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It has been an inauspicious start to the campaign for the Tories – politicalbetting.com

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  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,121

    Paul Brand
    @PaulBrandITV
    ·
    6m
    NEW: The Conservatives would upgrade the Triple Lock for pensioners with an extra income tax cut.

    The new 'Triple Lock Plus' would raise pensioners' tax-free allowance each year.

    National service for the young, tax cuts for the old. Big difference in the generational offering!

    https://x.com/PaulBrandITV/status/1795205841068454393
  • SandyRentoolSandyRentool Posts: 22,167
    They really are going to announce National Tea Time, aren't they?

    Good night all.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,821
    edited May 27

    AlsoLei said:

    spudgfsh said:

    kle4 said:

    spudgfsh said:

    I have been pondering, as I’m sure many other PBers have, whether Liz TRUSS could stage a remarkable comeback during the election campaign. It would be an eye-catching move. One to think carefully about.

    She could claim that on account of the number of Tory MPs standing down, Rishi Sunak's coup has no standing and she is the legitimate leader of the party.
    If the Tory Party is reduced to the 1997 level (or below) she could be one of the few "credible" candidates left.
    They may well have been no worse off had they kept her (if the fall had been slightly less precipitous she might have weathered it), so given she really was offering a new approach it is conceivable some would go for her again, especially as those who remain will be in the safest seats and as a result possibly the more ideologically minded.

    But I think she will still bear a brunt of anger for the whole debacle, and they'll go for fresh hands.

    They'll only have 100-130 to choose from, so options will be limited.
    in an alternative universe, Truss stayed on long enough to weather the storm but gets forced into an earlier election. Loses but has a clear message so doesn't lose as badly as Sunak is about to.
    I suspect she might have weathered the storm if she'd paused for a few weeks after QEII's death, rather than proceeding with the mini-budget immediately after the funeral. And if she'd done so, it's certainly possible that she'd have been able to grow into the job before the (as you say, inevitable) early election.

    But even if she had, I'm not sure that she'd have become any more palatable to MPs and CCHQ - and without their support, she'd probably have found herself in the same position Rishi is now, just a year earlier.
    Liz Truss's fatal flaw was learnt from Dominic Cummings: the civil service and wider establishment is a malign lefty blob out to destroy you. Truss had a record of dismissing civil servants she disliked. In Downing Street this led her to dismiss or bypass "the adults in the room" that were trusted by the financial markets. And so all the bad things Rishi Sunak had warned would happen, happened. Goodnight Vienna.
    This is utter rubbish. Truss's experience of the blob and their death grip on reform was developed over years of experience as a junior, then senior Minister. She has detailed it all in interviews and given practical examples. Her mistake was to assume that once you got to the level of PM, that type of interference stopped if you really had the political will to get things done. She found to her cost that that wasn't the case.

    If you're interested in being informed, the triggernometry interview is good on this - the second section 'does voting matter' deals with Truss's experiences as a Minister.

    https://youtu.be/jqN-B4DVUww?si=5pZo7kNG8AiFTbMF
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099
    @Nigel_Farage

    I am challenging @RishiSunak to a live TV debate on immigration.

    If he refuses, that will confirm the fact that he can’t stop the boats.

    @CountBinface

    I am challenging @Nigel_Farage to a live TV debate on the benefits of Brexit.

    If he refuses, it will confirm the fact that he sent Britain up shit creek without a paddle.
  • state_go_awaystate_go_away Posts: 5,818
    I am very surprised the tories (to shore up a core vote and a little extra) at this stage have not said they will abolish inheritance tax - It worked about 12 years ago and whilst I dont personally agree with it (fat chance of any inhertiance for me or me accumulating enough assets to pay it ) it is not the most outrageous policy (unlike conscription )
  • DumbosaurusDumbosaurus Posts: 812

    dixiedean said:

    Rumours on Twitter that Tories going to announce a triple lock in the personal allowance - but only for pensioners. If this is true then mega lolz.

    What's disturbing is I can't decide if that is someone being mischievously satirical or not.
    Someone who should know told me. Then I went on twitter and found a source.

    But tbf, he may have got it from that source...
    I think it's time for me to get five likes or more for scooping this ladies and gents, especially since my version was more accurate than the twitter one :)
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,121
    That electoral bribe in full:



    Downing Street said its proposals would mean eight million pensioners would save £100 in tax from next year

    Telegraph
  • wooliedyedwooliedyed Posts: 10,061
    Scott_xP said:

    Well, the Tory campaign seems to be built entirely on constant restatement of the contention that Starmer has no plan.

    Which might work if it wasn’t wholly evident from the last 8 years that the Tories haven’t had one either.

    If this is the best they can do, then the wipeout may yet be on.

    The 'Starmer has no plan' mantra, repeated endlessly by Sunak, is beginning to look like projection.
    120 business leaders have signed up to Labours' plan...
    What was it about the about to win Labour Party that attracted you to their plan?
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 43,337
    edited May 27

    Carnyx said:

    DougSeal said:

    DougSeal said:

    DougSeal said:

    viewcode said:

    Heathener said:

    malcolmg said:

    Heathener said:

    I did wonder with the new generation of men, whether lads' mags would re-appear.
    This is the last gasp of the reactionary right.

    Before the rest of the country moves on. Deporting boat people to Rwanda will be one of those things we look back on and wonder what they were taking. Trans rights will most certainly come back onto the agenda and with a huge majority there won’t be a lot to stop it, but it will be in the context of people generally chilling out and ceasing to judge those who want to identify how the fuck they want. And as for beating up the disabled … well ...
    Any idiot trying to push Trans shit again will be out on their arse and deservedly so.
    In the next few years those of us still alive will look back on the reactionary right’s shibboleths and wonder how we ended up there.

    You’ll not stop the tide of history. Same happened with gay rights. You’re on the lost side. Just a question of time.
    The last year or so has shown that tide crashing into a number of immovable objects, and then moving out again.
    There's no such thing as a "tide of history".

    Sometimes things are a good idea, like gay rights.

    Other time things are a bad idea, like Paedophile Information Exchange.

    Treating trans people with respect is a good idea.

    Treating women with disrespect is a bad idea.
    Indeed. There is no such thing.
    "The tide of history", otherwise known as "the Whig view of history" - that history evolves in a straight line in a progressive direction. It simply doesn't do that.

    In fact we are lucky that somebody went to the trouble of writing an entire article on how the UK resolves its social issues, with an actual real-life worked example.

    https://www1.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2024/04/21/the-history-of-gambling/
    I hold "the Whig view of history" (though I didn't know it was called that) - that history evolves in a straight line in a generally progressive direction.

    However, tempting though it is to use the "tide of history" cliche, it's a terrible metaphor because as we all know tides sweep out as regularly as they sweep in.

    Humans have been evolving societally and intellectually at an incredible rate for the past 50,000 years. Yes there are regressive interludes but the overriding direction is progressive. That surely is undeniable.
    Its completely deniable.

    It evolves, but not in a particular direction. In hindsight you tend to view evolution as progressive but that's post hoc ego proctor hoc.

    But you are completely ignoring all the stillborn failed evolutions or regressive ones. Or setting an impartial definition of progressive.
    Here is my thinking.

    500 years ago in every part of the world:
    - lives were short and brutal
    - starvation was a common experience
    - most people lived in slavery or serfdom, with almost zero opportunity to change that
    - women were second class citizens
    - disability was feared and stigmatised
    - education was the preserve of the top 1%
    - cruel physical punishment (often execution) was the norm for crimes or perceived crimes.
    - animal cruelty was ubiquitous
    - superstition ruled and ruined the lives of many
    - the rights of the individual were almost non-existent
    - difference was pilloried (often literally)
    ... I could go on.

    Go back further and the situation was progressively worse.

    We have come a long way incredibly quickly in evolutionary timescales, with setbacks and periods of regression for sure, but the overall direction of travel is clear.
    But 500 years ago, in England anyway, civic infrastructure was worse than it was 1100 years before that. Between the retreat of the Romans and the Victorians no decent roads were built here. Sewerage in London was worse than it was under the Romans. Life expectancy was creeping back up but it dropped precipitously between 400 and 700 AD. Civilisations fall.

    'setbacks and periods of regression'

    But we don't look back 50,000 years and think it's been progress and regress but regression overall do we?
    Pretty big “setback” if you ask me…a millennium long at least. And what of all the civilisations that are just, well, dust?
    Let me put it another way, which era would you like to go back to, to live out the rest of your days, if you could?
    Easy. I’d transport myself Quantum Leap style to be an English country parson somewhere with a nice living in about 1750 or so. Maybe in the Weald of Kent or the Berkshire Downs. Or maybe Newmarket for the horses. Somewhere like that. I fantasise about that a lot.
    Sounds lovely in principle but the lack of medicine would not be ideal.
    Especially anaesthesia.
    Other than an awful lot of brandy…
    Opium.

    Shit dentists.

    And generally rather shit if you were gay, with the risk of a trial ending with a noose or a free trip to Oz.
    Careful now, we all know what ‘death recorded’ means, now don’t we!
    That was after 1835. The OP specified 1750.

    Here is an example of a string-em-up in 1823:

    https://blogs.nottingham.ac.uk/historypastandpresent/2016/01/15/the-execution-of-benjamin-candler-valet-to-the-duke-of-newcastle-1823/

    (And, strictly, the policy after 1835 was only by discretion. The death penalty remained on the books till 1861, so the risk was there that some Victorian equivalent of our Tories would go all woke hunt and reimpose it ...)

    PS Some did get prison sentences in the UK anyway. Would need to check the details though.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099

    I am very surprised the tories (to shore up a core vote and a little extra) at this stage have not said they will abolish inheritance tax - It worked about 12 years ago and whilst I dont personally agree with it (fat chance of any inhertiance for me or me accumulating enough assets to pay it ) it is not the most outrageous policy (unlike conscription )

    another 5 weeks to go
  • DumbosaurusDumbosaurus Posts: 812

    I am very surprised the tories (to shore up a core vote and a little extra) at this stage have not said they will abolish inheritance tax - It worked about 12 years ago and whilst I dont personally agree with it (fat chance of any inhertiance for me or me accumulating enough assets to pay it ) it is not the most outrageous policy (unlike conscription )

    I personally think they're going to. And it will immediately be turned against Rishi cause he can't do anything right and it is noticeable that he has money. Similarly death penalty or leaving ECHR.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099
    @SkyNews

    PM Rishi Sunak consulted a focus group to gauge what the public thought about his 4 July general election announcement.

    @SamCoatesSky
    says this could indicate his campaign team are "worried".

    https://x.com/SkyNews/status/1795207708724871259
  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 8,951
    edited May 27

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    Scott_xP said:

    The thinktank that came up with the Lads Army says Richi's scheme won't work

    @Simon_Nixon

    Replying to @DanielKorski @RishiSunak and 2 others

    The @ukonward report you have linked to advocates what amounts to a voluntary mass Duke of Edinburgh award, nothing like the mandatory nonsense being proposed by Sunak. In fact @ukonward spells out quite clearly why Sunak’s scheme won’t work!

    https://x.com/Simon_Nixon/status/1795147944594690299

    The problem with it is definitely the mandatory bit - which is why it's such madness clearly cooked up so they can tell elderly reactionaries they're bringing back 'National Service'.

    Plus, the army bit is obviously not wanted by the army itself, as they don't want to babysit 30,000 18-year-olds over proper recruitment and kitting out.

    A mass boost to youth volunteering - pretty popular, even among the young. So long as it's optional.

