Since Starmer hasnt put any stakes in the ground he's trying to be all things to all men. That means he can only disappoint all since he hasnt set his stall out. Hes' heading down the same path as Sunak.
Since Starmer hasnt put any stakes in the ground he's trying to be all things to all men. That means he can only disappoint all since he hasnt set his stall out. Hes' heading down the same path as Sunak.
But he's not remotely as incompetent as Richi
Only because he doesnt have the day to day pressures. Watch him fizzle when in office. Yeah but no but yeah but no but .........
In May 2009 #KeirStarmer prosecuted Wendy Cousins, sub-postmistress of the Post Office branch in Hertford Heath, Herts. She was sentenced to 21 months’ imprisonment but died in 2022 before the Court of Appeal could formally exonerate her. #StarmerResign
HS2 to Birmingham may cost £65bn, railway boss says
The London to Birmingham stretch of the HS2 railway could cost more than £65bn in current prices, the boss of the company building it has said.
Sir Jonathan Thompson said a rise in the cost of materials such as concrete and steel over the past few years have added £8bn to £10bn.
In October the government cancelled the sections between the West Midlands, Manchester, and the East Midlands.
Now HS2 Ltd and the government disagree on the cost of building the rest.
Will it even happen? I feel like I should tell the government I could do it for half the amount, fail to deliver, and the country would therefore save a huge amount for the same outcome.
As I have been saying for a long time on here now, let's just scrap it. Please. Yes I know a lot of money has been spent but we can save much more by just cancelling it.
Goodnight 👍
I vote for scrapping it, then re-commissioning it in 2028, scrapping it in 2034, and re-commission it in 2038 as thats probably close to what HMG will do.
Before opening the previous comments I thought you were talking about NI, (National Insurance not Northern Ireland).
It does look like food retailers had a good Christmas, but at the expense of clothing and electrical goods. It hould help with the trade deficit, which I think our fundamental economic problem.
In May 2009 #KeirStarmer prosecuted Wendy Cousins, sub-postmistress of the Post Office branch in Hertford Heath, Herts. She was sentenced to 21 months’ imprisonment but died in 2022 before the Court of Appeal could formally exonerate her. #StarmerResign
A point of order, by "Starmer prosecuted" the writer meant to write the "CPS prosecuted", but other than that, a good point, well made Casino.
'“No, I wasn’t aware of any of them. I think there was a small number within a 20-year window, that’s all I know,” he said.
“I don’t even now – I think the CPS are helping with inquiries – how many of those may or may not have involved Horizon.”
While the Post Office itself prosecuted hundreds of post office operators based on the faulty Horizon IT system, it has emerged from official reviews that 10 cases taken by the CPS resulted in convictions. Three occurred while Starmer was DPP.
“They didn’t go to his desk,” a Labour spokesperson said.'
It does look like food retailers had a good Christmas, but at the expense of clothing and electrical goods. It hould help with the trade deficit, which I think our fundamental economic problem.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Interesting stuff. 3 key points: 1. The Tories are fucked. Proper Fucked. Another relaunch of Sunak won't make any difference. Their catastrophic failure to deliver quality of life improvements (because things are worse) means these voters are *done* with the Tories. 2. Labour need to stop attacking the Tories and switch to Shadow Government mode. The election could be less than 5 months away. We'd do this. We'd do that. You need this. 3. The Operation Samson approach for the Tories is to weaponise the Nigel. Yes, he would take votes off them. But more critically he could take votes off Labour. We have seen this week how Farage saying Starmer should resign as Post Office Minister has played. Offer him a knighthood - a proper one not a crappy one like IDS got.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Interesting stuff. 3 key points: 1. The Tories are fucked. Proper Fucked. Another relaunch of Sunak won't make any difference. Their catastrophic failure to deliver quality of life improvements (because things are worse) means these voters are *done* with the Tories. 2. Labour need to stop attacking the Tories and switch to Shadow Government mode. The election could be less than 5 months away. We'd do this. We'd do that. You need this. 3. The Operation Samson approach for the Tories is to weaponise the Nigel. Yes, he would take votes off them. But more critically he could take votes off Labour. We have seen this week how Farage saying Starmer should resign as Post Office Minister has played. Offer him a knighthood - a proper one not a crappy one like IDS got.
On Point #2. The Shadow Labour Government did this very effectively from1996. As a result the Media started to treat ask questions as if they were the "government in waiting" and it came over to the voters that Blair and his Shadow Cabinet were serious about running the country, something that too many doubted throughout the Major years.
I was previously infavour of SKS not publishing the Labour policies because the Tories would then have time to plan their attack. The Tories have now shown that they are incapable of attacking anything, so it is now it is time for Labour to start outlining in concrete policies how the Labour Party will be better than the Tories.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Interesting stuff. 3 key points: 1. The Tories are fucked. Proper Fucked. Another relaunch of Sunak won't make any difference. Their catastrophic failure to deliver quality of life improvements (because things are worse) means these voters are *done* with the Tories. 2. Labour need to stop attacking the Tories and switch to Shadow Government mode. The election could be less than 5 months away. We'd do this. We'd do that. You need this. 3. The Operation Samson approach for the Tories is to weaponise the Nigel. Yes, he would take votes off them. But more critically he could take votes off Labour. We have seen this week how Farage saying Starmer should resign as Post Office Minister has played. Offer him a knighthood - a proper one not a crappy one like IDS got.
I’ve been waiting for 2 for what feels like eons now. It would be good to hear more concrete proposals from Labour. My fear is that it isn’t really coming - they’re hoping mood music and anti Tory sentiment will carry them through on a bare bones manifesto. I hope I’m wrong, because the country doesn’t need a new government hamstrung from day 1 by a lack of vision/action plan.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Interesting stuff. 3 key points: 1. The Tories are fucked. Proper Fucked. Another relaunch of Sunak won't make any difference. Their catastrophic failure to deliver quality of life improvements (because things are worse) means these voters are *done* with the Tories. 2. Labour need to stop attacking the Tories and switch to Shadow Government mode. The election could be less than 5 months away. We'd do this. We'd do that. You need this. 3. The Operation Samson approach for the Tories is to weaponise the Nigel. Yes, he would take votes off them. But more critically he could take votes off Labour. We have seen this week how Farage saying Starmer should resign as Post Office Minister has played. Offer him a knighthood - a proper one not a crappy one like IDS got.
On Point #2. The Shadow Labour Government did this very effectively from1996. As a result the Media started to treat ask questions as if they were the "government in waiting" and it came over to the voters that Blair and his Shadow Cabinet were serious about running the country, something that too many doubted throughout the Major years.
I was previously infavour of SKS not publishing the Labour policies because the Tories would then have time to plan their attack. The Tories have now shown that they are incapable of attacking anything, so it is now it is time for Labour to start outlining in concrete policies how the Labour Party will be better than the Tories.
Labour have a whole stack of policies. LibDems as well. Nobody listens. As Blair discovered, the way to get people to listen is to repeat a mantra and repeat it and repeat it.
Pledge cards are done. Sunak had made a bit of a mess at his 5. Starmer has 5 missions which are grand and vague.
They need to pull a headline policy out of each of them and slam it every opportunity they get.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
"Sweden is warned to 'brace for war': Civil Defence minister tells citizens to 'get moving' and prepare for the end of 210 years of peace as country bids to join NATO in face of Russia tensions"
The concerning issue for Sweden and Finland is the amount of migrants and what level of commitment they would have towards "civil defence", also in light of the effectiveness of Russian propaganda operations, for instance in relation to the Israel/Palestine conflict.
That was the problem the Roman Empire had by the end. Lots of people living in its borders with no allegiance to Rome or willingness to defend the institution.
"Oscar Jonsson, a specialist from the Swedish Defence University, said that while war was a possibility, it would require several factors to fall into place: Russia's war in Ukraine coming to an end, its military having the time to rebuild and rearm its fighting force and for Europe to lose US military support... All of which were within the realms of possibility, he added."
There is a strong strategic argument for the war in Ukraine to get de-escalated but essentially unresolved and still active, so Russia are bogged down, whilst the rest of Europe can restructure its own defences, build border walls, set up armies, prepare for the likely arrival of Trump 2 and attendant uncertainty etc. NATO cannot attack Russia to try and suck out its energy but it can attack it by proxy in Ukraine where it doesn't recognise the 'border'.
I have had several discussions about this with people in Finland where the view set out above is not very welcome and regarded as weak. But I struggle to see the merit in going all out to reinstate the 2014 border. This seems to be based on some kind of punishment theory, that once 'beaten back' the Russians will not return. But I think this line of thinking runs in to the nuclear escalation problem which didn't exist in past conflicts with Russia (ie in the Winter War).
In the end, isn't it the case that a smaller Ukraine, deprived of the large bulk of its Russian speaking population (and thus the pretext for Russian claims) would be a more coherant and defensible entity?
In a word, no.
Russia considers Ukraine to be Russian territory, any “solution” that fails to recognise the 1991 border gives the Russians breathing space to rearm and try again. So long as the Ukranians want to keep fighting - which they very much do - it’s in the rest of Europe’s self-interest to keep them fed with supplies of the best kit they can get their hands on.
It isn't allowing them breathing space though because under the solution above Russia are still bogged down having to defend the current 'border'. Considering Western self interest more broadly, it is inevitably a balanced matter between supporting Ukraine and everything else Europe needs to do to defend itself against Russia given the uncertainties of the forthcoming US election. When you look at how unprepared Europe is for a war (as pre the articles about Sweden), throwing everything in to Ukraine looks like an elephant trap. Strategically the focus would be more effectively placed on securing its defensive abilities in relation to the existing situation. This position is never going to be acceptable to those in Ukraine who see the conflict as existential and all or nothing but it would achieve much in terms of reducing the legitimacy of Russian claims on Ukraine.
I think the fallacy to avoid is that any meaningful 'peace deal' or 'agreement' can be made with Russia.
Nobody would be attacking Russia if it was inside its internationally recognised borders. That includes withdrawing from South Ossetia and Transnistria, which is a humiliation for Mr Small One, but would end the conflict for them and mean they don't have to 'defend' anything.
The reason this deal can't be made is because the egos of the current fascist clowns running the Russian government won't let them accept it.
Another perspective is that the Russian psyche relies on peripheral wars. From a strategic western point of view it is desirable that these should be directed to the some conflict with Islamists in the middle east or alternatively with China. It is a strategic blunder on our part that it has ended up happening in Ukraine.
No. From a strategic point of view, it is desirable that Russia's psyche changes. And before you say "that won't happen," the rest of Europe has recovered from having serious wars at least every fifty years to relative peace and friendship.
There is zero reason why the Russian psyche has to be the way it is. It is that way because of a false mythos perpetuated by the Russian state, spread through the state-controlled media. If that leadership were to change, or its views change, then so would the 'Russian psyche', albeit slowly.
The UK has been involved in quite a few wars over the past 3 decades.
I said: "relative peace". The Napoleonic wars ended in 1815, and then he next major war in Europe was the Crimean war in 1850-odd and the Franco-Prussian war in 1870; then the next biggie was the First World War. But even in those periods of peace, there were a series of coups, revolutions and uprisings. But they did not consume the continent.
I'd argue the peace in Europe since 1945 has been unprecedented in history. The only breaks in that peace have been relatively minor, for all their tragedy; the Hungarian revolution, e.g. the Czech uprising, Kosova/Balkans; the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. But these conflicts did not spread across the continent, or involve the major continental powers in any significant way
It'd be easy for Russia to join that peace, if they wanted. But their current leadership has an imperialistic mindset that directly conflicts with that. And that's why your idea won't work: Russia wants a larger empire, and that means they don't want peace on any terms other than their own.
