' - which they do question, at least in its nature.
Edit: and add the Scottish Green Party, too. That's two parties.
If the Greens hadn't condemned "austerity", perhaps you might have a point.
But really the Greens are so peripheral, aren't they? If that's the best argument you can come up with in support of this certifiably insance idea that "almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition" were not in support of growth, that tells us something.
You said "every elected politician in this country."
There are plenty of Green elected pols - and more since the other week. Would be even more at Westminster but for FPTP.
Scotland: what's going on with the ferry company Caledonian MacBrayne? Just as the tourist season is taking off, they're not selling any tickets for three days. Absolutely no ticket sales, whether online or in person or over the phone, for sailing on any of their 20+ routes. Are they about to go into administration or something? Have they been told to nail their tills shut? Never heard anything like this before with such a large public transport monopoly.
They're bringing a new booking system online, including e-tickets. They were meant to be doing it a few weeks ago but, understandably, postponed it due to the ongoing clusterfuck with ferry repairs:
I do have some sympathy for the "take it down for a few days" approach to system migration. It reduces the chance of a TSB/Sabadell situation.
Only in the public sector, would a booking system be offline for three days for a system upgrade.
I’ve worked on IT projects like this. The downtime is at most a few hours overnight, as the future bookings are moved across and websites etc. set to point to the new servers.
A lot of planning and testing goes into the migration process, with the aim to minimise the downtime.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
Cheer up, flag shagging may become a protected characteristic.
Oh? What number on the gender list is that, then?
I’m starting to worry Keir may have been going on “a journey”. It happens to some people who started off as proper lefties. They go on a journey and then they keep going. All this true conservatives stuff: is he just doing the equivalent of big a hoodie and husky driving, or does he increasingly mean it?
Us centrists by contrast start in the centre and stay there.
Yep, it looks very much like Labour are going to go into the next election on a platform - if you ignore their rhetoric and a few eye-catching but token policy flourishes in areas like green energy - of managing the existing state of affairs less incompetently than the Tories. They're going to go our of their way to change as little as possible.
Your march Left is heartening to see. I can't reassure you totally, since I don't know for sure, but my sense is Starmer is all about derisking the GE as far as he possibly can, and that once in power (assuming he does win) he'll prove a bit more radical than you think. So don't write him off comrade.
That's exactly what I keep warning of on here: he's saying what he needs to say to get in.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
Cheer up, flag shagging may become a protected characteristic.
There's no 'patronising contempt' from me, it's just that I don't like to see the Union Jack all over the place. It lowers the tone.
Radicals: Thatcher, Blair, Brown Conservatives: May, Cameron, Major Populists: Johnson, Truss Managers: Sunak, Callaghan
Hard to say what various LoO might be or might have become once in office. Corbyn liked to think of himself as radical, but was very conservative albeit from an old skool left wing perspective.
Hmm... For a "populist" Truss was remarkably unpopular... 😂
You can be a crap populist. Boris ended up pretty unpopular.
He ended up unpopular but for most of his political career he was popular. I can't think of one moment where Truss has been popular... She just always came across as being as nutty as a fruitcake lol...
Truss was prepared to be unpopular; she said so many times - presumably her idea was that when her policies resulted in economic growth, she would become popular enough to win a GE on her record. That was always wildly ambitious, and perhaps to even attempt it was nutty, though I find it faintly heroic. I'm not sure why it's making you 'lol' so much though, given that she's been replaced by someone who isn't trying to make the economy grow at all (the opposite seems to be the case, unless he's just plain thick as shit), and frankly doesn't seem to be trying to make a decent fist of the General Election either.
I'm sorry - I can't help being curious, because you seem to be pretty much the only person on earth who can't see what an unmitigated disaster Liz Truss was.
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
Liz, despite being loony, got one big thing right. Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
Right. That would be why economic growth is the unquestioned mantra of every elected politician in this country.
It really isn’t.
It is so.
Green Party is a sufficient counterexample, in at least one important sense of 'economic growth' - which they do question, at least in its nature.
Edit: and add the Scottish Green Party, too. That's two parties.
If the Greens hadn't condemned "austerity", perhaps you might have a point.
But really the Greens are so peripheral, aren't they? If that's the best argument you can come up with in support of this certifiably insance idea that "almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition" were not in support of growth, that tells us something.
