Wasn't Mercer complaining about claims he was a combatant? He could have had a glorious seven years behind a desk.
No, senior special forces bods have vouched for Thomas’ service and it wasn’t behind a desk.
You have to wonder why Mercer is repeating this claim then. Pretty low.
Firstly he is desperate and secondly he knows that Thomas cannot come out and say, “actually I did this, this and this” etc which is why it’s pretty despicable of Mercer to call him a Walter Mitty as he knows what the rules are.
Mercer will potentially be in a spot of bother should he win narrowly in July. Many here will recall Phil Woolas being unseated by an election petition in 2010, due to making false statements about a candidate's character and conduct contrary to section 106 of the Representation of the People Act, and the result being close enough conceivably to have been decisive.
Quite apart from any defamation issues, he's potentially given himself quite a big problem.
Has Mercer explained how he is in a position to know whether what Thomas says about his service is true or not?
If the Conservatives have retargeted their campaigning efforts into seats with majorities of over 20,000 in 2019 to ensure that they come 2nd in the number of seats won, what evidence is there of a shift in the other parties changing their priorities?
The Greens appear to be focusing on North Herefordshire and Waveney Valley, but what about Labour and the Lib Dems?
At a guess, Labour won't be changing its strategy to pursue ultra-safe Tory seats. Picking up a few more if they're already heading for an immense majority won't be as important to them as keeping the effort going in places that may be vulnerable to a measure of swingback - even if that now feels unlikely.
The Liberal Democrats will have finite resources so couldn't go on the offensive in 200 seats even if they wanted to.
@Annaisaac New: The Guardian has seen internal Labour documents, confirmed by senior sources, which scope radical changes to capital gains and inheritance tax:
💸The proposals include increases in capital gains tax (CGT), first revealed by the Guardian two weeks ago, that could raise £8bn.
💰 Also in drafts are BIG potential changes to inheritance tax that could generate £2.3bn a year.
💳⌛️New measures would make it much more difficult to “gift” money and assets, such as farmland, tax free. It effectively scraps much of the relief used for passing on agricultural and business assets.
This all sounds positive, and as we were saying the other day they are things that need a long-term service / overhaul.
It would have been nice if it had not come out now, though.
Good evening
I actually support those measures so why isn't Reeves just honest and announce them
Agreed. People should just say what it is they're going to vote for. We all know, and they aren't fooling anyone...
More than thirty years ago, a 14 year old me was sat in a Design Technology class (no idea what they'd be called now) and the teacher decided to go well off topic.
He explained patiently how, with the current situation, it might be possible for there to be 100 seats in the country. Each seat could be even, with 100,000 people in it.
In 51 of them, 51,000 voted Conservative and the remaining 49,000 voted Labour. In the other 49, all 100,000 people voted Labour.
He set out the numbers and explained how the Conservatives had just won the election, not just with less votes than Labour but barely more than 25% of the vote.
Sure, it was a lesson about gerrymandering, as well as PR, but I've never forgot that lesson that day by Mr. Grundy.
I haven't always voted Lib Dem from 1997, but it's a near clean sheet. It's my number 1 priority and any party that promises reform[1] to the voting system has a chance of getting my vote.
[1] No pun intended - I'm not voting for Nigel's lot.
And OK, it's not quite as bad as that here, that's pretty much where the US has ended up, with politicians on both sides fiddling the boundaries to screw over the other lot, and Mr Grundy's model as the ideal.
This side of the pond, it's gentler and more genteel, but there's still a temptation for politicians to choose their electors (OK, suggest a map to the Boundary Commission) rather than the other way round.
This is my photo quota for the day - a baffling road design from near where I used to live, not far from here. It is like this for quite some distance.
The highway corridor wall-to-wall is just over 17m. The carriageway is 13m. The central hatchings are just under 4m wide. The solid hatchings are "entering here is an offence unless emergency". ~12000 vehicles per day. 30mph indicated speed limit.
The pedestrian refuges are 50m apart, and offset sideways in the carriageway by 1m+, so fundamentally different behaviour required from people driving vehicles.
I cycle up here once or twice a week and have to take a ridiculously positive primary position to prevent dangerous overtakes, since expectations are so unclear.
The cycle infrastructure is a shared footway, like virtually all of it in my town.
The pedestrian refuge on the right is at https://what3words.com/sheep.retain.haven . It is not a haven since those bollards, like nearly all of them, are not designed to protect pedestrians, rather to avoid damage to vehicles that drive into them.
This is my photo quota for the day - a baffling road design from near where I used to live, not far from here. It is like this for quite some distance.
The highway corridor wall-to-wall is just over 17m. The carriageway is 13m. The central hatchings are just under 4m wide. The solid hatchings are "entering here is an offence unless emergency".
The pedestrian refuges are 50m apart, and offset sideways in the carriageway by 1m+, so fundamentally different behaviour required from people driving vehicles.
I cycle up here once or twice a week and have to take a ridiculously positive primary position to prevent dangerous overtakes, since expectations are so unclear.
The cycle infrastructure is a shared footway, like virtually all of it in my town.
The pedestrian refuge on the right is at https://what3words.com/sheep.retain.haven . It is not a haven since those bollards, like nearly all of them, are not designed to protect pedestrians, rather to avoid damage to vehicles that drive into them.
America's extremism is in large part driven by 3 things we don't have.
1: A directly elected President outside of Congress, not answerable to their Representatives, our PM is part of the Commons. 2: A directly elected Upper House that often conflicts with their President and or their Representatives, our Upper House knows its place and the Parliament Act can override it. 3: An appointed for life SCOTUS that can set laws as it deems appropriate that elected Representatives can not change. Our Supreme Court can issue rulings, but our Commons can then change the law if it wants to.
Our MPs in the Commons are mightily powerful compared America's Representatives. If the PM or the courts get out of line too far, the Commons can (and do) course correct rather than having decades-long battles to corrupt those institutions because elected representatives have no say in them.
America's separation of powers is its downfall. It is a mistake.
it is possible to override the SCOTUS, it just takes changing the constitution.
More than thirty years ago, a 14 year old me was sat in a Design Technology class (no idea what they'd be called now) and the teacher decided to go well off topic.
He explained patiently how, with the current situation, it might be possible for there to be 100 seats in the country. Each seat could be even, with 100,000 people in it.
In 51 of them, 51,000 voted Conservative and the remaining 49,000 voted Labour. In the other 49, all 100,000 people voted Labour.
He set out the numbers and explained how the Conservatives had just won the election, not just with less votes than Labour but barely more than 25% of the vote.
Sure, it was a lesson about gerrymandering, as well as PR, but I've never forgot that lesson that day by Mr. Grundy.
I haven't always voted Lib Dem from 1997, but it's a near clean sheet. It's my number 1 priority and any party that promises reform[1] to the voting system has a chance of getting my vote.
[1] No pun intended - I'm not voting for Nigel's lot.
They're called Design Technology at our place at least. Happy to help. You're welcome.
Wasn't Mercer complaining about claims he was a combatant? He could have had a glorious seven years behind a desk.
No, senior special forces bods have vouched for Thomas’ service and it wasn’t behind a desk.
You have to wonder why Mercer is repeating this claim then. Pretty low.