"Sweden is warned to 'brace for war': Civil Defence minister tells citizens to 'get moving' and prepare for the end of 210 years of peace as country bids to join NATO in face of Russia tensions"
The concerning issue for Sweden and Finland is the amount of migrants and what level of commitment they would have towards "civil defence", also in light of the effectiveness of Russian propaganda operations, for instance in relation to the Israel/Palestine conflict.
That was the problem the Roman Empire had by the end. Lots of people living in its borders with no allegiance to Rome or willingness to defend the institution.
"Oscar Jonsson, a specialist from the Swedish Defence University, said that while war was a possibility, it would require several factors to fall into place: Russia's war in Ukraine coming to an end, its military having the time to rebuild and rearm its fighting force and for Europe to lose US military support... All of which were within the realms of possibility, he added."
There is a strong strategic argument for the war in Ukraine to get de-escalated but essentially unresolved and still active, so Russia are bogged down, whilst the rest of Europe can restructure its own defences, build border walls, set up armies, prepare for the likely arrival of Trump 2 and attendant uncertainty etc. NATO cannot attack Russia to try and suck out its energy but it can attack it by proxy in Ukraine where it doesn't recognise the 'border'.
I have had several discussions about this with people in Finland where the view set out above is not very welcome and regarded as weak. But I struggle to see the merit in going all out to reinstate the 2014 border. This seems to be based on some kind of punishment theory, that once 'beaten back' the Russians will not return. But I think this line of thinking runs in to the nuclear escalation problem which didn't exist in past conflicts with Russia (ie in the Winter War).
In the end, isn't it the case that a smaller Ukraine, deprived of the large bulk of its Russian speaking population (and thus the pretext for Russian claims) would be a more coherant and defensible entity?
In a word, no.
Russia considers Ukraine to be Russian territory, any “solution” that fails to recognise the 1991 border gives the Russians breathing space to rearm and try again. So long as the Ukranians want to keep fighting - which they very much do - it’s in the rest of Europe’s self-interest to keep them fed with supplies of the best kit they can get their hands on.
It isn't allowing them breathing space though because under the solution above Russia are still bogged down having to defend the current 'border'. Considering Western self interest more broadly, it is inevitably a balanced matter between supporting Ukraine and everything else Europe needs to do to defend itself against Russia given the uncertainties of the forthcoming US election. When you look at how unprepared Europe is for a war (as pre the articles about Sweden), throwing everything in to Ukraine looks like an elephant trap. Strategically the focus would be more effectively placed on securing its defensive abilities in relation to the existing situation. This position is never going to be acceptable to those in Ukraine who see the conflict as existential and all or nothing but it would achieve much in terms of reducing the legitimacy of Russian claims on Ukraine.
I think the fallacy to avoid is that any meaningful 'peace deal' or 'agreement' can be made with Russia.
There’s no ‘peace deal’ or ‘agreement’ possible with Russia. They’ve a longstanding history of ignoring any such agreements as they see fit.
The only permanent solution to the problem of Russia, is a very long Berlin Wall between Russia and Europe, on the 1991 border, and defended collectively by European nations backed by the threat of nuclear escalation.
The Berlin Wall was built to keep the 'citizens inside'. The wall you describe would be a Trumplike Wall, to keep 'the others out'
Although, you could say that they would both really be to keep reality out? Or, a different, better, reality.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Interesting stuff. 3 key points: 1. The Tories are fucked. Proper Fucked. Another relaunch of Sunak won't make any difference. Their catastrophic failure to deliver quality of life improvements (because things are worse) means these voters are *done* with the Tories. 2. Labour need to stop attacking the Tories and switch to Shadow Government mode. The election could be less than 5 months away. We'd do this. We'd do that. You need this. 3. The Operation Samson approach for the Tories is to weaponise the Nigel. Yes, he would take votes off them. But more critically he could take votes off Labour. We have seen this week how Farage saying Starmer should resign as Post Office Minister has played. Offer him a knighthood - a proper one not a crappy one like IDS got.
On Point #2. The Shadow Labour Government did this very effectively from1996. As a result the Media started to treat ask questions as if they were the "government in waiting" and it came over to the voters that Blair and his Shadow Cabinet were serious about running the country, something that too many doubted throughout the Major years.
I was previously infavour of SKS not publishing the Labour policies because the Tories would then have time to plan their attack. The Tories have now shown that they are incapable of attacking anything, so it is now it is time for Labour to start outlining in concrete policies how the Labour Party will be better than the Tories.
Labour have a whole stack of policies. LibDems as well. Nobody listens. As Blair discovered, the way to get people to listen is to repeat a mantra and repeat it and repeat it.
Pledge cards are done. Sunak had made a bit of a mess at his 5. Starmer has 5 missions which are grand and vague.
They need to pull a headline policy out of each of them and slam it every opportunity they get.
Blair repeated his mantra several years out, Starmer hasnt said anything. Market day approaches and nobody has fed the pig.
Unsure if this has been posted, but interesting to see research that essentially shows what many on the left have always argued - that centre-left parties making turns to the right don't actually increase their support from the right wing voters and instead alienates more of their base (and legitimises the talking points of the right as well):
There are many – oh so many – of other [heroes] to be found in all parties and in all corners of the Commons. The quiet ones. The ones who could never be arsed to turn up to any of the UQs or ministerial statements. Who never quite saw what the fuss was all about, nor worried that efforts to overturn convictions and award compensation were taking place at glacial speed. Until last week. At which point they morphed into dogged pursuers of the truth.
In May 2009 #KeirStarmer prosecuted Wendy Cousins, sub-postmistress of the Post Office branch in Hertford Heath, Herts. She was sentenced to 21 months’ imprisonment but died in 2022 before the Court of Appeal could formally exonerate her. #StarmerResign
A point of order, by "Starmer prosecuted" the writer meant to write the "CPS prosecuted", but other than that, a good point, well made Casino.
At the risk of being pedantic, it sounds as if the CPS did its job perfectly. It received evidence, assessed it, determined there was a case to answer, and took it to court. Having heard the case, it was the jury who found a guilty verdict.
The final outcome may have been incorrect but it is difficult to see how anyone in the CPS acted in error or maliciously.
That's a load of balls. No territory is exchanging hands, but the casualty rates tell an entirely different story.
How do you know what the casualty rates are? Everybody involved lies about everything all the time.
Sure, both sides lie. But there are plenty of independent groups reporting. No one can tell you what the casualty figures are with any accuracy, but they can certainly guesstimate the level of conflict from observed equipment losses, FPV suicide drone footage*, etc. And it hasn't been getting significantly quieter.
*interesting that stats suggest Russia is actually using more than Ukraine, but far fewer against armour/trucks/artillery, and far more against troop positions.
And one thing we can count quite accurately is the number of missile attacks on Ukrainian cities.
In May 2009 #KeirStarmer prosecuted Wendy Cousins, sub-postmistress of the Post Office branch in Hertford Heath, Herts. She was sentenced to 21 months’ imprisonment but died in 2022 before the Court of Appeal could formally exonerate her. #StarmerResign
A point of order, by "Starmer prosecuted" the writer meant to write the "CPS prosecuted", but other than that, a good point, well made Casino.
'“No, I wasn’t aware of any of them. I think there was a small number within a 20-year window, that’s all I know,” he said.
“I don’t even now – I think the CPS are helping with inquiries – how many of those may or may not have involved Horizon.”
While the Post Office itself prosecuted hundreds of post office operators based on the faulty Horizon IT system, it has emerged from official reviews that 10 cases taken by the CPS resulted in convictions. Three occurred while Starmer was DPP.
“They didn’t go to his desk,” a Labour spokesperson said.'
The argument Isam (and Farage) make is that a) the buck stops with Starmer as DPP irrespective of whether he was aware or not of the prosecutions (Isam would claim, just like Boris Johnson was hounded out as titular head of Downing Street whilst parties were going on, despite being unaware of parties he was attending) and b) the DPP had a duty of care to review (or task the CPS) with reviewing every single Horizon conviction between the1996 pilot and 2015.
Pilger passed away a couple of weeks ago, who would have thought the investigative journalist baton would have been picked up by Farage?
"Sweden is warned to 'brace for war': Civil Defence minister tells citizens to 'get moving' and prepare for the end of 210 years of peace as country bids to join NATO in face of Russia tensions"
The concerning issue for Sweden and Finland is the amount of migrants and what level of commitment they would have towards "civil defence", also in light of the effectiveness of Russian propaganda operations, for instance in relation to the Israel/Palestine conflict.
That was the problem the Roman Empire had by the end. Lots of people living in its borders with no allegiance to Rome or willingness to defend the institution.
"Oscar Jonsson, a specialist from the Swedish Defence University, said that while war was a possibility, it would require several factors to fall into place: Russia's war in Ukraine coming to an end, its military having the time to rebuild and rearm its fighting force and for Europe to lose US military support... All of which were within the realms of possibility, he added."
There is a strong strategic argument for the war in Ukraine to get de-escalated but essentially unresolved and still active, so Russia are bogged down, whilst the rest of Europe can restructure its own defences, build border walls, set up armies, prepare for the likely arrival of Trump 2 and attendant uncertainty etc. NATO cannot attack Russia to try and suck out its energy but it can attack it by proxy in Ukraine where it doesn't recognise the 'border'.
I have had several discussions about this with people in Finland where the view set out above is not very welcome and regarded as weak. But I struggle to see the merit in going all out to reinstate the 2014 border. This seems to be based on some kind of punishment theory, that once 'beaten back' the Russians will not return. But I think this line of thinking runs in to the nuclear escalation problem which didn't exist in past conflicts with Russia (ie in the Winter War).
In the end, isn't it the case that a smaller Ukraine, deprived of the large bulk of its Russian speaking population (and thus the pretext for Russian claims) would be a more coherant and defensible entity?
In a word, no.
Russia considers Ukraine to be Russian territory, any “solution” that fails to recognise the 1991 border gives the Russians breathing space to rearm and try again. So long as the Ukranians want to keep fighting - which they very much do - it’s in the rest of Europe’s self-interest to keep them fed with supplies of the best kit they can get their hands on.
It isn't allowing them breathing space though because under the solution above Russia are still bogged down having to defend the current 'border'. Considering Western self interest more broadly, it is inevitably a balanced matter between supporting Ukraine and everything else Europe needs to do to defend itself against Russia given the uncertainties of the forthcoming US election. When you look at how unprepared Europe is for a war (as pre the articles about Sweden), throwing everything in to Ukraine looks like an elephant trap. Strategically the focus would be more effectively placed on securing its defensive abilities in relation to the existing situation. This position is never going to be acceptable to those in Ukraine who see the conflict as existential and all or nothing but it would achieve much in terms of reducing the legitimacy of Russian claims on Ukraine.
I think the fallacy to avoid is that any meaningful 'peace deal' or 'agreement' can be made with Russia.
Nobody would be attacking Russia if it was inside its internationally recognised borders. That includes withdrawing from South Ossetia and Transnistria, which is a humiliation for Mr Small One, but would end the conflict for them and mean they don't have to 'defend' anything.
The reason this deal can't be made is because the egos of the current fascist clowns running the Russian government won't let them accept it.
Another perspective is that the Russian psyche relies on peripheral wars. From a strategic western point of view it is desirable that these should be directed to the some conflict with Islamists in the middle east or alternatively with China. It is a strategic blunder on our part that it has ended up happening in Ukraine.
No. From a strategic point of view, it is desirable that Russia's psyche changes. And before you say "that won't happen," the rest of Europe has recovered from having serious wars at least every fifty years to relative peace and friendship.
There is zero reason why the Russian psyche has to be the way it is. It is that way because of a false mythos perpetuated by the Russian state, spread through the state-controlled media. If that leadership were to change, or its views change, then so would the 'Russian psyche', albeit slowly.
