The other interesting stat I heard is that in the 90s, British equities were 85% in British ownership.
That’s now just a third.
Britain is becoming a branch economy, just as British regions are themselves feeble economic puppets of London.
That's just one more baleful consequence of the rotten property market. Piles of bricks are an almost guaranteed safe investment, offering stratospheric growth - thus, people are disincentivised from investing in anything else. This, in turn, makes homes to live in so stupidly expensive that younger generations have no choice but to bet the farm on property - if they can afford it - because the alternative is to be an impoverished rent serf for a succession of rapacious landlords until you die.
If you're a mortgage-free homeowner in this country you have reached the Promised Land.
Strange as it may seem, the rate of growth in house prices has significantly moderated since 2007. The government has effectively killed off the buy to let market, which contributed to that.
I can't help thinking that interest rates ought to have been raised from near zero a long time ago.
That observation about price growth trends is not entirely without merit, albeit that wages have performed so badly since the GFC that average prices as a multiple of average earnings have continued to accelerate into the stratosphere. @Kinabalu predicts that this trend will go into reverse, but I can't see how given that the cumulative effects of mass migration, renewed wage suppression as inflationary pressures ease, and lack of new building seem liable only to shore up prices.
@Ally_B1 has been woefully unfortunate in seeing the price of their residential property actually decline since 2007, and they're by no means alone: think of all the owners of flats who've been put through the wringer by the cladding disaster. Nonetheless, this won't be the case for the large majority of owner-occupiers, especially those in freehold houses. That's of absolutely no comfort to them, but most homeowners who've been in situ for any length of time are both sat on paper profits far in excess of anything they would've earned putting money in, say, a stock and share ISA invested in a FTSE100 tracker fund, and they're either at or working towards the point where their housing costs collapse to nothing, save for the price of repairs/service charges and insurance. In an economy that's so dominated by property investment and ownership, that's a very advantageous position in which to find oneself.
Going forward, there's no reason to suppose that property won't continue to be the best investment that anyone, save perhaps for the very rich, can possibly make in Britain. If a future Government is going to attempt to reduce the reliance of the economy on piles of bricks and free up more capital for productive investment, it's going to take a long time and require a lot of determined pushing back against powerful vested interests.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
You assume that your vision of centre-rightism is the same as theirs.
There’s very little that’s conservative about the Conservatives.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
Brexit is already dead, as a governing philosophy. The wave function collapsed over Christmas 2021, after Frost’s resignation.
Fewer people think Brexit has gone well than believe the moon landings were faked.
The incoming government has no interest in maintaining Brexit, only in mitigating it. Brexit is now short-hand for arrant stupidity, bordering on suicide. They should probably rename the Darwin Awards the Brexit Awards.
Brexit for most people was leaving the EU. We did. I don’t get this obsession some have for it being ‘a state of mind’ or a ‘governing philosophy’. Brexit happened. Two other things have also happened that have wrecked the economies around the world. Too much of the state of the nation is laid at Brexits door, mainly by those who hated Brexit.
This post is the dying dregs of Brexitism. “It hasn’t been as bad as a global pandemic or war in Europe”.
It’s really not. I voted remain, would rather have stayed in. It’s a post about remainers who blame everything on Brexit. (The same as the Brexiteers who blame(d) everything on the EU).
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
It isn't a loss of control, it's deliberate policy. Hunt has already floated it as economic policy. Brexit took back control from the EU and gave it to the UK Government; it didn't guarantee an end to shitty Government. Thankfully we can now sack them.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
It's astonishing how our Conservative Party seems to lack any confidence and conviction and, yet, the Republican Party, for all their faults, possess neither of these problems.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
Brexit is already dead, as a governing philosophy. The wave function collapsed over Christmas 2021, after Frost’s resignation.
Fewer people think Brexit has gone well than believe the moon landings were faked.
The incoming government has no interest in maintaining Brexit, only in mitigating it. Brexit is now short-hand for arrant stupidity, bordering on suicide. They should probably rename the Darwin Awards the Brexit Awards.
Brexit for most people was leaving the EU. We did. I don’t get this obsession some have for it being ‘a state of mind’ or a ‘governing philosophy’. Brexit happened. Two other things have also happened that have wrecked the economies around the world. Too much of the state of the nation is laid at Brexits door, mainly by those who hated Brexit.
This post is the dying dregs of Brexitism. “It hasn’t been as bad as a global pandemic or war in Europe”.
It’s really not. I voted remain, would rather have stayed in. It’s a post about remainers who blame everything on Brexit. (The same as the Brexiteers who blame(d) everything on the EU).
To criticise Brexit is not to blame everything on Brexit. Your touchiness on this subject is a bit dubious.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
Brexit is already dead, as a governing philosophy. The wave function collapsed over Christmas 2021, after Frost’s resignation.
Fewer people think Brexit has gone well than believe the moon landings were faked.
The incoming government has no interest in maintaining Brexit, only in mitigating it. Brexit is now short-hand for arrant stupidity, bordering on suicide. They should probably rename the Darwin Awards the Brexit Awards.
And, yet, the pomposity of Rejoiners could be more than enough to keep it in the frame for years to come.
To me it just feels like ultimately the right has been unable and totally useless at resolving any of the issues we elected them to solve.
The NHS and the other public services are the worst they've ever been, society is crumbling and yet our national debt is at the highest ever, taxes are at the highest ever and the deficit is still growing.
The right have failed on their own terms. It is time for a change, clearly.
It's a case of not relying solely on this, and addressing the fundamentals on top; this can only ever be a side/supplementary issue.
However, far too many people who say Stop The Culture War are actually arguing for the other side to cease resistance.
I've grown to dislike the term "culture war", I don't think it's useful. First, it's not a war, it is an ongoing national conversation. Second it's not a single issue that is being discussed, but several - and some aren't even especially related to each other. I mean, what have gender neutral toilets got to do with the slave trade? Nothing. If we just accept that people have different opinions on a number of thorny questions and agree to have a civil dialogue with each other to figure out where we stand and what role government policy has in any of them, without getting so riled up about it all on both sides, and without seeking to delegitimise other people's views, I think we'd be better off.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
It's astonishing how our Conservative Party seems to lack any confidence and conviction and, yet, the Republican Party, for all their faults, possess neither of these problems.
There is a fundamental confidence in the future here which seems lacking in British society across the board.
Brexit will never be able to be resolved in an intelligent way if every time somebody points out something they're called a Rejoiner.
Let's be honest, Brexit isn't working. We could do a lot to resolve it short of rejoining but since the Tories are incapable of doing that despite starting the whole thing, Labour will have to. They must ignore the people calling them rejoiners at all costs, these are the same people that crashed the car in the first place.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
The good thing about the conservatives under FPTP in the past was their ability to balance the sensible centre-right capitalists with the social conservatives without letting the latter go mad, but that doesn’t seem on offer anymore. If the Tories are going to go full AKP/BJP/GOP/national rally then we might as well go straight to PR and get ourselves a CDU and an AfD to choose from.
TSE's thread is 100% on the money, as is Gove. The problem is, and the reason for the focus on culture issues, is that the Tories don't have a good story to tell on the economy. The economy is rubbish and they're not doing anything worthwhile about it. So what else do they have?
You mean GDP is rubbish.
But for many millions - oldies, GenXers who have paid off their mortgages, teenagers who want a job things are very nice.
For other groups things aren't so good with the apogee of crap likely being a young, southern graduate.
Those “other groups” are sadly the ones who need to deliver economic growth. Ie, the non-retired.
I heard on the Merryn Somerset Webb podcast this morning (but can’t validate separately) that the UK is now experiencing a brain drain again, like it did in the 70s.
Well, it wouldn't be a surprise, would it? British society despises its youth and has done for a long time.
I really will not encourage my kids to hang around here if they have better options abroad. This is no country for young people right now.
That would be sad for you though. Ties tend to loosen with distance despite best intentions.
Brexit will never be able to be resolved in an intelligent way if every time somebody points out something they're called a Rejoiner.
Let's be honest, Brexit isn't working. We could do a lot to resolve it short of rejoining but since the Tories are incapable of doing that despite starting the whole thing, Labour will have to. They must ignore the people calling them rejoiners at all costs, these are the same people that crashed the car in the first place.
