They're all weak - but then Starmer is terrible and has an appallingly untalented cabinet. And they only have to beat the opposition, not the love child of Thatcher and Abe Lincoln
I'm not sure I care if Jenrick can build a good team and do the job.
He needs to not be solely obsessed with Rwanda/boats, though; that's important, and a big issue, but there will be huge opportunities to regain lots of DNV Tories and LD switchers on quasi-socialist economics.
I'd keep Hunt as Shadow Chancellor and go hard on Labour on tax & spend.
I think while in government the Rwanda policy only served to highlight how badly the government were failing on reducing those arrivals. Now that the Tories aren't in government they will need to work the boats angle hard to drive Labour voters to Reform and Reform voters back to the Tories. I think they also need an answer on winning back Lib Dem voters in the south of England but I'm not sure Jenrick would be well placed for it.
Are there really tonnes of Boris Johnson 'Get Brexit Done' 2019 fans who've gone over to the Lib Dems? It has never struck me as likely. Surely Lib Dem growth is mostly tactical Labour voters. And why go after them, when they represent a tiny number - Lib Dems underpolled Reform.
Because they hold 72 seats, most (but not all) of which had pretty low Reform totals. The Tories will inevitably win a lot of those back in due course. I don't see Reform displacing them as the main challengers in blue wall seats. But the Tories will certainly need to look competent for a bit first.
As to what they should do now. I think they should have a bit of fun. It's too early to start trying to elect a leader who looks like a PM in waiting. Have a go with Kemi Badenoch. She will entertain the base, give Labour some discomfort in PMQs, and keep the party in the headlines. I find her unappealing and antagonistic as a politician but that needn't matter yet, and I'm not the target audience.
What Conservatives can embrace now, which we've already seen on PB, is the joy of being in opposition. You can no longer be blamed for everything, that's someone else's problem. You can focus on policies and platforms that you really believe in, and you can really lay into the new government. It's a sort of release. It can be electorally disastrous - see both Corbyn and Swinson in 2019 - but quite cathartic. I would say they should lean into that for now. Do the whole triangulation and hugging of huskies later if they need to.
The Conservatives are likely to be called upon to govern very soon. I'm not saying this as some sort of Casino Royalesque bravado; I didn't even vote for them. SKS is genuinely a bit shit. He may also have fairly significant skeletons that may or may not have an impact on his already severely waning popularity.
But Labour have a Commons majority of 9,823. How on earth are they toppled outside war/plague/civil strife?
Curious maths and vote splitting got Labour where they are on a tiny % of the vote; similar forces could turn it the other way. FWIW I think next time will possibly depend on whether the nation veers in one of two ways, both possible:
To shore up the centre left mainstream, with Labour and LD being in fact unacknowledged allies (possible because English seats split up handily mostly either Con v Lab or Con v LD and not LD v Lab).
Or to look to a some form of Toryreform party (currently of course splitting votes) under the name Conservative, offering a really different, though thought out and costed (ie not Truss) alternative.
I want neither of these, but I'm a One Nation Tory.
It's a bit early to speculate, but I think it is certain the next election will be a cracker psephologically. It might even offer real alternatives policywise too.
A One Nation Tory who voted, um, Labour.
Yes. My guess is there were about 1-2 million of us. Maybe more. I have voted Tory for nearly 50 years. The Tory vote went from 14 m (2019) to just under 7 m (2024). And we were right.
No, you weren't. You made a fucking stupid decision and enabled a socialist.
I will never let you forget it.
Thanks. Lear puts it better:
I will have such revenges on you both, That all the world shall—I will do such things,— What they are, yet I know not: but they shall be The terrors of the earth.
I don't mind floating voters deciding to vote Labour. I can understand centrists deciding differently.
But what really grates my goat is people who have the temerity to claim to be loyal lifelong Tories who, when the chips are down, actually voter Labour without a flicker.
Yup, unless you voted Tory in 2019 AND 2024 you ain't a true Tory.