    Once you make it mandatory you create huge questions of sanctions, policing, safeguarding, training, and funding. None of which exist if you're launching a scheme designed to give people an incentive to volunteer rather than telling 18-year-olds what to do with their weekends. When many will already be working very hard to either pay for their education, care for families etc. Or already doing something valuable with their free time.

    Sublimely out-of-touch with ordinary young people's lives today.
    School is mandatory. Why is it such a problem that another part of young people's education is mandatory? This isn't out of touchness. This is the pathetic British mindset of being against all change, especially change that demands more responsibility for people.
    Education is mandatory for children until 18, yes.

    What is proposed is mandatory for adults so not a part of their education. And ignores the fact that many such adults have other responsibilities already at weekends, like jobs for example.

    If you want to adjust the mandatory education system then that's reasonable - for children under 18 and in hours that are reasonably for education, not for adults in hours they might have a job.
    I broadly agree.

    However, some people under 18 have weekend or full time jobs, care for family members and so on. An example I made earlier were the farmers in my class who would often work for 3 hours before school. So the adult/child distinction is blurred.

    And I have no fundamental issue with it being compulsory. Consider jury service.

    The difference is that it's another burden on young people, particularly those from the poorest backgrounds. They and their families often rely on their incomes - unless the child element of benefits like UC will be extended to children not in full time education?

    It's also part of the dangerous creep towards a reliance on volunteering to provide essential public services like social care. Furthermore, it's been suggested as a way to subvert labour markets by providing free labour to sectors such as agriculture.

    It's an unusual policy in that people from all schools of political thought can find something wrong with it.
  • The_WoodpeckerThe_Woodpecker Posts: 460

    Keir Starmer: I am a socialist.

    "Asked if he would use that word to describe himself, Sir Keir told the BBC: “Yes, I would describe myself as a socialist."

    You have been warned.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/05/27/keir-starmer-socialist-labour-general-election/

    The Labour Party is a Democratic Socialist Party. It says so on my membership card.

    It would be fecking weird if the leader of a Democratic Socialist Party wasn't a Socialist.
    Labour has never been a socialist party, whatever Starmer and the membership card may say. It’s a party of labour. The two are not the same, and the early days of the Independent Labour Party, the Social Democratic Federation, and the eventual Labour Representation Committee saw the union-dominated “party of labour” argument win the day.

    There are some really interesting counterfactuals about what could have happened if Hyndman, Grayson, Blatchford and Morris had been the ones to set the course of Britain’s left wing parties rather than Hardie and Macdonald.
    Tony Blair described himself as a socialist before the 1997 election.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,473

    dixiedean said:

    Well, the Tory campaign seems to be built entirely on constant restatement of the contention that Starmer has no plan.

    Which might work if it wasn’t wholly evident from the last 8 years that the Tories haven’t had one either.

    If this is the best they can do, then the wipeout may yet be on.

    Ironically it's followed up with clear Tory plan.
    What that is I can't discern.
    Fuck anyone working for a living, look after pensioners.

    And block construction so that house prices remain high.
    Jeez. You seem more annoyed about this than I am!
    Relax. They're digging their own grave.
  • another_richardanother_richard Posts: 26,789
    Carnyx said:

    MJW said:

    The next Tory policy will be to give every pensioner the right to demand a pound of flesh and a pint of blood from anyone under 45.

    It's honestly hateful what the Tories are doing to working age people in this country. They deserve to be wiped out.

    Well they've also given them:

    Full employment
    Affordable housing in much of the country
    A 4% reduction in national insurance
    University tuition fees frozen for seven years

    Sure there's plenty that many working age people can be upset about but can we stop the imbecilic levels of exaggeration.
    Usurious rates for university loans, though.

    Afforable housing? Maybe in the wilds of the Northern coalfields.

    And NI used to be 11% back in 2009 IIRC.
    Sure things aren't perfect and for many distinctly difficult.

    But, as I keep saying, if you're young, northern and working class things have never been better.

    Pretty good for many others as well - I'm included here and I'm sure many other PBers as well (though few will admit it).

    I'd certainly take the current situation compared with what we had in 2008-2010.

    Now for many its not good but that's the way of the world - sometimes one socioeconomic demographic does well, sometimes it doesn't and another does.

    And usually its a pattern happening also in similar countries irrespective of what governments do.
  • I am very angry.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,578

    Is there any betting on which seat will get the smallest majority ? If not be good to do a sweep stake or opinions on here

    It's really hard to pinpoint an individual seat for such a specific thing, given you'd probably have to first think about what overall swing is likely, then try to predict any local variation which might be higher or lower, then apply that to the current majorities, taking account of changes to seat boundaries.

    The most marginal seat last time was Fermanagh and South Tyrone at 57 votes, and it has been even more marginal in the past. But you'd probably need a NI expert, and know whether the unionist parties will cooperate as they sometimes do there.

    Most other marginals last time probably won't be this time - I believe in 2017 the most marginal was Fife NE by 2 votes, which the LDs held by 1300 in 2019. Which is pretty marginal in most places but Scotland has a lot of close races.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,473

    dixiedean said:

    Rumours on Twitter that Tories going to announce a triple lock in the personal allowance - but only for pensioners. If this is true then mega lolz.

    What's disturbing is I can't decide if that is someone being mischievously satirical or not.
    Someone who should know told me. Then I went on twitter and found a source.

    But tbf, he may have got it from that source...
    I think it's time for me to get five likes or more for scooping this ladies and gents, especially since my version was more accurate than the twitter one :)
    Still not 100% convinced it isn't satire, mind.
  • CleitophonCleitophon Posts: 489
    AlsoLei said:

    Just saw Mercer in the times radio podcast. WOW. He looks like a man who has given up ... he offers nothing buttotal exasperation. He is making excuses for why there is no message discipline, which is catastrophic for a GE campaign. His tone screams: I don't believe a word of what I am saying... I am just saying what I have to.... crazy to witness this kind of performance this early in a campaign. I am saying this as marketing academic: sunak is going to regret going 6 weeks long. He wanted to reveal labour... his own party is revealing itself. Who would get excited about this????

    https://youtu.be/NkC2iggYwq4?si=OtkZQZymnPa2U9cO

    He has the air of someone who's never been on a video call before.

    It's almost a surprise that he didn't stand up and show us all that he was only clothed from the waist up...
    Wow James Daly has an equally crash and burn interview.... wow.... oh dear oh dear... the deputy chair ... Holy cow, what a shambles. I am going to repeat: the tories are going to totally unravel before the 4th of july.


    https://youtu.be/8ilDMHpI8_c?si=SQ4TkuajrsN9CTTM
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,578

    I am very angry.

    You should have said something to indicate that.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,578
    edited May 27
    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    Well, the Tory campaign seems to be built entirely on constant restatement of the contention that Starmer has no plan.

    Which might work if it wasn’t wholly evident from the last 8 years that the Tories haven’t had one either.

    If this is the best they can do, then the wipeout may yet be on.

    Ironically it's followed up with clear Tory plan.
    What that is I can't discern.
    Fuck anyone working for a living, look after pensioners.

    And block construction so that house prices remain high.
    Jeez. You seem more annoyed about this than I am!
    Relax. They're digging their own grave.
    Nah, that seems like something someone on national service could do.
  • Northern_AlNorthern_Al Posts: 8,472
    edited May 27
    The state pension does of course count as taxable income, but it is never taxed directly. So, for example, when my state pension rises, my work pension automatically reduces as it is taxed more.

    The dilemma is for those who have absolutely no income other than the state pension. If this rises above the personal allowance, a few million poorer pensioners would have to pay tax on the surplus amount - it would likely be a very small amount, and would no doubt cost more to collect (through self-assessment if the DWP won't tax the pension at source - good luck with that) than it would raise. So it would make some sense to tie the state pension to the personal allowance.

    If we want to collect more tax from wealthier pensioners, there are much easier ways to do it. Having different personal allowances for pensioners and workers is palpably absurd.
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 52,282

    I am very angry.

    Did the phone mast policy not make it into Labour's manifesto?
  • WillGWillG Posts: 2,366
    MJW said:

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    Scott_xP said:

    The thinktank that came up with the Lads Army says Richi's scheme won't work

    @Simon_Nixon

    Replying to @DanielKorski @RishiSunak and 2 others

    The @ukonward report you have linked to advocates what amounts to a voluntary mass Duke of Edinburgh award, nothing like the mandatory nonsense being proposed by Sunak. In fact @ukonward spells out quite clearly why Sunak’s scheme won’t work!

    https://x.com/Simon_Nixon/status/1795147944594690299

    The problem with it is definitely the mandatory bit - which is why it's such madness clearly cooked up so they can tell elderly reactionaries they're bringing back 'National Service'.

    Plus, the army bit is obviously not wanted by the army itself, as they don't want to babysit 30,000 18-year-olds over proper recruitment and kitting out.

    A mass boost to youth volunteering - pretty popular, even among the young. So long as it's optional.

    Once you make it mandatory you create huge questions of sanctions, policing, safeguarding, training, and funding. None of which exist if you're launching a scheme designed to give people an incentive to volunteer rather than telling 18-year-olds what to do with their weekends. When many will already be working very hard to either pay for their education, care for families etc. Or already doing something valuable with their free time.

    Sublimely out-of-touch with ordinary young people's lives today.
    School is mandatory. Why is it such a problem that another part of young people's education is mandatory? This isn't out of touchness. This is the pathetic British mindset of being against all change, especially change that demands more responsibility for people.
    Because these people are adults. Many of whom have responsibilities and aspirations that aren't best served by the government telling them what they have to do for 25 days a year - and it's not education, it's forced labour. You don't get a useful qualification (unless you're planning to join a related service - in which case you might volunteer for a voluntary scheme) at the end of it.

    If for, example, you study full-time at college but need to work weekends to help pay your way at home or the rent, then it's a massive inconvenience. If you're caring for a parent, brother or sister, or your own child it is too. Or volunteer for valuable things that don't qualify or are looking to do to further your professional skills in a specific area.

    It's also an insult because younger generations have been made poorer and had rights taken away by their elders, who now want to make their lives even harder because of their creepy World War 2 fetish and failure to come to terms with how feckless and selfish they have been themselves.

    Seeing as you're not against forcing into work that makes their lives harder but provides an education and sense of community. How about we do National Service but for pensioners who own their own home? They can work the second jobs many young people have to to afford rent in such the inflated property market they benefited from.

    Oh. Thought not.
    Oh please. If we need to create an exemption system for those caring for a relative or doing other, genuine volunteer work, then we can make that part of a scheme. I bet it is less than 2% of the 18 year old population.

    And the reason why it makes sense to do it for this group is because the primary benefit of doing it is equipping people for the lives ahead of them. Therefore it makes sense to do it with people entering the workforce, not those who have left it. Too many British people lack a real work ethic or sense of service and I am glad Sunak is a politician actually willing to do something about it.

    As for house and rental prices, that is overwhelmingly driven by the population growing far more quickly than construction can keep up. The best approach to that is to limit immigration to those who contribute more than they cost the system. The only PM that has actually done anything about that is Sunak, with meaningful income thresholds and limits on student dependents.
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 52,282

    AlsoLei said:

    Just saw Mercer in the times radio podcast. WOW. He looks like a man who has given up ... he offers nothing buttotal exasperation. He is making excuses for why there is no message discipline, which is catastrophic for a GE campaign. His tone screams: I don't believe a word of what I am saying... I am just saying what I have to.... crazy to witness this kind of performance this early in a campaign. I am saying this as marketing academic: sunak is going to regret going 6 weeks long. He wanted to reveal labour... his own party is revealing itself. Who would get excited about this????

    https://youtu.be/NkC2iggYwq4?si=OtkZQZymnPa2U9cO

    He has the air of someone who's never been on a video call before.