See CasinoRoyale’s post upthread. He was one of the car-crashers, and he needs to accept several points on his license and a multi-year suspension.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
It's astonishing how our Conservative Party seems to lack any confidence and conviction and, yet, the Republican Party, for all their faults, possess neither of these problems.
I am sure if Kemi, Suella or Jacob win the next Conservative leadership election after a Rishi and Jeremy H general election loss, the Conservatives will swiftly find their rightwing mojo again and be ready to fight the culture war as hard as Trump and DeSantis' GOP now are
I am sure if Kemi, Suella or Jacob win the next Conservative leadership election after a Rishi and Jeremy H general election loss, the Conservatives will swiftly find their rightwing mojo again and be ready to fight the culture war as hard as Trump and DeSantis' GOP now are
But to what end?
The rivers are dirty, the economy is in the toilet, the trains never run on time.
Seriously, what is the point in this stuff? Have you admitted you don't know how to help resolve any of these issues?
It is very hard to believe that more money has been spent on the water network in the last thirty-odd years than in the period 1870-1900. All those new reservoirs and associated pipeworks, plus the treatment works and sewage systems, did not come cheap.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
It's astonishing how our Conservative Party seems to lack any confidence and conviction and, yet, the Republican Party, for all their faults, possess neither of these problems.
I am sure if Kemi, Suella or Jacob win the next Conservative leadership election after a Rishi and Jeremy H general election loss, the Conservatives will swiftly find their rightwing mojo again and be ready to fight the culture war as hard as Trump and DeSantis' GOP now are
God help us all. The best we can hope for is that, as a far more secular society than the United States, we prove more immune to the slide into Christian Fascism.
It is very hard to believe that more money has been spent on the water network in the last thirty-odd years than in the period 1870-1900. All those new reservoirs and associated pipeworks, plus the treatment works and sewage systems, did not come cheap.
Except it was cheaper back in the day to build things. You shipped in a load of labourers and let them dig, live in shanty towns etc. The U.K. seems to have some of the highest build costs of infrastructure anywhere, no idea why.
It is very hard to believe that more money has been spent on the water network in the last thirty-odd years than in the period 1870-1900. All those new reservoirs and associated pipeworks, plus the treatment works and sewage systems, did not come cheap.
How much of the money spent by the owners of the water monopolies came out of their own pockets, and how much came from ours? Does the operation of an English water business bear any relation to the conventional understanding of risk and reward, or is it just a licence to print money? Why has all the money that's been spent left us, at once, acutely vulnerable to drought and to having our waterways drenched in raw sewage? And how many other countries rely on a fully privatised water and sewerage system?
It's a case of not relying solely on this, and addressing the fundamentals on top; this can only ever be a side/supplementary issue.
However, far too many people who say Stop The Culture War are actually arguing for the other side to cease resistance.
I've grown to dislike the term "culture war", I don't think it's useful. First, it's not a war, it is an ongoing national conversation. Second it's not a single issue that is being discussed, but several - and some aren't even especially related to each other. I mean, what have gender neutral toilets got to do with the slave trade? Nothing. If we just accept that people have different opinions on a number of thorny questions and agree to have a civil dialogue with each other to figure out where we stand and what role government policy has in any of them, without getting so riled up about it all on both sides, and without seeking to delegitimise other people's views, I think we'd be better off.
Yes I'm afraid it's become 2 teams and there's pressure to support everything about yours and nothing about theirs if you're on one of them. Eg I'm not completely enamoured of Meghan Markle but I would never never say that out loud on here.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
The good thing about the conservatives under FPTP in the past was their ability to balance the sensible centre-right capitalists with the social conservatives without letting the latter go mad, but that doesn’t seem on offer anymore. If the Tories are going to go full AKP/BJP/GOP/national rally then we might as well go straight to PR and get ourselves a CDU and an AfD to choose from.
The problem with that is the more socially conservative populist wing might win. Only about 10% of the UK population are traditional Tory centre right, while about another 25-30% are socially conservative rightwingers. See the 2019 European elections when Farage's Brexit Party got 30% and May's Tories only 9%. ' That is what has happened in France and Italy too where the populist right National Rally and Brothers of Italy and Lega Nord have overtaken the centre right Les Republicains and Forza Italia under non FPTP 2nd ballot and PR systems.
In Canada in 1993 the populist rightwing Reform Party overtook the centre right Progressive Conservatives, though as it was FPTP by 2003 the former effectively took over the latter to create today's Conservative Party of Canada so the united right could win again. A similar thing has happened in the US where the populist Trump has effectively taken over the more moderate GOP of the Bushes and Romney and McCain.
Germany is a rare exception where the centre right CDU is still ahead of the populist right AfD with PR, though even there its new leader Merz is shifting the Union right of where Merkel left it
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
It's astonishing how our Conservative Party seems to lack any confidence and conviction and, yet, the Republican Party, for all their faults, possess neither of these problems.
I am sure if Kemi, Suella or Jacob win the next Conservative leadership election after a Rishi and Jeremy H general election loss, the Conservatives will swiftly find their rightwing mojo again and be ready to fight the culture war as hard as Trump and DeSantis' GOP now are
What they will do is to posture and bloviate. Which has, essentially been the modus operandi of the ERG since 2017.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
It's astonishing how our Conservative Party seems to lack any confidence and conviction and, yet, the Republican Party, for all their faults, possess neither of these problems.
I am sure if Kemi, Suella or Jacob win the next Conservative leadership election after a Rishi and Jeremy H general election loss, the Conservatives will swiftly find their rightwing mojo again and be ready to fight the culture war as hard as Trump and DeSantis' GOP now are
God help us all. The best we can hope for is that, as a far more secular society than the United States, we prove more immune to the slide into Christian Fascism.
Not if Jacob wins, he is an even more reactionary socially conservative Christian than Trump and even more strict Roman Catholic than DeSantis
If the talent of the Tories next is seriously Kemi, then Labour are going to be in power a long time.
I get where you are coming from, but to be honest Labour isn’t exactly brimming with talent. One of their best isn’t even an MP (Burnham). None have been in power and will find it a different challenge to opposing an unpopular government (easy in the current climate). Personally I think Starmer is ok, but does not inspire. I quite like streeting. I have time for Jonathon Ashworth. Beyond that? Rayner is a cartoon figure of class war, the Punchy John of our times. I’m sure some will emerge with greater exposure, but it would be wrong to expect many labour ministers not to flounder every bit as badly as the current government of none of the talents.
If the talent of the Tories next is seriously Kemi, then Labour are going to be in power a long time.
I get where you are coming from, but to be honest Labour isn’t exactly brimming with talent. One of their best isn’t even an MP (Burnham). None have been in power and will find it a different challenge to opposing an unpopular government (easy in the current climate). Personally I think Starmer is ok, but does not inspire. I quite like streeting. I have time for Jonathon Ashworth. Beyond that? Rayner is a cartoon figure of class war, the Punchy John of our times. I’m sure some will emerge with greater exposure, but it would be wrong to expect many labour ministers not to flounder every bit as badly as the current government of none of the talents.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
It's astonishing how our Conservative Party seems to lack any confidence and conviction and, yet, the Republican Party, for all their faults, possess neither of these problems.
I am sure if Kemi, Suella or Jacob win the next Conservative leadership election after a Rishi and Jeremy H general election loss, the Conservatives will swiftly find their rightwing mojo again and be ready to fight the culture war as hard as Trump and DeSantis' GOP now are
God help us all. The best we can hope for is that, as a far more secular society than the United States, we prove more immune to the slide into Christian Fascism.
Not if Jacob wins, he is an even more reactionary socially conservative Christian than Trump and even more strict Roman Catholic than DeSantis
But fortunately there are far fewer religious loons about to flock to such a banner, so it should make it that much harder for such an individual to get their hands on real power.
It's a case of not relying solely on this, and addressing the fundamentals on top; this can only ever be a side/supplementary issue.
However, far too many people who say Stop The Culture War are actually arguing for the other side to cease resistance.
I've grown to dislike the term "culture war", I don't think it's useful. First, it's not a war, it is an ongoing national conversation. Second it's not a single issue that is being discussed, but several - and some aren't even especially related to each other. I mean, what have gender neutral toilets got to do with the slave trade? Nothing. If we just accept that people have different opinions on a number of thorny questions and agree to have a civil dialogue with each other to figure out where we stand and what role government policy has in any of them, without getting so riled up about it all on both sides, and without seeking to delegitimise other people's views, I think we'd be better off.