The UK has been involved in quite a few wars over the past 3 decades.
I said: "relative peace". The Napoleonic wars ended in 1815, and then he next major war in Europe was the Crimean war in 1850-odd and the Franco-Prussian war in 1870; then the next biggie was the First World War. But even in those periods of peace, there were a series of coups, revolutions and uprisings. But they did not consume the continent.
I'd argue the peace in Europe since 1945 has been unprecedented in history. The only breaks in that peace have been relatively minor, for all their tragedy; the Hungarian revolution, e.g. the Czech uprising, Kosova/Balkans; the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. But these conflicts did not spread across the continent, or involve the major continental powers in any significant way
It'd be easy for Russia to join that peace, if they wanted. But their current leadership has an imperialistic mindset that directly conflicts with that. And that's why your idea won't work: Russia wants a larger empire, and that means they don't want peace on any terms other than their own.
1848 was an interesting year. And dramatic, in some places.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Farage has a real appeal for a lot of people (not me - I’m just the messenger)
The tories need to be led by Farage to stand a chance but I don't see a way for even those scheming, treacherous ratfuckers to make it happen.
I think most countries in Europe will be led by hard right or far right governments within 5-10 years. I’ve no idea why Britain will be immune
The Tories should get ahead of the curve and smuggle Farage in now, before they are replaced by an actual Farageiste party
About 40% of the time I fear you may be right; feels like the 1930s all over again. Maybe democracy was the short-lived sweet fruit of the Enlightenment, a fruit now rotting on the tree.
(Then again, 60% of the time I think it's two steps forward, one step back towards a fairer, ever more humane, ever more comfortable human existence. Onwards comrades!)
In May 2009 #KeirStarmer prosecuted Wendy Cousins, sub-postmistress of the Post Office branch in Hertford Heath, Herts. She was sentenced to 21 months’ imprisonment but died in 2022 before the Court of Appeal could formally exonerate her. #StarmerResign
A point of order, by "Starmer prosecuted" the writer meant to write the "CPS prosecuted", but other than that, a good point, well made Casino.
'“No, I wasn’t aware of any of them. I think there was a small number within a 20-year window, that’s all I know,” he said.
“I don’t even now – I think the CPS are helping with inquiries – how many of those may or may not have involved Horizon.”
While the Post Office itself prosecuted hundreds of post office operators based on the faulty Horizon IT system, it has emerged from official reviews that 10 cases taken by the CPS resulted in convictions. Three occurred while Starmer was DPP.
“They didn’t go to his desk,” a Labour spokesperson said.'
We have a problem in the UK. It's not unique to the UK, but it's here.
The perfect example was the run around and lies given to Rory Stewart, when he tried to find out why money was going to a particular "aid agency" - which turned out to be a semi-terrorist front.
The problem is that lying upwards is seen as perfectly acceptable. And that actions that would be considered gross insubordination in most situations are tolerated.
This is not just recent - ministers memoirs (all parties, over the years) are full of stories of obfustication, out right refusal to carry out instructions, opposite polices pursued etc.
I have no trouble imagining that if the CPS *had* been in the loop on the PO disaster and were prosecuting people, they would have lied to Starmer about it.
We need to drop a bridge and establish some kind of discipline. If the system isn't answerable to politicians, then they are answerable to whom? The tabloids?
This might create a diplomatic problem should the Japanese government get involved, just as any proposal for fair taxation of Amazon or Google on their UK profits will be opposed by the American government.
"Sweden is warned to 'brace for war': Civil Defence minister tells citizens to 'get moving' and prepare for the end of 210 years of peace as country bids to join NATO in face of Russia tensions"
The concerning issue for Sweden and Finland is the amount of migrants and what level of commitment they would have towards "civil defence", also in light of the effectiveness of Russian propaganda operations, for instance in relation to the Israel/Palestine conflict.
That was the problem the Roman Empire had by the end. Lots of people living in its borders with no allegiance to Rome or willingness to defend the institution.
"Oscar Jonsson, a specialist from the Swedish Defence University, said that while war was a possibility, it would require several factors to fall into place: Russia's war in Ukraine coming to an end, its military having the time to rebuild and rearm its fighting force and for Europe to lose US military support... All of which were within the realms of possibility, he added."
There is a strong strategic argument for the war in Ukraine to get de-escalated but essentially unresolved and still active, so Russia are bogged down, whilst the rest of Europe can restructure its own defences, build border walls, set up armies, prepare for the likely arrival of Trump 2 and attendant uncertainty etc. NATO cannot attack Russia to try and suck out its energy but it can attack it by proxy in Ukraine where it doesn't recognise the 'border'.
I have had several discussions about this with people in Finland where the view set out above is not very welcome and regarded as weak. But I struggle to see the merit in going all out to reinstate the 2014 border. This seems to be based on some kind of punishment theory, that once 'beaten back' the Russians will not return. But I think this line of thinking runs in to the nuclear escalation problem which didn't exist in past conflicts with Russia (ie in the Winter War).
In the end, isn't it the case that a smaller Ukraine, deprived of the large bulk of its Russian speaking population (and thus the pretext for Russian claims) would be a more coherant and defensible entity?
In a word, no.
Russia considers Ukraine to be Russian territory, any “solution” that fails to recognise the 1991 border gives the Russians breathing space to rearm and try again. So long as the Ukranians want to keep fighting - which they very much do - it’s in the rest of Europe’s self-interest to keep them fed with supplies of the best kit they can get their hands on.
It isn't allowing them breathing space though because under the solution above Russia are still bogged down having to defend the current 'border'. Considering Western self interest more broadly, it is inevitably a balanced matter between supporting Ukraine and everything else Europe needs to do to defend itself against Russia given the uncertainties of the forthcoming US election. When you look at how unprepared Europe is for a war (as pre the articles about Sweden), throwing everything in to Ukraine looks like an elephant trap. Strategically the focus would be more effectively placed on securing its defensive abilities in relation to the existing situation. This position is never going to be acceptable to those in Ukraine who see the conflict as existential and all or nothing but it would achieve much in terms of reducing the legitimacy of Russian claims on Ukraine.
I think the fallacy to avoid is that any meaningful 'peace deal' or 'agreement' can be made with Russia.
Nobody would be attacking Russia if it was inside its internationally recognised borders. That includes withdrawing from South Ossetia and Transnistria, which is a humiliation for Mr Small One, but would end the conflict for them and mean they don't have to 'defend' anything.
The reason this deal can't be made is because the egos of the current fascist clowns running the Russian government won't let them accept it.
Another perspective is that the Russian psyche relies on peripheral wars. From a strategic western point of view it is desirable that these should be directed to the some conflict with Islamists in the middle east or alternatively with China. It is a strategic blunder on our part that it has ended up happening in Ukraine.
No. From a strategic point of view, it is desirable that Russia's psyche changes. And before you say "that won't happen," the rest of Europe has recovered from having serious wars at least every fifty years to relative peace and friendship.
There is zero reason why the Russian psyche has to be the way it is. It is that way because of a false mythos perpetuated by the Russian state, spread through the state-controlled media. If that leadership were to change, or its views change, then so would the 'Russian psyche', albeit slowly.
The UK has been involved in quite a few wars over the past 3 decades.
I said: "relative peace". The Napoleonic wars ended in 1815, and then he next major war in Europe was the Crimean war in 1850-odd and the Franco-Prussian war in 1870; then the next biggie was the First World War. But even in those periods of peace, there were a series of coups, revolutions and uprisings. But they did not consume the continent.
I'd argue the peace in Europe since 1945 has been unprecedented in history. The only breaks in that peace have been relatively minor, for all their tragedy; the Hungarian revolution, e.g. the Czech uprising, Kosova/Balkans; the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. But these conflicts did not spread across the continent, or involve the major continental powers in any significant way
It'd be easy for Russia to join that peace, if they wanted. But their current leadership has an imperialistic mindset that directly conflicts with that. And that's why your idea won't work: Russia wants a larger empire, and that means they don't want peace on any terms other than their own.
The long peace in Europe was largely due to the acceptance, by nearly all, of the 1945 borders as final. The places where conflict happened, were where that is not so.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Farage has a real appeal for a lot of people (not me - I’m just the messenger)
The tories need to be led by Farage to stand a chance but I don't see a way for even those scheming, treacherous ratfuckers to make it happen.
I think most countries in Europe will be led by hard right or far right governments within 5-10 years. I’ve no idea why Britain will be immune
The Tories should get ahead of the curve and smuggle Farage in now, before they are replaced by an actual Farageiste party
About 40% of the time I fear you may be right; feels like the 1930s all over again. Maybe democracy was the short-lived sweet fruit of the Enlightenment, a fruit now rotting on the tree.
(Then again, 60% of the time I think it's two steps forward, one step back towards a fairer, ever more humane, ever more comfortable human existence. Onwards comrades!)
Democracy doesn’t really work if you have mass immigration of people who don’t believe in democracy, allied with an elite which refuses to admit there are any serious problems with immigration and equally refuses to do anything serious to restrict it
That’s when you get far right governments, as voters pull the last lever remaining
The Tories have been pursuing ever more Faragist policies since 2016, and the result has been abject failure and worsening polls.
It is not obvious to this observer how "more Fucking Farage" will reverse those trends...
Ah, but they haven't been tried properly, by people who really believe in them...
(Which, to be fair, is true. Sunak is the only True Brexit Backer we've had as PM, and his vision isn't that of Farage, or (I suspect) most of the 52%.) Whether a true believer will make it work better is another matter.)
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Interesting stuff. 3 key points: 1. The Tories are fucked. Proper Fucked. Another relaunch of Sunak won't make any difference. Their catastrophic failure to deliver quality of life improvements (because things are worse) means these voters are *done* with the Tories. 2. Labour need to stop attacking the Tories and switch to Shadow Government mode. The election could be less than 5 months away. We'd do this. We'd do that. You need this. 3. The Operation Samson approach for the Tories is to weaponise the Nigel. Yes, he would take votes off them. But more critically he could take votes off Labour. We have seen this week how Farage saying Starmer should resign as Post Office Minister has played. Offer him a knighthood - a proper one not a crappy one like IDS got.
I’ve been waiting for 2 for what feels like eons now. It would be good to hear more concrete proposals from Labour. My fear is that it isn’t really coming - they’re hoping mood music and anti Tory sentiment will carry them through on a bare bones manifesto. I hope I’m wrong, because the country doesn’t need a new government hamstrung from day 1 by a lack of vision/action plan.
In 1996 Blair could promise to spray money around to those on low incomes. The simple fact is (and Is something that does not get any coverage) the current Government have already done this. The minimum wage is high, UC is a very generous benefit and anyone on it has been getting an extra £300 cost of living payment every 3 months. Benefits under the next Government cannot go any higher as it would make work pointless. There is little that Labour can promise other than saying we will run the Country better.
There are many – oh so many – of other [heroes] to be found in all parties and in all corners of the Commons. The quiet ones. The ones who could never be arsed to turn up to any of the UQs or ministerial statements. Who never quite saw what the fuss was all about, nor worried that efforts to overturn convictions and award compensation were taking place at glacial speed. Until last week. At which point they morphed into dogged pursuers of the truth.
This might create a diplomatic problem should the Japanese government get involved, just as any proposal for fair taxation of Amazon or Google on their UK profits will be opposed by the American government.
It’s also a total cop-out by the PO.
It wasn’t the case that the vendor was lying to the customer, it was that the customer was using the vendor to back up their own lies in court, both of whom had knowledge that the lies were lies.
Yes I’d bar the company from public projects, but trying to pin a financial penalty on them is unjust. The PO, as the prosecuting authority, needs to take the blame for the miscarriages of justice. Which sadly means that taxpayers pick up the bill.