    It's almost a surprise that he didn't stand up and show us all that he was only clothed from the waist up...
    Wow James Daly has an equally crash and burn interview.... wow.... oh dear oh dear... the deputy chair ... Holy cow, what a shambles. I am going to repeat: the tories are going to totally unravel before the 4th of july.


    https://youtu.be/8ilDMHpI8_c?si=SQ4TkuajrsN9CTTM
    You don't think a joint appearance with John Major, David Cameron and Theresa May solemnly warning people not to vote Labour might swing it?
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099
    @gabyhinsliff

    UK politics will offer ageing boomers literally anything EXCEPT a functioning NHS and properly funded social care, ie the things that actually keep them alive.

    quadruple lock on pensions, take your estate out of inheritance tax, no to wealth taxes, bring back blue passports/national service/imperial measures? Absolutely! Waiting less than 24 hours in A&E for a bed, in your 80s? Sorry no can do.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,473
    kle4 said:

    Is there any betting on which seat will get the smallest majority ? If not be good to do a sweep stake or opinions on here

    It's really hard to pinpoint an individual seat for such a specific thing, given you'd probably have to first think about what overall swing is likely, then try to predict any local variation which might be higher or lower, then apply that to the current majorities, taking account of changes to seat boundaries.

    The most marginal seat last time was Fermanagh and South Tyrone at 57 votes, and it has been even more marginal in the past. But you'd probably need a NI expert, and know whether the unionist parties will cooperate as they sometimes do there.

    Most other marginals last time probably won't be this time - I believe in 2017 the most marginal was Fife NE by 2 votes, which the LDs held by 1300 in 2019. Which is pretty marginal in most places but Scotland has a lot of close races.
    Was announced today that Unionists wouldn't be co-operating there.
  • Sunil_PrasannanSunil_Prasannan Posts: 52,121

    Keir Starmer: I am a socialist.

    "Asked if he would use that word to describe himself, Sir Keir told the BBC: “Yes, I would describe myself as a socialist."

    You have been warned.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/05/27/keir-starmer-socialist-labour-general-election/

    The Labour Party is a Democratic Socialist Party. It says so on my membership card.

    It would be fecking weird if the leader of a Democratic Socialist Party wasn't a Socialist.
    Labour has never been a socialist party, whatever Starmer and the membership card may say. It’s a party of labour. The two are not the same, and the early days of the Independent Labour Party, the Social Democratic Federation, and the eventual Labour Representation Committee saw the union-dominated “party of labour” argument win the day.

    There are some really interesting counterfactuals about what could have happened if Hyndman, Grayson, Blatchford and Morris had been the ones to set the course of Britain’s left wing parties rather than Hardie and Macdonald.
    Tony Blair described himself as a socialist before the 1997 election.
    I say unto you that Jesus himself was a socialist.
  • another_richardanother_richard Posts: 26,789

    That electoral bribe in full:



    Downing Street said its proposals would mean eight million pensioners would save £100 in tax from next year

    Telegraph

    Or in a currency oldies will understand about eight Sunday carveries at Brewers fayre.
  • BartholomewRobertsBartholomewRoberts Posts: 22,366
    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    Well, the Tory campaign seems to be built entirely on constant restatement of the contention that Starmer has no plan.

    Which might work if it wasn’t wholly evident from the last 8 years that the Tories haven’t had one either.

    If this is the best they can do, then the wipeout may yet be on.

    Ironically it's followed up with clear Tory plan.
    What that is I can't discern.
    Fuck anyone working for a living, look after pensioners.

    And block construction so that house prices remain high.
    Jeez. You seem more annoyed about this than I am!
    Relax. They're digging their own grave.
    Hunt in cutting NI had correctly identified what is wrong with our tax system and was starting to fix it, but I didn't trust Sunak since his instinct was the opposite.

    This campaign has Sunak all over it. Its absolutely awful. Hunt seems to have been sidelined completely.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,121

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    Well, the Tory campaign seems to be built entirely on constant restatement of the contention that Starmer has no plan.

    Which might work if it wasn’t wholly evident from the last 8 years that the Tories haven’t had one either.

    If this is the best they can do, then the wipeout may yet be on.

    Ironically it's followed up with clear Tory plan.
    What that is I can't discern.
    Fuck anyone working for a living, look after pensioners.

    And block construction so that house prices remain high.
    Jeez. You seem more annoyed about this than I am!
    Relax. They're digging their own grave.
    Hunt in cutting NI had correctly identified what is wrong with our tax system and was starting to fix it, but I didn't trust Sunak since his instinct was the opposite.

    This campaign has Sunak all over it. Its absolutely awful. Hunt seems to have been sidelined completely.
    He is busy trying to save his seat.

    Sunak is too stupid to realise his seat is also in jeopardy.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,473

    The state pension does of course count as taxable income, but it is never taxed directly. So, for example, when my state pension rises, my work pension automatically reduces as it is taxed more.

    The dilemma is for those who have absolutely no income other than the state pension. If this rises above the personal allowance, a few million poorer pensioners would have to pay tax on the surplus amount - it would likely be a very small amount, and would no doubt cost more to collect (through self-assessment if the DWP won't tax the pension at source - good luck with that) than it would raise. So it would make some sense to tie the state pension to the personal allowance.

    If we want to collect more tax from wealthier pensioners, there are much easier ways to do it. Having different personal allowances for pensioners and workers is palpably absurd.

    Yes but.
    How does that argument differ from someone working earning £13k? It would be an equally small amount.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099
    Here is the FT headline

    @ftukpolitics

    Sunak unveils £2.4bn pensioner tax cut in bid to stabilise election campaign


    I now have a mental image of a sinking hot air balloon with Richi desperately jettisoning anything he can grab to stop it crashing.

    It's not working...
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,578
    edited May 27
    Scott_xP said:

    Here is the FT headline

    @ftukpolitics

    Sunak unveils £2.4bn pensioner tax cut in bid to stabilise election campaign


    I now have a mental image of a sinking hot air balloon with Richi desperately jettisoning anything he can grab to stop it crashing.

    It's not working...

    When you are doing badly even good ideas will get dismissed as being proposed in 'desperation'.

    Case in point (not that this is a good idea per se, but it sounds good to appeal to Pensioners)

    Scott_xP said:

    Here is the FT headline

    @ftukpolitics

    Sunak unveils £2.4bn pensioner tax cut in bid to stabilise election campaign


    I now have a mental image of a sinking hot air balloon with Richi desperately jettisoning anything he can grab to stop it crashing.

    It's not working...

    I love the smell of desperation in the morning air.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,121
    Scott_xP said:

    Here is the FT headline

    @ftukpolitics

    Sunak unveils £2.4bn pensioner tax cut in bid to stabilise election campaign


    I now have a mental image of a sinking hot air balloon with Richi desperately jettisoning anything he can grab to stop it crashing.

    It's not working...

    I love the smell of desperation in the morning air.
  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 8,951
    edited May 27

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    Well, the Tory campaign seems to be built entirely on constant restatement of the contention that Starmer has no plan.

    Which might work if it wasn’t wholly evident from the last 8 years that the Tories haven’t had one either.

    If this is the best they can do, then the wipeout may yet be on.

    Ironically it's followed up with clear Tory plan.
    What that is I can't discern.
    Fuck anyone working for a living, look after pensioners.

    And block construction so that house prices remain high.
    Jeez. You seem more annoyed about this than I am!
    Relax. They're digging their own grave.
    Hunt in cutting NI had correctly identified what is wrong with our tax system and was starting to fix it, but I didn't trust Sunak since his instinct was the opposite.

    This campaign has Sunak all over it. Its absolutely awful. Hunt seems to have been sidelined completely.
    It makes sense. The Tories are losing loads of votes to Reform in the older age groups, and as older people are spread more evenly around the country, their votes are more valuable than those from working people.

    Going for working people would also require a massive pivot to the centre or left. That's impossible now.
  • state_go_awaystate_go_away Posts: 5,818
    Farooq said:

    I've decided where I would time travel to.
    I would pile up a bunch of newspapers and go back to 1997. I'd track down Carol Vorderman and let her loose on all the shit that's happened. Give her a fast track to her anti-Tory radicalisation.

    I'd then get rich winning the national lottery ten times in a row.

    I'd then fly to New York and spend the next four years getting to know Donald Trump, before inviting him to a breakfast meeting on a crisp, early fall Tuesday morning. Somewhere with a view. I wouldn't show up.

    so you would priortize Carol Vordeman's political education over becoming a multi millionaire or killing Trump (if thats your thing ) - Wow you must really fancy her!!
  • ohnotnowohnotnow Posts: 3,991

    AlsoLei said:

    spudgfsh said:

    kle4 said:

    spudgfsh said:

    I have been pondering, as I’m sure many other PBers have, whether Liz TRUSS could stage a remarkable comeback during the election campaign. It would be an eye-catching move. One to think carefully about.

    She could claim that on account of the number of Tory MPs standing down, Rishi Sunak's coup has no standing and she is the legitimate leader of the party.
    If the Tory Party is reduced to the 1997 level (or below) she could be one of the few "credible" candidates left.
    They may well have been no worse off had they kept her (if the fall had been slightly less precipitous she might have weathered it), so given she really was offering a new approach it is conceivable some would go for her again, especially as those who remain will be in the safest seats and as a result possibly the more ideologically minded.

    But I think she will still bear a brunt of anger for the whole debacle, and they'll go for fresh hands.

    They'll only have 100-130 to choose from, so options will be limited.
    in an alternative universe, Truss stayed on long enough to weather the storm but gets forced into an earlier election. Loses but has a clear message so doesn't lose as badly as Sunak is about to.
    I suspect she might have weathered the storm if she'd paused for a few weeks after QEII's death, rather than proceeding with the mini-budget immediately after the funeral. And if she'd done so, it's certainly possible that she'd have been able to grow into the job before the (as you say, inevitable) early election.

    But even if she had, I'm not sure that she'd have become any more palatable to MPs and CCHQ - and without their support, she'd probably have found herself in the same position Rishi is now, just a year earlier.
    Liz Truss's fatal flaw was learnt from Dominic Cummings: the civil service and wider establishment is a malign lefty blob out to destroy you. Truss had a record of dismissing civil servants she disliked. In Downing Street this led her to dismiss or bypass "the adults in the room" that were trusted by the financial markets. And so all the bad things Rishi Sunak had warned would happen, happened. Goodnight Vienna.
    This is utter rubbish. Truss's experience of the blob and their death grip on reform was developed over years of experience as a junior, then senior Minister. She has detailed it all in interviews and given practical examples. Her mistake was to assume that once you got to the level of PM, that type of interference stopped if you really had the political will to get things done. She found to her cost that that wasn't the case.

    If you're interested in being informed, the triggernometry interview is good on this - the second section 'does voting matter' deals with Truss's experiences as a Minister.

    https://youtu.be/jqN-B4DVUww?si=5pZo7kNG8AiFTbMF
    She was also rubbish. Don't forget that aspect.

    I have nothing in particular to pro-or-anti her policies. But really, she was rubbish.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,821
    Scott_xP said:

    @Nigel_Farage

    I am challenging @RishiSunak to a live TV debate on immigration.

    If he refuses, that will confirm the fact that he can’t stop the boats.

    @CountBinface

    I am challenging @Nigel_Farage to a live TV debate on the benefits of Brexit.