Just as unless you voted Labour in 2019 AND 2024 you ain't true Labour.
If you fall in neither of the above categories you are a floating voter really (unless say you voted for a minor party like the LDs or SNP in both GEs)
But who proudly claims loyalty to a party, aside from a few at the extremes? I didn't vote Tory in 2024. I don't mind you calling me not a true Tory. Because I'm not. I happened to vote Tory 2001-2019, but not out of any sort of loyalty - it was because for varying reasons I favoured either the Con candidate or a Con government over the realistic alternative. You can't shame people into voting Tory.
I do. I see loyalty as a virtue.
It's a shame it's not more common IMHO
I also value loyalty, but, to paraphrase something I read on a different website earlier today:
What does “loyalty” mean in a country where the people you failed are angry, and you despise what the party has become?
Those two statements are not contradictory, so long as the labour force participation rate has risen.
The labour force participation rate was 78% in 1990 and 78% now.
I don't think total UK labour force participation rate has ever been 78%! Now, male UK labour force participation might have been that, but I'd be staggered if combined male, female was much higher than 72-74%, and it has been rising over time as more and more women have entered the workforce.
I’m talking about the working age population, to emphasise that it has grown, contrary to @Foxy’s post.
They're all weak - but then Starmer is terrible and has an appallingly untalented cabinet. And they only have to beat the opposition, not the love child of Thatcher and Abe Lincoln
I'm not sure I care if Jenrick can build a good team and do the job.
He needs to not be solely obsessed with Rwanda/boats, though; that's important, and a big issue, but there will be huge opportunities to regain lots of DNV Tories and LD switchers on quasi-socialist economics.
I'd keep Hunt as Shadow Chancellor and go hard on Labour on tax & spend.
I think while in government the Rwanda policy only served to highlight how badly the government were failing on reducing those arrivals. Now that the Tories aren't in government they will need to work the boats angle hard to drive Labour voters to Reform and Reform voters back to the Tories. I think they also need an answer on winning back Lib Dem voters in the south of England but I'm not sure Jenrick would be well placed for it.
Are there really tonnes of Boris Johnson 'Get Brexit Done' 2019 fans who've gone over to the Lib Dems? It has never struck me as likely. Surely Lib Dem growth is mostly tactical Labour voters. And why go after them, when they represent a tiny number - Lib Dems underpolled Reform.
Because they hold 72 seats, most (but not all) of which had pretty low Reform totals. The Tories will inevitably win a lot of those back in due course. I don't see Reform displacing them as the main challengers in blue wall seats. But the Tories will certainly need to look competent for a bit first.
As to what they should do now. I think they should have a bit of fun. It's too early to start trying to elect a leader who looks like a PM in waiting. Have a go with Kemi Badenoch. She will entertain the base, give Labour some discomfort in PMQs, and keep the party in the headlines. I find her unappealing and antagonistic as a politician but that needn't matter yet, and I'm not the target audience.
What Conservatives can embrace now, which we've already seen on PB, is the joy of being in opposition. You can no longer be blamed for everything, that's someone else's problem. You can focus on policies and platforms that you really believe in, and you can really lay into the new government. It's a sort of release. It can be electorally disastrous - see both Corbyn and Swinson in 2019 - but quite cathartic. I would say they should lean into that for now. Do the whole triangulation and hugging of huskies later if they need to.
The Conservatives are likely to be called upon to govern very soon. I'm not saying this as some sort of Casino Royalesque bravado; I didn't even vote for them. SKS is genuinely a bit shit. He may also have fairly significant skeletons that may or may not have an impact on his already severely waning popularity.
But Labour have a Commons majority of 9,823. How on earth are they toppled outside war/plague/civil strife?
Curious maths and vote splitting got Labour where they are on a tiny % of the vote; similar forces could turn it the other way. FWIW I think next time will possibly depend on whether the nation veers in one of two ways, both possible:
To shore up the centre left mainstream, with Labour and LD being in fact unacknowledged allies (possible because English seats split up handily mostly either Con v Lab or Con v LD and not LD v Lab).