The Tories have been pursuing ever more Faragist policies since 2016, and the result has been abject failure and worsening polls.
It is not obvious to this observer how "more Fucking Farage" will reverse those trends...
Ah, but they haven't been tried properly, by people who really believe in them...
(Which, to be fair, is true. Sunak is the only True Brexit Backer we've had as PM, and his vision isn't that of Farage, or (I suspect) most of the 52%.) Whether a true believer will make it work better is another matter.)
The infamous poster from the Brexit campaign could have been an advert for Rwanda.
Whether Richi believes in it or not, he has tied his Premiership to trying to make it happen.
In May 2009 #KeirStarmer prosecuted Wendy Cousins, sub-postmistress of the Post Office branch in Hertford Heath, Herts. She was sentenced to 21 months’ imprisonment but died in 2022 before the Court of Appeal could formally exonerate her. #StarmerResign
A point of order, by "Starmer prosecuted" the writer meant to write the "CPS prosecuted", but other than that, a good point, well made Casino.
'“No, I wasn’t aware of any of them. I think there was a small number within a 20-year window, that’s all I know,” he said.
“I don’t even now – I think the CPS are helping with inquiries – how many of those may or may not have involved Horizon.”
While the Post Office itself prosecuted hundreds of post office operators based on the faulty Horizon IT system, it has emerged from official reviews that 10 cases taken by the CPS resulted in convictions. Three occurred while Starmer was DPP.
“They didn’t go to his desk,” a Labour spokesperson said.'
The argument Isam (and Farage) make is that a) the buck stops with Starmer as DPP irrespective of whether he was aware or not of the prosecutions (Isam would claim, just like Boris Johnson was hounded out as titular head of Downing Street whilst parties were going on, despite being unaware of parties he was attending) and b) the DPP had a duty of care to review (or task the CPS) with reviewing every single Horizon conviction between the1996 pilot and 2015.
Pilger passed away a couple of weeks ago, who would have thought the investigative journalist baton would have been picked up by Farage?
The CPS does not appear to have any such duty. It has the power to take over private prosecutions in cases which are referred to it. But I can't find anywhere that says it has a duty of review.
This is from a recent Parliamentary select committee report. https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm5801/cmselect/cmjust/497/49706.htm ...47.The CPS’s evidence to the Committee outlines that the CPS “is only made aware of a proportion of all private prosecution cases before the courts”.92 The CPS website outlines a number of different ways that the CPS might be informed of a private prosecution referred for review. A private prosecutor, a defendant or a judge might refer a prosecution to the CPS for review. The CPS might learn of a private prosecution via a press report. However, the CPS’ legal guidance on private prosecutions explains that in such circumstances, in the absence of a specific request, “no action will generally be taken unless there are exceptional circumstances”.93 The CPS explains that it would intervene “where a private prosecution was commenced for perverting the course of justice in relation to a rape allegation”.94 The guidance indicates that the CPS does not take a proactive approach to reviewing private prosecutions, but if it is alerted to a prosecution which has circumstances that raise particular issues that are considered to be of public importance it may review a private prosecution without a referral.
48.The CPS does not keep an official record of the number of prosecutions which are referred to it.95 However, in 2019, the Special Crime Division of the CPS started “keeping a manual record of private prosecution cases referred pursuant to its quality assurance function”.96 The CPS have stressed to us that these are not official statistics, nonetheless we are grateful that they have been made available. The CPS’s evidence states:
A detailed manual check of these records shows that for the period April 2019 to March 2020, the Special Crime Division quality assured 49 private prosecution referrals. Of the 49 referrals:
the CPS decided to take over 32 private prosecutions. Of these 32 cases, 29 were taken over and discontinued and three were taken over and continued; the CPS decided not to take over the private prosecution in 17 cases...
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Interesting stuff. 3 key points: 1. The Tories are fucked. Proper Fucked. Another relaunch of Sunak won't make any difference. Their catastrophic failure to deliver quality of life improvements (because things are worse) means these voters are *done* with the Tories. 2. Labour need to stop attacking the Tories and switch to Shadow Government mode. The election could be less than 5 months away. We'd do this. We'd do that. You need this. 3. The Operation Samson approach for the Tories is to weaponise the Nigel. Yes, he would take votes off them. But more critically he could take votes off Labour. We have seen this week how Farage saying Starmer should resign as Post Office Minister has played. Offer him a knighthood - a proper one not a crappy one like IDS got.
I’ve been waiting for 2 for what feels like eons now. It would be good to hear more concrete proposals from Labour. My fear is that it isn’t really coming - they’re hoping mood music and anti Tory sentiment will carry them through on a bare bones manifesto. I hope I’m wrong, because the country doesn’t need a new government hamstrung from day 1 by a lack of vision/action plan.
In 1996 Blair could promise to spray money around to those on low incomes. The simple fact is (and Is something that does not get any coverage) the current Government have already done this. The minimum wage is high, UC is a very generous benefit and anyone on it has been getting an extra £300 cost of living payment every 3 months. Benefits under the next Government cannot go any higher as it would make work pointless. There is little that Labour can promise other than saying we will run the Country better.
He may have implied it (though he also kept Conservative spending plans for the first couple of years), but Blair's actual pledges in 1997 were relatively small;
Which is not to say that Starmer doesn't need more meat on the bones of his missions PDQ.
We have ever higher taxes and record breaking levels of immigration.
That's because the Government are fukwits, not because they don't want to appeal to the swivel eyed loons and closet racists that Nigel Fucking Farage attracts
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Farage has a real appeal for a lot of people (not me - I’m just the messenger)
The tories need to be led by Farage to stand a chance but I don't see a way for even those scheming, treacherous ratfuckers to make it happen.
I think most countries in Europe will be led by hard right or far right governments within 5-10 years. I’ve no idea why Britain will be immune
The Tories should get ahead of the curve and smuggle Farage in now, before they are replaced by an actual Farageiste party
About 40% of the time I fear you may be right; feels like the 1930s all over again. Maybe democracy was the short-lived sweet fruit of the Enlightenment, a fruit now rotting on the tree.
(Then again, 60% of the time I think it's two steps forward, one step back towards a fairer, ever more humane, ever more comfortable human existence. Onwards comrades!)
It's the same old story as the 1930s. The proletariat being screwed by the bourgeoisie (the PPE scandal says hi!). Marx identified the problem but his solution failed. Hitler, Mussolini, Putin, Trump and Farage offer the snake oil remedy, And damn, snake oil is both cheap and tastes good.
The Tories have been pursuing ever more Faragist policies since 2016, and the result has been abject failure and worsening polls.
It is not obvious to this observer how "more Fucking Farage" will reverse those trends...
Ah, but they haven't been tried properly, by people who really believe in them...
(Which, to be fair, is true. Sunak is the only True Brexit Backer we've had as PM, and his vision isn't that of Farage, or (I suspect) most of the 52%.) Whether a true believer will make it work better is another matter.)
Who believes what is an interesting question. My verdict was that Theresa May was a Leaver pretending to be a Remainer, while Boris was a Remainer posing as a Leaver. However, Nadine Dorries in her book has Boris as the true Brexiteer while Gove and Cummings were faking it.
Rishi has at least delivered the Windsor Framework to make Brexit more something or other.
"Sweden is warned to 'brace for war': Civil Defence minister tells citizens to 'get moving' and prepare for the end of 210 years of peace as country bids to join NATO in face of Russia tensions"
The concerning issue for Sweden and Finland is the amount of migrants and what level of commitment they would have towards "civil defence", also in light of the effectiveness of Russian propaganda operations, for instance in relation to the Israel/Palestine conflict.
That was the problem the Roman Empire had by the end. Lots of people living in its borders with no allegiance to Rome or willingness to defend the institution.
"Oscar Jonsson, a specialist from the Swedish Defence University, said that while war was a possibility, it would require several factors to fall into place: Russia's war in Ukraine coming to an end, its military having the time to rebuild and rearm its fighting force and for Europe to lose US military support... All of which were within the realms of possibility, he added."
There is a strong strategic argument for the war in Ukraine to get de-escalated but essentially unresolved and still active, so Russia are bogged down, whilst the rest of Europe can restructure its own defences, build border walls, set up armies, prepare for the likely arrival of Trump 2 and attendant uncertainty etc. NATO cannot attack Russia to try and suck out its energy but it can attack it by proxy in Ukraine where it doesn't recognise the 'border'.
I have had several discussions about this with people in Finland where the view set out above is not very welcome and regarded as weak. But I struggle to see the merit in going all out to reinstate the 2014 border. This seems to be based on some kind of punishment theory, that once 'beaten back' the Russians will not return. But I think this line of thinking runs in to the nuclear escalation problem which didn't exist in past conflicts with Russia (ie in the Winter War).
In the end, isn't it the case that a smaller Ukraine, deprived of the large bulk of its Russian speaking population (and thus the pretext for Russian claims) would be a more coherant and defensible entity?
In a word, no.
Russia considers Ukraine to be Russian territory, any “solution” that fails to recognise the 1991 border gives the Russians breathing space to rearm and try again. So long as the Ukranians want to keep fighting - which they very much do - it’s in the rest of Europe’s self-interest to keep them fed with supplies of the best kit they can get their hands on.
It isn't allowing them breathing space though because under the solution above Russia are still bogged down having to defend the current 'border'. Considering Western self interest more broadly, it is inevitably a balanced matter between supporting Ukraine and everything else Europe needs to do to defend itself against Russia given the uncertainties of the forthcoming US election. When you look at how unprepared Europe is for a war (as pre the articles about Sweden), throwing everything in to Ukraine looks like an elephant trap. Strategically the focus would be more effectively placed on securing its defensive abilities in relation to the existing situation. This position is never going to be acceptable to those in Ukraine who see the conflict as existential and all or nothing but it would achieve much in terms of reducing the legitimacy of Russian claims on Ukraine.
I think the fallacy to avoid is that any meaningful 'peace deal' or 'agreement' can be made with Russia.
Nobody would be attacking Russia if it was inside its internationally recognised borders. That includes withdrawing from South Ossetia and Transnistria, which is a humiliation for Mr Small One, but would end the conflict for them and mean they don't have to 'defend' anything.
The reason this deal can't be made is because the egos of the current fascist clowns running the Russian government won't let them accept it.
Another perspective is that the Russian psyche relies on peripheral wars. From a strategic western point of view it is desirable that these should be directed to the some conflict with Islamists in the middle east or alternatively with China. It is a strategic blunder on our part that it has ended up happening in Ukraine.
No. From a strategic point of view, it is desirable that Russia's psyche changes. And before you say "that won't happen," the rest of Europe has recovered from having serious wars at least every fifty years to relative peace and friendship.
There is zero reason why the Russian psyche has to be the way it is. It is that way because of a false mythos perpetuated by the Russian state, spread through the state-controlled media. If that leadership were to change, or its views change, then so would the 'Russian psyche', albeit slowly.
The UK has been involved in quite a few wars over the past 3 decades.
I said: "relative peace". The Napoleonic wars ended in 1815, and then he next major war in Europe was the Crimean war in 1850-odd and the Franco-Prussian war in 1870; then the next biggie was the First World War. But even in those periods of peace, there were a series of coups, revolutions and uprisings. But they did not consume the continent.
I'd argue the peace in Europe since 1945 has been unprecedented in history. The only breaks in that peace have been relatively minor, for all their tragedy; the Hungarian revolution, e.g. the Czech uprising, Kosova/Balkans; the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. But these conflicts did not spread across the continent, or involve the major continental powers in any significant way
It'd be easy for Russia to join that peace, if they wanted. But their current leadership has an imperialistic mindset that directly conflicts with that. And that's why your idea won't work: Russia wants a larger empire, and that means they don't want peace on any terms other than their own.