Yes I'm afraid it's become 2 teams and there's pressure to support everything about yours and nothing about theirs if you're on one of them. Eg I'm not completely enamoured of Meghan Markle but I would never never say that out loud on here.
Social media bears a lot of blame. It’s designed to generate hate, and eliminate nuance. Hate means clicks, and so, advertising.
If you have a serious, but good-natured, argument, face to face, I think most of would accept that our opponents’ views have varying degrees of merit. Social media eliminates that.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
The good thing about the conservatives under FPTP in the past was their ability to balance the sensible centre-right capitalists with the social conservatives without letting the latter go mad, but that doesn’t seem on offer anymore. If the Tories are going to go full AKP/BJP/GOP/national rally then we might as well go straight to PR and get ourselves a CDU and an AfD to choose from.
The problem with that is the more socially conservative populist wing might win. Only about 10% of the UK population are traditional Tory centre right, while about another 25-30% are socially conservative rightwingers. See the 2019 European elections when Farage's Brexit Party got 30% and May's Tories only 9%. ' That is what has happened in France and Italy too where the populist right National Rally and Brothers of Italy and Lega Nord have overtaken the centre right Les Republicains and Forza Italia under non FPTP 2nd ballot and PR systems.
In Canada in 1993 the populist rightwing Reform Party overtook the centre right Progressive Conservatives, though as it was FPTP by 2003 the former effectively took over the latter to create today's Conservative Party of Canada so the united right could win again. A similar thing has happened in the US where the populist Trump has effectively taken over the more moderate GOP of the Bushes and Romney and McCain.
Germany is a rare exception where the centre right CDU is still ahead of the populist right AfD with PR, though even there its new leader Merz is shifting the Union right of where Merkel left it
What's your evidence for: "Only about 10% of the population are tradition Tory centre right, while about another 25-30% are socially conservative rightwingers"?
If the talent of the Tories next is seriously Kemi, then Labour are going to be in power a long time.
I get where you are coming from, but to be honest Labour isn’t exactly brimming with talent. One of their best isn’t even an MP (Burnham). None have been in power and will find it a different challenge to opposing an unpopular government (easy in the current climate). Personally I think Starmer is ok, but does not inspire. I quite like streeting. I have time for Jonathon Ashworth. Beyond that? Rayner is a cartoon figure of class war, the Punchy John of our times. I’m sure some will emerge with greater exposure, but it would be wrong to expect many labour ministers not to flounder every bit as badly as the current government of none of the talents.
Burnham is crap. He is the Kemi of Labour.
I disagree. I think he connects with people, but each to their own.
To me it just feels like ultimately the right has been unable and totally useless at resolving any of the issues we elected them to solve.
The NHS and the other public services are the worst they've ever been, society is crumbling and yet our national debt is at the highest ever, taxes are at the highest ever and the deficit is still growing.
The right have failed on their own terms. It is time for a change, clearly.
And what will you say in 2029 after 5 years of a labour governement when things are even worse..(note I dont think its because they are labour it would be said if its a tory or lib dem government). I merely thing another 5 years of centrist governement has only one way its going
If the talent of the Tories next is seriously Kemi, then Labour are going to be in power a long time.
I get where you are coming from, but to be honest Labour isn’t exactly brimming with talent. One of their best isn’t even an MP (Burnham). None have been in power and will find it a different challenge to opposing an unpopular government (easy in the current climate). Personally I think Starmer is ok, but does not inspire. I quite like streeting. I have time for Jonathon Ashworth. Beyond that? Rayner is a cartoon figure of class war, the Punchy John of our times. I’m sure some will emerge with greater exposure, but it would be wrong to expect many labour ministers not to flounder every bit as badly as the current government of none of the talents.
Burnham is crap. He is the Kemi of Labour.
I disagree. I think he connects with people, but each to their own.
Andy Burnham has held every single possible position on every single issue. He stands for nothing and is nothing.
To me it just feels like ultimately the right has been unable and totally useless at resolving any of the issues we elected them to solve.
The NHS and the other public services are the worst they've ever been, society is crumbling and yet our national debt is at the highest ever, taxes are at the highest ever and the deficit is still growing.
The right have failed on their own terms. It is time for a change, clearly.
And what will you say in 2029 after 5 years of a labour governement when things are even worse..(note I dont think its because they are labour it would be said if its a tory or lib dem government). I merely thing another 5 years of centrist governement has only one way its going
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
Not if Labour win a decent majority. Why e would they?
Labour won't offer PR even if they don't get a decent majority. Just because some of us hope that they might make a better fist of governing than the Conservatives, it does no good to get dewy-eyed over the Labour Party. It has just as powerful an interest in maintaining the status quo, and its attitude to a Hung Parliament will therefore be "We shall do our best to prove we can govern well, and aim for a majority next time around."
Labour would only start to campaign for PR if it were convinced that it could never win a majority by itself again, so as to spike the guns of the Tories and improve its chances of leading coalition administrations in future. So long as the electoral duopoly remains as it is, neither of its beneficiaries will want to break it up.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
It's astonishing how our Conservative Party seems to lack any confidence and conviction and, yet, the Republican Party, for all their faults, possess neither of these problems.
I am sure if Kemi, Suella or Jacob win the next Conservative leadership election after a Rishi and Jeremy H general election loss, the Conservatives will swiftly find their rightwing mojo again and be ready to fight the culture war as hard as Trump and DeSantis' GOP now are
God help us all. The best we can hope for is that, as a far more secular society than the United States, we prove more immune to the slide into Christian Fascism.
Not if Jacob wins, he is an even more reactionary socially conservative Christian than Trump and even more strict Roman Catholic than DeSantis
But fortunately there are far fewer religious loons about to flock to such a banner, so it should make it that much harder for such an individual to get their hands on real power.
JRM is not the man, he’s such a twit.
But, a more plausible figure, imagine a Conservative version of Kate Forbes, could do it.
Voters respect politicians who are sincere and comfortable in their own skin, even if they don’t entirely agree.
Brexit will never be able to be resolved in an intelligent way if every time somebody points out something they're called a Rejoiner.
Let's be honest, Brexit isn't working. We could do a lot to resolve it short of rejoining but since the Tories are incapable of doing that despite starting the whole thing, Labour will have to. They must ignore the people calling them rejoiners at all costs, these are the same people that crashed the car in the first place.
See CasinoRoyale’s post upthread. He was one of the car-crashers, and he needs to accept several points on his license and a multi-year suspension.
Can't they do a "stupid populism" awareness course instead? Preferably on a 1:1 basis, to save embarrassment.
Yes the economy is key and getting the deficit and inflation down but that doesn't mean you can ignore the culture wars the woke left are raging, which the right needs to fight back on. As Meloni proved last year and Trump proved in 2016 fighting the culture wars on a conservative platform can even lead to victory
So having proved incompetent and disinterested in the war people want you to fight, you propose to fight a different war because that's what you're really interested in.
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
I think this country’s centre right politicians are the most useless set of centre-right politicians anywhere in the democratic world. They are incapable of achieving anything they claim to want.
Like @Richard Tyndall, I sometimes wish the Conservative Party would just disappear. But, I doubt if a replacement would be any better.
The good thing about the conservatives under FPTP in the past was their ability to balance the sensible centre-right capitalists with the social conservatives without letting the latter go mad, but that doesn’t seem on offer anymore. If the Tories are going to go full AKP/BJP/GOP/national rally then we might as well go straight to PR and get ourselves a CDU and an AfD to choose from.
The problem with that is the more socially conservative populist wing might win. Only about 10% of the UK population are traditional Tory centre right, while about another 25-30% are socially conservative rightwingers. See the 2019 European elections when Farage's Brexit Party got 30% and May's Tories only 9%. ' That is what has happened in France and Italy too where the populist right National Rally and Brothers of Italy and Lega Nord have overtaken the centre right Les Republicains and Forza Italia under non FPTP 2nd ballot and PR systems.
In Canada in 1993 the populist rightwing Reform Party overtook the centre right Progressive Conservatives, though as it was FPTP by 2003 the former effectively took over the latter to create today's Conservative Party of Canada so the united right could win again. A similar thing has happened in the US where the populist Trump has effectively taken over the more moderate GOP of the Bushes and Romney and McCain.