Or to look to a some form of Toryreform party (currently of course splitting votes) under the name Conservative, offering a really different, though thought out and costed (ie not Truss) alternative.
I want neither of these, but I'm a One Nation Tory.
It's a bit early to speculate, but I think it is certain the next election will be a cracker psephologically. It might even offer real alternatives policywise too.
A One Nation Tory who voted, um, Labour.
Yes. My guess is there were about 1-2 million of us. Maybe more. I have voted Tory for nearly 50 years. The Tory vote went from 14 m (2019) to just under 7 m (2024). And we were right.
No, you weren't. You made a fucking stupid decision and enabled a socialist.
I will never let you forget it.
Thanks. Lear puts it better:
I will have such revenges on you both, That all the world shall—I will do such things,— What they are, yet I know not: but they shall be The terrors of the earth.
I don't mind floating voters deciding to vote Labour. I can understand centrists deciding differently.
But what really grates my goat is people who have the temerity to claim to be loyal lifelong Tories who, when the chips are down, actually voter Labour without a flicker.
No one owes a political party loyalty. Politicians certainly don't display any.
If you're a lifelong Tory you do. And you never ever vote for our truest enemy.
If you're unhappy you stay at home, or spoil your ballot.
We'll vote for whom we fucking well please. That's democracy.
There we go, a bit of spunk.
Sure, but you don't say you're a lifelong Tory. So many of you are missing the fucking point but at least you didn't post the seat count again for the 4,679th time and said something at least vaguely different.
I'm surprised you have the energy to peel apart your semen-encrusted sheets in the morning
Why?
After I've had a good night's sleep I'm well-rested.
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Anatolia is the Near East, Italy is indisputably in the West, so the midpoint seems to be Greece or thereabouts. Suez at the rightmost. That looks Eurocentric to me.
If we had to cast a generic Tory with no interesting characteristic, the casting agency would pick him, somehow managing to be both bland and off putting. A curious combo. Ed Daveys ideal choice.
I guess he’s ambitious? What’s the appeal?
The MPs might like him, I doubt the membership will.
As for the voters...
A truly terrible night for the Conservatives. They are simply continuing to talk amongst themselves, with no recognition that they seem to be stumbling towards oblivion.
Blah, blah, blah. This is NOT 1997. Starmer is NOT Blair but a dull Brownite already whacking up tax to fund union backed public sector workers and cutting pensioners fuel allowance and ending right to buy, hitting private schools with VAT and completely incapable of stopping the boats.
Jenrick is perfectly reasonable and can capitalise on the unpopularity this awful government already has. He also does not have the negatives Priti Patel had who has now gone out (and I admired Priti's toughness but she is not popular with swing voters)
I can usually see why some politicians simply irritate the voters. Ed Miliband. Young William Hague. Gove
But I don’t see why Patel. Maybe Racism? Misogyny? Snobbery?
I suspect a complex mix of all three are at work, with varying blends in individuals
Because she's shit, and has no self-awareness?
Well, d'uh.
She wouldn't be in politics if she wasn't.
1. Her performance against Hislop on QT on the infamous death penalty issue was woeful.
2. She was a massive disappointment in office, and didn't seem to achieve anything but was adept at blaming others
3. She has a history of dishonesty
4. She is full of self-confidence but it seems to be baseless.
Those two statements are not contradictory, so long as the labour force participation rate has risen.
The labour force participation rate was 78% in 1990 and 78% now.
I don't think total UK labour force participation rate has ever been 78%! Now, male UK labour force participation might have been that, but I'd be staggered if combined male, female was much higher than 72-74%, and it has been rising over time as more and more women have entered the workforce.
I’m talking about the working age population, to emphasise that it has grown, contrary to @Foxy’s post.