1848 was an interesting year. And dramatic, in some places.
The Year of Revolutions. Whilst the British had a big Chartist picnic in the park. With tea of course
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Farage has a real appeal for a lot of people (not me - I’m just the messenger)
The tories need to be led by Farage to stand a chance but I don't see a way for even those scheming, treacherous ratfuckers to make it happen.
I think most countries in Europe will be led by hard right or far right governments within 5-10 years. I’ve no idea why Britain will be immune
The Tories should get ahead of the curve and smuggle Farage in now, before they are replaced by an actual Farageiste party
About 40% of the time I fear you may be right; feels like the 1930s all over again. Maybe democracy was the short-lived sweet fruit of the Enlightenment, a fruit now rotting on the tree.
(Then again, 60% of the time I think it's two steps forward, one step back towards a fairer, ever more humane, ever more comfortable human existence. Onwards comrades!)
Democracy doesn’t really work if you have mass immigration of people who don’t believe in democracy, allied with an elite which refuses to admit there are any serious problems with immigration and equally refuses to do anything serious to restrict it
That’s when you get far right governments, as voters pull the last lever remaining
Oh come on, where's your evidence for that?
The issue is that a large chunk of the indigenous population no longer believe in democracy.
What's the cause of that? My guess is it's largely down to the gap between expectation and reality. The constant sniping at politicians especially from the media (all sides) can't help, nor can the patent ineptitude of our governments.
This might create a diplomatic problem should the Japanese government get involved, just as any proposal for fair taxation of Amazon or Google on their UK profits will be opposed by the American government.
It’s also a total cop-out by the PO.
It wasn’t the case that the vendor was lying to the customer, it was that the customer was using the vendor to back up their own lies in court, both of whom had knowledge that the lies were lies.
Yes I’d bar the company from public projects, but trying to pin a financial penalty on them is unjust. The PO, as the prosecuting authority, needs to take the blame for the miscarriages of justice. Which sadly means that taxpayers pick up the bill.
It was a bit of both. Read some of the evidence, particularly during development of the system, and some of the mid-ranking PO managers on the project team were tearing their hair out over the lack information of Fujitsu, who kept their customer away from the developing program and effectively told them, 'everything's OK, leave it to us'. The PFI contract gave Fujitsu commercial confidentiality over the IT, hence they could tell their customer as little as they wanted. It's also clear from evidence from Fujitsu whistleblowers that they didn't have any of the protocols or processes or checks in place that you'd expect to see in a major coding project. One witness described the coding team as "like the wild west".
Nor, during the rollout, did Fujitsu come clean about the number of bugs they were finding nor the team of thirty programmers they had trying to recode and correct the bugs, often during the night while SPSOs were closed.
Equally, one of the Fujitsu witnesses said that no-one there had any idea that the Post Office was taking the data from the system and using it to go out and prosecute people. One of them said this was beyond his comprehension, and he only found out about it when the story hit the media.
So the PO didn't know how crap their system was (at least to begin with) and Fujitsu didn't know how good the PO was taking it to be.
The CPS does not keep an official record of the number of prosecutions which are referred to it. WTF?
Take it up with the government which defines its remit. As with the burden of proof falling on the defendant with regard to computer evidence, it's the responsibility of government. And up to them to make changes.
The figure for private prosecutions which are not referred to it is probably higher, of course.
In May 2009 #KeirStarmer prosecuted Wendy Cousins, sub-postmistress of the Post Office branch in Hertford Heath, Herts. She was sentenced to 21 months’ imprisonment but died in 2022 before the Court of Appeal could formally exonerate her. #StarmerResign
A point of order, by "Starmer prosecuted" the writer meant to write the "CPS prosecuted", but other than that, a good point, well made Casino.
'“No, I wasn’t aware of any of them. I think there was a small number within a 20-year window, that’s all I know,” he said.
“I don’t even now – I think the CPS are helping with inquiries – how many of those may or may not have involved Horizon.”
While the Post Office itself prosecuted hundreds of post office operators based on the faulty Horizon IT system, it has emerged from official reviews that 10 cases taken by the CPS resulted in convictions. Three occurred while Starmer was DPP.
“They didn’t go to his desk,” a Labour spokesperson said.'
The argument Isam (and Farage) make is that a) the buck stops with Starmer as DPP irrespective of whether he was aware or not of the prosecutions (Isam would claim, just like Boris Johnson was hounded out as titular head of Downing Street whilst parties were going on, despite being unaware of parties he was attending) and b) the DPP had a duty of care to review (or task the CPS) with reviewing every single Horizon conviction between the1996 pilot and 2015.
Pilger passed away a couple of weeks ago, who would have thought the investigative journalist baton would have been picked up by Farage?
Even though I think he should have retired long ago,I think Farage is considerably more honest than was Pilger.
There is an interesting line in a recent interview with Rachel Reeves, the Shadow Chancellor
"a party which promises investors stability can hardly re-litigate the paralysing Brexit debates"
And yet, they must. The Country can't stop arguing about it. The Mayor of London wants to launch a new campaign after a report suggests 140bn loss due to Brexit.
A party of Government may not want to re-litigate, but they equally can't just shrug their shoulders and say "We know it's shit, but we can't fix it..."
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
There is an interesting line in a recent interview with Rachel Reeves, the Shadow Chancellor
"a party which promises investors stability can hardly re-litigate the paralysing Brexit debates"
And yet, they must. The Country can't stop arguing about it. The Mayor of London wants to launch a new campaign after a report suggests 140bn loss due to Brexit.
A party of Government may not want to re-litigate, but they equally can't just shrug their shoulders and say "We know it's shit, but we can't fix it..."
Keep banging that pointless drum Scott. It's quaint if nothing else.
There is an interesting line in a recent interview with Rachel Reeves, the Shadow Chancellor
"a party which promises investors stability can hardly re-litigate the paralysing Brexit debates"
And yet, they must. The Country can't stop arguing about it. The Mayor of London wants to launch a new campaign after a report suggests 140bn loss due to Brexit.
A party of Government may not want to re-litigate, but they equally can't just shrug their shoulders and say "We know it's shit, but we can't fix it..."
Points to death by a thousand cuts, while waiting to see what happens after the Brexit Bulge Generation.
I'd say salami slicing, but that's dangerously Continental.
In May 2009 #KeirStarmer prosecuted Wendy Cousins, sub-postmistress of the Post Office branch in Hertford Heath, Herts. She was sentenced to 21 months’ imprisonment but died in 2022 before the Court of Appeal could formally exonerate her. #StarmerResign
A point of order, by "Starmer prosecuted" the writer meant to write the "CPS prosecuted", but other than that, a good point, well made Casino.
'“No, I wasn’t aware of any of them. I think there was a small number within a 20-year window, that’s all I know,” he said.
“I don’t even now – I think the CPS are helping with inquiries – how many of those may or may not have involved Horizon.”
While the Post Office itself prosecuted hundreds of post office operators based on the faulty Horizon IT system, it has emerged from official reviews that 10 cases taken by the CPS resulted in convictions. Three occurred while Starmer was DPP.
“They didn’t go to his desk,” a Labour spokesperson said.'
The argument Isam (and Farage) make is that a) the buck stops with Starmer as DPP irrespective of whether he was aware or not of the prosecutions (Isam would claim, just like Boris Johnson was hounded out as titular head of Downing Street whilst parties were going on, despite being unaware of parties he was attending) and b) the DPP had a duty of care to review (or task the CPS) with reviewing every single Horizon conviction between the1996 pilot and 2015.
Pilger passed away a couple of weeks ago, who would have thought the investigative journalist baton would have been picked up by Farage?
Even though I think he should have retired long ago,I think Farage is considerably more honest than was Pilger.
There is an interesting line in a recent interview with Rachel Reeves, the Shadow Chancellor
"a party which promises investors stability can hardly re-litigate the paralysing Brexit debates"
And yet, they must. The Country can't stop arguing about it. The Mayor of London wants to launch a new campaign after a report suggests 140bn loss due to Brexit.
A party of Government may not want to re-litigate, but they equally can't just shrug their shoulders and say "We know it's shit, but we can't fix it..."
Reeves is right.
Should the country want to move forward from where we are, or to continually try and re-litigate the past?
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Farage has a real appeal for a lot of people (not me - I’m just the messenger)
The tories need to be led by Farage to stand a chance but I don't see a way for even those scheming, treacherous ratfuckers to make it happen.
I think most countries in Europe will be led by hard right or far right governments within 5-10 years. I’ve no idea why Britain will be immune
The Tories should get ahead of the curve and smuggle Farage in now, before they are replaced by an actual Farageiste party
Well, I am not sure if you are the boy who cried "wolf", or whether you and others in the political/media complex actually desire such an outcome, but I think your analysis is simply wrong.
You have previously said that the UK Tories are not so right wing, but in the context of the rest of Europe, they have been so consistently further right that they could not stay in the EPP and went off with a mish mash of kooks and oddballs into a separate further right group.
Cruella and the Rwanda gimmick was populist nonsense that even Marine Le Pen thought was too extreme. People like JRM are Faragist in all but name.
And the country hates it.
The creepy, kooky weirdos are deeply unpopular, undermining themselves by arrogance, ignorance and a bone headed insolence towards the truth, while their propagandists in the Telegraph et al cheer them on.
Meanwhile in the EU, the far right was growing over the past decade and a half, but when tested with actual government they have tended to be flaky, as with the FPO in Austria, or even more corrupt than the status quo, as with FIDESZ in Hungary or Fico in Slovakia. Poland has just comprehensively rejected the populist right wing in power over the past 7 years, and while I have no doubt that the right can make progress in Germany, I am sceptical that France will ever elect Le Pen. So the situation is not that there is some populist wave about to overwhelm Europe, including the UK, but rather that the reality is considerably more nuanced and there are just as many signs that point to weakness and decline for the far right as there are that suggest strength and progress.
A few random polls showing Farage at 10% is unlikely to be born out at the next general election, and it may be that they do not even match the performance of Goldsmith´s Referendum Party in 1997. In the end I think Farage will end up with a round number of seats: that is to say 0.
In May 2009 #KeirStarmer prosecuted Wendy Cousins, sub-postmistress of the Post Office branch in Hertford Heath, Herts. She was sentenced to 21 months’ imprisonment but died in 2022 before the Court of Appeal could formally exonerate her. #StarmerResign
A point of order, by "Starmer prosecuted" the writer meant to write the "CPS prosecuted", but other than that, a good point, well made Casino.
'“No, I wasn’t aware of any of them. I think there was a small number within a 20-year window, that’s all I know,” he said.
“I don’t even now – I think the CPS are helping with inquiries – how many of those may or may not have involved Horizon.”
While the Post Office itself prosecuted hundreds of post office operators based on the faulty Horizon IT system, it has emerged from official reviews that 10 cases taken by the CPS resulted in convictions. Three occurred while Starmer was DPP.
“They didn’t go to his desk,” a Labour spokesperson said.'
The argument Isam (and Farage) make is that a) the buck stops with Starmer as DPP irrespective of whether he was aware or not of the prosecutions (Isam would claim, just like Boris Johnson was hounded out as titular head of Downing Street whilst parties were going on, despite being unaware of parties he was attending) and b) the DPP had a duty of care to review (or task the CPS) with reviewing every single Horizon conviction between the1996 pilot and 2015.
Pilger passed away a couple of weeks ago, who would have thought the investigative journalist baton would have been picked up by Farage?
Even though I think he should have retired long ago,I think Farage is considerably more honest than was Pilger.
There is an interesting line in a recent interview with Rachel Reeves, the Shadow Chancellor
"a party which promises investors stability can hardly re-litigate the paralysing Brexit debates"
And yet, they must. The Country can't stop arguing about it. The Mayor of London wants to launch a new campaign after a report suggests 140bn loss due to Brexit.