Germany is a rare exception where the centre right CDU is still ahead of the populist right AfD with PR, though even there its new leader Merz is shifting the Union right of where Merkel left it
What's your evidence for: "Only about 10% of the population are tradition Tory centre right, while about another 25-30% are socially conservative rightwingers"?
The European elections under PR where by 2019 the Tories got less than 10% while Farage's party got 30%. Only FPTP keeps them all voting Conservative.
Overall I would say about 30% of the UK population are socially conservative Right, 30% are Labour left, 10% are Liberals, 10% are traditional Tories and the rest a mixture of swing voters, Greens, hard right and Welsh and Scottish Nationalists and the NI parties
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
Not if Labour win a decent majority. Why e would they?
They won't.
Do you mean they won’t win a decent majority? I think they will be comfortable (50 +). You not convinced?
No almost certainly will be a Hung Parliament.
Why do say that? Much as I think @heathener is a loon, she is not that far wrong in how the parties stand and how many voters see the Tories right now.
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
Not if Labour win a decent majority. Why e would they?
They won't.
Do you mean they won’t win a decent majority? I think they will be comfortable (50 +). You not convinced?
No almost certainly will be a Hung Parliament.
Why do say that? Much as I think @heathener is a loon, she is not that far wrong in how the parties stand and how many voters see the Tories right now.
Because of what happened in 2010. I just do not think people trust Labour enough to put them over the line.
One, some interesting insights into the 2022 mid-terms from Catalina who generally have a favourable reputation across the board, even if they have a partisan (D) bias.
Second, Sen Tim Scott of SC is about to enter the GOP nomination. Part of his motivation may be to act as an alternative to RDS if Trump is forced out. However, I suspect it's more he is looking to be DJT's VP pick. Could be interesting both what it means for 2024 but also for what RDS does next.
The other interesting stat I heard is that in the 90s, British equities were 85% in British ownership.
That’s now just a third.
Britain is becoming a branch economy, just as British regions are themselves feeble economic puppets of London.
That's just one more baleful consequence of the rotten property market. Piles of bricks are an almost guaranteed safe investment, offering stratospheric growth - thus, people are disincentivised from investing in anything else. This, in turn, makes homes to live in so stupidly expensive that younger generations have no choice but to bet the farm on property - if they can afford it - because the alternative is to be an impoverished rent serf for a succession of rapacious landlords until you die.
If you're a mortgage-free homeowner in this country you have reached the Promised Land.
Strange as it may seem, the rate of growth in house prices has significantly moderated since 2007. The government has effectively killed off the buy to let market, which contributed to that.
I can't help thinking that interest rates ought to have been raised from near zero a long time ago.
That observation about price growth trends is not entirely without merit, albeit that wages have performed so badly since the GFC that average prices as a multiple of average earnings have continued to accelerate into the stratosphere. @Kinabalu predicts that this trend will go into reverse, but I can't see how given that the cumulative effects of mass migration, renewed wage suppression as inflationary pressures ease, and lack of new building seem liable only to shore up prices.
@Ally_B1 has been woefully unfortunate in seeing the price of their residential property actually decline since 2007, and they're by no means alone: think of all the owners of flats who've been put through the wringer by the cladding disaster. Nonetheless, this won't be the case for the large majority of owner-occupiers, especially those in freehold houses. That's of absolutely no comfort to them, but most homeowners who've been in situ for any length of time are both sat on paper profits far in excess of anything they would've earned putting money in, say, a stock and share ISA invested in a FTSE100 tracker fund, and they're either at or working towards the point where their housing costs collapse to nothing, save for the price of repairs/service charges and insurance. In an economy that's so dominated by property investment and ownership, that's a very advantageous position in which to find oneself.
Going forward, there's no reason to suppose that property won't continue to be the best investment that anyone, save perhaps for the very rich, can possibly make in Britain. If a future Government is going to attempt to reduce the reliance of the economy on piles of bricks and free up more capital for productive investment, it's going to take a long time and require a lot of determined pushing back against powerful vested interests.
My mother (and her generation) bought houses on the basis of
- no accommodation costs when you retire - paying your own mortgage has to be better than paying someone else's. - When you sold, if you were lucky and timed it right, you would get your money back.
The one-way-bet thing is still strange to me - my first flat had the same price in 1997 (when I bought) that it had 10 years earlier. No, not inflation adjusted. Same number of pounds.
To me it just feels like ultimately the right has been unable and totally useless at resolving any of the issues we elected them to solve.
The NHS and the other public services are the worst they've ever been, society is crumbling and yet our national debt is at the highest ever, taxes are at the highest ever and the deficit is still growing.
The right have failed on their own terms. It is time for a change, clearly.
And what will you say in 2029 after 5 years of a labour governement when things are even worse..(note I dont think its because they are labour it would be said if its a tory or lib dem government). I merely thing another 5 years of centrist governement has only one way its going
Yes I'm afraid it's become 2 teams and there's pressure to support everything about yours and nothing about theirs if you're on one of them. Eg I'm not completely enamoured of Meghan Markle but I would never never say that out loud on here.
Social media bears a lot of blame. It’s designed to generate hate, and eliminate nuance. Hate means clicks, and so, advertising.
If you have a serious, but good-natured, argument, face to face, I think most of would accept that our opponents’ views have varying degrees of merit. Social media eliminates that.
Plus the rise of social media has coincided with the decline of traditional media, so a lot of papers and journalists end up amplifying and rebroadcasting the latest twitter flamewars to a lot of people who aren't among the Very Online and would not ever have seen or cared about it otherwise, because that kind of recycling of your morning twitter browse is a lot cheaper than real journalism.
...As...Trump proved in 2016 fighting the culture wars on a conservative platform can even lead to victory
In this specific instance I think you're wrong. Trump assembled a coalition of populists and blue collar workers who voted for him because of globalisation making the rust belt rust, and illegal migrants competing for wages: both economic issues. It may well be that culture-war issues will make a difference in Potus 2024, but I don't think it did in Potus 2016.
I am sure if Kemi, Suella or Jacob win the next Conservative leadership election after a Rishi and Jeremy H general election loss, the Conservatives will swiftly find their rightwing mojo again and be ready to fight the culture war as hard as Trump and DeSantis' GOP now are
But to what end?
The rivers are dirty, the economy is in the toilet, the trains never run on time.
Seriously, what is the point in this stuff? Have you admitted you don't know how to help resolve any of these issues?
I’d say the issues are the trains are dirty, the toilet is in the rivers and it’s time for a run on the economy.
...As...Trump proved in 2016 fighting the culture wars on a conservative platform can even lead to victory
In this specific instance I think you're wrong. Trump assembled a coalition of populists and blue collar workers who voted for him because of globalisation making the rust belt rust, and illegal migrants competing for wages: both economic issues. It may well be that culture-war issues will make a difference in Potus 2024, but I don't think it did in Potus 2016.
It was partly that, partly a reaction from the rustbelt white working class against the cultural liberals on the East and West coasts backing Hillary. Biden was less identified with those groups in 2020 and more with bluecollar voters so was able to beat Trump
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
We wont get pr under labour for the simple reason is they will have to put it to a referendum and the result of it will be fuck no we dont want that
Nah, no referendum. Just do it.
Voting for our government is our choice not theirs, it is their job interview.....they dont get to tell us how to do the interview. Any party that tries to change the system without a referendum is going to land itself in the shit with voters.
Yes the economy is key and getting the deficit and inflation down but that doesn't mean you can ignore the culture wars the woke left are raging, which the right needs to fight back on. As Meloni proved last year and Trump proved in 2016 fighting the culture wars on a conservative platform can even lead to victory
So having proved incompetent and disinterested in the war people want you to fight, you propose to fight a different war because that's what you're really interested in.
If Labour win but inflation and cost of living continues to rise and economic growth is slow, the Tories will take the lead on the economy without needing to do anything anyway. If Labour however gets the economy going again and inflation down then the Tories won't win anyway and fighting the culture war is all they can do to get their base out
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
We wont get pr under labour for the simple reason is they will have to put it to a referendum and the result of it will be fuck no we dont want that
Nah, no referendum. Just do it.