There’s no evidence that most politicians are pro-growth, and much evidence to the contrary.
Conservative just means you're cautious and a bit suspicious of change, and only want to do so if you have to, and then to do so gradually. If it ain't broke dont fix it.
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
Which is why Brexit has pissed off so many natural Conservatives. Totally silly idea with radical dogma and poorly thought through.
The Conservatives won't recover until they repent of Brexitism.
I knew someone would respond (in seconds) with Brexit.
That conflicted across the principle because many Conservatives thought it was riskier to stay because of the radical change that they felt would inevitably come, which was also against their values. If you believe in conserving national sovereignty and independence, and not steadily creeping towards a federal Europe, you won't have had a problem with this.
Too many seem to miss this and focus just on the economic disruption, more often than not because they themselves aren't Conservatives.
The only unConservative bit, in my view, was in the response to the vote itself, which became too dogmatic.
When I go to Tesco later I'll see if they'll accept sovereignty to pay my bills.....
The money saved in EU fees (which we have now stopped paying) is only too real, and under the current circumstances that's a huge economic boon. Unfortunately, the current Government seems intent on finding ways to piss away that saving.
Comments
Real-world example. I want to buy a bike, a Brompton, costs around £1,000 + VAT. That means that it’s currently £1,050 in Dubai, and £1,200 in London.
If I visit London from Dubai, and I can buy the bike for £1,000, I’m going to buy it in London, if I have to pay £1,200, I’ll buy it in Dubai and the UK retailer will miss out on the sale.
The UK retail sector has been on its knees since the pandemic, and short-sighted thinking from the government is making the situation worse for them.
Perhaps I don’t just want a bike, perhaps I might also pick up a new iPhone, some clothes and some jewellery for my wife while I’m there. Maybe we go to Paris instead of London, they still have VAT-free shopping there.
In fact, perhaps rich Brits will start going on shopping holidays to Paris, or perhaps department stores will set up in Calais, like the old booze shops used to. All money lost to the UK retail sector.
Besides, I know I keep coming back to this point ad nauseam, but it's only because I think it's very important: not nearly everyone is suffering from the current socio-economic car crash. There's a large cohort of Boomer homeowners - bought dirt cheap council houses under Thatcher, benefit from older style occupational pensions as well as the triple lock, altogether very comfortable - for whom the Conservatives have delivered in spades. Older Gen-Xers, who also managed to get on the property ladder when it was still fairly easy to do so, are coasting towards their own gold-plated retirements, and are looking forward to receiving both their triple locked pensions and enormous inheritances over the next 10-15 years, will also feel not wholly unsympathetic towards they who made all of this possible.
We also have to remember that the electoral system itself favours the two large parties, because most voters who passionately hate one of the main parties will vote negatively for the other, even if they think it is rubbish, because they view the alternative as even worse. There's a substantial number of Never Labour voters out there, and the polarising effects of Brexit and the Corbyn experiment will have increased their numbers.
We may still be getting polls coming out with outrageous shares like Lab 51, Con 24, but come a GE the likelihood of anything like that is surely remote in the extreme?
But as I said initially the idea that a government which already has 'one rule for you and another rule for us' issues is going to give a tax cut to rich foreign tourists so that they can fly around the world to boost profits at Harrods would be 'politically brave'.
I've already explained how the cut in the 45 per cent top income tax rate could be self-financing. Allowing foreign tourists to shop VAT-free could bring in a lot more visitors and, with them, a lot more taxable spending power.
Opportunity missed.
I will refine it more in the last 2-3 months. But even then it's very easy for 20-30 seats to go the "wrong" way because plenty will hinge on just a few hundred votes and tactical voting, or not, which is impossible to predict with any certainty.
Since my main objective is to generate a tax-free profit that comfortably beats ISAs and the equity markets, I will hedge my bets if I feel I need to do so!
I don't. You'd be well advised to read my betting posts in that guise, because I bet to win money- not back my "team".
Of course, that in itself is reason enough why plenty of people don't like them.
The other point of view is that many people don't like change and taking this approach to Government allows for stability, consistency, broad peace, preservation of tradition/ what works, predictability and thus extra space economic growth, and stops silly ideas and radical dogma that's poorly thought through from being put into practice.