Firstly he is desperate and secondly he knows that Thomas cannot come out and say, “actually I did this, this and this” etc which is why it’s pretty despicable of Mercer to call him a Walter Mitty as he knows what the rules are.
Mercer will potentially be in a spot of bother should he win narrowly in July. Many here will recall Phil Woolas being unseated by an election petition in 2010, due to making false statements about a candidate's character and conduct contrary to section 106 of the Representation of the People Act, and the result being close enough conceivably to have been decisive.
Quite apart from any defamation issues, he's potentially given himself quite a big problem.
Has Mercer explained how he is in a position to know whether what Thomas says about his service is true or not?
It’s funny isn’t it that since Thomas was selected and his military backstory was brought up, including nods to him being SBS in obscure news mongers such as the Guardian, that nobody apart from Mercer has thought to come out and call bullshit.
That there isn’t one single Marine or Naval officer who would have served with Thomas who is a Tory and would have loved to nobble the Labour candidate especially as lying about service history is a cardinal sin is quite something.
If the Conservatives have retargeted their campaigning efforts into seats with majorities of over 20,000 in 2019 to ensure that they come 2nd in the number of seats won, what evidence is there of a shift in the other parties changing their priorities?
The Greens appear to be focusing on North Herefordshire and Waveney Valley, but what about Labour and the Lib Dems?
At a guess, Labour won't be changing its strategy to pursue ultra-safe Tory seats. Picking up a few more if they're already heading for an immense majority won't be as important to them as keeping the effort going in places that may be vulnerable to a measure of swingback - even if that now feels unlikely.
The Liberal Democrats will have finite resources so couldn't go on the offensive in 200 seats even if they wanted to.
How many seats do we reckon the LDs are targeting?
A new poll from Whitestone Insight has been added to wiki (19-20 June; changes on 12-13) CON 19 (-) LAB 39 (-2) LDM 12 (+1) GRN 6 (-) RFM 20 (+3)
Another poll with Ref ahead of Con and Lab dropping into the 30s.
Yes. In the heavily postal voting 65+ demographic, the subsample for this poll gives a split of CON-LAB-RFM 31-23-25.
If that's accurate then it's a mighty swing away from the Tories already on its way back to the returning officers. According to Ipsos, the 65+ age group voted by 64-17 for the Tories over Labour in 2019. A swing of nearly 20%.
America's extremism is in large part driven by 3 things we don't have.
1: A directly elected President outside of Congress, not answerable to their Representatives, our PM is part of the Commons. 2: A directly elected Upper House that often conflicts with their President and or their Representatives, our Upper House knows its place and the Parliament Act can override it. 3: An appointed for life SCOTUS that can set laws as it deems appropriate that elected Representatives can not change. Our Supreme Court can issue rulings, but our Commons can then change the law if it wants to.
Our MPs in the Commons are mightily powerful compared America's Representatives. If the PM or the courts get out of line too far, the Commons can (and do) course correct rather than having decades-long battles to corrupt those institutions because elected representatives have no say in them.
America's separation of powers is its downfall. It is a mistake.
America's extremism is driven by the Electoral college which gives smaller states with smaller populations a bigger say than bigger populations
America's extremism is in large part driven by 3 things we don't have.
1: A directly elected President outside of Congress, not answerable to their Representatives, our PM is part of the Commons. 2: A directly elected Upper House that often conflicts with their President and or their Representatives, our Upper House knows its place and the Parliament Act can override it. 3: An appointed for life SCOTUS that can set laws as it deems appropriate that elected Representatives can not change. Our Supreme Court can issue rulings, but our Commons can then change the law if it wants to.
Our MPs in the Commons are mightily powerful compared America's Representatives. If the PM or the courts get out of line too far, the Commons can (and do) course correct rather than having decades-long battles to corrupt those institutions because elected representatives have no say in them.
America's separation of powers is its downfall. It is a mistake.
it is possible to override the SCOTUS, it just takes changing the constitution.
Exactly.
Its an absurd bar.
Whereas ours takes a General Election. Far more democratic.
Candace Owens is a strange person because I've heard her say sensible things on some topics, and then she supports conspiracy theories at other times.
She is a nutjob. Andy you're posting and talking about a lot of nutters lately, get help
Just because I post something doesn't mean I agree with it.
Fair point but just be careful to not get sucked in. I've seen my brother recently get sucked into this kind of stuff initially out of interest and now he's started to repeat it.
Both Lib Dems and Reform are immune from the “don’t give Labour a supermajority” nonsense, in fact they might even benefit from it if people reply “fair enough, we won’t. But we’re not voting for you lot”.
America's extremism is in large part driven by 3 things we don't have.
1: A directly elected President outside of Congress, not answerable to their Representatives, our PM is part of the Commons. 2: A directly elected Upper House that often conflicts with their President and or their Representatives, our Upper House knows its place and the Parliament Act can override it. 3: An appointed for life SCOTUS that can set laws as it deems appropriate that elected Representatives can not change. Our Supreme Court can issue rulings, but our Commons can then change the law if it wants to.
Our MPs in the Commons are mightily powerful compared America's Representatives. If the PM or the courts get out of line too far, the Commons can (and do) course correct rather than having decades-long battles to corrupt those institutions because elected representatives have no say in them.
America's separation of powers is its downfall. It is a mistake.
America's extremism is driven by the Electoral college which gives smaller states with smaller populations a bigger say than bigger populations
I'd argue that's a very minor factor compared to those I mentioned.
Equalise the electoral votes per capita of the states and you'd still have the extremism because of the other things, especially SCOTUS.
Separation of powers just disenfranchises the electorate.
Off thread: wife and daughters are off to see Taylor Swift in London tomorrow so have 48 hours free of parental responsibility and the nicest weekend of the year so far to do it in. The amount of choice has been paralytic. But my decision was sort of made when I noticed there is a train from Manchester Victoria at 8.15 which goes to Ribblehead via Clitheroe, and a nice day with a strong westerly wind forecast. I'm going to try to cycle from Ribblehead (or Kirkby Stephen) to Northallerton. There is so much that can go wrong. First off, you can't book bikes on Northern, but nor can you board if there are two other bikes there before you. Still, feel I'm planning to do three new things I've long wanted to in one day: crossing the Pennines by bike*, going out for a day by bike and train, and going on the Settle and Carlisle railway. Oh, and also going on the secret Clitheroe-Hellifield route. I am so far out of my comfort zone it is quite dizzying.
Amazing. I've done most of those roads - it's glorious all the way to Leyburn and pleasant enough after that.
In my experience on Northern (over here in Cumbria) they are pretty relaxed about the number of bikes but more concerned with the space they take up. We've managed to fit 6 bikes in the designated space for 2 and they were happy enough.
@Annaisaac New: The Guardian has seen internal Labour documents, confirmed by senior sources, which scope radical changes to capital gains and inheritance tax:
💸The proposals include increases in capital gains tax (CGT), first revealed by the Guardian two weeks ago, that could raise £8bn.
💰 Also in drafts are BIG potential changes to inheritance tax that could generate £2.3bn a year.
💳⌛️New measures would make it much more difficult to “gift” money and assets, such as farmland, tax free. It effectively scraps much of the relief used for passing on agricultural and business assets.
This all sounds positive, and as we were saying the other day they are things that need a long-term service / overhaul.
It would have been nice if it had not come out now, though.