They're all weak - but then Starmer is terrible and has an appallingly untalented cabinet. And they only have to beat the opposition, not the love child of Thatcher and Abe Lincoln
I'm not sure I care if Jenrick can build a good team and do the job.
He needs to not be solely obsessed with Rwanda/boats, though; that's important, and a big issue, but there will be huge opportunities to regain lots of DNV Tories and LD switchers on quasi-socialist economics.
I'd keep Hunt as Shadow Chancellor and go hard on Labour on tax & spend.
I think while in government the Rwanda policy only served to highlight how badly the government were failing on reducing those arrivals. Now that the Tories aren't in government they will need to work the boats angle hard to drive Labour voters to Reform and Reform voters back to the Tories. I think they also need an answer on winning back Lib Dem voters in the south of England but I'm not sure Jenrick would be well placed for it.
Are there really tonnes of Boris Johnson 'Get Brexit Done' 2019 fans who've gone over to the Lib Dems? It has never struck me as likely. Surely Lib Dem growth is mostly tactical Labour voters. And why go after them, when they represent a tiny number - Lib Dems underpolled Reform.
Because they hold 72 seats, most (but not all) of which had pretty low Reform totals. The Tories will inevitably win a lot of those back in due course. I don't see Reform displacing them as the main challengers in blue wall seats. But the Tories will certainly need to look competent for a bit first.
As to what they should do now. I think they should have a bit of fun. It's too early to start trying to elect a leader who looks like a PM in waiting. Have a go with Kemi Badenoch. She will entertain the base, give Labour some discomfort in PMQs, and keep the party in the headlines. I find her unappealing and antagonistic as a politician but that needn't matter yet, and I'm not the target audience.
What Conservatives can embrace now, which we've already seen on PB, is the joy of being in opposition. You can no longer be blamed for everything, that's someone else's problem. You can focus on policies and platforms that you really believe in, and you can really lay into the new government. It's a sort of release. It can be electorally disastrous - see both Corbyn and Swinson in 2019 - but quite cathartic. I would say they should lean into that for now. Do the whole triangulation and hugging of huskies later if they need to.
The Conservatives are likely to be called upon to govern very soon. I'm not saying this as some sort of Casino Royalesque bravado; I didn't even vote for them. SKS is genuinely a bit shit. He may also have fairly significant skeletons that may or may not have an impact on his already severely waning popularity.
But Labour have a Commons majority of 9,823. How on earth are they toppled outside war/plague/civil strife?
PM forced to resign, successor forced to resign, successor goes to the country. That's how it worked with Boris's stonking majority.
Yes; it's very fragile. 33.7% of the vote, and fewer actual votes than Corbyn in both 2017 and 2019 is precarious. But curiously all the parties are precarious. Put together Labour's low vote numbers. the Reform splitting Tory seats, the inevitable fragility of LDs massive numbers and SNP meltdown. The policy issues are all boring us to death, but the subterranean psephology and tactics is remarkable.
And it is not only the UK. Anyone heard how our USA friends are getting on? And France. And Germany. And Italy. And Canada.
What's interesting to me is that all of the traditional parties seem to be struggling with all the same problems and none of them will work together to formulate a plan to combat illegal immigration. Even within the EU there is so much disagreement on how to handle it with Italy the only country talking sense and more widely across the world countries on the receiving end of illegal immigration need to start discussions on reform the ECHR and UN convention on refugees to take into account modern mobility of people vs when those were written.
A smart Tory leader will go down this route rather than try and go it alone like they did last time with the Rwanda policy. There needs to be a much broader agreement on what to do about illegal immigration and it needs to come from the UK, Germany, France and Italy in Europe so the ECHR can be reformed and no longer used as a shield for deportation by illegal immigrants and foreign criminals.
Established elites across Europe and the West still think it's ick to deal with illegal/mass immigration, because they'd both be shunned in their social circles and they also benefit from it economically in their personal ones.
This is risible nonsense. Some bizarre culture war/great replacement theory mash-up. Governments across Europe and the West are working to tackle illegal immigration. The commentariat spend their whole time talking about immigration. And you, Casino, as a very high earner who sends his kids to private school, you are the elite.