    If he refuses, it will confirm the fact that he sent Britain up shit creek without a paddle.

    Farage should do it. I think he'd take the noble count apart. Whoever is behind Binface may regret that challenge - others like him have.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099
    @FraserNelson
    Once, Cameron said the Tories were the party of the workers. Sunak is now positioning them as party of the pensioners.

    This is consistent with a core vote strategy aiming for ~200 seats by making Tories party of the elderly.
  • EPGEPG Posts: 6,653
    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    Scott_xP said:

    The thinktank that came up with the Lads Army says Richi's scheme won't work

    @Simon_Nixon

    Replying to @DanielKorski @RishiSunak and 2 others

    The @ukonward report you have linked to advocates what amounts to a voluntary mass Duke of Edinburgh award, nothing like the mandatory nonsense being proposed by Sunak. In fact @ukonward spells out quite clearly why Sunak’s scheme won’t work!

    https://x.com/Simon_Nixon/status/1795147944594690299

    The problem with it is definitely the mandatory bit - which is why it's such madness clearly cooked up so they can tell elderly reactionaries they're bringing back 'National Service'.

    Plus, the army bit is obviously not wanted by the army itself, as they don't want to babysit 30,000 18-year-olds over proper recruitment and kitting out.

    A mass boost to youth volunteering - pretty popular, even among the young. So long as it's optional.

    Once you make it mandatory you create huge questions of sanctions, policing, safeguarding, training, and funding. None of which exist if you're launching a scheme designed to give people an incentive to volunteer rather than telling 18-year-olds what to do with their weekends. When many will already be working very hard to either pay for their education, care for families etc. Or already doing something valuable with their free time.

    Sublimely out-of-touch with ordinary young people's lives today.
    School is mandatory. Why is it such a problem that another part of young people's education is mandatory? This isn't out of touchness. This is the pathetic British mindset of being against all change, especially change that demands more responsibility for people.
    Because these people are adults. Many of whom have responsibilities and aspirations that aren't best served by the government telling them what they have to do for 25 days a year - and it's not education, it's forced labour. You don't get a useful qualification (unless you're planning to join a related service - in which case you might volunteer for a voluntary scheme) at the end of it.

    If for, example, you study full-time at college but need to work weekends to help pay your way at home or the rent, then it's a massive inconvenience. If you're caring for a parent, brother or sister, or your own child it is too. Or volunteer for valuable things that don't qualify or are looking to do to further your professional skills in a specific area.

    It's also an insult because younger generations have been made poorer and had rights taken away by their elders, who now want to make their lives even harder because of their creepy World War 2 fetish and failure to come to terms with how feckless and selfish they have been themselves.

    Seeing as you're not against forcing into work that makes their lives harder but provides an education and sense of community. How about we do National Service but for pensioners who own their own home? They can work the second jobs many young people have to to afford rent in such the inflated property market they benefited from.

    Oh. Thought not.
    Oh please. If we need to create an exemption system for those caring for a relative or doing other, genuine volunteer work, then we can make that part of a scheme. I bet it is less than 2% of the 18 year old population.

    And the reason why it makes sense to do it for this group is because the primary benefit of doing it is equipping people for the lives ahead of them. Therefore it makes sense to do it with people entering the workforce, not those who have left it. Too many British people lack a real work ethic or sense of service and I am glad Sunak is a politician actually willing to do something about it.

    As for house and rental prices, that is overwhelmingly driven by the population growing far more quickly than construction can keep up. The best approach to that is to limit immigration to those who contribute more than they cost the system. The only PM that has actually done anything about that is Sunak, with meaningful income thresholds and limits on student dependents.
    Equip them in the vital skill of fruit picking? Teach them the ethic that work doesn't pay and you have no control?
  • TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 42,146

    Keir Starmer: I am a socialist.

    "Asked if he would use that word to describe himself, Sir Keir told the BBC: “Yes, I would describe myself as a socialist."

    You have been warned.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/05/27/keir-starmer-socialist-labour-general-election/

    TB tribute act, though I don't think Sir Keir would ever have been this balls out.

    I am a socialist not through reading a textbook that has caught my intellectual fancy, nor through unthinking tradition, but because I believe that, at its best, socialism corresponds most closely to an existence that is both rational and moral.
    Maiden speech, House of Commons, July 6 1983
  • Northern_AlNorthern_Al Posts: 8,472
    dixiedean said:

    The state pension does of course count as taxable income, but it is never taxed directly. So, for example, when my state pension rises, my work pension automatically reduces as it is taxed more.

    The dilemma is for those who have absolutely no income other than the state pension. If this rises above the personal allowance, a few million poorer pensioners would have to pay tax on the surplus amount - it would likely be a very small amount, and would no doubt cost more to collect (through self-assessment if the DWP won't tax the pension at source - good luck with that) than it would raise. So it would make some sense to tie the state pension to the personal allowance.

    If we want to collect more tax from wealthier pensioners, there are much easier ways to do it. Having different personal allowances for pensioners and workers is palpably absurd.

    Yes but.
    How does that argument differ from someone working earning £13k? It would be an equally small amount.
    Well, I don't think somebody earning £13k should be taxed at all. But the point I was trying to make, possibly clumsily, is that there's no current mechanism for collecting tax from a pensioner receiving nothing but the state pension, whereas PAYE for the low-paid worker is cheap and easy.
    Like everything though, I don't think the Tories have thought it through.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,473
    Anyone for what's next?
    Taxi drivers to wear ties looks feasible.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099

    Scott_xP said:

    @Nigel_Farage

    I am challenging @RishiSunak to a live TV debate on immigration.

    If he refuses, that will confirm the fact that he can’t stop the boats.

    @CountBinface

    I am challenging @Nigel_Farage to a live TV debate on the benefits of Brexit.

    If he refuses, it will confirm the fact that he sent Britain up shit creek without a paddle.

    Farage should do it. I think he'd take the noble count apart. Whoever is behind Binface may regret that challenge - others like him have.
    Nigel Fucking Farage will not do it because he thinks he is better than a clown in a bin. Doing it would confirm he is just as big a joke.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099
    dixiedean said:

    Anyone for what's next?
    Taxi drivers to wear ties looks feasible.

    National Tea Time.

    Nailed on now...
  • another_richardanother_richard Posts: 26,789

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    Scott_xP said:

    The thinktank that came up with the Lads Army says Richi's scheme won't work

    @Simon_Nixon

    Replying to @DanielKorski @RishiSunak and 2 others

    The @ukonward report you have linked to advocates what amounts to a voluntary mass Duke of Edinburgh award, nothing like the mandatory nonsense being proposed by Sunak. In fact @ukonward spells out quite clearly why Sunak’s scheme won’t work!

    https://x.com/Simon_Nixon/status/1795147944594690299

    The problem with it is definitely the mandatory bit - which is why it's such madness clearly cooked up so they can tell elderly reactionaries they're bringing back 'National Service'.

    Plus, the army bit is obviously not wanted by the army itself, as they don't want to babysit 30,000 18-year-olds over proper recruitment and kitting out.

    A mass boost to youth volunteering - pretty popular, even among the young. So long as it's optional.

    Once you make it mandatory you create huge questions of sanctions, policing, safeguarding, training, and funding. None of which exist if you're launching a scheme designed to give people an incentive to volunteer rather than telling 18-year-olds what to do with their weekends. When many will already be working very hard to either pay for their education, care for families etc. Or already doing something valuable with their free time.

    Sublimely out-of-touch with ordinary young people's lives today.
    School is mandatory. Why is it such a problem that another part of young people's education is mandatory? This isn't out of touchness. This is the pathetic British mindset of being against all change, especially change that demands more responsibility for people.
    Education is mandatory for children until 18, yes.

    What is proposed is mandatory for adults so not a part of their education. And ignores the fact that many such adults have other responsibilities already at weekends, like jobs for example.

    If you want to adjust the mandatory education system then that's reasonable - for children under 18 and in hours that are reasonably for education, not for adults in hours they might have a job.
    One of the maddening things is that there are the germs of a couple of maybe decent (but not cheap) ideas here.

    One is a widely-available, competitive but easy application process Public Service Internship, a year between school/college and university/employment/apprenticeship. No reason why it just has to be military.

    The other is making helping out in the community a natural part of the compulsory education experience. Duke of Edinburgh, NCS, International Baccalaureate... they've all got it. Schools and colleges just need a smallish amount of cash and a larger amount of staff time, and Rishi claimed to be hoping to reform post-16 education anyway. It would have fitted in there pretty well without too much need to reinvent the wheel. (Couple of conditions I would put on this- it should fit within the school/college timetable and the main reward participants should get is the learning, and the projects should be nice-to-haves, not core functions of government. That's where the Sunak Grand Design stuffed up.)

    But it's all got lost due to Rishi's unwillingness to spend money (given a chance, he would have axed NCS altogether) and the Conservative obsession with fluffing boomers with phrases like National Service. And that looks like it's discredited the whole thing.
    There's been nothing to stop Labour formulating a more realistic proposal.

    In 1945, 1964, 1997 Labour came to power with ideas on how to modernise and reform the country.

    Whereas now Labour offer nothing but being a repository of votes for getting rid of the Conservatives and SNP.
  • ToryJimToryJim Posts: 4,189
    Scott_xP said:

    @SkyNews

    PM Rishi Sunak consulted a focus group to gauge what the public thought about his 4 July general election announcement.

    @SamCoatesSky
    says this could indicate his campaign team are "worried".

    https://x.com/SkyNews/status/1795207708724871259

    I do think some journalists are in danger of getting carried away. I imagine parties focus group the impact of most announcements, it doesn’t necessarily mean anything that Sunak wants to gauge what voters really thought of it.
  • MJWMJW Posts: 1,736
    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    Scott_xP said:

    The thinktank that came up with the Lads Army says Richi's scheme won't work

    @Simon_Nixon

    Replying to @DanielKorski @RishiSunak and 2 others

    The @ukonward report you have linked to advocates what amounts to a voluntary mass Duke of Edinburgh award, nothing like the mandatory nonsense being proposed by Sunak. In fact @ukonward spells out quite clearly why Sunak’s scheme won’t work!

    https://x.com/Simon_Nixon/status/1795147944594690299

    The problem with it is definitely the mandatory bit - which is why it's such madness clearly cooked up so they can tell elderly reactionaries they're bringing back 'National Service'.

    Plus, the army bit is obviously not wanted by the army itself, as they don't want to babysit 30,000 18-year-olds over proper recruitment and kitting out.

    A mass boost to youth volunteering - pretty popular, even among the young. So long as it's optional.

    Once you make it mandatory you create huge questions of sanctions, policing, safeguarding, training, and funding. None of which exist if you're launching a scheme designed to give people an incentive to volunteer rather than telling 18-year-olds what to do with their weekends. When many will already be working very hard to either pay for their education, care for families etc. Or already doing something valuable with their free time.

    Sublimely out-of-touch with ordinary young people's lives today.
    School is mandatory. Why is it such a problem that another part of young people's education is mandatory? This isn't out of touchness. This is the pathetic British mindset of being against all change, especially change that demands more responsibility for people.
    Because these people are adults. Many of whom have responsibilities and aspirations that aren't best served by the government telling them what they have to do for 25 days a year - and it's not education, it's forced labour. You don't get a useful qualification (unless you're planning to join a related service - in which case you might volunteer for a voluntary scheme) at the end of it.

    If for, example, you study full-time at college but need to work weekends to help pay your way at home or the rent, then it's a massive inconvenience. If you're caring for a parent, brother or sister, or your own child it is too. Or volunteer for valuable things that don't qualify or are looking to do to further your professional skills in a specific area.