Good evening
I actually support those measures so why isn't Reeves just honest and announce them
I think it's political strategy, perhaps, and election narratives being so ingrained about tax cuts and individual interest?
As it is, she can do an arrival in Government, followed by silence until September, then "We have lifted the lid on the can of worms, and OMIGOD it is horrible, therefore we have to consider ...." .
I am convinced that REFORM are in second place and we are in for a big surprise on July 5th!
I'd be surprised if they didn't end up with a lot of 2nd and 3rd places with between 15 and 25% of the vote. they are too far behind to make serious inroads in terms of seats this time around.
@Annaisaac New: The Guardian has seen internal Labour documents, confirmed by senior sources, which scope radical changes to capital gains and inheritance tax:
💸The proposals include increases in capital gains tax (CGT), first revealed by the Guardian two weeks ago, that could raise £8bn.
💰 Also in drafts are BIG potential changes to inheritance tax that could generate £2.3bn a year.
💳⌛️New measures would make it much more difficult to “gift” money and assets, such as farmland, tax free. It effectively scraps much of the relief used for passing on agricultural and business assets.
This all sounds positive, and as we were saying the other day they are things that need a long-term service / overhaul.
It would have been nice if it had not come out now, though.
Good evening
I actually support those measures so why isn't Reeves just honest and announce them
You might support them, but Labour is terrified of talking about any tax rises outside of the limited package of token measures that they've already announced - simply because the assumption is that solid evidence that Labour's tax take is liable to be much more broad than they're willing to admit will be successfully weaponised by the Conservatives to drive some of their lost supporters back into the fold.
Inheritance tax, in particular, is loathed by the electorate, and most voters are cakeist: they want lots more money spending on health and other nice things, but the money must on no account come from them because they are special sunflowers (and, indeed, already pay far too much.)
There's this fiction - that the country won't be obliged to choose between punishing austerity and socking great tax rises, because miraculous economic growth will solve everything - which needs to be maintained between now and polling day. The electorate knows that this is bollocks, but believing really hard in fairies is more appealing than confronting the alternative. It gives everyone a little holiday from reality, before Labour starts doing all the nasty things and the voters then get to moan bitterly about how they were lied to.
@Annaisaac New: The Guardian has seen internal Labour documents, confirmed by senior sources, which scope radical changes to capital gains and inheritance tax:
💸The proposals include increases in capital gains tax (CGT), first revealed by the Guardian two weeks ago, that could raise £8bn.
💰 Also in drafts are BIG potential changes to inheritance tax that could generate £2.3bn a year.
💳⌛️New measures would make it much more difficult to “gift” money and assets, such as farmland, tax free. It effectively scraps much of the relief used for passing on agricultural and business assets.
This all sounds positive, and as we were saying the other day they are things that need a long-term service / overhaul.
It would have been nice if it had not come out now, though.
Why, because it might hinder the deceit Labour are trying to play over their election mandate?
That said, CCHQ are so shit and in such disarray they'll probably fail to kick the ball anywhere near this massive open goal and just hit themselves in the face again instead.
This is my photo quota for the day - a baffling road design from near where I used to live, not far from here. It is like this for quite some distance.
The highway corridor wall-to-wall is just over 17m. The carriageway is 13m. The central hatchings are just under 4m wide. The solid hatchings are "entering here is an offence unless emergency".
The pedestrian refuges are 50m apart, and offset sideways in the carriageway by 1m+, so fundamentally different behaviour required from people driving vehicles.
I cycle up here once or twice a week and have to take a ridiculously positive primary position to prevent dangerous overtakes, since expectations are so unclear.
The cycle infrastructure is a shared footway, like virtually all of it in my town.
The pedestrian refuge on the right is at https://what3words.com/sheep.retain.haven . It is not a haven since those bollards, like nearly all of them, are not designed to protect pedestrians, rather to avoid damage to vehicles that drive into them.
What would you change?
Website?
I don't quite get that comment, unless you want a different website (I might be being affected by Friday teatime gin), or are quipping. Here is a Google link:
Both Lib Dems and Reform are immune from the “don’t give Labour a supermajority” nonsense, in fact they might even benefit from it if people reply “fair enough, we won’t. But we’re not voting for you lot”.
Still think Tories end up above 26% though.
Based on......? Gut feel, only
Based on many elections as a Lib Dem getting excited about us surging during the campaign and then being disappointed when at the end of the day the big two close ranks and burst our bubble.
Happened to us in 1983, 2010 and 2019 and to an extent also in 2005.
Happened to UKIP in 2015, and happens to the Greens every time.
Evening all. Reform join the placard wars in Norwich South, spotted my first Reform placard today, so they join the odd Lab and Green seen, no LD or Con yet and just one Lab leaflet
@Annaisaac New: The Guardian has seen internal Labour documents, confirmed by senior sources, which scope radical changes to capital gains and inheritance tax:
💸The proposals include increases in capital gains tax (CGT), first revealed by the Guardian two weeks ago, that could raise £8bn.
💰 Also in drafts are BIG potential changes to inheritance tax that could generate £2.3bn a year.
💳⌛️New measures would make it much more difficult to “gift” money and assets, such as farmland, tax free. It effectively scraps much of the relief used for passing on agricultural and business assets.
This all sounds positive, and as we were saying the other day they are things that need a long-term service / overhaul.
It would have been nice if it had not come out now, though.
Good evening
I actually support those measures so why isn't Reeves just honest and announce them
You might support them, but Labour is terrified of talking about any tax rises outside of the limited package of token measures that they've already announced - simply because the assumption is that solid evidence that Labour's tax take is liable to be much more broad than they're willing to admit will be successfully weaponised by the Conservatives to drive some of their lost supporters back into the fold.
Inheritance tax, in particular, is loathed by the electorate, and most voters are cakeist: they want lots more money spending on health and other nice things, but the money must on no account come from them because they are special sunflowers (and, indeed, already pay far too much.)
There's this fiction - that the country won't be obliged to choose between punishing austerity and socking great tax rises, because miraculous economic growth will solve everything - which needs to be maintained between now and polling day. The electorate knows that this is bollocks, but believing really hard in fairies is more appealing than confronting the alternative. It gives everyone a little holiday from reality, before Labour starts doing all the nasty things and the voters then get to moan bitterly about how they were lied to.
I'd rather pay my taxes when dead than when working.
Workers pay too much tax. Just abolish inheritance tax it and tax any inheritances at the same rate as wages are taxed.
This is my photo quota for the day - a baffling road design from near where I used to live, not far from here. It is like this for quite some distance.
The highway corridor wall-to-wall is just over 17m. The carriageway is 13m. The central hatchings are just under 4m wide. The solid hatchings are "entering here is an offence unless emergency".
The pedestrian refuges are 50m apart, and offset sideways in the carriageway by 1m+, so fundamentally different behaviour required from people driving vehicles.
I cycle up here once or twice a week and have to take a ridiculously positive primary position to prevent dangerous overtakes, since expectations are so unclear.
The cycle infrastructure is a shared footway, like virtually all of it in my town.
The pedestrian refuge on the right is at https://what3words.com/sheep.retain.haven . It is not a haven since those bollards, like nearly all of them, are not designed to protect pedestrians, rather to avoid damage to vehicles that drive into them.
What would you change?
Website?