Which western government has a policy of net zero migration?
Casino talked of dealing with “illegal/mass immigration”. Not having mass immigration would not have to be net zero migration.
Greenland is a Western country and has net emigration. Do you count Mexico as a western government? They have net emigration too. I don’t know whether either have that as a policy aim!
The obvious Western country (for most definitions of the West) with low immigration as a policy is Japan. Greece and France have immigration rates (relative to their population sizes) about a third of the UK. Portugal have recently announced a very significant tightening of their immigration rules. The French passed immigration reform late last year that was aimed at reducing numbers. I could go on.
Japan isn't Western for "most" definitions of the West. Western is not a synonym for developed.
Japan is, in any event, taking small steps towards encouraging immigration. Which will probably accelerate.
First! All the way from sunny breakfast time Colorado…
No dog?
Breakfast?
Hello JohnO, who are you supporting in this clash of the titans?
Preferences are Stride, Cleverly, Tugendhat….shrugs shoulders…then Badenoch but NEVER Jenrick.
I will never get over Jenrick's decision to paint over Disney characters at an Asylum detention centre. I just cannot relate to someone who would want to do that. Frightened, bewildered children and he wants to remove any sense of joy for something more dystopian. It is beyond vile. It is sick. Such an unbelievable lack of empathy makes him barely fit to be a member of the human race, let alone the leader of a political party.
Those two statements are not contradictory, so long as the labour force participation rate has risen.
The labour force participation rate was 78% in 1990 and 78% now.
I don't think total UK labour force participation rate has ever been 78%! Now, male UK labour force participation might have been that, but I'd be staggered if combined male, female was much higher than 72-74%, and it has been rising over time as more and more women have entered the workforce.
I’m talking about the working age population, to emphasise that it has grown, contrary to @Foxy’s post.
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Where would you put the zero longitude line?
Greenwich.
What the fuck is wrong with being Eurocentric?
Britain helped the modern world and set international maritime standards and law, so why shouldn't the meridian be here. It's one reason our financial markets are so well placed.
Other countries might like to see themselves as the centre. Tough. They're not. But they might have better weather or some interesting geography or antiquities instead.
Those two statements are not contradictory, so long as the labour force participation rate has risen.
The labour force participation rate was 78% in 1990 and 78% now.
I don't think total UK labour force participation rate has ever been 78%! Now, male UK labour force participation might have been that, but I'd be staggered if combined male, female was much higher than 72-74%, and it has been rising over time as more and more women have entered the workforce.
I’m talking about the working age population, to emphasise that it has grown, contrary to @Foxy’s post.
You could be right, but the point stands that the working age population has expanded.
I'm sure it has, but you haven't actually provided me any data showing the increase in the working age population in either absolute terms or as a total of the population.
One thing I have noticed, and this is purely based on anecdote, is many people who were previously very sure in themselves about voting to oust the Tories are now much less sure about their decision. If the next leader can harness this sentiment I think a win in 2029 isn't off the table.
People who are natural small c conservatives abandoned the party in July but even this small taste of their first Labour government since they were teenagers or in their early 20s has begun to make them see sense.
Yep, the best antidote to Labour is seeing Labour in office.
So many people I know are properly shitting it about this budget at the end of October.
Everybody knew there was going to be a reckoning - there should have been one immediately after the pandemic, a one off tax raid to try and recoup some of the millions thrown at the economy by Sunak when Chancellor (parts of which were defrauded by some).
We are still borrowing £80-£90 billion a year - the priority must be to get the public finances back somewhere near balance and that's going to need a mix of tax rises and spending cuts and that's what October will be about.
You don't like the answer but it involves cutting state employment by a substantial number and completely reworking the benefits system. There is no path to a balanced budget while 3m people sit in sickness benefits and 1/5 people are on the state payroll, the other 4 people simply don't pay enough tax to cover it all.