Voting for our government is our choice not theirs, it is their job interview.....they dont get to tell us how to do the interview. Any party that tries to change the system without a referendum is going to land itself in the shit with voters.
The voting belongs to us not fuckwit politicians
If the Lib Dems demand PR and Labour agree, they should implement it. They'll have a mandate and it will be better for us all.
Brexit will never be able to be resolved in an intelligent way if every time somebody points out something they're called a Rejoiner.
Let's be honest, Brexit isn't working. We could do a lot to resolve it short of rejoining but since the Tories are incapable of doing that despite starting the whole thing, Labour will have to. They must ignore the people calling them rejoiners at all costs, these are the same people that crashed the car in the first place.
See CasinoRoyale’s post upthread. He was one of the car-crashers, and he needs to accept several points on his license and a multi-year suspension.
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
We wont get pr under labour for the simple reason is they will have to put it to a referendum and the result of it will be fuck no we dont want that
Nah, no referendum. Just do it.
Voting for our government is our choice not theirs, it is their job interview.....they dont get to tell us how to do the interview. Any party that tries to change the system without a referendum is going to land itself in the shit with voters.
The voting belongs to us not fuckwit politicians
If the Lib Dems demand PR and Labour agree, they should implement it. They'll have a mandate and it will be better for us all.
Then they wont mind if we just implement lamppost protocol
The other interesting stat I heard is that in the 90s, British equities were 85% in British ownership.
That’s now just a third.
Britain is becoming a branch economy, just as British regions are themselves feeble economic puppets of London.
That's just one more baleful consequence of the rotten property market. Piles of bricks are an almost guaranteed safe investment, offering stratospheric growth - thus, people are disincentivised from investing in anything else. This, in turn, makes homes to live in so stupidly expensive that younger generations have no choice but to bet the farm on property - if they can afford it - because the alternative is to be an impoverished rent serf for a succession of rapacious landlords until you die.
If you're a mortgage-free homeowner in this country you have reached the Promised Land.
Strange as it may seem, the rate of growth in house prices has significantly moderated since 2007. The government has effectively killed off the buy to let market, which contributed to that.
I can't help thinking that interest rates ought to have been raised from near zero a long time ago.
That observation about price growth trends is not entirely without merit, albeit that wages have performed so badly since the GFC that average prices as a multiple of average earnings have continued to accelerate into the stratosphere. @Kinabalu predicts that this trend will go into reverse, but I can't see how given that the cumulative effects of mass migration, renewed wage suppression as inflationary pressures ease, and lack of new building seem liable only to shore up prices.
@Ally_B1 has been woefully unfortunate in seeing the price of their residential property actually decline since 2007, and they're by no means alone: think of all the owners of flats who've been put through the wringer by the cladding disaster. Nonetheless, this won't be the case for the large majority of owner-occupiers, especially those in freehold houses. That's of absolutely no comfort to them, but most homeowners who've been in situ for any length of time are both sat on paper profits far in excess of anything they would've earned putting money in, say, a stock and share ISA invested in a FTSE100 tracker fund, and they're either at or working towards the point where their housing costs collapse to nothing, save for the price of repairs/service charges and insurance. In an economy that's so dominated by property investment and ownership, that's a very advantageous position in which to find oneself.
Going forward, there's no reason to suppose that property won't continue to be the best investment that anyone, save perhaps for the very rich, can possibly make in Britain. If a future Government is going to attempt to reduce the reliance of the economy on piles of bricks and free up more capital for productive investment, it's going to take a long time and require a lot of determined pushing back against powerful vested interests.
My mother (and her generation) bought houses on the basis of
- no accommodation costs when you retire - paying your own mortgage has to be better than paying someone else's. - When you sold, if you were lucky and timed it right, you would get your money back.
The one-way-bet thing is still strange to me - my first flat had the same price in 1997 (when I bought) that it had 10 years earlier. No, not inflation adjusted. Same number of pounds.
Items 1 and 2 on your Mum's list were the great attraction to me, plus security of tenure. I've had to move on the whim of a landlord, wanting to sell up for their profit/convenience, before. Never again.
Beyond that, having very little in the way of accommodation costs and not having to hand over a third of your entire net income to a bloody rentier every month is tremendously satisfying.
On topic. No. Michael Gove is very wrong actually. This is how I would explain it. As Miriam Cates says, seeking to strengthen families, communities and the nation, through providing homes and jobs, is the correct policy position - who would disagree with that? So why drop any talk about strengthening families community and our nation and talk nothing but NHS and the economy? The National Conservative conference and the values of family, community and nation at its heart, was not all bad, these types of attacks, such as it was a waste of time promoting family and communities, you should only talk about the NHS and economy as no one is listening, are very petty and shallow minded. If no one is listening to what you feel is important, this is precisely the reason to talk about it and get their attention.
So you're a National Conservative now?
A group believed in and campaigned for the poll tax to replace rates, if they didn’t bother, if they gave up campaigning for it and just banged on about NHS instead, no one would have listened and adopted the policy. If you believe in something you should campaign for it, you should form a pressure group and lobby for it. Everyone at Nat Con were doing exactly the right thing in that regard, surely you must agree?
I just find it odd that you can be a Labour voter one day, a Lib Dem the next and then become this.
I’ve never voted Labour and never will. I haven’t yet voted Conservative either.
You’ve completely missed my point, about how successful the National Conservative rally was for them. Lots of coverage, new converts, key Conservative Party speakers, quite possibly more wealthy sponsors. And the fact they are a pressure group for good old Conservative family values.
My take is not to be judgemental, just honest, as per the example, if you want poll tax to replace rates, there is absolutely nothing wrong campaigning for it, lobbying for it, arguing for it - likewise If you feel it’s wrong a man dressed as a drag queen is rubbing his crotch in front of pre pubescent children, there is absolutely nothing wrong in speaking up about it, is there?
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
We wont get pr under labour for the simple reason is they will have to put it to a referendum and the result of it will be fuck no we dont want that
Nah, no referendum. Just do it.
Voting for our government is our choice not theirs, it is their job interview.....they dont get to tell us how to do the interview. Any party that tries to change the system without a referendum is going to land itself in the shit with voters.
The voting belongs to us not fuckwit politicians
If the Lib Dems demand PR and Labour agree, they should implement it. They'll have a mandate and it will be better for us all.
Then they wont mind if we just implement lamppost protocol
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
We wont get pr under labour for the simple reason is they will have to put it to a referendum and the result of it will be fuck no we dont want that
Nah, no referendum. Just do it.
Voting for our government is our choice not theirs, it is their job interview.....they dont get to tell us how to do the interview. Any party that tries to change the system without a referendum is going to land itself in the shit with voters.
The voting belongs to us not fuckwit politicians
If the Lib Dems demand PR and Labour agree, they should implement it. They'll have a mandate and it will be better for us all.
Then they wont mind if we just implement lamppost protocol
You are seriously suggesting if a party that gets less than 10% of the countries votes should be able to unilaterally demand a change to the voting system....then you wonder why people think the left are deluded
It is very hard to believe that more money has been spent on the water network in the last thirty-odd years than in the period 1870-1900. All those new reservoirs and associated pipeworks, plus the treatment works and sewage systems, did not come cheap.
How much of the money spent by the owners of the water monopolies came out of their own pockets, and how much came from ours? Does the operation of an English water business bear any relation to the conventional understanding of risk and reward, or is it just a licence to print money? Why has all the money that's been spent left us, at once, acutely vulnerable to drought and to having our waterways drenched in raw sewage? And how many other countries rely on a fully privatised water and sewerage system?
This thread looks to be informative on investments in the English water system.
AIUI capital is raised on future water bills. For obvious reasons OFWAT decides what these bills will be, not the water companies. OFWAT tends to be conservative because it doesn't want to be author of unaffordable bills. The consequence is less capital raised and less investment than might be desirable.
OFWAT works how much capital can be raised based on expected future receipts, which gives an annual budget for investment plus a margin for water company operations and profits. OFWAT then tells the water companies what facilities they need to build or upgrade within the investment budget. OFWAT tends to overestimate the cost of capital, which means the investment budget is lower than it needs be - and water company profits bigger than they need be.
So capital investment is shortchanged by this process twice.