A party of Government may not want to re-litigate, but they equally can't just shrug their shoulders and say "We know it's shit, but we can't fix it..."
Here's what happens: The Labour government make a variety of incremental changes to the post-Brexit trading environment. Each one of them clearly undoes some of the Brexit damage, but isn't "reversing Brexit" as we aren't rejoining the EU. A minority of blowhards complain about betrayal whilst everyone else enjoys cheaper food and business costs being cut and travel being made simpler.
Brexit is done. What the post-Brexit environment looks and thus changes made to it is practical sovereignty as demanded by Brexit voters. aside from the noisy 10% at either extreme, this won't be an issue at the election.
This might create a diplomatic problem should the Japanese government get involved, just as any proposal for fair taxation of Amazon or Google on their UK profits will be opposed by the American government.
It’s also a total cop-out by the PO.
It wasn’t the case that the vendor was lying to the customer, it was that the customer was using the vendor to back up their own lies in court, both of whom had knowledge that the lies were lies.
Yes I’d bar the company from public projects, but trying to pin a financial penalty on them is unjust. The PO, as the prosecuting authority, needs to take the blame for the miscarriages of justice. Which sadly means that taxpayers pick up the bill.
They, the company, delivered utterly shit software that caused the problem in the first place.
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
The CPS does not keep an official record of the number of prosecutions which are referred to it. WTF?
This is possibly just a reference to official statistics under the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007 or similar. There are some technical legal distinctions between records and "official" records to do with verification and accreditation.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
There is an interesting line in a recent interview with Rachel Reeves, the Shadow Chancellor
"a party which promises investors stability can hardly re-litigate the paralysing Brexit debates"
And yet, they must. The Country can't stop arguing about it. The Mayor of London wants to launch a new campaign after a report suggests 140bn loss due to Brexit.
A party of Government may not want to re-litigate, but they equally can't just shrug their shoulders and say "We know it's shit, but we can't fix it..."
Keep banging that pointless drum Scott. It's quaint if nothing else.
It's a political view, Richard, such as the like of which we all have.
Or would you like to pick a point in history and freeze every political development there. Scott, you, me, Rachel Reeves are allowed to ponder and want to change any goddamn thing we want.
The fact that they are choosing the shitshow that is Brexit (not heard the £140bn before but doesn't seem outrageous to me) should surprise no one. Not even you.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Farage has a real appeal for a lot of people (not me - I’m just the messenger)
The tories need to be led by Farage to stand a chance but I don't see a way for even those scheming, treacherous ratfuckers to make it happen.
I think most countries in Europe will be led by hard right or far right governments within 5-10 years. I’ve no idea why Britain will be immune
The Tories should get ahead of the curve and smuggle Farage in now, before they are replaced by an actual Farageiste party
About 40% of the time I fear you may be right; feels like the 1930s all over again. Maybe democracy was the short-lived sweet fruit of the Enlightenment, a fruit now rotting on the tree.
(Then again, 60% of the time I think it's two steps forward, one step back towards a fairer, ever more humane, ever more comfortable human existence. Onwards comrades!)
Democracy doesn’t really work if you have mass immigration of people who don’t believe in democracy, allied with an elite which refuses to admit there are any serious problems with immigration and equally refuses to do anything serious to restrict it
That’s when you get far right governments, as voters pull the last lever remaining
Oh come on, where's your evidence for that?
The issue is that a large chunk of the indigenous population no longer believe in democracy.
What's the cause of that? My guess is it's largely down to the gap between expectation and reality. The constant sniping at politicians especially from the media (all sides) can't help, nor can the patent ineptitude of our governments.
You're both right.
Both significant numbers of immigrants and significant numbers of the indigenous young have a low level of faith in democracy, along with a view that certain topics are off limits for discussion (though not necessarily for the same topics, and not necessarily for the same reason).
OTOH, it would be ridiculous to complain that our forebears were all Jean-Jacques Rousseaus, and yet democracy emerged ok. So while we should not be complacent, we should not necessarily despair.
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
The mistake you are making is trying to answer this logically and look at the relative competencies between the PO and the DPP/CPS.
It is nothing to do with that. This is all entirely about the fact that Starmer was DPP and it is a desperate attempt to politicise the whole sad affair and drag him into it to his detrement.
Put simply, If Starmer had never been DPP this discussion would not be happening.
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
12 cases apparently. I mean what's 12 cases in the scheme of things. Margin of error and all that. Families, lives ruined etc but that's fine 12 over a large number is a rounding error. Let's move on.
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
Since the change in law, to allow the CPS to take over private prosecutions, it was assumed that the CPS was taking on a role as a regulator.
A brilliantly coy, euphemistic Guardian article on the NYC tunnels story. Admits memes are exploding, but at no point explicitly says why: ie coz these are “Jewish tunnels”. Instead the tunnels are made by “religious diggers”. Methodists, maybe?
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
The mistake you are making is trying to answer this logically and look at the relative competencies between the PO and the DPP/CPS.
It is nothing to do with that. This is all entirely about the fact that Starmer was DPP and it is a desperate attempt to politicise the whole sad affair and drag him into it to his detrement.
Put simply, If Starmer had never been DPP this discussion would not be happening.
Ironically this Tory effort to smear Starmer is blocking its own good news about the announced vindication of sub-postmasters. I swear CCHQ is run by 12-year-olds.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Farage has a real appeal for a lot of people (not me - I’m just the messenger)
The tories need to be led by Farage to stand a chance but I don't see a way for even those scheming, treacherous ratfuckers to make it happen.
I think most countries in Europe will be led by hard right or far right governments within 5-10 years. I’ve no idea why Britain will be immune
The Tories should get ahead of the curve and smuggle Farage in now, before they are replaced by an actual Farageiste party
Well, I am not sure if you are the boy who cried "wolf", or whether you and others in the political/media complex actually desire such an outcome, but I think your analysis is simply wrong.
You have previously said that the UK Tories are not so right wing, but in the context of the rest of Europe, they have been so consistently further right that they could not stay in the EPP and went off with a mish mash of kooks and oddballs into a separate further right group.
Cruella and the Rwanda gimmick was populist nonsense that even Marine Le Pen thought was too extreme. People like JRM are Faragist in all but name.
And the country hates it.
The creepy, kooky weirdos are deeply unpopular, undermining themselves by arrogance, ignorance and a bone headed insolence towards the truth, while their propagandists in the Telegraph et al cheer them on.
Meanwhile in the EU, the far right was growing over the past decade and a half, but when tested with actual government they have tended to be flaky, as with the FPO in Austria, or even more corrupt than the status quo, as with FIDESZ in Hungary or Fico in Slovakia. Poland has just comprehensively rejected the populist right wing in power over the past 7 years, and while I have no doubt that the right can make progress in Germany, I am sceptical that France will ever elect Le Pen. So the situation is not that there is some populist wave about to overwhelm Europe, including the UK, but rather that the reality is considerably more nuanced and there are just as many signs that point to weakness and decline for the far right as there are that suggest strength and progress.
A few random polls showing Farage at 10% is unlikely to be born out at the next general election, and it may be that they do not even match the performance of Goldsmith´s Referendum Party in 1997. In the end I think Farage will end up with a round number of seats: that is to say 0.
There is a massive disconnect between views like this and the reality of many continental European centre-left parties having policies on immigration and identity that would be regarded as being on the far-right in the context of UK and broader Anglosphere politics.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Farage has a real appeal for a lot of people (not me - I’m just the messenger)
The tories need to be led by Farage to stand a chance but I don't see a way for even those scheming, treacherous ratfuckers to make it happen.
I think most countries in Europe will be led by hard right or far right governments within 5-10 years. I’ve no idea why Britain will be immune
The Tories should get ahead of the curve and smuggle Farage in now, before they are replaced by an actual Farageiste party
About 40% of the time I fear you may be right; feels like the 1930s all over again. Maybe democracy was the short-lived sweet fruit of the Enlightenment, a fruit now rotting on the tree.
(Then again, 60% of the time I think it's two steps forward, one step back towards a fairer, ever more humane, ever more comfortable human existence. Onwards comrades!)
Democracy doesn’t really work if you have mass immigration of people who don’t believe in democracy, allied with an elite which refuses to admit there are any serious problems with immigration and equally refuses to do anything serious to restrict it
That’s when you get far right governments, as voters pull the last lever remaining
Oh come on, where's your evidence for that?
The issue is that a large chunk of the indigenous population no longer believe in democracy.
What's the cause of that? My guess is it's largely down to the gap between expectation and reality. The constant sniping at politicians especially from the media (all sides) can't help, nor can the patent ineptitude of our governments.
I'd add that I suspect a pretty large proportion of immigrants are likely to be amongst the MOST likely to "believe in democracy" as they've made a conscious decision to leave a home country that lacks a stable democracy with a functioning rule of law to go to one that does.
That's not going to be universal, of course, but Leon's comment is just his usual lazy bullshit, designed to get attention. He always strikes me as a sort of aging peacock - increasingly aggressive squawking to cover for the fact half his feathers have fallen off.
There is an interesting line in a recent interview with Rachel Reeves, the Shadow Chancellor
"a party which promises investors stability can hardly re-litigate the paralysing Brexit debates"
And yet, they must. The Country can't stop arguing about it. The Mayor of London wants to launch a new campaign after a report suggests 140bn loss due to Brexit.
A party of Government may not want to re-litigate, but they equally can't just shrug their shoulders and say "We know it's shit, but we can't fix it..."
Keep banging that pointless drum Scott. It's quaint if nothing else.
It's a political view, Richard, such as the like of which we all have.
Or would you like to pick a point in history and freeze every political development there. Scott, you, me, Rachel Reeves are allowed to ponder and want to change any goddamn thing we want.
The fact that they are choosing the shitshow that is Brexit (not heard the £140bn before but doesn't seem outrageous to me) should surprise no one. Not even you.
I didn't say he shouldn't keep posting his drivel, exactly the opposite in fact. I am delighted to see people like Scott still fighting yesterday's wars. It is the political equivalent of the treacle and the feather. Great for keeping young minds quiet.
As for the £140bn figure, just pick a number and pretend it has some real world significance. It is what politicians of all stripes do and it has no basis in reality at all.
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
The mistake you are making is trying to answer this logically and look at the relative competencies between the PO and the DPP/CPS.
It is nothing to do with that. This is all entirely about the fact that Starmer was DPP and it is a desperate attempt to politicise the whole sad affair and drag him into it to his detrement.
Put simply, If Starmer had never been DPP this discussion would not be happening.
Clearly, very few people come out of this with any credit. I appreciate that this was mostly not a CPS thing, but I'd still expect the DPP to take an interest in potential systemic issues such as this. And as I pointed out last night, this scandal was getting some coverage in the media. This was from 2011:
A brilliantly coy, euphemistic Guardian article on the NYC tunnels story. Admits memes are exploding, but at no point explicitly says why: ie coz these are “Jewish tunnels”. Instead the tunnels are made by “religious diggers”. Methodists, maybe?
All the papers lead on the Post Office scandal apart from The Sun which splashes Kyle Walker's marital problems. Does this non-political front page mean Rupert Murdoch is wondering whether it is time to switch The Sun's support to Labour?
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Farage has a real appeal for a lot of people (not me - I’m just the messenger)
The tories need to be led by Farage to stand a chance but I don't see a way for even those scheming, treacherous ratfuckers to make it happen.
I think most countries in Europe will be led by hard right or far right governments within 5-10 years. I’ve no idea why Britain will be immune
The Tories should get ahead of the curve and smuggle Farage in now, before they are replaced by an actual Farageiste party
Bookmark this one. An unequivocal Leondamus prediction. I think you're wrong, FWIW.