    It's also an insult because younger generations have been made poorer and had rights taken away by their elders, who now want to make their lives even harder because of their creepy World War 2 fetish and failure to come to terms with how feckless and selfish they have been themselves.

    Seeing as you're not against forcing into work that makes their lives harder but provides an education and sense of community. How about we do National Service but for pensioners who own their own home? They can work the second jobs many young people have to to afford rent in such the inflated property market they benefited from.

    Oh. Thought not.
    Oh please. If we need to create an exemption system for those caring for a relative or doing other, genuine volunteer work, then we can make that part of a scheme. I bet it is less than 2% of the 18 year old population.

    And the reason why it makes sense to do it for this group is because the primary benefit of doing it is equipping people for the lives ahead of them. Therefore it makes sense to do it with people entering the workforce, not those who have left it. Too many British people lack a real work ethic or sense of service and I am glad Sunak is a politician actually willing to do something about it.

    As for house and rental prices, that is overwhelmingly driven by the population growing far more quickly than construction can keep up. The best approach to that is to limit immigration to those who contribute more than they cost the system. The only PM that has actually done anything about that is Sunak, with meaningful income thresholds and limits on student dependents.
    "Too many British people lack a real work ethic or sense of service and I am glad Sunak is a politician actually willing to do something about it."

    Oh do sod off you insulting fool. What a great example of the deluded madness of the selfish generation. Younger people are working harder than ever - for worse equivalent pay. I bet they work harder and have a stronger sense of service than you do to your fellow citizens and the way you have voted for things that have made their lives worse.

    People like you could certainly do with National Service far more than the young, as you are so selfish and ignorant of others' lives that you need it far more than they do.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,121
    Scott_xP said:

    @FraserNelson
    Once, Cameron said the Tories were the party of the workers. Sunak is now positioning them as party of the pensioners.

    This is consistent with a core vote strategy aiming for ~200 seats by making Tories party of the elderly.

    They were the future once.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099
    ToryJim said:

    Scott_xP said:

    @SkyNews

    PM Rishi Sunak consulted a focus group to gauge what the public thought about his 4 July general election announcement.

    @SamCoatesSky
    says this could indicate his campaign team are "worried".

    https://x.com/SkyNews/status/1795207708724871259

    I do think some journalists are in danger of getting carried away. I imagine parties focus group the impact of most announcements, it doesn’t necessarily mean anything that Sunak wants to gauge what voters really thought of it.
    Typically they focus group announcements before they make them. It is atypical to ask "How badly did I fuck that up?"
  • state_go_awaystate_go_away Posts: 5,818
    Has there been an election where the two main party leaders are so bad ( dull) at public speaking? Oh for the days of Thatcher against Kinnock or even Blair and Hague
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 29,473

    dixiedean said:

    The state pension does of course count as taxable income, but it is never taxed directly. So, for example, when my state pension rises, my work pension automatically reduces as it is taxed more.

    The dilemma is for those who have absolutely no income other than the state pension. If this rises above the personal allowance, a few million poorer pensioners would have to pay tax on the surplus amount - it would likely be a very small amount, and would no doubt cost more to collect (through self-assessment if the DWP won't tax the pension at source - good luck with that) than it would raise. So it would make some sense to tie the state pension to the personal allowance.

    If we want to collect more tax from wealthier pensioners, there are much easier ways to do it. Having different personal allowances for pensioners and workers is palpably absurd.

    Yes but.
    How does that argument differ from someone working earning £13k? It would be an equally small amount.
    Well, I don't think somebody earning £13k should be taxed at all. But the point I was trying to make, possibly clumsily, is that there's no current mechanism for collecting tax from a pensioner receiving nothing but the state pension, whereas PAYE for the low-paid worker is cheap and easy.
    Like everything though, I don't think the Tories have thought it through.
    Setting up such a mechanism?
    There was no mechanism for checking whether or not UC claimants had £6k in savings either.
    Demanding access to their bank accounts was put on Statute stat.
  • state_go_awaystate_go_away Posts: 5,818
    Farooq said:

    Farooq said:

    I've decided where I would time travel to.
    I would pile up a bunch of newspapers and go back to 1997. I'd track down Carol Vorderman and let her loose on all the shit that's happened. Give her a fast track to her anti-Tory radicalisation.

    I'd then get rich winning the national lottery ten times in a row.

    I'd then fly to New York and spend the next four years getting to know Donald Trump, before inviting him to a breakfast meeting on a crisp, early fall Tuesday morning. Somewhere with a view. I wouldn't show up.

    so you would priortize Carol Vordeman's political education over becoming a multi millionaire or killing Trump (if thats your thing ) - Wow you must really fancy her!!
    I don't really give two shits about Vorderman... it was just a callback to another conversation. I thought it would be mildly humorous.

    Also, I didn't say I would be killing anyone. Mere inviting someone to admire a clear, blue, sunny morning in September and standing them up wouldn't normally result in their demise. And if -- somehow -- it did, that's not really my doing now, is it?
    tell it to the Time Judge
  • StuartinromfordStuartinromford Posts: 17,449

    AlsoLei said:

    Just saw Mercer in the times radio podcast. WOW. He looks like a man who has given up ... he offers nothing buttotal exasperation. He is making excuses for why there is no message discipline, which is catastrophic for a GE campaign. His tone screams: I don't believe a word of what I am saying... I am just saying what I have to.... crazy to witness this kind of performance this early in a campaign. I am saying this as marketing academic: sunak is going to regret going 6 weeks long. He wanted to reveal labour... his own party is revealing itself. Who would get excited about this????

    https://youtu.be/NkC2iggYwq4?si=OtkZQZymnPa2U9cO

    He has the air of someone who's never been on a video call before.

    It's almost a surprise that he didn't stand up and show us all that he was only clothed from the waist up...
    Wow James Daly has an equally crash and burn interview.... wow.... oh dear oh dear... the deputy chair ... Holy cow, what a shambles. I am going to repeat: the tories are going to totally unravel before the 4th of july.


    https://youtu.be/8ilDMHpI8_c?si=SQ4TkuajrsN9CTTM
    One one hand, it's still crazy to contemplate. On the other, what is there to stop them?

    Consider the list of MPs in order of seniority;

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_Kingdom_MPs_by_seniority_(2019–2024)

    There aren't many vetrans of 1997 and 2001 left on the Conservative benches, and even fewer are in any sort of senior role. (There's Andrew Mitchell, but at a glance, I can't see any others.) The class of 2005 gives you Shapps, Davies the Welsh and Gove, but the Conservatives were on the up by them.

    How many of them have the experience needed to develop the inner fortitude to keep smiling as the ship sinks beneath the waves?

    We're about to find out, but the omens aren't good.
  • ohnotnowohnotnow Posts: 3,991

    Has there been an election where the two main party leaders are so bad ( dull) at public speaking? Oh for the days of Thatcher against Kinnock or even Blair and Hague

    Count Binface vs Farage is our future. We're still winning compared to the USA I guess.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,121
    Scott_xP said:

    @SkyNews

    PM Rishi Sunak consulted a focus group to gauge what the public thought about his 4 July general election announcement.

    @SamCoatesSky
    says this could indicate his campaign team are "worried".

    https://x.com/SkyNews/status/1795207708724871259

    Bit fucking late now.

    What's he going to do, trudge back to Charles and say there's been a terrible mistake?
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,121
    ohnotnow said:

    Has there been an election where the two main party leaders are so bad ( dull) at public speaking? Oh for the days of Thatcher against Kinnock or even Blair and Hague

    Count Binface vs Farage is our future. We're still winning compared to the USA I guess.
    Both under 80.
  • SouthamObserverSouthamObserver Posts: 39,668
    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    Scott_xP said:

    The thinktank that came up with the Lads Army says Richi's scheme won't work

    @Simon_Nixon

    Replying to @DanielKorski @RishiSunak and 2 others

    The @ukonward report you have linked to advocates what amounts to a voluntary mass Duke of Edinburgh award, nothing like the mandatory nonsense being proposed by Sunak. In fact @ukonward spells out quite clearly why Sunak’s scheme won’t work!

    https://x.com/Simon_Nixon/status/1795147944594690299

    The problem with it is definitely the mandatory bit - which is why it's such madness clearly cooked up so they can tell elderly reactionaries they're bringing back 'National Service'.

    Plus, the army bit is obviously not wanted by the army itself, as they don't want to babysit 30,000 18-year-olds over proper recruitment and kitting out.

    A mass boost to youth volunteering - pretty popular, even among the young. So long as it's optional.

    Once you make it mandatory you create huge questions of sanctions, policing, safeguarding, training, and funding. None of which exist if you're launching a scheme designed to give people an incentive to volunteer rather than telling 18-year-olds what to do with their weekends. When many will already be working very hard to either pay for their education, care for families etc. Or already doing something valuable with their free time.

    Sublimely out-of-touch with ordinary young people's lives today.
    School is mandatory. Why is it such a problem that another part of young people's education is mandatory? This isn't out of touchness. This is the pathetic British mindset of being against all change, especially change that demands more responsibility for people.
    Because these people are adults. Many of whom have responsibilities and aspirations that aren't best served by the government telling them what they have to do for 25 days a year - and it's not education, it's forced labour. You don't get a useful qualification (unless you're planning to join a related service - in which case you might volunteer for a voluntary scheme) at the end of it.

    If for, example, you study full-time at college but need to work weekends to help pay your way at home or the rent, then it's a massive inconvenience. If you're caring for a parent, brother or sister, or your own child it is too. Or volunteer for valuable things that don't qualify or are looking to do to further your professional skills in a specific area.

    It's also an insult because younger generations have been made poorer and had rights taken away by their elders, who now want to make their lives even harder because of their creepy World War 2 fetish and failure to come to terms with how feckless and selfish they have been themselves.

    Seeing as you're not against forcing into work that makes their lives harder but provides an education and sense of community. How about we do National Service but for pensioners who own their own home? They can work the second jobs many young people have to to afford rent in such the inflated property market they benefited from.

    Oh. Thought not.
    Oh please. If we need to create an exemption system for those caring for a relative or doing other, genuine volunteer work, then we can make that part of a scheme. I bet it is less than 2% of the 18 year old population.

    And the reason why it makes sense to do it for this group is because the primary benefit of doing it is equipping people for the lives ahead of them. Therefore it makes sense to do it with people entering the workforce, not those who have left it. Too many British people lack a real work ethic or sense of service and I am glad Sunak is a politician actually willing to do something about it.

    As for house and rental prices, that is overwhelmingly driven by the population growing far more quickly than construction can keep up. The best approach to that is to limit immigration to those who contribute more than they cost the system. The only PM that has actually done anything about that is Sunak, with meaningful income thresholds and limits on student dependents.

    Forced labour for others but absolutely not for you. Of course!

  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 8,951
    dixiedean said:

    Anyone for what's next?
    Taxi drivers to wear ties looks feasible.

    Vibe: Fuck cyclists
    Policy: Illegal for cyclists (and pedestrians) to use the carriageway when a segregated cycle lane(pavement) is available, require insurance, compulsory helmets, some sort of registration scheme, speed limit of 15mph

    Vibe: Death death death
    Policy: Death penalty for anyone who defrauds a pensioner, sex offenders

    Vibe: Death death death
    Policy: Ban the RNLI from operating in the Channel

    Vibe: Transphobia
    Policy: Restrict Trans people from working in hospitals, schools with gender mixing and so on

    Vibe: Old people
    Policy: Free broadband - the modern equivalent of free TV license

    Vibe: Old people
    Policy: Free VED - the modern version of free bus pass
  • another_richardanother_richard Posts: 26,789

    Has there been an election where the two main party leaders are so bad ( dull) at public speaking? Oh for the days of Thatcher against Kinnock or even Blair and Hague

    Public speaking is last millennium.