(Edit possibly three times if water companies are shortcutting operational requirements eg on sewerage spills for their greater profit)
...As...Trump proved in 2016 fighting the culture wars on a conservative platform can even lead to victory
In this specific instance I think you're wrong. Trump assembled a coalition of populists and blue collar workers who voted for him because of globalisation making the rust belt rust, and illegal migrants competing for wages: both economic issues. It may well be that culture-war issues will make a difference in Potus 2024, but I don't think it did in Potus 2016.
It was partly that, partly a reaction from the rustbelt white working class against the cultural liberals on the East and West coasts backing Hillary. Biden was less identified with those groups in 2020 and more with bluecollar voters so was able to beat Trump
To me it just feels like ultimately the right has been unable and totally useless at resolving any of the issues we elected them to solve.
The NHS and the other public services are the worst they've ever been, society is crumbling and yet our national debt is at the highest ever, taxes are at the highest ever and the deficit is still growing.
The right have failed on their own terms. It is time for a change, clearly.
And what will you say in 2029 after 5 years of a labour governement when things are even worse..(note I dont think its because they are labour it would be said if its a tory or lib dem government). I merely thing another 5 years of centrist governement has only one way its going
I will vote against them and probably vote Tory.
"When the evidence changes I change my view".
An admirable position and one it would be good for more people to take.
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
We wont get pr under labour for the simple reason is they will have to put it to a referendum and the result of it will be fuck no we dont want that
Nah, no referendum. Just do it.
Voting for our government is our choice not theirs, it is their job interview.....they dont get to tell us how to do the interview. Any party that tries to change the system without a referendum is going to land itself in the shit with voters.
The voting belongs to us not fuckwit politicians
If the Lib Dems demand PR and Labour agree, they should implement it. They'll have a mandate and it will be better for us all.
I cannot see such a huge change to the way we elect parliament without a referendum.
I’ve never voted Labour and never will. I haven’t yet voted Conservative either.
You’ve completely missed my point, about how successful the National Conservative rally was for them. Lots of coverage, new converts, key Conservative Party speakers, quite possibly more wealthy sponsors. And the fact they are a pressure group for good old Conservative family values.
My take is not to be judgemental, just honest, as per the example, if you want poll tax to replace rates, there is absolutely nothing wrong campaigning for it, lobbying for it, arguing for it - likewise If you feel it’s wrong a man dressed as a drag queen is rubbing his crotch in front of pre pubescent children, there is absolutely nothing wrong in speaking up about it, is there?
You say it is successful because you agree with it - which is fine as it goes.
They can do what they want, I can call them nutters who do not represent the centre ground of British politics, which the Tories seem to think they occupy but what actually happened was Labour vacated the field for five years.
It is clear to me, the Tories have learned nothing since the 90s.
FPTP has delivered 100 years of consistently effective governments that have taken the UK from strength to strength. We’ve never been stronger. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it.
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
We wont get pr under labour for the simple reason is they will have to put it to a referendum and the result of it will be fuck no we dont want that
Nah, no referendum. Just do it.
Voting for our government is our choice not theirs, it is their job interview.....they dont get to tell us how to do the interview. Any party that tries to change the system without a referendum is going to land itself in the shit with voters.
The voting belongs to us not fuckwit politicians
If the Lib Dems demand PR and Labour agree, they should implement it. They'll have a mandate and it will be better for us all.
I cannot see such a huge change to the way we elect parliament without a referendum.
They should get on and do it. Referendums are a disastrous idea.
I’ve never voted Labour and never will. I haven’t yet voted Conservative either.
You’ve completely missed my point, about how successful the National Conservative rally was for them. Lots of coverage, new converts, key Conservative Party speakers, quite possibly more wealthy sponsors. And the fact they are a pressure group for good old Conservative family values.
My take is not to be judgemental, just honest, as per the example, if you want poll tax to replace rates, there is absolutely nothing wrong campaigning for it, lobbying for it, arguing for it - likewise If you feel it’s wrong a man dressed as a drag queen is rubbing his crotch in front of pre pubescent children, there is absolutely nothing wrong in speaking up about it, is there?
You say it is successful because you agree with it - which is fine as it goes.
They can do what they want, I can call them nutters who do not represent the centre ground of British politics, which the Tories seem to think they occupy but what actually happened was Labour vacated the field for five years.
It is clear to me, the Tories have learned nothing since the 90s.
Being on the centre ground is a successful electoral strategy as long as you keep your base, as Cameron and Blair proved.
Being on the centre ground but losing your base however is a strategy for electoral oblivion, see Nick Clegg 2015
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
We wont get pr under labour for the simple reason is they will have to put it to a referendum and the result of it will be fuck no we dont want that
Nah, no referendum. Just do it.
Voting for our government is our choice not theirs, it is their job interview.....they dont get to tell us how to do the interview. Any party that tries to change the system without a referendum is going to land itself in the shit with voters.
The voting belongs to us not fuckwit politicians
If the Lib Dems demand PR and Labour agree, they should implement it. They'll have a mandate and it will be better for us all.
No it will be better for the parties and far worse for democracy. We should be reducing the influence and power of the parties not increasing it.
Gill gets back to back 100s in T20 matches, beating Kohli who also scored back to back 100s.
T20 cricket is getting truly insane. This year's IPL has already produced more 6s than any previous year and there are several matches left. What is slightly concerning is that, unlike previous years, very few English players are genuinely excelling. Several Aussies and a frightening number of young Indians.
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
We wont get pr under labour for the simple reason is they will have to put it to a referendum and the result of it will be fuck no we dont want that
Nah, no referendum. Just do it.
Voting for our government is our choice not theirs, it is their job interview.....they dont get to tell us how to do the interview. Any party that tries to change the system without a referendum is going to land itself in the shit with voters.
The voting belongs to us not fuckwit politicians
If the Lib Dems demand PR and Labour agree, they should implement it. They'll have a mandate and it will be better for us all.
Then they wont mind if we just implement lamppost protocol
Do you honestly think PR is bad? Really?
Yes I do because I vote for party x they count my vote as a mandate then join up with party y and z to form a governement. They confer and produce a manifesto. They still claim my vote as a part of their mandate even if I knew the manifesto before they would not have got my vote.
This happened to me in 2010 with the ld con coalition. If I had known what they would agree I would have pissed on them not voted for them
PR is give me a vote then I will tell you what you voted for system and they can fuck it.
To me it just feels like ultimately the right has been unable and totally useless at resolving any of the issues we elected them to solve.
The NHS and the other public services are the worst they've ever been, society is crumbling and yet our national debt is at the highest ever, taxes are at the highest ever and the deficit is still growing.
The right have failed on their own terms. It is time for a change, clearly.
And what will you say in 2029 after 5 years of a labour governement when things are even worse..(note I dont think its because they are labour it would be said if its a tory or lib dem government). I merely thing another 5 years of centrist governement has only one way its going
I will vote against them and probably vote Tory.
"When the evidence changes I change my view".
An admirable position and one it would be good for more people to take.
You really believe he would do that rather than arguing well actually labour did good regardless?
A third thing I learned on Twitter this morning (via Nick Timothy) is that 22% of study visas went to dependants, compared to 6% in 2019.
You can see what the government is *trying* to do about economic growth.
I cannot fathom it. I suspect it's to get more medical staff into the NHS quick-ish but it's one hell of a brave way to do it.
44% of the dependent visas are going to Indian nationals and 30% to Nigerian nationals. And it's expected to have gone from c.16k to 150k in the last year. That's on top of Indians being the biggest in boat crossings last month.
It's clear to me that student visas, as well as boat crossings, are simply a way to circumvent work permits to economically migrate - and the combined population of India and Nigeria is nearly 1.7 billion, so there will be no end to it.
To me, this is a greater “loss of control” than even the volumes we saw under FOM (against which, successive governments made no effective mitigation).
I can't think of a better way to kill off Brexit than pursuing this policy.
Brexit is already dead, as a governing philosophy. The wave function collapsed over Christmas 2021, after Frost’s resignation.
Fewer people think Brexit has gone well than believe the moon landings were faked.
The incoming government has no interest in maintaining Brexit, only in mitigating it. Brexit is now short-hand for arrant stupidity, bordering on suicide. They should probably rename the Darwin Awards the Brexit Awards.
And, yet, the pomposity of Rejoiners could be more than enough to keep it in the frame for years to come.