What we need Leon to articulate is the sequence of his 'next 5-10 years' predictions:
- Europe led by far right governments - AI taking over - Aliens killing us all off - Nuclear holocaust - Brexit working out ok
Have I missed any?
Couple of Fair questions in there
Here’s my answers in order
- Europe led by far right governments
You are rephrasing me. I said within 5-10 years the majority of European governments will be led by hard right or far right parties. Far right is pretty extreme - that’s actual fascists. Hard right encompasses Meloni, le pen, wilders, AfD, those Polish dudes. I stand by 5-10 years
- AI taking over
What does this even mean?
- aliens killing us all off
Pff
- nuclear holocaust
0.03% chance within the decade
- Brexit working out
This is more difficult and interesting. At some point Britain WILL sort itself out (presumably) and the pendulum will swing and we will do better vis a vis the EU. Could be happening already
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
12 cases apparently. I mean what's 12 cases in the scheme of things. Margin of error and all that. Families, lives ruined etc but that's fine 12 over a large number is a rounding error. Let's move on.
Obviously the point I'm making is that when numbers are tiny it is practically impossible to pick up statistically significant anomalies from them.
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
The mistake you are making is trying to answer this logically and look at the relative competencies between the PO and the DPP/CPS.
It is nothing to do with that. This is all entirely about the fact that Starmer was DPP and it is a desperate attempt to politicise the whole sad affair and drag him into it to his detrement.
Put simply, If Starmer had never been DPP this discussion would not be happening.
Ironically this Tory effort to smear Starmer is blocking its own good news about the announced vindication of sub-postmasters. I swear CCHQ is run by 12-year-olds.
Surely the promoted notion that Starmer is wholly responsible for the Horizon scandal is the bigger news story.
A brilliantly coy, euphemistic Guardian article on the NYC tunnels story. Admits memes are exploding, but at no point explicitly says why: ie coz these are “Jewish tunnels”. Instead the tunnels are made by “religious diggers”. Methodists, maybe?
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
The mistake you are making is trying to answer this logically and look at the relative competencies between the PO and the DPP/CPS.
It is nothing to do with that. This is all entirely about the fact that Starmer was DPP and it is a desperate attempt to politicise the whole sad affair and drag him into it to his detrement.
Put simply, If Starmer had never been DPP this discussion would not be happening.
Ironically this Tory effort to smear Starmer is blocking its own good news about the announced vindication of sub-postmasters. I swear CCHQ is run by 12-year-olds.
Surely the promoted notion that Starmer is wholly responsible for the Horizon scandal is the bigger news story.
Which is a problem if your aim is to get kind Uncle Rishi into the headlines.
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
The mistake you are making is trying to answer this logically and look at the relative competencies between the PO and the DPP/CPS.
No, I'm not. I'm pointing out that that trying to hang this on the DPP is completely illogical.
Obvious the reason it's happening is the one you give - it's a purely political smear campaign against Starmer.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Farage has a real appeal for a lot of people (not me - I’m just the messenger)
The tories need to be led by Farage to stand a chance but I don't see a way for even those scheming, treacherous ratfuckers to make it happen.
I think most countries in Europe will be led by hard right or far right governments within 5-10 years. I’ve no idea why Britain will be immune
The Tories should get ahead of the curve and smuggle Farage in now, before they are replaced by an actual Farageiste party
About 40% of the time I fear you may be right; feels like the 1930s all over again. Maybe democracy was the short-lived sweet fruit of the Enlightenment, a fruit now rotting on the tree.
(Then again, 60% of the time I think it's two steps forward, one step back towards a fairer, ever more humane, ever more comfortable human existence. Onwards comrades!)
Democracy doesn’t really work if you have mass immigration of people who don’t believe in democracy, allied with an elite which refuses to admit there are any serious problems with immigration and equally refuses to do anything serious to restrict it
That’s when you get far right governments, as voters pull the last lever remaining
Oh come on, where's your evidence for that?
The issue is that a large chunk of the indigenous population no longer believe in democracy.
What's the cause of that? My guess is it's largely down to the gap between expectation and reality. The constant sniping at politicians especially from the media (all sides) can't help, nor can the patent ineptitude of our governments.
I'd add that I suspect a pretty large proportion of immigrants are likely to be amongst the MOST likely to "believe in democracy" as they've made a conscious decision to leave a home country that lacks a stable democracy with a functioning rule of law to go to one that does.
That's not going to be universal, of course, but Leon's comment is just his usual lazy bullshit, designed to get attention. He always strikes me as a sort of aging peacock - increasingly aggressive squawking to cover for the fact half his feathers have fallen off.
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
Since the change in law, to allow the CPS to take over private prosecutions, it was assumed that the CPS was taking on a role as a regulator.
The CPS doesn't seem to have realised this.
Unjoined up government.
Assume makes an ass of you and me. Or at any rate of the small number of people who made the false assumption.
💥 These switchers have left the Tories "for good", furious at lack of delivery of promises in 14 years of govt
💥 Rishi Sunak has gone from a breath of fresh air a year ago to "typical politician who never answers a question", "out of touch", "spineless", and "false"
💥 Sunak's new year election visits have been noticed - and have gone down like a cup of cold sick ("oily", "staged", PM "full of himself")
💥 Tax cuts viewed as a "sweetener" just to get votes
💥 Keir Starmer seen as "weak", "spineless", "unchallenging", "boring" and - above all else - as having "no plan". They are voting Labour *despite* Keir Starmer rather than because of him. Lack of plan/square one attack by Sunak was the only clip that went down well
💥 The person who got the best reception - and is a threat to both parties - is Nigel Farage, seen as "relatable", "strong", shown to be "in touch" by time in the jungle. All bar one said they would vote for Nigel Farage if they had the chance
💥 Tory win would leave people "gutted", Labour win a mix of "worried" and "hopeful". Hard to argue that - as the polling of direct switchers shows - these voters are coming back to the Conservatives any time soon
Farage has a real appeal for a lot of people (not me - I’m just the messenger)
The tories need to be led by Farage to stand a chance but I don't see a way for even those scheming, treacherous ratfuckers to make it happen.
I think most countries in Europe will be led by hard right or far right governments within 5-10 years. I’ve no idea why Britain will be immune
The Tories should get ahead of the curve and smuggle Farage in now, before they are replaced by an actual Farageiste party
Well, I am not sure if you are the boy who cried "wolf", or whether you and others in the political/media complex actually desire such an outcome, but I think your analysis is simply wrong.
You have previously said that the UK Tories are not so right wing, but in the context of the rest of Europe, they have been so consistently further right that they could not stay in the EPP and went off with a mish mash of kooks and oddballs into a separate further right group.
Cruella and the Rwanda gimmick was populist nonsense that even Marine Le Pen thought was too extreme. People like JRM are Faragist in all but name.
And the country hates it.
The creepy, kooky weirdos are deeply unpopular, undermining themselves by arrogance, ignorance and a bone headed insolence towards the truth, while their propagandists in the Telegraph et al cheer them on.
Meanwhile in the EU, the far right was growing over the past decade and a half, but when tested with actual government they have tended to be flaky, as with the FPO in Austria, or even more corrupt than the status quo, as with FIDESZ in Hungary or Fico in Slovakia. Poland has just comprehensively rejected the populist right wing in power over the past 7 years, and while I have no doubt that the right can make progress in Germany, I am sceptical that France will ever elect Le Pen. So the situation is not that there is some populist wave about to overwhelm Europe, including the UK, but rather that the reality is considerably more nuanced and there are just as many signs that point to weakness and decline for the far right as there are that suggest strength and progress.
A few random polls showing Farage at 10% is unlikely to be born out at the next general election, and it may be that they do not even match the performance of Goldsmith´s Referendum Party in 1997. In the end I think Farage will end up with a round number of seats: that is to say 0.
There is a massive disconnect between views like this and the reality of many continental European centre-left parties having policies on immigration and identity that would be regarded as being on the far-right in the context of UK and broader Anglosphere politics.
Tell me about it
It’s like Stuart Dickson (PBUH) lecturing us all in England about our racism when his adopted country, Sweden, puts actual neo Nazis in power
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
The mistake you are making is trying to answer this logically and look at the relative competencies between the PO and the DPP/CPS.
It is nothing to do with that. This is all entirely about the fact that Starmer was DPP and it is a desperate attempt to politicise the whole sad affair and drag him into it to his detrement.
Put simply, If Starmer had never been DPP this discussion would not be happening.
Ironically this Tory effort to smear Starmer is blocking its own good news about the announced vindication of sub-postmasters. I swear CCHQ is run by 12-year-olds.
Surely the promoted notion that Starmer is wholly responsible for the Horizon scandal is the bigger news story.
Which is a problem if your aim is to get kind Uncle Rishi into the headlines.
But isn't an early election and a Rishi landslide more likely if Starmer is hounded out of office for programming the Horizon software so ineptly?
All the fuss about trying to blame the DPP for a miscarriage of justice seems very strange to me. It seems to be based on the idea that the DPP should in effect be conducting a preliminary trial before the case comes to court. Why would anyone think that was the DPP's job?
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
The mistake you are making is trying to answer this logically and look at the relative competencies between the PO and the DPP/CPS.
No, I'm not. I'm pointing out that that trying to hang this on the DPP is completely illogical.
Obvious the reason it's happening is the one you give - it's a purely political smear campaign against Starmer.
The problem with the Post Office story is that virtually no-one with any power comes out of it looking good. A couple of journalists and politicians, perhaps. Some of the poor victims as well.
Everyone in power has questions to answer; including the government, and those who were in government. But that also extends to Starmer, and these attempts to try to make him into a victim of this mess ("political smear campaign') carries more than a little whiff.
Comments
As a percentage of GDP, it will be over 7% this year. So you've rather proved my point.
BBC News - Sainsbury's sells record pigs in blankets and mince pies
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-67932239
“I don’t even now – I think the CPS are helping with inquiries – how many of those may or may not have involved Horizon.”
While the Post Office itself prosecuted hundreds of post office operators based on the faulty Horizon IT system, it has emerged from official reviews that 10 cases taken by the CPS resulted in convictions. Three occurred while Starmer was DPP.
“They didn’t go to his desk,” a Labour spokesperson said.'
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/10/keir-starmer-denies-he-knew-cps-was-prosecuting-post-office-operators
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-us-opioid-crisis-has-come-to-britain/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-7V_gocsII
I was previously infavour of SKS not publishing the Labour policies because the Tories would then have time to plan their attack. The Tories have now shown that they are incapable of attacking anything, so it is now it is time for Labour to start outlining in concrete policies how the Labour Party will be better than the Tories.
The Tories should get ahead of the curve and smuggle Farage in now, before they are replaced by an actual Farageiste party
Pledge cards are done. Sunak had made a bit of a mess at his 5. Starmer has 5 missions which are grand and vague.
They need to pull a headline policy out of each of them and slam it every opportunity they get.
Fujitsu may have to repay ‘fortune’ spent on Post Office scandal, Chalk says
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/11/fujitsu-repay-post-office-scandal-horizon-it-software
AfD on its way to being the largest party in eastern Germany, getting to the point where nobody at state level can form a government without them
https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article249468706/AfD-in-Thueringen-Sachsen-und-Brandenburg-teilweise-deutlich-vorn.html
Has Nigel really been making plans for us, to run the country better? Being Top Dog is different to being Attack Dog.
(See the Starmer problem, which is real, but at least he has soggy Wilsonian Social Democracy to fall back on.)