I don't quite get that comment, unless you want a different website (I might be being affected by Friday teatime gin). Here is a Google link:
(You can navigate directly to Streetview from what3words.)
It was a tongue-in-cheek suggestion that you may be posting this on the wrong website. It was a long and involved post that meant bugger-all to me and seemed to end up as a traffic planning test question.
If the Conservatives have retargeted their campaigning efforts into seats with majorities of over 20,000 in 2019 to ensure that they come 2nd in the number of seats won, what evidence is there of a shift in the other parties changing their priorities?
The Greens appear to be focusing on North Herefordshire and Waveney Valley, but what about Labour and the Lib Dems?
At a guess, Labour won't be changing its strategy to pursue ultra-safe Tory seats. Picking up a few more if they're already heading for an immense majority won't be as important to them as keeping the effort going in places that may be vulnerable to a measure of swingback - even if that now feels unlikely.
The Liberal Democrats will have finite resources so couldn't go on the offensive in 200 seats even if they wanted to.
I'd suggest Labour are also just much more likely to have seats fall into their lap than the Lib Dems. If the landslide is at the top end of expectations, they probably will win seats which have had very sparse campaigns, just because they are the default anti-Tory choice, and none of the other anti-Tory choices will have done much either.
This is partly why I am very sceptical at projections putting the Lib Dems at the higher end of expectations and overtaking the Tories. To get there, they need to win seats they aren't targeting, and it's probably too late in the campaign to turn around now. They'd also probably take 40 odd seats and third place - it makes a big difference to their status and coverage in the next Parliament to surpass the SNP.
It will be interesting to watch leader visit locations in the next few days, though. I believe the most distant target Starmer has gone to so far is Reading West which they'd get with only just over 200 gains (which would give them a huge majority but not actually that close to the real wipeout territory). He's been to lots that they need to win to get any majority at all.
Davey has gone perhaps surprisingly far down the list to Chichester (which is outside the top 100), Stratford-upon-Avon (about 80), and Torbay (similar). Arguably there are special reasons, though - Torbay has been Lib Dem in the relatively recent past, and Stratford and Chichester had stellar Lib Dem local election results (although time will tell if it converts).
My feeling is Starmer will get a bit more adventurous in the sorts of seats he visits and Davey a little less so - but the Davey ones will be particularly revealing in betting terms.
If the Conservatives have retargeted their campaigning efforts into seats with majorities of over 20,000 in 2019 to ensure that they come 2nd in the number of seats won, what evidence is there of a shift in the other parties changing their priorities?
The Greens appear to be focusing on North Herefordshire and Waveney Valley, but what about Labour and the Lib Dems?
At a guess, Labour won't be changing its strategy to pursue ultra-safe Tory seats. Picking up a few more if they're already heading for an immense majority won't be as important to them as keeping the effort going in places that may be vulnerable to a measure of swingback - even if that now feels unlikely.
The Liberal Democrats will have finite resources so couldn't go on the offensive in 200 seats even if they wanted to.
How many seats do we reckon the LDs are targeting?
There are 75 constituencies where Lib Dems were in second place in the 2019 general election and had more than 20% of the vote, the large bulk of them in Southern England and held by the Tories, either absolutely or nominally based on redrawn boundaries. Some of those won't be realistic (they're not gaining Cambridge off Labour, for example,) but most of them will feel within reach based on the cataclysmic polling data for the Tories. So, maybe looking at concentrating their resources on around 50-60 potential gains?
I am convinced that REFORM are in second place and we are in for a big suprise on July 5th!
I think it's worth looking at the 2019 European elections because it's the last time we had such volatility going into a real election.
The final Survation had the Conservatives on 14% but they actually got 9%. Perhaps more interestingly, they had Labour on 23%, but they actually got only 14%. Their total for the Brexit Party on the other hand was spot on at 31%.
Wasn't Mercer complaining about claims he was a combatant? He could have had a glorious seven years behind a desk.
No, senior special forces bods have vouched for Thomas’ service and it wasn’t behind a desk.
You have to wonder why Mercer is repeating this claim then. Pretty low.
Firstly he is desperate and secondly he knows that Thomas cannot come out and say, “actually I did this, this and this” etc which is why it’s pretty despicable of Mercer to call him a Walter Mitty as he knows what the rules are.
Mercer will potentially be in a spot of bother should he win narrowly in July. Many here will recall Phil Woolas being unseated by an election petition in 2010, due to making false statements about a candidate's character and conduct contrary to section 106 of the Representation of the People Act, and the result being close enough conceivably to have been decisive.
Quite apart from any defamation issues, he's potentially given himself quite a big problem.
Has Mercer explained how he is in a position to know whether what Thomas says about his service is true or not?
Yup. He says "I was a minister in the department" (MOD presumably). Though he must have gone looking, to know career details of an obscure junior officer. Which I think is atrocious, using civil service resources to dig political dirt.
After the humiliation will come something much worse: irrelevance. It is impossible to overstate just how totally irrelevant the Conservatives are about to become. There is no easy way to say this, but nobody will be filling in their wall charts with the runners and riders for the Tory leadership. The tight timetabling for elections to the 1922 Committee matters not. Senior Tory sources will be left to scream into the void.
The alphabet spaghetti leftovers will be scraped into the bin: ERG, CCHQ, IEA, IDS. Bye bye to the banging of tables. Farewell to the star chambers. Arrivederci to the five families — they will struggle to muster one.
Nobody will care who Penny Mordaunt has unfollowed on Twitter. Or about the sandwiches at Tom Tugendhat’s launch. Or what Latin phrase Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg has had mowed into his front lawn. Or anything that is said in all those WhatsApp groups. Step away from Nadine Dorries’s column, Lee Anderson’s GB News show, Dominic Cummings’s Substack. Think how much free time you’ll now have.
America's extremism is in large part driven by 3 things we don't have.
1: A directly elected President outside of Congress, not answerable to their Representatives, our PM is part of the Commons. 2: A directly elected Upper House that often conflicts with their President and or their Representatives, our Upper House knows its place and the Parliament Act can override it. 3: An appointed for life SCOTUS that can set laws as it deems appropriate that elected Representatives can not change. Our Supreme Court can issue rulings, but our Commons can then change the law if it wants to.
Our MPs in the Commons are mightily powerful compared America's Representatives. If the PM or the courts get out of line too far, the Commons can (and do) course correct rather than having decades-long battles to corrupt those institutions because elected representatives have no say in them.
America's separation of powers is its downfall. It is a mistake.
America's extremism is driven by the Electoral college which gives smaller states with smaller populations a bigger say than bigger populations
During the Trump saga, I've quite enjoyed finding out about how Common Law has evolved differently, and how in some ways the USA retains more of the old structures - such as Grand Juries which went here before about 1850.
If labour do fall into the 30s on polling day, there are going to be a lot of seats won on a much lower share of the vote than 2019 where it was mostly 40s and up winning seats. That means some unlikely gains but also probably some holds on 'buttons' for the Tories
I am convinced that REFORM are in second place and we are in for a big suprise on July 5th!
I think it's worth looking at the 2019 European elections because it's the last time we had such volatility going into a real election.
The final Survation had the Conservatives on 14% but they actually got 9%. Perhaps more interestingly, they had Labour on 23%, but they actually got only 14%. Their total for the Brexit Party on the other hand was spot on at 31%.