    Spouting crap on social media is what politicians do now.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,121
    Meanwhile back on Planet Reality:


    Paul Johnson
    @PJTheEconomist
    ·
    31m
    About half the cost of this is just not imposing the planned tax increase (via 3 more years of freezing allowances) on pensioners. So the £100 "saving" next year is mostly just avoiding a £100 tax increase, rather than an actual giveaway.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 49,122
    EPG said:

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    Scott_xP said:

    The thinktank that came up with the Lads Army says Richi's scheme won't work

    @Simon_Nixon

    Replying to @DanielKorski @RishiSunak and 2 others

    The @ukonward report you have linked to advocates what amounts to a voluntary mass Duke of Edinburgh award, nothing like the mandatory nonsense being proposed by Sunak. In fact @ukonward spells out quite clearly why Sunak’s scheme won’t work!

    https://x.com/Simon_Nixon/status/1795147944594690299

    The problem with it is definitely the mandatory bit - which is why it's such madness clearly cooked up so they can tell elderly reactionaries they're bringing back 'National Service'.

    Plus, the army bit is obviously not wanted by the army itself, as they don't want to babysit 30,000 18-year-olds over proper recruitment and kitting out.

    A mass boost to youth volunteering - pretty popular, even among the young. So long as it's optional.

    Once you make it mandatory you create huge questions of sanctions, policing, safeguarding, training, and funding. None of which exist if you're launching a scheme designed to give people an incentive to volunteer rather than telling 18-year-olds what to do with their weekends. When many will already be working very hard to either pay for their education, care for families etc. Or already doing something valuable with their free time.

    Sublimely out-of-touch with ordinary young people's lives today.
    School is mandatory. Why is it such a problem that another part of young people's education is mandatory? This isn't out of touchness. This is the pathetic British mindset of being against all change, especially change that demands more responsibility for people.
    Because these people are adults. Many of whom have responsibilities and aspirations that aren't best served by the government telling them what they have to do for 25 days a year - and it's not education, it's forced labour. You don't get a useful qualification (unless you're planning to join a related service - in which case you might volunteer for a voluntary scheme) at the end of it.

    If for, example, you study full-time at college but need to work weekends to help pay your way at home or the rent, then it's a massive inconvenience. If you're caring for a parent, brother or sister, or your own child it is too. Or volunteer for valuable things that don't qualify or are looking to do to further your professional skills in a specific area.

    It's also an insult because younger generations have been made poorer and had rights taken away by their elders, who now want to make their lives even harder because of their creepy World War 2 fetish and failure to come to terms with how feckless and selfish they have been themselves.

    Seeing as you're not against forcing into work that makes their lives harder but provides an education and sense of community. How about we do National Service but for pensioners who own their own home? They can work the second jobs many young people have to to afford rent in such the inflated property market they benefited from.

    Oh. Thought not.
    Oh please. If we need to create an exemption system for those caring for a relative or doing other, genuine volunteer work, then we can make that part of a scheme. I bet it is less than 2% of the 18 year old population.

    And the reason why it makes sense to do it for this group is because the primary benefit of doing it is equipping people for the lives ahead of them. Therefore it makes sense to do it with people entering the workforce, not those who have left it. Too many British people lack a real work ethic or sense of service and I am glad Sunak is a politician actually willing to do something about it.

    As for house and rental prices, that is overwhelmingly driven by the population growing far more quickly than construction can keep up. The best approach to that is to limit immigration to those who contribute more than they cost the system. The only PM that has actually done anything about that is Sunak, with meaningful income thresholds and limits on student dependents.
    Equip them in the vital skill of fruit picking? Teach them the ethic that work doesn't pay and you have no control?
    Surely the first step is to decide what skills they should acquire by their compulsory volunteering, and how on earth it stimulates a work ethic.

    Don't conscript them first then wonder what you are going to do with them. That will just teach them to skive off.
  • CookieCookie Posts: 14,074

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    Scott_xP said:

    The thinktank that came up with the Lads Army says Richi's scheme won't work

    @Simon_Nixon

    Replying to @DanielKorski @RishiSunak and 2 others

    The @ukonward report you have linked to advocates what amounts to a voluntary mass Duke of Edinburgh award, nothing like the mandatory nonsense being proposed by Sunak. In fact @ukonward spells out quite clearly why Sunak’s scheme won’t work!

    https://x.com/Simon_Nixon/status/1795147944594690299

    The problem with it is definitely the mandatory bit - which is why it's such madness clearly cooked up so they can tell elderly reactionaries they're bringing back 'National Service'.

    Plus, the army bit is obviously not wanted by the army itself, as they don't want to babysit 30,000 18-year-olds over proper recruitment and kitting out.

    A mass boost to youth volunteering - pretty popular, even among the young. So long as it's optional.

    Once you make it mandatory you create huge questions of sanctions, policing, safeguarding, training, and funding. None of which exist if you're launching a scheme designed to give people an incentive to volunteer rather than telling 18-year-olds what to do with their weekends. When many will already be working very hard to either pay for their education, care for families etc. Or already doing something valuable with their free time.

    Sublimely out-of-touch with ordinary young people's lives today.
    School is mandatory. Why is it such a problem that another part of young people's education is mandatory? This isn't out of touchness. This is the pathetic British mindset of being against all change, especially change that demands more responsibility for people.
    Education is mandatory for children until 18, yes.

    What is proposed is mandatory for adults so not a part of their education. And ignores the fact that many such adults have other responsibilities already at weekends, like jobs for example.

    If you want to adjust the mandatory education system then that's reasonable - for children under 18 and in hours that are reasonably for education, not for adults in hours they might have a job.
    One of the maddening things is that there are the germs of a couple of maybe decent (but not cheap) ideas here.

    One is a widely-available, competitive but easy application process Public Service Internship, a year between school/college and university/employment/apprenticeship. No reason why it just has to be military.

    The other is making helping out in the community a natural part of the compulsory education experience. Duke of Edinburgh, NCS, International Baccalaureate... they've all got it. Schools and colleges just need a smallish amount of cash and a larger amount of staff time, and Rishi claimed to be hoping to reform post-16 education anyway. It would have fitted in there pretty well without too much need to reinvent the wheel. (Couple of conditions I would put on this- it should fit within the school/college timetable and the main reward participants should get is the learning, and the projects should be nice-to-haves, not core functions of government. That's where the Sunak Grand Design stuffed up.)

    But it's all got lost due to Rishi's unwillingness to spend money (given a chance, he would have axed NCS altogether) and the Conservative obsession with fluffing boomers with phrases like National Service. And that looks like it's discredited the whole thing.
    I don't think Boomers are the target. I remember 'reintroduce National Service' as a background noise to the 1980s that I grew up in - not a proposal anyone took seriously, but one which had a certain emotional pull for some of those who had experienced NS.
    But National Service was abolished in, what, 1960? Meaning the only people who experienced it are those over the age of 80. That isn't Boomers.
  • Northern_AlNorthern_Al Posts: 8,472
    edited May 27

    dixiedean said:

    The state pension does of course count as taxable income, but it is never taxed directly. So, for example, when my state pension rises, my work pension automatically reduces as it is taxed more.

    The dilemma is for those who have absolutely no income other than the state pension. If this rises above the personal allowance, a few million poorer pensioners would have to pay tax on the surplus amount - it would likely be a very small amount, and would no doubt cost more to collect (through self-assessment if the DWP won't tax the pension at source - good luck with that) than it would raise. So it would make some sense to tie the state pension to the personal allowance.

    If we want to collect more tax from wealthier pensioners, there are much easier ways to do it. Having different personal allowances for pensioners and workers is palpably absurd.

    Yes but.
    How does that argument differ from someone working earning £13k? It would be an equally small amount.
    Well, I don't think somebody earning £13k should be taxed at all. But the point I was trying to make, possibly clumsily, is that there's no current mechanism for collecting tax from a pensioner receiving nothing but the state pension, whereas PAYE for the low-paid worker is cheap and easy.
    Like everything though, I don't think the Tories have thought it through.
    I don't think we're really disagreeing. My view is that pensioners who can afford it should be taxed more, as should workers who can afford it. By contrast, poor pensioners and poor workers should not be taxed until they cease to be poor.
    (Sorry, reply to DD).
  • AlsoLeiAlsoLei Posts: 1,500
    edited May 27
    Farooq said:

    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    Well, the Tory campaign seems to be built entirely on constant restatement of the contention that Starmer has no plan.

    Which might work if it wasn’t wholly evident from the last 8 years that the Tories haven’t had one either.

    If this is the best they can do, then the wipeout may yet be on.

    Ironically it's followed up with clear Tory plan.
    What that is I can't discern.
    Fuck anyone working for a living, look after pensioners.

    And block construction so that house prices remain high.
    Jeez. You seem more annoyed about this than I am!
    Relax. They're digging their own grave.
    Hunt in cutting NI had correctly identified what is wrong with our tax system and was starting to fix it, but I didn't trust Sunak since his instinct was the opposite.

    This campaign has Sunak all over it. Its absolutely awful. Hunt seems to have been sidelined completely.
    The Conservatives made a mistake in not electing Hunt leader in 2022.
    Perhaps they should have inverted the nominations process, and let the membership decide between Javid, Shapps, and Chisti. They'd likely be in a far better position today, no matter which of them won.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099
    Eabhal said:

    Vibe: Old people
    Policy: Free broadband - the modern equivalent of free TV license

    No.

    This was discussed previously.

    Not only does the free TV license remain, a Royal Commission will determine whether TV returns to 4 channels, or only 3, with big buttons to select each one.
  • ohnotnowohnotnow Posts: 3,991
    dixiedean said:

    dixiedean said:

    The state pension does of course count as taxable income, but it is never taxed directly. So, for example, when my state pension rises, my work pension automatically reduces as it is taxed more.

    The dilemma is for those who have absolutely no income other than the state pension. If this rises above the personal allowance, a few million poorer pensioners would have to pay tax on the surplus amount - it would likely be a very small amount, and would no doubt cost more to collect (through self-assessment if the DWP won't tax the pension at source - good luck with that) than it would raise. So it would make some sense to tie the state pension to the personal allowance.

    If we want to collect more tax from wealthier pensioners, there are much easier ways to do it. Having different personal allowances for pensioners and workers is palpably absurd.

    Yes but.
    How does that argument differ from someone working earning £13k? It would be an equally small amount.
    Well, I don't think somebody earning £13k should be taxed at all. But the point I was trying to make, possibly clumsily, is that there's no current mechanism for collecting tax from a pensioner receiving nothing but the state pension, whereas PAYE for the low-paid worker is cheap and easy.
    Like everything though, I don't think the Tories have thought it through.
    Setting up such a mechanism?
    There was no mechanism for checking whether or not UC claimants had £6k in savings either.
    Demanding access to their bank accounts was put on Statute stat.
    But... they were young. Some of them were trying to work and better their lives. I mean, WTF? That's not what the current tory party is about.
  • ToryJimToryJim Posts: 4,189
    Scott_xP said:

    ToryJim said:

    Scott_xP said:

    @SkyNews

    PM Rishi Sunak consulted a focus group to gauge what the public thought about his 4 July general election announcement.