All a bit glib and predictable from the Conservative end of the fence - call it "austerity" or just having another pop at the "public sector".
Let's have some specifics - which "state payroll" jobs are you going to lose, Police, Fire, Armed Forces, School Teachers? As an aside, everyone on the "state payroll" pays taxes as well and spends money and contributes to the economy even if they are paid from public funds.
50% cuts across the board in the NHS to anyone who doesn't have a patient facing role. A 50% cut in the civil service in all departments, see what breaks if anything and then move from there.
I'd also freeze public sector pay in the middle for a period of 5 years, the only way to move up the pay scale is to get promoted or leave for the private sector.
Another easy cut is banning the use of agency staff across the state, no more locums being paid 4x the rate and doctors and nurses being lured into agency work. Just kill the entire sector. I have no issue with them working in the private sector or if the private hospitals want to waste money on locums but the agency rip off merchants need to be cut asap. Another easy cut is putting a hard cap on consultancy fees and the use of external consultants.
I would also cut a deal with OpenAI to introduce AI chat bots across all departments so that phone agents are free to actually talk to people who need it.
A 50% cut across the civil service would mean around 260,000 dismissals - presuming that would do wonders for processing asylum claims, sorting out planning appeals etc.
I can't speak to the use of agency staff in terms of numbers but as for consultants, they are often used in local Government to provide a specialism or fill a short term gap in a particular area. A Council isn't going to make a full time role of what a Consultant provides - often, Members want Consultants because they can't or won't believe what Officers tell them and want an "independent" view. If you can spare £1,500 a day you can get a lot of independent view.
To be fair, with most Councils short of money, the days of easy money for Consultants are probably over. As for Chat bots, already being used by Councils to resolve simple transactions.
Most of what you propose is impractical and would cause huge disruption but fine if you can persuade the Conservative Party it's "the answer" - it hasn't been up to now.
I'm not saying there's no fat to cut in parts of the "public sector" but there isn't a pot of gold at the end of that rainbow.
I regularly work with teams of council direct labour kerbside refuse collectors. When new journeymen Directors of Frontline Services are recruited, their remit is to cut costs without reducing service provision. So in they come realising their only costs to cut are the Labour force. Say they start with 100 collectors and their cost cutting target is a 30% reduction so 30 are laid off. The new Service Director polishes his halo and probably gets a promotion elsewhere. He has after all cut costs by 30%. However, the service provision is sub-standard and the complaints are up 500%. So in order to equalise the service 10 agency staff are employed, still the complaints come in, so another 10 are recruited, and then another 10. So we are back up to 100 heads but the costs for those 30 agency heads are 40% higher per head than the DLO 70. So the 30 are given permanent contracts. We have a 100 headcount just as we started. Then the Chief Executive recruits another Section Director and the cycle starts again.
PB armchair economists know the cost of everything and the value of nothing.
Exactly the same stupid approach applied in the retail bank I used to work for.
Directors were forever lauding their own success in 'streamlining', 'de-layering', and 'productivity improvements' but the total number of staff, employees + contract, only ever seemed to go up even though the business was not growing.
Productivity has only ever improved by improving the process - generally through mechanisation.
So, when it comes to kerbside refuse collection - how can we make it possible for the employee to collect the more refuse for the same or *less* effort and time? Better trucks? Better bins that can be automatically emptied into the trucks?
One thing I have noticed, and this is purely based on anecdote, is many people who were previously very sure in themselves about voting to oust the Tories are now much less sure about their decision. If the next leader can harness this sentiment I think a win in 2029 isn't off the table.
People who are natural small c conservatives abandoned the party in July but even this small taste of their first Labour government since they were teenagers or in their early 20s has begun to make them see sense.
Yep, the best antidote to Labour is seeing Labour in office.
So many people I know are properly shitting it about this budget at the end of October.
Everybody knew there was going to be a reckoning - there should have been one immediately after the pandemic, a one off tax raid to try and recoup some of the millions thrown at the economy by Sunak when Chancellor (parts of which were defrauded by some).