I am convinced that REFORM are in second place and we are in for a big suprise on July 5th!
I think it's worth looking at the 2019 European elections because it's the last time we had such volatility going into a real election.
The final Survation had the Conservatives on 14% but they actually got 9%. Perhaps more interestingly, they had Labour on 23%, but they actually got only 14%. Their total for the Brexit Party on the other hand was spot on at 31%.
After the humiliation will come something much worse: irrelevance. It is impossible to overstate just how totally irrelevant the Conservatives are about to become. There is no easy way to say this, but nobody will be filling in their wall charts with the runners and riders for the Tory leadership. The tight timetabling for elections to the 1922 Committee matters not. Senior Tory sources will be left to scream into the void.
The alphabet spaghetti leftovers will be scraped into the bin: ERG, CCHQ, IEA, IDS. Bye bye to the banging of tables. Farewell to the star chambers. Arrivederci to the five families — they will struggle to muster one.
Nobody will care who Penny Mordaunt has unfollowed on Twitter. Or about the sandwiches at Tom Tugendhat’s launch. Or what Latin phrase Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg has had mowed into his front lawn. Or anything that is said in all those WhatsApp groups. Step away from Nadine Dorries’s column, Lee Anderson’s GB News show, Dominic Cummings’s Substack. Think how much free time you’ll now have.
If labour do fall into the 30s on polling day, there are going to be a lot of seats won on a much lower share of the vote than 2019 where it was mostly 40s and up winning seats. That means some unlikely gains but also probably some holds on 'buttons' for the Tories
I am convinced that REFORM are in second place and we are in for a big suprise on July 5th!
I think it's worth looking at the 2019 European elections because it's the last time we had such volatility going into a real election.
The final Survation had the Conservatives on 14% but they actually got 9%. Perhaps more interestingly, they had Labour on 23%, but they actually got only 14%. Their total for the Brexit Party on the other hand was spot on at 31%.
PR though and the European elections were always sort of treated as a giant opinion poll, as nothing that really mattered was at stake.
But so many governments break their promises now, and mainstream parties agree on so much, that voters may well believe that voting is consequence-free.
After the humiliation will come something much worse: irrelevance. It is impossible to overstate just how totally irrelevant the Conservatives are about to become. There is no easy way to say this, but nobody will be filling in their wall charts with the runners and riders for the Tory leadership. The tight timetabling for elections to the 1922 Committee matters not. Senior Tory sources will be left to scream into the void.
The alphabet spaghetti leftovers will be scraped into the bin: ERG, CCHQ, IEA, IDS. Bye bye to the banging of tables. Farewell to the star chambers. Arrivederci to the five families — they will struggle to muster one.
Nobody will care who Penny Mordaunt has unfollowed on Twitter. Or about the sandwiches at Tom Tugendhat’s launch. Or what Latin phrase Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg has had mowed into his front lawn. Or anything that is said in all those WhatsApp groups. Step away from Nadine Dorries’s column, Lee Anderson’s GB News show, Dominic Cummings’s Substack. Think how much free time you’ll now have.
Wasn't Mercer complaining about claims he was a combatant? He could have had a glorious seven years behind a desk.
No, senior special forces bods have vouched for Thomas’ service and it wasn’t behind a desk.
You have to wonder why Mercer is repeating this claim then. Pretty low.
Firstly he is desperate and secondly he knows that Thomas cannot come out and say, “actually I did this, this and this” etc which is why it’s pretty despicable of Mercer to call him a Walter Mitty as he knows what the rules are.
Mercer will potentially be in a spot of bother should he win narrowly in July. Many here will recall Phil Woolas being unseated by an election petition in 2010, due to making false statements about a candidate's character and conduct contrary to section 106 of the Representation of the People Act, and the result being close enough conceivably to have been decisive.
Quite apart from any defamation issues, he's potentially given himself quite a big problem.
Has Mercer explained how he is in a position to know whether what Thomas says about his service is true or not?
Yup. He says "I was a minister in the department" (MOD presumably). Though he must have gone looking, to know career details of an obscure junior officer. Which I think is atrocious, using civil service resources to dig political dirt.
Well, I was wondering about that as a possibility, but I'm flabbergasted if Mercer has actually admitted he obtained the information through his ministerial office.
Surely Mercer will be in a lot more than a "spot of bother"? It strikes me as much worse than the shenanigans over Tories having a flutter on the date of the election.
After the humiliation will come something much worse: irrelevance. It is impossible to overstate just how totally irrelevant the Conservatives are about to become. There is no easy way to say this, but nobody will be filling in their wall charts with the runners and riders for the Tory leadership. The tight timetabling for elections to the 1922 Committee matters not. Senior Tory sources will be left to scream into the void.
The alphabet spaghetti leftovers will be scraped into the bin: ERG, CCHQ, IEA, IDS. Bye bye to the banging of tables. Farewell to the star chambers. Arrivederci to the five families — they will struggle to muster one.
Nobody will care who Penny Mordaunt has unfollowed on Twitter. Or about the sandwiches at Tom Tugendhat’s launch. Or what Latin phrase Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg has had mowed into his front lawn. Or anything that is said in all those WhatsApp groups. Step away from Nadine Dorries’s column, Lee Anderson’s GB News show, Dominic Cummings’s Substack. Think how much free time you’ll now have.
If labour do fall into the 30s on polling day, there are going to be a lot of seats won on a much lower share of the vote than 2019 where it was mostly 40s and up winning seats. That means some unlikely gains but also probably some holds on 'buttons' for the Tories
Depends what the Tory share is tbh.
Not really. If Labour got, say 37, then there will be seats in that 'safest 100' of the Tories where nobody is mustering much. A 37, 22, 18, 14 type result and you've only got so many votes to spread about.
This is my photo quota for the day - a baffling road design from near where I used to live, not far from here. It is like this for quite some distance.
The highway corridor wall-to-wall is just over 17m. The carriageway is 13m. The central hatchings are just under 4m wide. The solid hatchings are "entering here is an offence unless emergency". ~12000 vehicles per day. 30mph indicated speed limit.
The pedestrian refuges are 50m apart, and offset sideways in the carriageway by 1m+, so fundamentally different behaviour required from people driving vehicles.
I cycle up here once or twice a week and have to take a ridiculously positive primary position to prevent dangerous overtakes, since expectations are so unclear.
The cycle infrastructure is a shared footway, like virtually all of it in my town.
The pedestrian refuge on the right is at https://what3words.com/sheep.retain.haven . It is not a haven since those bollards, like nearly all of them, are not designed to protect pedestrians, rather to avoid damage to vehicles that drive into them.
If the Conservatives have retargeted their campaigning efforts into seats with majorities of over 20,000 in 2019 to ensure that they come 2nd in the number of seats won, what evidence is there of a shift in the other parties changing their priorities?
The Greens appear to be focusing on North Herefordshire and Waveney Valley, but what about Labour and the Lib Dems?
At a guess, Labour won't be changing its strategy to pursue ultra-safe Tory seats. Picking up a few more if they're already heading for an immense majority won't be as important to them as keeping the effort going in places that may be vulnerable to a measure of swingback - even if that now feels unlikely.
The Liberal Democrats will have finite resources so couldn't go on the offensive in 200 seats even if they wanted to.
How many seats do we reckon the LDs are targeting?