    @SamCoatesSky
    says this could indicate his campaign team are "worried".

    https://x.com/SkyNews/status/1795207708724871259

    I do think some journalists are in danger of getting carried away. I imagine parties focus group the impact of most announcements, it doesn’t necessarily mean anything that Sunak wants to gauge what voters really thought of it.
    Typically they focus group announcements before they make them. It is atypical to ask "How badly did I fuck that up?"
    I would expect that they would focus group either side or an announcement as a matter of course. It would seem insensible to ask people what they think about something you might do but not check that it is what they actually think when you go ahead and do it. I think Mr Coates is letting the narrative interpret the facts rather than developing a narrative from out of the facts.
  • ohnotnowohnotnow Posts: 3,991
    dixiedean said:

    See. The danger I worry about is that this is going to turn into blind fury against the older generation. Jibes about bone idleness from folk who haven't worked in 25 years are contributing.
    And to demand "punishment". They may end up a lot worse off than they'd imagined.

    I already see it amongst the 'alt-right-curious' on Discord forums etc. The mild jibes of "ok, boomer" are becoming way, way more pointed.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099
    @DPJHodges

    With his first 2 big announcements - National Service and Quadruple Pensions Lock - we can see Rishi Sunak isn’t trying to win this election. He’s looking to shore up the core and minimise losses. Which is OK in the circumstances. But it needs less shambolic implementation.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099
    @lewis_goodall
    Will be amazed if we get to polling day with inheritance tax left untouched. Suspect promise to abolish will be centrepiece of Conservative manifesto
  • BartholomewRobertsBartholomewRoberts Posts: 22,366
    Scott_xP said:

    Eabhal said:

    Vibe: Old people
    Policy: Free broadband - the modern equivalent of free TV license

    No.

    This was discussed previously.

    Not only does the free TV license remain, a Royal Commission will determine whether TV returns to 4 channels, or only 3, with big buttons to select each one.
    Broadband to be shut down and to be replaced by the return of Teletext.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,121
    dixiedean said:

    See. The danger I worry about is that this is going to turn into blind fury against the older generation. Jibes about bone idleness from folk who haven't worked in 25 years are contributing.
    And to demand "punishment". They may end up a lot worse off than they'd imagined.

    Maybe if the 18-24 year olds could be arsed to vote there'd be less of a problem.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,578
    edited May 27

    Scott_xP said:

    Eabhal said:

    Vibe: Old people
    Policy: Free broadband - the modern equivalent of free TV license

    No.

    This was discussed previously.

    Not only does the free TV license remain, a Royal Commission will determine whether TV returns to 4 channels, or only 3, with big buttons to select each one.
    Broadband to be shut down and to be replaced by the return of Teletext.
    I think that's already a Count Binface policy.

    But an end to self service supermarket tills will be in there.
  • CleitophonCleitophon Posts: 489

    AlsoLei said:

    Just saw Mercer in the times radio podcast. WOW. He looks like a man who has given up ... he offers nothing buttotal exasperation. He is making excuses for why there is no message discipline, which is catastrophic for a GE campaign. His tone screams: I don't believe a word of what I am saying... I am just saying what I have to.... crazy to witness this kind of performance this early in a campaign. I am saying this as marketing academic: sunak is going to regret going 6 weeks long. He wanted to reveal labour... his own party is revealing itself. Who would get excited about this????

    https://youtu.be/NkC2iggYwq4?si=OtkZQZymnPa2U9cO

    He has the air of someone who's never been on a video call before.

    It's almost a surprise that he didn't stand up and show us all that he was only clothed from the waist up...
    Wow James Daly has an equally crash and burn interview.... wow.... oh dear oh dear... the deputy chair ... Holy cow, what a shambles. I am going to repeat: the tories are going to totally unravel before the 4th of july.


    https://youtu.be/8ilDMHpI8_c?si=SQ4TkuajrsN9CTTM
    One one hand, it's still crazy to contemplate. On the other, what is there to stop them?

    Consider the list of MPs in order of seniority;

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_Kingdom_MPs_by_seniority_(2019–2024)

    There aren't many vetrans of 1997 and 2001 left on the Conservative benches, and even fewer are in any sort of senior role. (There's Andrew Mitchell, but at a glance, I can't see any others.) The class of 2005 gives you Shapps, Davies the Welsh and Gove, but the Conservatives were on the up by them.

    How many of them have the experience needed to develop the inner fortitude to keep smiling as the ship sinks beneath the waves?

    We're about to find out, but the omens aren't good.
    I suspect I know why the country is in this state. They have run it with the same skill they are running their campaign. Dear me... what a terrifying thought.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 36,099
    @lewis_goodall
    Clear this Tory campaign is about shoring up the core vote as much as possible, rather than broad strategy. Given their polling, it’s not a foolish idea. But it’s a strategy for averting catastrophe by losing quite badly, not winning.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,578

    dixiedean said:

    See. The danger I worry about is that this is going to turn into blind fury against the older generation. Jibes about bone idleness from folk who haven't worked in 25 years are contributing.
    And to demand "punishment". They may end up a lot worse off than they'd imagined.

    Maybe if the 18-24 year olds could be arsed to vote there'd be less of a problem.
    This time they won't need to as they'll be joined by everyone up to age 60.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 49,122

    Scott_xP said:

    @SkyNews

    PM Rishi Sunak consulted a focus group to gauge what the public thought about his 4 July general election announcement.

    @SamCoatesSky
    says this could indicate his campaign team are "worried".

    https://x.com/SkyNews/status/1795207708724871259

    Bit fucking late now.

    What's he going to do, trudge back to Charles and say there's been a terrible mistake?
    Please, Your Majesty...




  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 63,121
    Scott_xP said:

    @lewis_goodall
    Will be amazed if we get to polling day with inheritance tax left untouched. Suspect promise to abolish will be centrepiece of Conservative manifesto

    Yep. Hunt has already used the front page of Telegraph this weekend to say as much.

  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 43,337
    dixiedean said:

    kle4 said:

    Is there any betting on which seat will get the smallest majority ? If not be good to do a sweep stake or opinions on here

    It's really hard to pinpoint an individual seat for such a specific thing, given you'd probably have to first think about what overall swing is likely, then try to predict any local variation which might be higher or lower, then apply that to the current majorities, taking account of changes to seat boundaries.

    The most marginal seat last time was Fermanagh and South Tyrone at 57 votes, and it has been even more marginal in the past. But you'd probably need a NI expert, and know whether the unionist parties will cooperate as they sometimes do there.

    Most other marginals last time probably won't be this time - I believe in 2017 the most marginal was Fife NE by 2 votes, which the LDs held by 1300 in 2019. Which is pretty marginal in most places but Scotland has a lot of close races.
    Was announced today that Unionists wouldn't be co-operating there.
    But Mr Ross has alrteady demanded that tactical voting happen - when it favours the Tories. About a week ago (seems a long time ...).
  • another_richardanother_richard Posts: 26,789
    dixiedean said:

    See. The danger I worry about is that this is going to turn into blind fury against the older generation. Jibes about bone idleness from folk who haven't worked in 25 years are contributing.
    And to demand "punishment". They may end up a lot worse off than they'd imagined.

    They wont be.

    Labour's already promising to increase the spending on the oldies.

    While anyone doing GCSE's this year will get increased tuition fees if they go to university.

    Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDfAdHBtK_Q&t=469s
  • wooliedyedwooliedyed Posts: 10,061
    edited May 27
    Redfield appear to have not done a poll because theyve been busy doing one of those shit 'who would you rather have a pint with/put up a shelf' Sunak/Starmer polls for the independent. Cant see any VI. Garbage
  • another_richardanother_richard Posts: 26,789

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    Scott_xP said:

    The thinktank that came up with the Lads Army says Richi's scheme won't work

    @Simon_Nixon

    Replying to @DanielKorski @RishiSunak and 2 others

    The @ukonward report you have linked to advocates what amounts to a voluntary mass Duke of Edinburgh award, nothing like the mandatory nonsense being proposed by Sunak. In fact @ukonward spells out quite clearly why Sunak’s scheme won’t work!

    https://x.com/Simon_Nixon/status/1795147944594690299

    The problem with it is definitely the mandatory bit - which is why it's such madness clearly cooked up so they can tell elderly reactionaries they're bringing back 'National Service'.

    Plus, the army bit is obviously not wanted by the army itself, as they don't want to babysit 30,000 18-year-olds over proper recruitment and kitting out.

    A mass boost to youth volunteering - pretty popular, even among the young. So long as it's optional.

    Once you make it mandatory you create huge questions of sanctions, policing, safeguarding, training, and funding. None of which exist if you're launching a scheme designed to give people an incentive to volunteer rather than telling 18-year-olds what to do with their weekends. When many will already be working very hard to either pay for their education, care for families etc. Or already doing something valuable with their free time.

    Sublimely out-of-touch with ordinary young people's lives today.
    School is mandatory. Why is it such a problem that another part of young people's education is mandatory? This isn't out of touchness. This is the pathetic British mindset of being against all change, especially change that demands more responsibility for people.
    Education is mandatory for children until 18, yes.

    What is proposed is mandatory for adults so not a part of their education. And ignores the fact that many such adults have other responsibilities already at weekends, like jobs for example.

    If you want to adjust the mandatory education system then that's reasonable - for children under 18 and in hours that are reasonably for education, not for adults in hours they might have a job.
    One of the maddening things is that there are the germs of a couple of maybe decent (but not cheap) ideas here.

    One is a widely-available, competitive but easy application process Public Service Internship, a year between school/college and university/employment/apprenticeship. No reason why it just has to be military.

    The other is making helping out in the community a natural part of the compulsory education experience. Duke of Edinburgh, NCS, International Baccalaureate... they've all got it. Schools and colleges just need a smallish amount of cash and a larger amount of staff time, and Rishi claimed to be hoping to reform post-16 education anyway. It would have fitted in there pretty well without too much need to reinvent the wheel. (Couple of conditions I would put on this- it should fit within the school/college timetable and the main reward participants should get is the learning, and the projects should be nice-to-haves, not core functions of government. That's where the Sunak Grand Design stuffed up.)

    But it's all got lost due to Rishi's unwillingness to spend money (given a chance, he would have axed NCS altogether) and the Conservative obsession with fluffing boomers with phrases like National Service. And that looks like it's discredited the whole thing.
    There's been nothing to stop Labour formulating a more realistic proposal.

    In 1945, 1964, 1997 Labour came to power with ideas on how to modernise and reform the country.

    Whereas now Labour offer nothing but being a repository of votes for getting rid of the Conservatives and SNP.
    Not inflicting forced labour on 18 year-olds seems a pretty realistic alternative to me.

    You modernise and reform what is actually happening.

    Not some hypothetical future which isn't going to happen.

    Vote Labour - For no change apart from which politicians gets their snouts in the trough.
  • CookieCookie Posts: 14,074
    dixiedean said:

    See. The danger I worry about is that this is going to turn into blind fury against the older generation. Jibes about bone idleness from folk who haven't worked in 25 years are contributing.
    And to demand "punishment". They may end up a lot worse off than they'd imagined.

    Who are demanding punishment, and who may end up a lot worse than imagined? This feels like an interestingpoint, but I can't see what it's referring to.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 96,578

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    Scott_xP said:

    The thinktank that came up with the Lads Army says Richi's scheme won't work

    @Simon_Nixon

    Replying to @DanielKorski @RishiSunak and 2 others

    The @ukonward report you have linked to advocates what amounts to a voluntary mass Duke of Edinburgh award, nothing like the mandatory nonsense being proposed by Sunak. In fact @ukonward spells out quite clearly why Sunak’s scheme won’t work!

    https://x.com/Simon_Nixon/status/1795147944594690299

    The problem with it is definitely the mandatory bit - which is why it's such madness clearly cooked up so they can tell elderly reactionaries they're bringing back 'National Service'.