The Conservatives won't recover until they repent of Brexitism.
Others say it's the usual Tory scare tactics relating to a Labour leader in opposition.
But, look at what his own side say - like your good self - and the evidence at how he behaved to his own base once he won the Labour leadership election.
You don't know what you'll get with SKS.
The problem, of course, is that Britain isn't a typical European country. We labour under the cumulative burden of a stagnant, rotting economy that revolves around bricks and mortar rather than productive activity, allied to the fact that the people who make the most demands upon the state also control most of the wealth and expect not to be asked to give any of it up.
There are simply too many voters with too much to lose from a regime of land value taxes and higher extraction from capital gains and inheritances. Labour is too frightened of upsetting the well-off, and low and middle earners have seen their wages squeezed until they have nothing left to give, so all it has left to offer politically is tinkering around the edges (exhibit A: its hypothetical energy windfall tax to pay for the capping of council tax for a year.) It's a very small-c conservative platform, which puts most of the burden of delivering meaningful change on administrative reform. Well, ministers can draft all the new laws and regulations that they like, but it's going to do bugger all to alleviate poverty, facilitate economic development or repair the crumbling edifice of the state.
I'm afraid that the likelihood of the next Government spending inordinate amounts of time trying to decide what to replace the House of Lords with, and debating what fresh powers it does or does not want to ship off to Scotland - whilst more children die of respiratory disease in mouldy houses, and property becomes every more scarce and ever more pricey - is rather high.
If its a voluntary change its usually important that things are thought and planned properly. Failure to do so can lead to failure even if the idea is good.
A forced change, even if its through negative factors, can be good - for example I've reduced my utility energy consumption by about 20%. Something I'll likely continue even if prices fell back to previous levels.
I can't say I'm a fan of any form of forced change, but I do agree some nudges can, sometimes, have positive effects - charging for plastic bags, for example.
In 1997 (when I continued to vote Tory BTW) there was a reasonable case against the government, and an outstanding Labour leader. They won by a mile.
This time Labour is not outstanding. No-one is. It is not a golden age for heroes. The best way of dealing with your point is for Labour to form a government with LD help. This may well happen.
There are only two parties who can lead a government. Once the nation has decided 'Time for a change' the options number precisely One. One more than North Korea, but enough. But Sir Keir needs to revisit his Lords proposal and the votes for children plan.
That conflicted across the principle because many Conservatives thought it was riskier to stay because of the radical change that they felt would inevitably come, which was also against their values. If you believe in conserving national sovereignty and independence, and not steadily creeping towards a federal Europe, you won't have had a problem with this.
Too many seem to miss this and focus just on the economic disruption, more often than not because they themselves aren't Conservatives.
The only unConservative bit, in my view, was in the response to the vote itself, which became too dogmatic.
Once again, Brexit means making hard choices about how we earn our living. It strikes me that this isn’t even a hard choice.
There's precious little appreciation of what is right about the country, or of trying to nurture and encourage gradual improvements. There's a very strong sense of them and us, and if you're not one of us then you're one of them, the anti-growth coalition, the blob, enemies of all that is good and right.
I'm naturally quite a cautious person. I find it more instinctive to identify potential problems with suggestions for change. So that sounds quite conservative, but I've always supported rather radical left-wing politics because I can see so much that needs fixing, and so much that doesn't feel like it should be hard to fix.
Most of what I've seen from the Tories over the decades has been the desire to trash the things that I think work at least a bit, and make the things that have gone wrong even worse. If I'd grown up in an era when the Tories were actually more conservative, I don't think I'd now be so reflexively anti-Tory.
(The left and centre left are just as split. But this is less seen because they have not been in power.)
Please relieve my curiosity and tell me whether it's a sexual thing or what?
And of course by "brave", I mean "utterly mad". It would be laughed off stage in less time than it takes to ban a Russian troll here.
Clem Attlee.
As to economics its very doubtful.
What isn't doubtful is that rich people who do a lot of international travel think its a wonderful idea.
Britain needs to grow.
This sounds incredibly obvious, but it seems that it’s a truth that evades almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition.
Brexit is the political monkeys paw. You get what you wish for and regret it very quickly.
She would have enthused the Tory base and voters with her proper Toryism. She stood up to leaky Sue and sacked her.