There are 75 constituencies where Lib Dems were in second place in the 2019 general election and had more than 20% of the vote, the large bulk of them in Southern England and held by the Tories, either absolutely or nominally based on redrawn boundaries. Some of those won't be realistic (they're not gaining Cambridge off Labour, for example,) but most of them will feel within reach based on the cataclysmic polling data for the Tories. So, maybe looking at concentrating their resources on around 50-60 potential gains?
Targeting strategy, inasmuch as how I would do it, relies on a series of factors of which the 2019 result isn't going to be the most important.
The LDs will have looked at recent local results, the strength and extent of local organisation, candidate profile, available nearby resources and finances.
Every LD parliamentary success, apart from by elections, has been built on local organisation based on a robust network of activists and campaigners, supported by deliverers, constituency wide.
The same will be true of seats won on July 4th - it will be where the party maintains a strong profile all year round across the constituency. Ed Davey's visits will be aimed at seats meeting those criteria. I know all this from the 1990s when I worked in Tom Brake's constituency. We were 10,000 behind but had wiped out the Conservatives and Labour at council level - the worry was not whether we would outpoll the Conservative but whether we could get enough tactical votes from Labour.
This is my photo quota for the day - a baffling road design from near where I used to live, not far from here. It is like this for quite some distance.
The highway corridor wall-to-wall is just over 17m. The carriageway is 13m. The central hatchings are just under 4m wide. The solid hatchings are "entering here is an offence unless emergency". ~12000 vehicles per day. 30mph indicated speed limit.
The pedestrian refuges are 50m apart, and offset sideways in the carriageway by 1m+, so fundamentally different behaviour required from people driving vehicles.
I cycle up here once or twice a week and have to take a ridiculously positive primary position to prevent dangerous overtakes, since expectations are so unclear.
The cycle infrastructure is a shared footway, like virtually all of it in my town.
The pedestrian refuge on the right is at https://what3words.com/sheep.retain.haven . It is not a haven since those bollards, like nearly all of them, are not designed to protect pedestrians, rather to avoid damage to vehicles that drive into them.
If the Conservatives have retargeted their campaigning efforts into seats with majorities of over 20,000 in 2019 to ensure that they come 2nd in the number of seats won, what evidence is there of a shift in the other parties changing their priorities?
The Greens appear to be focusing on North Herefordshire and Waveney Valley, but what about Labour and the Lib Dems?
At a guess, Labour won't be changing its strategy to pursue ultra-safe Tory seats. Picking up a few more if they're already heading for an immense majority won't be as important to them as keeping the effort going in places that may be vulnerable to a measure of swingback - even if that now feels unlikely.
The Liberal Democrats will have finite resources so couldn't go on the offensive in 200 seats even if they wanted to.
How many seats do we reckon the LDs are targeting?
Wasn't Mercer complaining about claims he was a combatant? He could have had a glorious seven years behind a desk.
No, senior special forces bods have vouched for Thomas’ service and it wasn’t behind a desk.
You have to wonder why Mercer is repeating this claim then. Pretty low.
Firstly he is desperate and secondly he knows that Thomas cannot come out and say, “actually I did this, this and this” etc which is why it’s pretty despicable of Mercer to call him a Walter Mitty as he knows what the rules are.
Mercer will potentially be in a spot of bother should he win narrowly in July. Many here will recall Phil Woolas being unseated by an election petition in 2010, due to making false statements about a candidate's character and conduct contrary to section 106 of the Representation of the People Act, and the result being close enough conceivably to have been decisive.
Quite apart from any defamation issues, he's potentially given himself quite a big problem.
Has Mercer explained how he is in a position to know whether what Thomas says about his service is true or not?
Yup. He says "I was a minister in the department" (MOD presumably). Though he must have gone looking, to know career details of an obscure junior officer. Which I think is atrocious, using civil service resources to dig political dirt.
Well, I was wondering about that as a possibility, but I'm flabbergasted if Mercer has actually admitted he obtained the information through his ministerial office.
Surely Mercer will be in a lot more than a "spot of bother"? It strikes me as much worse than the shenanigans over Tories having a flutter on the date of the election.
I’m more surprised that Mercer is saying that people in the MOD can look at a database of which soldiers are doing what and who is in special forces. There is clearly no way at all that could be a security risk. No way. No chance of a spy for a foreign country providing lists and numbers and operations of British personnel.
Wasn't Mercer complaining about claims he was a combatant? He could have had a glorious seven years behind a desk.
No, senior special forces bods have vouched for Thomas’ service and it wasn’t behind a desk.
You have to wonder why Mercer is repeating this claim then. Pretty low.
Firstly he is desperate and secondly he knows that Thomas cannot come out and say, “actually I did this, this and this” etc which is why it’s pretty despicable of Mercer to call him a Walter Mitty as he knows what the rules are.
Mercer will potentially be in a spot of bother should he win narrowly in July. Many here will recall Phil Woolas being unseated by an election petition in 2010, due to making false statements about a candidate's character and conduct contrary to section 106 of the Representation of the People Act, and the result being close enough conceivably to have been decisive.
Quite apart from any defamation issues, he's potentially given himself quite a big problem.
Has Mercer explained how he is in a position to know whether what Thomas says about his service is true or not?
Yup. He says "I was a minister in the department" (MOD presumably). Though he must have gone looking, to know career details of an obscure junior officer. Which I think is atrocious, using civil service resources to dig political dirt.
Well, I was wondering about that as a possibility, but I'm flabbergasted if Mercer has actually admitted he obtained the information through his ministerial office.
Surely Mercer will be in a lot more than a "spot of bother"? It strikes me as much worse than the shenanigans over Tories having a flutter on the date of the election.
Odd wording, [edit] about Mr M being a minister, speaking out loud at the hustings presumably. But that's what it seems to say. (The other interpretation is that Mr Thomas was never a minister in the department, but that doesn't really make sense in the context.)
I am convinced that REFORM are in second place and we are in for a big suprise on July 5th!
Only if Labour are in third....
Bong! And the exit poll predicts the Tories will be opposition to Nigel Farages Reform Party with Keir Starmers Labour reduced to their Liverpool redout just behind Sir Edward Daveys Liberal Democrats and George Galloways Workers Party
America's extremism is in large part driven by 3 things we don't have.
1: A directly elected President outside of Congress, not answerable to their Representatives, our PM is part of the Commons. 2: A directly elected Upper House that often conflicts with their President and or their Representatives, our Upper House knows its place and the Parliament Act can override it. 3: An appointed for life SCOTUS that can set laws as it deems appropriate that elected Representatives can not change. Our Supreme Court can issue rulings, but our Commons can then change the law if it wants to.
Our MPs in the Commons are mightily powerful compared America's Representatives. If the PM or the courts get out of line too far, the Commons can (and do) course correct rather than having decades-long battles to corrupt those institutions because elected representatives have no say in them.
America's separation of powers is its downfall. It is a mistake.
it is possible to override the SCOTUS, it just takes changing the constitution.
Yes and no. Ultimately, the Constitution is a relatively limited document in terms of scope and both federal and state governments have very wide discretion in their areas of responsibility. Additionally, in many cases, the states or federal government can, when a law is struck down, achieve pretty much the same result in a slightly different way.