We’re not going to fix anything if you simply insult the people who are pointing out the problems as “pompous Rejoiners”
Yes the economy is key and getting the deficit and inflation down but that doesn't mean you can ignore the culture wars the woke left are raging, which the right needs to fight back on. As Meloni proved last year and Trump proved in 2016 fighting the culture wars on a conservative platform can even lead to victory
Had to laugh at: "...the culture wars the woke left are raging..."
You won't hear anyone on the left talking about the 'culture war'; it is entirely an invention and preoccupation of the right.
I’ve never voted Labour and never will. I haven’t yet voted Conservative either.
You’ve completely missed my point, about how successful the National Conservative rally was for them. Lots of coverage, new converts, key Conservative Party speakers, quite possibly more wealthy sponsors. And the fact they are a pressure group for good old Conservative family values.
My take is not to be judgemental, just honest, as per the example, if you want poll tax to replace rates, there is absolutely nothing wrong campaigning for it, lobbying for it, arguing for it - likewise If you feel it’s wrong a man dressed as a drag queen is rubbing his crotch in front of pre pubescent children, there is absolutely nothing wrong in speaking up about it, is there?
You say it is successful because you agree with it - which is fine as it goes.
They can do what they want, I can call them nutters who do not represent the centre ground of British politics, which the Tories seem to think they occupy but what actually happened was Labour vacated the field for five years.
It is clear to me, the Tories have learned nothing since the 90s.
Being on the centre ground is a successful electoral strategy as long as you keep your base, as Cameron and Blair proved.
Being on the centre ground but losing your base however is a strategy for electoral oblivion, see Nick Clegg 2015
But then I find it odd you are okay with the current Tory strategy which loses those voters.
Danny Finkelstein has been warning of this for years. Not somebody I normally agree with but his analysis of where the Tories are is spot on.
Yes the economy is key and getting the deficit and inflation down but that doesn't mean you can ignore the culture wars the woke left are raging, which the right needs to fight back on. As Meloni proved last year and Trump proved in 2016 fighting the culture wars on a conservative platform can even lead to victory
Had to laugh at: "...the culture wars the woke left are raging..."
You won't hear anyone on the left talking about the 'culture war'; it is entirely an invention and preoccupation of the right.
I am fairly young. Genuinely these culture issues just do not occur in the real world, we talk about football, cricket and how the Tube is broken again.
To me it just feels like ultimately the right has been unable and totally useless at resolving any of the issues we elected them to solve.
The NHS and the other public services are the worst they've ever been, society is crumbling and yet our national debt is at the highest ever, taxes are at the highest ever and the deficit is still growing.
The right have failed on their own terms. It is time for a change, clearly.
And what will you say in 2029 after 5 years of a labour governement when things are even worse..(note I dont think its because they are labour it would be said if its a tory or lib dem government). I merely thing another 5 years of centrist governement has only one way its going
I will vote against them and probably vote Tory.
"When the evidence changes I change my view".
An admirable position and one it would be good for more people to take.
You really believe he would do that rather than arguing well actually labour did good regardless?
Well then you are implying I'm a liar, despite having voted Tory before. So bugger off.
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
We wont get pr under labour for the simple reason is they will have to put it to a referendum and the result of it will be fuck no we dont want that
Nah, no referendum. Just do it.
Voting for our government is our choice not theirs, it is their job interview.....they dont get to tell us how to do the interview. Any party that tries to change the system without a referendum is going to land itself in the shit with voters.
The voting belongs to us not fuckwit politicians
If the Lib Dems demand PR and Labour agree, they should implement it. They'll have a mandate and it will be better for us all.
No it will be better for the parties and far worse for democracy. We should be reducing the influence and power of the parties not increasing it.
Really? Parties are a social technology through which people come together on complex topics and agree on enough to propose a definite course of action. If they are to weaken we will need to replace them. What might that be?
To me it just feels like ultimately the right has been unable and totally useless at resolving any of the issues we elected them to solve.
The NHS and the other public services are the worst they've ever been, society is crumbling and yet our national debt is at the highest ever, taxes are at the highest ever and the deficit is still growing.
The right have failed on their own terms. It is time for a change, clearly.
And what will you say in 2029 after 5 years of a labour governement when things are even worse..(note I dont think its because they are labour it would be said if its a tory or lib dem government). I merely thing another 5 years of centrist governement has only one way its going
I will vote against them and probably vote Tory.
"When the evidence changes I change my view".
An admirable position and one it would be good for more people to take.
I believe Winston Churchill said this although it is attributed to Keynes. Both heroes of mine.
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
We wont get pr under labour for the simple reason is they will have to put it to a referendum and the result of it will be fuck no we dont want that
Nah, no referendum. Just do it.
Voting for our government is our choice not theirs, it is their job interview.....they dont get to tell us how to do the interview. Any party that tries to change the system without a referendum is going to land itself in the shit with voters.
The voting belongs to us not fuckwit politicians
If the Lib Dems demand PR and Labour agree, they should implement it. They'll have a mandate and it will be better for us all.
Then they wont mind if we just implement lamppost protocol
Do you honestly think PR is bad? Really?
PR is different. Under FPTP parties are coalitions. Generally in the U.K. we have majority governments which represent the coalition of the ruling party, and broadly implements manifestos. Under PM parties tend to splinter, and government relies on horse trading after the election. At which point manifestos get ripped up, Pace tuition fees and the Lib Dems. I don’t know which is best. For minor parties FPTP is unfair. UKIP representaed a lot of people but struggled to gain representation in parliament, as does the greens etc. But many would not like the act of a coalition formation either.
For all its faults, FPTP post has tended to deliver stable government in the U.K., which is probably why it’s lasted so long.
I do think we will probably get PR under Labour but not because Labour particularly wants it.
We wont get pr under labour for the simple reason is they will have to put it to a referendum and the result of it will be fuck no we dont want that
Nah, no referendum. Just do it.
Voting for our government is our choice not theirs, it is their job interview.....they dont get to tell us how to do the interview. Any party that tries to change the system without a referendum is going to land itself in the shit with voters.
The voting belongs to us not fuckwit politicians
If the Lib Dems demand PR and Labour agree, they should implement it. They'll have a mandate and it will be better for us all.
Well Labour (and the Tories) have always hated electoral reform (and I do not see that changing). And I do not vote for either of them.
I doubt (sadly) that electoral reform will happen in my (not too long) lifetime, but I will still say that I do hope (hope?, do not be silly) that we get STV rather than some partisan (AMS) variety.
To me it just feels like ultimately the right has been unable and totally useless at resolving any of the issues we elected them to solve.
The NHS and the other public services are the worst they've ever been, society is crumbling and yet our national debt is at the highest ever, taxes are at the highest ever and the deficit is still growing.
The right have failed on their own terms. It is time for a change, clearly.
And what will you say in 2029 after 5 years of a labour governement when things are even worse..(note I dont think its because they are labour it would be said if its a tory or lib dem government). I merely thing another 5 years of centrist governement has only one way its going
I will vote against them and probably vote Tory.
"When the evidence changes I change my view".
An admirable position and one it would be good for more people to take.
You really believe he would do that rather than arguing well actually labour did good regardless?
Well then you are implying I'm a liar, despite having voted Tory before. So bugger off.
Evidence : you were all for Corbyn you swore the man was the real deal.....now you think he was the worst thing since sliced bread but now you are a starmer fan. I cannot imagine a universe where you vote tory, hell even the people that wrote the last series of game of thrones couldn't come up with a script to support that
Comments
@Ally_B1 has been woefully unfortunate in seeing the price of their residential property actually decline since 2007, and they're by no means alone: think of all the owners of flats who've been put through the wringer by the cladding disaster. Nonetheless, this won't be the case for the large majority of owner-occupiers, especially those in freehold houses. That's of absolutely no comfort to them, but most homeowners who've been in situ for any length of time are both sat on paper profits far in excess of anything they would've earned putting money in, say, a stock and share ISA invested in a FTSE100 tracker fund, and they're either at or working towards the point where their housing costs collapse to nothing, save for the price of repairs/service charges and insurance. In an economy that's so dominated by property investment and ownership, that's a very advantageous position in which to find oneself.