There’s an argument Truss wasn’t doing any harm.
Johnson's 2019 manifesto was basically Labour's 2017 manifesto with populist elements. What is conservative about that?
But in relation to the technological issues that are now paramount, the ideal of keeping everything as much as possible the same is becoming completely incompatible with the ideal of letting big business do whatever is most profitable.
It would be (a bit) reassuring if the advocates of "Conservatism" here showed a glimmering of awareness of that dichotomy, and (a bit more) reassuring if any of them - on reflection - realised that "laissez faire" is not at all a good idea in present circumstances.
He is much closer to Keir Starmer than Jeremy Corbyn was.
Keir Starmer politically - from the people I know in the leader's office - is instinctively a "wet" social democrat but overall a pragmatist.
Thatcher's radicalism in the 1980s was partly a response to the UK's problems in the 1970s.
She would have been much more conservative in the 1990s because, in her opinion, there would no longer have been the problems requiring radical change.
Brexit was a terrible mistake - but like the water companies that should never have been sold off - we simply cannot do this again. There are new challenges we must face.
Labour will only win by looking forwards. We must see more of that from SKS.
The biggest impact we'll probably see is - absent an economic miracle- Starmer's votint coalition rapidly splintering once he takes office.
He will end up disappointing a lot of people who thought he was on their side but will realise they've been taken for mugs.
The recent policing reforms, which dilute the ancient liberties of the English people, is, again, also obvious.
There are loads of these sorts of things.
Won't make much difference though. I suspect the electorate just want the Tories out and don't much care who else it is, or why, as long as it's someone else.
It exists, in different shapes and sizes, in every country and every organisation.
There's a bit of Blob in all of us.
However, your prescription of what is needed from Government is wrong. Huge corporations actually like high taxes and regulation. They are barriers to entry for smaller companies, so they eliminate competition for the big boys. A positive Government would reduce the barriers to entry for smaller players - for example, raise the VAT threshold for smaller companies, whilst opposing anti-competitive activity in big corporations. What our Government and many like them do is the opposite.
Edit: and add the Scottish Green Party, too. That's two parties.
The Corinthia is has improved massively, for example. Upstairs at Rules is beginning to get consistent, I find.
But yes, at some point the Conservatives stopped being conservative. Incremental change, think in generations, work out why the fence was put up before you tear it down, that sort of thing. It's not just about Brexit, for all that is totemic. (After all, a conservative approach to being Eurosceptic would have been to take Dave's deal and set it in concrete. It probably would have stuck.)
And then there's Starmer's speech today (there's a link here; https://twitter.com/SpaJw/status/1657353519165321216). Large chunks of it read like the sort of thing that a One Nation Tory of previous generations- Iain Macleod, say, could have said. But it's really hard to see who is standing up for this sort of thing in the current setup.
But that also works down the ladder as well.
A prerequisite for greater profitability is for the workers to benefit from so doing.
If all the benefit instead goes to shareholders, or worse to the executive oligarchy, why should workers look to increase profitability ?
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/homenews/23446389.six-calmac-ferries-need-repairs-easter-disruption/
I do have some sympathy for the "take it down for a few days" approach to system migration. It reduces the chance of a TSB/Sabadell situation.
That one fact tells you everything you need to know about the total failure of the British economic model. It's all about property speculation rather than productive economic activity.
Covid and Ukraine happened to everyone else, so why are we suffering worse? These excuses are a smokescreen. The entire Thatcherite "property owning democracy" has turned out to be nothing more than an oligarchy in which all the power resides with rentiers. There is absolutely no chance of the country thriving under such a dispensation.
But really the Greens are so peripheral, aren't they? If that's the best argument you can come up with in support of this certifiably insance idea that "almost all of the governing party and likely most of the Opposition" were not in support of growth, that tells us something.
There are plenty of Green elected pols - and more since the other week. Would be even more at Westminster but for FPTP.
I’ve worked on IT projects like this. The downtime is at most a few hours overnight, as the future bookings are moved across and websites etc. set to point to the new servers.
A lot of planning and testing goes into the migration process, with the aim to minimise the downtime.
Us centrists by contrast start in the centre and stay there.
Why on earth do the Scots put up with such pisspoor governance?
(And, for that matter, why do the Welsh?).