    Plus, the army bit is obviously not wanted by the army itself, as they don't want to babysit 30,000 18-year-olds over proper recruitment and kitting out.

    A mass boost to youth volunteering - pretty popular, even among the young. So long as it's optional.

    Once you make it mandatory you create huge questions of sanctions, policing, safeguarding, training, and funding. None of which exist if you're launching a scheme designed to give people an incentive to volunteer rather than telling 18-year-olds what to do with their weekends. When many will already be working very hard to either pay for their education, care for families etc. Or already doing something valuable with their free time.

    Sublimely out-of-touch with ordinary young people's lives today.
    School is mandatory. Why is it such a problem that another part of young people's education is mandatory? This isn't out of touchness. This is the pathetic British mindset of being against all change, especially change that demands more responsibility for people.
    Education is mandatory for children until 18, yes.

    What is proposed is mandatory for adults so not a part of their education. And ignores the fact that many such adults have other responsibilities already at weekends, like jobs for example.

    If you want to adjust the mandatory education system then that's reasonable - for children under 18 and in hours that are reasonably for education, not for adults in hours they might have a job.
    One of the maddening things is that there are the germs of a couple of maybe decent (but not cheap) ideas here.

    One is a widely-available, competitive but easy application process Public Service Internship, a year between school/college and university/employment/apprenticeship. No reason why it just has to be military.

    The other is making helping out in the community a natural part of the compulsory education experience. Duke of Edinburgh, NCS, International Baccalaureate... they've all got it. Schools and colleges just need a smallish amount of cash and a larger amount of staff time, and Rishi claimed to be hoping to reform post-16 education anyway. It would have fitted in there pretty well without too much need to reinvent the wheel. (Couple of conditions I would put on this- it should fit within the school/college timetable and the main reward participants should get is the learning, and the projects should be nice-to-haves, not core functions of government. That's where the Sunak Grand Design stuffed up.)

    But it's all got lost due to Rishi's unwillingness to spend money (given a chance, he would have axed NCS altogether) and the Conservative obsession with fluffing boomers with phrases like National Service. And that looks like it's discredited the whole thing.
    There's been nothing to stop Labour formulating a more realistic proposal.

    In 1945, 1964, 1997 Labour came to power with ideas on how to modernise and reform the country.

    Whereas now Labour offer nothing but being a repository of votes for getting rid of the Conservatives and SNP.
    Not inflicting forced labour on 18 year-olds seems a pretty realistic alternative to me.

    You modernise and reform what is actually happening.

    Not some hypothetical future which isn't going to happen.

    Vote Labour - For no change apart from which politicians gets their snouts in the trough.
    If there's no change might as well swap people over from time to time to keep them a bit fresher.
  • MJWMJW Posts: 1,736

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    Scott_xP said:

    The thinktank that came up with the Lads Army says Richi's scheme won't work

    @Simon_Nixon

    Replying to @DanielKorski @RishiSunak and 2 others

    The @ukonward report you have linked to advocates what amounts to a voluntary mass Duke of Edinburgh award, nothing like the mandatory nonsense being proposed by Sunak. In fact @ukonward spells out quite clearly why Sunak’s scheme won’t work!

    https://x.com/Simon_Nixon/status/1795147944594690299

    The problem with it is definitely the mandatory bit - which is why it's such madness clearly cooked up so they can tell elderly reactionaries they're bringing back 'National Service'.

    Plus, the army bit is obviously not wanted by the army itself, as they don't want to babysit 30,000 18-year-olds over proper recruitment and kitting out.

    A mass boost to youth volunteering - pretty popular, even among the young. So long as it's optional.

    Once you make it mandatory you create huge questions of sanctions, policing, safeguarding, training, and funding. None of which exist if you're launching a scheme designed to give people an incentive to volunteer rather than telling 18-year-olds what to do with their weekends. When many will already be working very hard to either pay for their education, care for families etc. Or already doing something valuable with their free time.

    Sublimely out-of-touch with ordinary young people's lives today.
    School is mandatory. Why is it such a problem that another part of young people's education is mandatory? This isn't out of touchness. This is the pathetic British mindset of being against all change, especially change that demands more responsibility for people.
    Education is mandatory for children until 18, yes.

    What is proposed is mandatory for adults so not a part of their education. And ignores the fact that many such adults have other responsibilities already at weekends, like jobs for example.

    If you want to adjust the mandatory education system then that's reasonable - for children under 18 and in hours that are reasonably for education, not for adults in hours they might have a job.
    One of the maddening things is that there are the germs of a couple of maybe decent (but not cheap) ideas here.

    One is a widely-available, competitive but easy application process Public Service Internship, a year between school/college and university/employment/apprenticeship. No reason why it just has to be military.

    The other is making helping out in the community a natural part of the compulsory education experience. Duke of Edinburgh, NCS, International Baccalaureate... they've all got it. Schools and colleges just need a smallish amount of cash and a larger amount of staff time, and Rishi claimed to be hoping to reform post-16 education anyway. It would have fitted in there pretty well without too much need to reinvent the wheel. (Couple of conditions I would put on this- it should fit within the school/college timetable and the main reward participants should get is the learning, and the projects should be nice-to-haves, not core functions of government. That's where the Sunak Grand Design stuffed up.)

    But it's all got lost due to Rishi's unwillingness to spend money (given a chance, he would have axed NCS altogether) and the Conservative obsession with fluffing boomers with phrases like National Service. And that looks like it's discredited the whole thing.
    There's been nothing to stop Labour formulating a more realistic proposal.

    In 1945, 1964, 1997 Labour came to power with ideas on how to modernise and reform the country.

    Whereas now Labour offer nothing but being a repository of votes for getting rid of the Conservatives and SNP.
    Labour's position is that they'd keep the money in the levelling up fund as was previously promised. Which seems sensible as it's badly needed as it's there to replace previous EU pots of money and was/is apparently a matter of national importance to spend what money there is on struggling communities.

    So why should they be following by offering a more realistic version of a crackpot scheme when there's umpteen places the money it 'costs' (but apparently will cost way more) is needed?

    There's an important point here as to why Labour is cautious. If Labour came up with a scheme like this, or a giveaway to pensioners like the one announced tonight, it would be rightly asked where the money was coming from and whether it was a good use of it. Imagine say Labour had announced a £2.5bn scheme with dubious costings to offer training to poor 18-year-olds. It would immediately have come under scrutiny.

    Yet the same sort of scrutiny never gets applied to the Tories when they offer their bribes or own pet schemes. Look at the money wasted on sending one bloke, voluntarily, to Rwanda.
  • SouthamObserverSouthamObserver Posts: 39,668

    WillG said:

    MJW said:

    Scott_xP said:

    The thinktank that came up with the Lads Army says Richi's scheme won't work

    @Simon_Nixon

    Replying to @DanielKorski @RishiSunak and 2 others

    The @ukonward report you have linked to advocates what amounts to a voluntary mass Duke of Edinburgh award, nothing like the mandatory nonsense being proposed by Sunak. In fact @ukonward spells out quite clearly why Sunak’s scheme won’t work!

    https://x.com/Simon_Nixon/status/1795147944594690299

    The problem with it is definitely the mandatory bit - which is why it's such madness clearly cooked up so they can tell elderly reactionaries they're bringing back 'National Service'.

    Plus, the army bit is obviously not wanted by the army itself, as they don't want to babysit 30,000 18-year-olds over proper recruitment and kitting out.

    A mass boost to youth volunteering - pretty popular, even among the young. So long as it's optional.

    Once you make it mandatory you create huge questions of sanctions, policing, safeguarding, training, and funding. None of which exist if you're launching a scheme designed to give people an incentive to volunteer rather than telling 18-year-olds what to do with their weekends. When many will already be working very hard to either pay for their education, care for families etc. Or already doing something valuable with their free time.

    Sublimely out-of-touch with ordinary young people's lives today.
    School is mandatory. Why is it such a problem that another part of young people's education is mandatory? This isn't out of touchness. This is the pathetic British mindset of being against all change, especially change that demands more responsibility for people.
    Education is mandatory for children until 18, yes.

    What is proposed is mandatory for adults so not a part of their education. And ignores the fact that many such adults have other responsibilities already at weekends, like jobs for example.

    If you want to adjust the mandatory education system then that's reasonable - for children under 18 and in hours that are reasonably for education, not for adults in hours they might have a job.
    One of the maddening things is that there are the germs of a couple of maybe decent (but not cheap) ideas here.

    One is a widely-available, competitive but easy application process Public Service Internship, a year between school/college and university/employment/apprenticeship. No reason why it just has to be military.

    The other is making helping out in the community a natural part of the compulsory education experience. Duke of Edinburgh, NCS, International Baccalaureate... they've all got it. Schools and colleges just need a smallish amount of cash and a larger amount of staff time, and Rishi claimed to be hoping to reform post-16 education anyway. It would have fitted in there pretty well without too much need to reinvent the wheel. (Couple of conditions I would put on this- it should fit within the school/college timetable and the main reward participants should get is the learning, and the projects should be nice-to-haves, not core functions of government. That's where the Sunak Grand Design stuffed up.)

    But it's all got lost due to Rishi's unwillingness to spend money (given a chance, he would have axed NCS altogether) and the Conservative obsession with fluffing boomers with phrases like National Service. And that looks like it's discredited the whole thing.
    There's been nothing to stop Labour formulating a more realistic proposal.

    In 1945, 1964, 1997 Labour came to power with ideas on how to modernise and reform the country.

    Whereas now Labour offer nothing but being a repository of votes for getting rid of the Conservatives and SNP.
    Not inflicting forced labour on 18 year-olds seems a pretty realistic alternative to me.

    You modernise and reform what is actually happening.

    Not some hypothetical future which isn't going to happen.

    Vote Labour - For no change apart from which politicians gets their snouts in the trough.

    Forced labour for 18 year-olds is not currently happening. It will happen if the Tories are returned to power. So saying you won’t do it is a very realistic alternative.

  • another_richardanother_richard Posts: 26,789

    dixiedean said:

    See. The danger I worry about is that this is going to turn into blind fury against the older generation. Jibes about bone idleness from folk who haven't worked in 25 years are contributing.
    And to demand "punishment". They may end up a lot worse off than they'd imagined.

    They wont be.

    Labour's already promising to increase the spending on the oldies.

    While anyone doing GCSE's this year will get increased tuition fees if they go to university.

    Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDfAdHBtK_Q&t=469s
    Yes, we need a party that cares for people who work for a living and want to get on in life.

    That used to be the Tories. Which is why they used to be a party worth voting for.

    Hopefully someone steps into that vacuum.
    Hopefully.

    The Conservatives need to learn many lessons before it might be them.

    Unfortunately I can see them becoming electable again without learning anything.
  • SteveSSteveS Posts: 190
    Farooq said:

    I've decided where I would time travel to.
    I would pile up a bunch of newspapers and go back to 1997. I'd track down Carol Vorderman and let her loose on all the shit that's happened. Give her a fast track to her anti-Tory radicalisation.

    I'd then get rich winning the national lottery ten times in a row.

    I'd then fly to New York and spend the next four years getting to know Donald Trump, before inviting him to a breakfast meeting on a crisp, early fall Tuesday morning. Somewhere with a view. I wouldn't show up.

    If you get rid of The Apprentice you nullify both Trump and Surallan Sugar too.
This discussion has been closed.