Going forward, there's no reason to suppose that property won't continue to be the best investment that anyone, save perhaps for the very rich, can possibly make in Britain. If a future Government is going to attempt to reduce the reliance of the economy on piles of bricks and free up more capital for productive investment, it's going to take a long time and require a lot of determined pushing back against powerful vested interests.
There’s very little that’s conservative about the Conservatives.
"We've seen record investment in water"
Broadcaster Martin Lewis and Conservative MP Jake Berry clash over the government's record on water pollution
https://twitter.com/BBCPolitics/status/1660214056517599232
Get him as a Labour candidate for goodness sake.
Your touchiness on this subject is a bit dubious.
The NHS and the other public services are the worst they've ever been, society is crumbling and yet our national debt is at the highest ever, taxes are at the highest ever and the deficit is still growing.
The right have failed on their own terms. It is time for a change, clearly.
Let's be honest, Brexit isn't working. We could do a lot to resolve it short of rejoining but since the Tories are incapable of doing that despite starting the whole thing, Labour will have to. They must ignore the people calling them rejoiners at all costs, these are the same people that crashed the car in the first place.
FPTP in the past was their ability to balance
the sensible centre-right capitalists with the social conservatives without letting the latter go mad, but that doesn’t seem on offer anymore. If the Tories are going to go full AKP/BJP/GOP/national rally then we might as well go straight to PR and get ourselves a CDU and an AfD to choose from.
He was one of the car-crashers, and he needs to accept several points on his license and a multi-year suspension.
The rivers are dirty, the economy is in the toilet, the trains never run on time.
Seriously, what is the point in this stuff? Have you admitted you don't know how to help resolve any of these issues?
'
That is what has happened in France and Italy too where the populist right National Rally and Brothers of Italy and Lega Nord have overtaken the centre right Les Republicains and Forza Italia under non FPTP 2nd ballot and PR systems.
In Canada in 1993 the populist rightwing Reform Party overtook the centre right Progressive Conservatives, though as it was FPTP by 2003 the former effectively took over the latter to create today's Conservative Party of Canada so the united right could win again. A similar thing has happened in the US where the populist Trump has effectively taken over the more moderate GOP of the Bushes and Romney and McCain.
Germany is a rare exception where the centre right CDU is still ahead of the populist right AfD with PR, though even there its new leader Merz is shifting the Union right of where Merkel left it
I’m sure some will emerge with greater exposure, but it would be wrong to expect many labour ministers not to flounder every bit as badly as the current government of none of the talents.
I'm sure this disruption will be called out by the pro free speech brigade here
If you have a serious, but good-natured, argument, face to face, I think most of would accept that our opponents’ views have varying degrees of merit. Social media eliminates that.
Labour would only start to campaign for PR if it were convinced that it could never win a majority by itself again, so as to spike the guns of the Tories and improve its chances of leading coalition administrations in future. So long as the electoral duopoly remains as it is, neither of its beneficiaries will want to break it up.
But, a more plausible figure, imagine a Conservative version of Kate Forbes, could do it.
Voters respect politicians who are sincere and comfortable in their own skin, even if they don’t entirely agree.
Overall I would say about 30% of the UK population are socially conservative Right, 30% are Labour left, 10% are Liberals, 10% are traditional Tories and the rest a mixture of swing voters, Greens, hard right and Welsh and Scottish Nationalists and the NI parties
In 2029 they will win big. But not in 2024.
But if it did, the next Tory PM is possibly advising Hunt and will take power in coalition sometime around 2037.
One, some interesting insights into the 2022 mid-terms from Catalina who generally have a favourable reputation across the board, even if they have a partisan (D) bias.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/why-the-2022-midterms-broke-for-democrats-and-what-that-means-for-2024/ar-AA1brVgO
Second, Sen Tim Scott of SC is about to enter the GOP nomination. Part of his motivation may be to act as an alternative to RDS if Trump is forced out. However, I suspect it's more he is looking to be DJT's VP pick. Could be interesting both what it means for 2024 but also for what RDS does next.
- no accommodation costs when you retire
- paying your own mortgage has to be better than paying someone else's.
- When you sold, if you were lucky and timed it right, you would get your money back.
The one-way-bet thing is still strange to me - my first flat had the same price in 1997 (when I bought) that it had 10 years earlier. No, not inflation adjusted. Same number of pounds.
PM now expected to consult with his independent ethics adviser Laurie Magnus when he returns to London from the G7 in Japan
@johnestevens
EXCLUSIVE 🚨: Suella Braverman's team originally denied she'd got speeding ticket
Raises troubling questions about the government's dealings with journalists
@GdnPolitics
Suella Braverman ‘tried to get out of final vote on small boats bill’
@skynewsniall
Suella Braverman all over the papers like a puppy.
I’m beginning to think that someone somewhere in Whitehall *really* doesn’t like the home sec
The voting belongs to us not fuckwit politicians
Beyond that, having very little in the way of accommodation costs and not having to hand over a third of your entire net income to a bloody rentier every month is tremendously satisfying.
You’ve completely missed my point, about how successful the National Conservative rally was for them. Lots of coverage, new converts, key Conservative Party speakers, quite possibly more wealthy sponsors. And the fact they are a pressure group for good old Conservative family values.
My take is not to be judgemental, just honest, as per the example, if you want poll tax to replace rates, there is absolutely nothing wrong campaigning for it, lobbying for it, arguing for it - likewise If you feel it’s wrong a man dressed as a drag queen is rubbing his crotch in front of pre pubescent children, there is absolutely nothing wrong in speaking up about it, is there?
AIUI capital is raised on future water bills. For obvious reasons OFWAT decides what these bills will be, not the water companies. OFWAT tends to be conservative because it doesn't want to be author of unaffordable bills. The consequence is less capital raised and less investment than might be desirable.
OFWAT works how much capital can be raised based on expected future receipts, which gives an annual budget for investment plus a margin for water company operations and profits. OFWAT then tells the water companies what facilities they need to build or upgrade within the investment budget. OFWAT tends to overestimate the cost of capital, which means the investment budget is lower than it needs be - and water company profits bigger than they need be.
So capital investment is shortchanged by this process twice.
(Edit possibly three times if water companies are shortcutting operational requirements eg on sewerage spills for their greater profit)
https://twitter.com/ACJSissons/status/1659982474099736580
An admirable position and one it would be good for more people to take.
They can do what they want, I can call them nutters who do not represent the centre ground of British politics, which the Tories seem to think they occupy but what actually happened was Labour vacated the field for five years.
It is clear to me, the Tories have learned nothing since the 90s.
Being on the centre ground but losing your base however is a strategy for electoral oblivion, see Nick Clegg 2015
T20 cricket is getting truly insane. This year's IPL has already produced more 6s than any previous year and there are several matches left. What is slightly concerning is that, unlike previous years, very few English players are genuinely excelling. Several Aussies and a frightening number of young Indians.
This happened to me in 2010 with the ld con coalition. If I had known what they would agree I would have pissed on them not voted for them
PR is give me a vote then I will tell you what you voted for system and they can fuck it.
🚨 The Mirror has published a transcript of the FOUR TIMES Suella Braverman's aide denied she'd been done for speeding
The adviser claimed it was "nonsense"
https://twitter.com/johnestevens/status/1660354592201224194
You won't hear anyone on the left talking about the 'culture war'; it is entirely an invention and preoccupation of the right.
Danny Finkelstein has been warning of this for years. Not somebody I normally agree with but his analysis of where the Tories are is spot on.
I’m surprised though that she hasn’t done the martyr routine and resigned in protest at the cabinets stance on immigration .
That way she can position herself as the darling of the right and hope to become leader when Sunak loses the GE.
Under PM parties tend to splinter, and government relies on horse trading after the election. At which point manifestos get ripped up, Pace tuition fees and the Lib Dems.
I don’t know which is best. For minor parties FPTP is unfair. UKIP representaed a lot of people but struggled to gain representation in parliament, as does the greens etc. But many would not like the act of a coalition formation either.
For all its faults, FPTP post has tended to deliver stable government in the U.K., which is probably why it’s lasted so long.
I doubt (sadly) that electoral reform will happen in my (not too long) lifetime, but I will still say that I do hope (hope?, do not be silly) that we get STV rather than some partisan (AMS) variety.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricket/scorecard/ECKO56241
https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/1660355541187588096?t=ioEabeA9XlREWVk-PpmRrA&s=19