I'd argue the peace in Europe since 1945 has been unprecedented in history. The only breaks in that peace have been relatively minor, for all their tragedy; the Hungarian revolution, e.g. the Czech uprising, Kosova/Balkans; the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. But these conflicts did not spread across the continent, or involve the major continental powers in any significant way
It'd be easy for Russia to join that peace, if they wanted. But their current leadership has an imperialistic mindset that directly conflicts with that. And that's why your idea won't work: Russia wants a larger empire, and that means they don't want peace on any terms other than their own.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/jan/10/adopting-rightwing-policies-does-not-help-centre-left-win-votes
It is not obvious to this observer how "more Fucking Farage" will reverse those trends...
The final outcome may have been incorrect but it is difficult to see how anyone in the CPS acted in error or maliciously.
But there are plenty of independent groups reporting. No one can tell you what the casualty figures are with any accuracy, but they can certainly guesstimate the level of conflict from observed equipment losses, FPV suicide drone footage*, etc.
And it hasn't been getting significantly quieter.
*interesting that stats suggest Russia is actually using more than Ukraine, but far fewer against armour/trucks/artillery, and far more against troop positions.
And one thing we can count quite accurately is the number of missile attacks on Ukrainian cities.
Pilger passed away a couple of weeks ago, who would have thought the investigative journalist baton would have been picked up by Farage?
(Then again, 60% of the time I think it's two steps forward, one step back towards a fairer, ever more humane, ever more comfortable human existence. Onwards comrades!)
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/jan/11/tasmanian-garden-wins-prize-for-worlds-ugliest-lawn
Complete with echidna. Ooh.
That is just so LOL with this government.
We have a problem in the UK. It's not unique to the UK, but it's here.
The perfect example was the run around and lies given to Rory Stewart, when he tried to find out why money was going to a particular "aid agency" - which turned out to be a semi-terrorist front.
The problem is that lying upwards is seen as perfectly acceptable. And that actions that would be considered gross insubordination in most situations are tolerated.
This is not just recent - ministers memoirs (all parties, over the years) are full of stories of obfustication, out right refusal to carry out instructions, opposite polices pursued etc.
I have no trouble imagining that if the CPS *had* been in the loop on the PO disaster and were prosecuting people, they would have lied to Starmer about it.
We need to drop a bridge and establish some kind of discipline. If the system isn't answerable to politicians, then they are answerable to whom? The tabloids?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/67942943
That’s when you get far right governments, as voters pull the last lever remaining
(Which, to be fair, is true. Sunak is the only True Brexit Backer we've had as PM, and his vision isn't that of Farage, or (I suspect) most of the 52%.) Whether a true believer will make it work better is another matter.)
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/picture/2024/jan/09/martin-rowson-crocodile-tears-post-office-scandal-cartoon
It wasn’t the case that the vendor was lying to the customer, it was that the customer was using the vendor to back up their own lies in court, both of whom had knowledge that the lies were lies.
Yes I’d bar the company from public projects, but trying to pin a financial penalty on them is unjust. The PO, as the prosecuting authority, needs to take the blame for the miscarriages of justice. Which sadly means that taxpayers pick up the bill.
Whether Richi believes in it or not, he has tied his Premiership to trying to make it happen.
But I can't find anywhere that says it has a duty of review.
This is from a recent Parliamentary select committee report.
https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm5801/cmselect/cmjust/497/49706.htm
...47.The CPS’s evidence to the Committee outlines that the CPS “is only made aware of a proportion of all private prosecution cases before the courts”.92 The CPS website outlines a number of different ways that the CPS might be informed of a private prosecution referred for review. A private prosecutor, a defendant or a judge might refer a prosecution to the CPS for review. The CPS might learn of a private prosecution via a press report. However, the CPS’ legal guidance on private prosecutions explains that in such circumstances, in the absence of a specific request, “no action will generally be taken unless there are exceptional circumstances”.93 The CPS explains that it would intervene “where a private prosecution was commenced for perverting the course of justice in relation to a rape allegation”.94 The guidance indicates that the CPS does not take a proactive approach to reviewing private prosecutions, but if it is alerted to a prosecution which has circumstances that raise particular issues that are considered to be of public importance it may review a private prosecution without a referral.
48.The CPS does not keep an official record of the number of prosecutions which are referred to it.95 However, in 2019, the Special Crime Division of the CPS started “keeping a manual record of private prosecution cases referred pursuant to its quality assurance function”.96 The CPS have stressed to us that these are not official statistics, nonetheless we are grateful that they have been made available. The CPS’s evidence states:
A detailed manual check of these records shows that for the period April 2019 to March 2020, the Special Crime Division quality assured 49 private prosecution referrals. Of the 49 referrals:
the CPS decided to take over 32 private prosecutions. Of these 32 cases, 29 were taken over and discontinued and three were taken over and continued;
the CPS decided not to take over the private prosecution in 17 cases...
Which is not to say that Starmer doesn't need more meat on the bones of his missions PDQ.
WTF?
Rishi has at least delivered the Windsor Framework to make Brexit more something or other.
I think you're wrong, FWIW.
The issue is that a large chunk of the indigenous population no longer believe in democracy.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/apr/10/young-adults-loss-of-faith-in-uk-democracy-survey
What's the cause of that? My guess is it's largely down to the gap between expectation and reality. The constant sniping at politicians especially from the media (all sides) can't help, nor can the patent ineptitude of our governments.
Nor, during the rollout, did Fujitsu come clean about the number of bugs they were finding nor the team of thirty programmers they had trying to recode and correct the bugs, often during the night while SPSOs were closed.
Equally, one of the Fujitsu witnesses said that no-one there had any idea that the Post Office was taking the data from the system and using it to go out and prosecute people. One of them said this was beyond his comprehension, and he only found out about it when the story hit the media.
So the PO didn't know how crap their system was (at least to begin with) and Fujitsu didn't know how good the PO was taking it to be.
As with the burden of proof falling on the defendant with regard to computer evidence, it's the responsibility of government. And up to them to make changes.
The figure for private prosecutions which are not referred to it is probably higher, of course.
"a party which promises investors stability can hardly re-litigate the paralysing Brexit debates"
And yet, they must. The Country can't stop arguing about it. The Mayor of London wants to launch a new campaign after a report suggests 140bn loss due to Brexit.
A party of Government may not want to re-litigate, but they equally can't just shrug their shoulders and say "We know it's shit, but we can't fix it..."
- Europe led by far right governments
- AI taking over
- Aliens killing us all off
- Nuclear holocaust
- Brexit working out ok
Have I missed any?
I'd say salami slicing, but that's dangerously Continental.
Should the country want to move forward from where we are, or to continually try and re-litigate the past?
You have previously said that the UK Tories are not so right wing, but in the context of the rest of Europe, they have been so consistently further right that they could not stay in the EPP and went off with a mish mash of kooks and oddballs into a separate further right group.
Cruella and the Rwanda gimmick was populist nonsense that even Marine Le Pen thought was too extreme. People like JRM are Faragist in all but name.
And the country hates it.
The creepy, kooky weirdos are deeply unpopular, undermining themselves by arrogance, ignorance and a bone headed insolence towards the truth, while their propagandists in the Telegraph et al cheer them on.
Meanwhile in the EU, the far right was growing over the past decade and a half, but when tested with actual government they have tended to be flaky, as with the FPO in Austria, or even more corrupt than the status quo, as with FIDESZ in Hungary or Fico in Slovakia. Poland has just comprehensively rejected the populist right wing in power over the past 7 years, and while I have no doubt that the right can make progress in Germany, I am sceptical that France will ever elect Le Pen. So the situation is not that there is some populist wave about to overwhelm Europe, including the UK, but rather that the reality is considerably more nuanced and there are just as many signs that point to weakness and decline for the far right as there are that suggest strength and progress.
A few random polls showing Farage at 10% is unlikely to be born out at the next general election, and it may be that they do not even match the performance of Goldsmith´s Referendum Party in 1997. In the end I think Farage will end up with a round number of seats: that is to say 0.
The Labour government make a variety of incremental changes to the post-Brexit trading environment.
Each one of them clearly undoes some of the Brexit damage, but isn't "reversing Brexit" as we aren't rejoining the EU.
A minority of blowhards complain about betrayal whilst everyone else enjoys cheaper food and business costs being cut and travel being made simpler.
Brexit is done. What the post-Brexit environment looks and thus changes made to it is practical sovereignty as demanded by Brexit voters. aside from the noisy 10% at either extreme, this won't be an issue at the election.
Perhaps the DPP could reasonably be expected to pick up on anomalously large numbers of disputed cases with a common factor that might point to a systemic problem. But not if the DPP had involvement in only a tiny number of these cases, as was the case here.
Or would you like to pick a point in history and freeze every political development there. Scott, you, me, Rachel Reeves are allowed to ponder and want to change any goddamn thing we want.
The fact that they are choosing the shitshow that is Brexit (not heard the £140bn before but doesn't seem outrageous to me) should surprise no one. Not even you.
https://x.com/rene_springer/status/1745061387804512694
Both significant numbers of immigrants and significant numbers of the indigenous young have a low level of faith in democracy, along with a view that certain topics are off limits for discussion (though not necessarily for the same topics, and not necessarily for the same reason).
OTOH, it would be ridiculous to complain that our forebears were all Jean-Jacques Rousseaus, and yet democracy emerged ok. So while we should not be complacent, we should not necessarily despair.
- Ordered: Cherry Blossom black shoe polish tin
- Offered substitute: Old Spice Deep Sea deodorant stick for men
Now wondering whether either (or both) of shoe polish/Old Spice deodorants have undocumented other uses!It is nothing to do with that. This is all entirely about the fact that Starmer was DPP and it is a desperate attempt to politicise the whole sad affair and drag him into it to his detrement.
Put simply, If Starmer had never been DPP this discussion would not be happening.
The CPS doesn't seem to have realised this.
Unjoined up government.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/jan/10/new-york-secret-illegal-brooklyn-tunnel-religious-diggers
Offered without comment so that you can imagine your own.
That's not going to be universal, of course, but Leon's comment is just his usual lazy bullshit, designed to get attention. He always strikes me as a sort of aging peacock - increasingly aggressive squawking to cover for the fact half his feathers have fallen off.
As for the £140bn figure, just pick a number and pretend it has some real world significance. It is what politicians of all stripes do and it has no basis in reality at all.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQ2FLuFVGMg
I'd be interested to know when Starmer was first aware of this issue and if he sought to do anything about it.
(Posted by someone else yday I think)
https://www.spiked-online.com/2024/01/10/the-myth-of-brooklyns-jew-tunnels/
Look at today's front pages.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-papers-67941911
All the papers lead on the Post Office scandal apart from The Sun which splashes Kyle Walker's marital problems. Does this non-political front page mean Rupert Murdoch is wondering whether it is time to switch The Sun's support to Labour?
Here’s my answers in order
- Europe led by far right governments
You are rephrasing me. I said within 5-10 years the majority of European governments will be led by hard right or far right parties. Far right is pretty extreme - that’s actual fascists. Hard right encompasses Meloni, le pen, wilders, AfD, those Polish dudes. I stand by 5-10 years
- AI taking over
What does this even mean?
- aliens killing us all off
Pff
- nuclear holocaust
0.03% chance within the decade
- Brexit working out
This is more difficult and interesting. At some point Britain WILL sort itself out (presumably) and the pendulum will swing and we will do better vis a vis the EU. Could be happening already
Hard to to put numbers on it however
Or do you think it is just a brilliantly mad story which appeals to millions - for different reasons - as it fits so many insane conspiracy theories?
Obvious the reason it's happening is the one you give - it's a purely political smear campaign against Starmer.
It’s like Stuart Dickson (PBUH) lecturing us all in England about our racism when his adopted country, Sweden, puts actual neo Nazis in power
Everyone in power has questions to answer; including the government, and those who were in government. But that also extends to Starmer, and these attempts to try to make him into a victim of this mess ("political smear campaign') carries more than a little whiff.