What you can't do (or you can but you'll get very little change) is just say "I don't like this law so I'm going to the Supreme Court for a second opinion" - you do actually need a serious argument that it is unconstitutional. There are a load of laws the right wing majority now on the court probably disagree with on a personal level, but they are entirely safe.
None of that is to downplay the Supreme Court's pivotal importance in SOME areas. But the scope of that is actually quite limited.
Part of the thing with the cases involving Trump being held off the ballot in some states was the Supreme Court said you CAN legislate on this under the Constitution at the federal level... but haven't. The Constitution doesn't need changing to do that - it needs a simple majority (which is unlikely to happen in the near future but isn't a constitutional amendment).
NEW: Nigel Farage says the West "provoked" Vladimir Putin into invading Ukraine.
What a fucking appeaser.
Any vote for Farage/Reform is a vote for Putin.
Tories need to hammer this until 4th July.
It should not be hard to dig up dozens of clips of Trump saying mad stuff about Russia and Ukraine, and put them alongside lots of clips of Farage praising Trump and hanging out with him.
Any CCHQ wonks reading, this is piss easy stuff, so get to work.
NEW: Nigel Farage says the West "provoked" Vladimir Putin into invading Ukraine.
What a fucking appeaser.
Any vote for Farage/Reform is a vote for Putin.
Nigel Farage has reiterated that he blames the West and NATO for the Russian invasion of Ukraine - as he confirmed that he previously said he "admired" Vladimir Putin as a statesman.
Speaking to the BBC, the Reform UK leader was asked about his previous comments on Russia and Ukraine.
Asked about the Russia invading Ukraine in 2022, Mr Farage told Nick Robinson that he has been saying since Berlin Wall fell there would be a war in Ukraine due to the "ever-eastward expansion of NATO and the European Union".
He said this was giving this Putin a reason to say to the Russian people "'They're coming for us again,' and to go to war".
The Reform leader confirmed his belief the West "provoked" the conflict - but did say it was Putin's "fault".
On Putin himself, previous comments Mr Farage had made were put to him.
He was asked about comments he made previously stating that Putin was the statesman he most admired.
Mr Farage said he disliked the Russian leader - but "I admired him as a political operator because he's managed to take control of running Russia".
"This is the nonsense, you know, you can pick any figure, current or historical, and say, you know, did they have good aspects?" he added.
"And if you said, well, they were very talented in one area, then suddenly you're the biggest supporter."
How many deposits will the Lib Dems lose and in how many seats will the Greens beat them? If the Lib Dems come out of this with, what 30, 40,50, 60 seats what happens then. They will have virtually nothing to build on in the other 600 plus. It could be the final nail in their coffin as the Cons will inevitable rise again and take back all their southern losses.
NEW: Nigel Farage says the West "provoked" Vladimir Putin into invading Ukraine.
What a fucking appeaser.
Any vote for Farage/Reform is a vote for Putin.
Nigel Farage has reiterated that he blames the West and NATO for the Russian invasion of Ukraine - as he confirmed that he previously said he "admired" Vladimir Putin as a statesman.
Speaking to the BBC, the Reform UK leader was asked about his previous comments on Russia and Ukraine.
Asked about the Russia invading Ukraine in 2022, Mr Farage told Nick Robinson that he has been saying since Berlin Wall fell there would be a war in Ukraine due to the "ever-eastward expansion of NATO and the European Union".
He said this was giving this Putin a reason to say to the Russian people "'They're coming for us again,' and to go to war".
The Reform leader confirmed his belief the West "provoked" the conflict - but did say it was Putin's "fault".
On Putin himself, previous comments Mr Farage had made were put to him.
He was asked about comments he made previously stating that Putin was the statesman he most admired.
Mr Farage said he disliked the Russian leader - but "I admired him as a political operator because he's managed to take control of running Russia".
"This is the nonsense, you know, you can pick any figure, current or historical, and say, you know, did they have good aspects?" he added.
"And if you said, well, they were very talented in one area, then suddenly you're the biggest supporter."
Both Lib Dems and Reform are immune from the “don’t give Labour a supermajority” nonsense, in fact they might even benefit from it if people reply “fair enough, we won’t. But we’re not voting for you lot”.
Still think Tories end up above 26% though.
Based on......? Gut feel, only
Based on many elections as a Lib Dem getting excited about us surging during the campaign and then being disappointed when at the end of the day the big two close ranks and burst our bubble.
Happened to us in 1983, 2010 and 2019 and to an extent also in 2005.
Happened to UKIP in 2015, and happens to the Greens every time.
It didn't happen to UKIP, they got 13% close to what the polls are saying it is FPTP that screwed them
Comments
The Liberal Democrats will have finite resources so couldn't go on the offensive in 200 seats even if they wanted to.
This side of the pond, it's gentler and more genteel, but there's still a temptation for politicians to choose their electors (OK, suggest a map to the Boundary Commission) rather than the other way round.
The highway corridor wall-to-wall is just over 17m. The carriageway is 13m. The central hatchings are just under 4m wide. The solid hatchings are "entering here is an offence unless emergency". ~12000 vehicles per day. 30mph indicated speed limit.
The pedestrian refuges are 50m apart, and offset sideways in the carriageway by 1m+, so fundamentally different behaviour required from people driving vehicles.
I cycle up here once or twice a week and have to take a ridiculously positive primary position to prevent dangerous overtakes, since expectations are so unclear.
The cycle infrastructure is a shared footway, like virtually all of it in my town.
The pedestrian refuge on the right is at https://what3words.com/sheep.retain.haven . It is not a haven since those bollards, like nearly all of them, are not designed to protect pedestrians, rather to avoid damage to vehicles that drive into them.
What would you change?
@MarqueeMark you're on the ground, what are you feeling about the Reform surge?
My parents in East Hants are still predicting it to narrowly stay Tory but people are utterly fed up with them (albeit small sample size).
They are the guardians of the site, not you
I am convinced that REFORM are in second place and we are in for a big suprise on July 5th!
Happy to help. You're welcome.
That there isn’t one single Marine or Naval officer who would have served with Thomas who is a Tory and would have loved to nobble the Labour candidate especially as lying about service history is a cardinal sin is quite something.
If that's accurate then it's a mighty swing away from the Tories already on its way back to the returning officers. According to Ipsos, the 65+ age group voted by 64-17 for the Tories over Labour in 2019. A swing of nearly 20%.
Its an absurd bar.
Whereas ours takes a General Election. Far more democratic.
Equalise the electoral votes per capita of the states and you'd still have the extremism because of the other things, especially SCOTUS.
Separation of powers just disenfranchises the electorate.
As it is, she can do an arrival in Government, followed by silence until September, then "We have lifted the lid on the can of worms, and OMIGOD it is horrible, therefore we have to consider ...." .
But, I hope you enjoy it.
https://x.com/MattCartoonist/status/1804193023586099642
Now, Pizza Express, Pizza Hut, yum! But hold the pineapple.
Inheritance tax, in particular, is loathed by the electorate, and most voters are cakeist: they want lots more money spending on health and other nice things, but the money must on no account come from them because they are special sunflowers (and, indeed, already pay far too much.)
There's this fiction - that the country won't be obliged to choose between punishing austerity and socking great tax rises, because miraculous economic growth will solve everything - which needs to be maintained between now and polling day. The electorate knows that this is bollocks, but believing really hard in fairies is more appealing than confronting the alternative. It gives everyone a little holiday from reality, before Labour starts doing all the nasty things and the voters then get to moan bitterly about how they were lied to.
The election betting scandal cuts through with the public: asked which story they have heard most about recently, it comes first on 17%
Election betting scandal: 17%
General election: 15%
Jay Slater missing: 11%
Euro 2024: 8%
Election poll results: 4%
https://x.com/YouGov/status/1804186800782557606
That said, CCHQ are so shit and in such disarray they'll probably fail to kick the ball anywhere near this massive open goal and just hit themselves in the face again instead.
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Ashland+Rd+W,+Sutton-in-Ashfield/@53.126978,-1.2879198,101m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x4879969f691cd8b7:0xf24eb726f139295a!8m2!3d53.1302336!4d-1.283206!16s/g/1vc6cy5y?entry=ttu
(You can navigate directly to Streetview from what3words.)
What3words is going to conquer the world; we have been told.
Happened to us in 1983, 2010 and 2019 and to an extent also in 2005.
Happened to UKIP in 2015, and happens to the Greens every time.
Workers pay too much tax. Just abolish inheritance tax it and tax any inheritances at the same rate as wages are taxed.
Other views are no doubt available.
This is partly why I am very sceptical at projections putting the Lib Dems at the higher end of expectations and overtaking the Tories. To get there, they need to win seats they aren't targeting, and it's probably too late in the campaign to turn around now. They'd also probably take 40 odd seats and third place - it makes a big difference to their status and coverage in the next Parliament to surpass the SNP.
It will be interesting to watch leader visit locations in the next few days, though. I believe the most distant target Starmer has gone to so far is Reading West which they'd get with only just over 200 gains (which would give them a huge majority but not actually that close to the real wipeout territory). He's been to lots that they need to win to get any majority at all.
Davey has gone perhaps surprisingly far down the list to Chichester (which is outside the top 100), Stratford-upon-Avon (about 80), and Torbay (similar). Arguably there are special reasons, though - Torbay has been Lib Dem in the relatively recent past, and Stratford and Chichester had stellar Lib Dem local election results (although time will tell if it converts).
My feeling is Starmer will get a bit more adventurous in the sorts of seats he visits and Davey a little less so - but the Davey ones will be particularly revealing in betting terms.
The final Survation had the Conservatives on 14% but they actually got 9%. Perhaps more interestingly, they had Labour on 23%, but they actually got only 14%. Their total for the Brexit Party on the other hand was spot on at 31%.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2019_European_Parliament_election_in_the_United_Kingdom
After the humiliation will come something much worse: irrelevance. It is impossible to overstate just how totally irrelevant the Conservatives are about to become. There is no easy way to say this, but nobody will be filling in their wall charts with the runners and riders for the Tory leadership. The tight timetabling for elections to the 1922 Committee matters not. Senior Tory sources will be left to scream into the void.
The alphabet spaghetti leftovers will be scraped into the bin: ERG, CCHQ, IEA, IDS. Bye bye to the banging of tables. Farewell to the star chambers. Arrivederci to the five families — they will struggle to muster one.
Nobody will care who Penny Mordaunt has unfollowed on Twitter. Or about the sandwiches at Tom Tugendhat’s launch. Or what Latin phrase Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg has had mowed into his front lawn. Or anything that is said in all those WhatsApp groups. Step away from Nadine Dorries’s column, Lee Anderson’s GB News show, Dominic Cummings’s Substack. Think how much free time you’ll now have.
https://www.thetimes.com/comment/columnists/article/where-are-they-now-file-beckons-for-spud-u-hate-and-the-rest-of-the-tories-029zgg2fb
They were a bad joke at the best of times, and 2019 was not the best of times.
This is a real election.
https://archive.ph/UFDra (Bloomberg)
Apple's fight with the EU on privacy and monopoly concerns not ending any time soon.
Surely Mercer will be in a lot more than a "spot of bother"? It strikes me as much worse than the shenanigans over Tories having a flutter on the date of the election.
NEW: Nigel Farage says the West "provoked" Vladimir Putin into invading Ukraine.
Look how many clear vetting fails have already come up during the campaign, from all parties.
Reduce the speed limit to 20mph.
Any vote for Farage/Reform is a vote for Putin.
The LDs will have looked at recent local results, the strength and extent of local organisation, candidate profile, available nearby resources and finances.
Every LD parliamentary success, apart from by elections, has been built on local organisation based on a robust network of activists and campaigners, supported by deliverers, constituency wide.
The same will be true of seats won on July 4th - it will be where the party maintains a strong profile all year round across the constituency. Ed Davey's visits will be aimed at seats meeting those criteria. I know all this from the 1990s when I worked in Tom Brake's constituency. We were 10,000 behind but had wiped out the Conservatives and Labour at council level - the worry was not whether we would outpoll the Conservative but whether we could get enough tactical votes from Labour.
Change the speed limit to 40mph.
Hopefully this leads the news tonight, and knocks a dozen points off the Reform score.
https://www.itv.com/news/westcountry/2024-06-21/johnny-mercer-accuses-labour-opponent-of-lying-about-military-service
This Government's support for Ukraine is one of the few things they've done the bulk of voters can get behind.
What you can't do (or you can but you'll get very little change) is just say "I don't like this law so I'm going to the Supreme Court for a second opinion" - you do actually need a serious argument that it is unconstitutional. There are a load of laws the right wing majority now on the court probably disagree with on a personal level, but they are entirely safe.
None of that is to downplay the Supreme Court's pivotal importance in SOME areas. But the scope of that is actually quite limited.
Part of the thing with the cases involving Trump being held off the ballot in some states was the Supreme Court said you CAN legislate on this under the Constitution at the federal level... but haven't. The Constitution doesn't need changing to do that - it needs a simple majority (which is unlikely to happen in the near future but isn't a constitutional amendment).
Any CCHQ wonks reading, this is piss easy stuff, so get to work.
Speaking to the BBC, the Reform UK leader was asked about his previous comments on Russia and Ukraine.
Asked about the Russia invading Ukraine in 2022, Mr Farage told Nick Robinson that he has been saying since Berlin Wall fell there would be a war in Ukraine due to the "ever-eastward expansion of NATO and the European Union".
He said this was giving this Putin a reason to say to the Russian people "'They're coming for us again,' and to go to war".
The Reform leader confirmed his belief the West "provoked" the conflict - but did say it was Putin's "fault".
On Putin himself, previous comments Mr Farage had made were put to him.
He was asked about comments he made previously stating that Putin was the statesman he most admired.
Mr Farage said he disliked the Russian leader - but "I admired him as a political operator because he's managed to take control of running Russia".
"This is the nonsense, you know, you can pick any figure, current or historical, and say, you know, did they have good aspects?" he added.
"And if you said, well, they were very talented in one area, then suddenly you're the biggest supporter."
https://news.sky.com/story/general-election-2024-sunak-starmer-conservatives-labour-reform-davey-lib-dem-12593360?postid=7854097#liveblog-body
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news
If the Lib Dems come out of this with, what 30, 40,50, 60 seats what happens then. They will have virtually nothing to build on in the other 600 plus. It could be the final nail in their coffin as the Cons will inevitable rise again and take back all their southern losses.