We are still borrowing £80-£90 billion a year - the priority must be to get the public finances back somewhere near balance and that's going to need a mix of tax rises and spending cuts and that's what October will be about.
You don't like the answer but it involves cutting state employment by a substantial number and completely reworking the benefits system. There is no path to a balanced budget while 3m people sit in sickness benefits and 1/5 people are on the state payroll, the other 4 people simply don't pay enough tax to cover it all.
All a bit glib and predictable from the Conservative end of the fence - call it "austerity" or just having another pop at the "public sector".
Let's have some specifics - which "state payroll" jobs are you going to lose, Police, Fire, Armed Forces, School Teachers? As an aside, everyone on the "state payroll" pays taxes as well and spends money and contributes to the economy even if they are paid from public funds.
50% cuts across the board in the NHS to anyone who doesn't have a patient facing role. A 50% cut in the civil service in all departments, see what breaks if anything and then move from there.
I'd also freeze public sector pay in the middle for a period of 5 years, the only way to move up the pay scale is to get promoted or leave for the private sector.
Another easy cut is banning the use of agency staff across the state, no more locums being paid 4x the rate and doctors and nurses being lured into agency work. Just kill the entire sector. I have no issue with them working in the private sector or if the private hospitals want to waste money on locums but the agency rip off merchants need to be cut asap. Another easy cut is putting a hard cap on consultancy fees and the use of external consultants.
I would also cut a deal with OpenAI to introduce AI chat bots across all departments so that phone agents are free to actually talk to people who need it.
A 50% cut across the civil service would mean around 260,000 dismissals - presuming that would do wonders for processing asylum claims, sorting out planning appeals etc.
I can't speak to the use of agency staff in terms of numbers but as for consultants, they are often used in local Government to provide a specialism or fill a short term gap in a particular area. A Council isn't going to make a full time role of what a Consultant provides - often, Members want Consultants because they can't or won't believe what Officers tell them and want an "independent" view. If you can spare £1,500 a day you can get a lot of independent view.
To be fair, with most Councils short of money, the days of easy money for Consultants are probably over. As for Chat bots, already being used by Councils to resolve simple transactions.
Most of what you propose is impractical and would cause huge disruption but fine if you can persuade the Conservative Party it's "the answer" - it hasn't been up to now.
I'm not saying there's no fat to cut in parts of the "public sector" but there isn't a pot of gold at the end of that rainbow.
I regularly work with teams of council direct labour kerbside refuse collectors. When new journeymen Directors of Frontline Services are recruited, their remit is to cut costs without reducing service provision. So in they come realising their only costs to cut are the Labour force. Say they start with 100 collectors and their cost cutting target is a 30% reduction so 30 are laid off. The new Service Director polishes his halo and probably gets a promotion elsewhere. He has after all cut costs by 30%. However, the service provision is sub-standard and the complaints are up 500%. So in order to equalise the service 10 agency staff are employed, still the complaints come in, so another 10 are recruited, and then another 10. So we are back up to 100 heads but the costs for those 30 agency heads are 40% higher per head than the DLO 70. So the 30 are given permanent contracts. We have a 100 headcount just as we started. Then the Chief Executive recruits another Section Director and the cycle starts again.
PB armchair economists know the cost of everything and the value of nothing.
Exactly the same stupid approach applied in the retail bank I used to work for.
Directors were forever lauding their own success in 'streamlining', 'de-layering', and 'productivity improvements' but the total number of staff, employees + contract, only ever seemed to go up even though the business was not growing.
Productivity has only ever improved by improving the process - generally through mechanisation.
So, when it comes to kerbside refuse collection - how can we make it possible for the employee to collect the more refuse for the same or *less* effort and time? Better trucks? Better bins that can be automatically emptied into the trucks?
You know the problems there.
One is that mechanisation means spending upfront to save over the following decades.
The other is that changing processes makes people unhappy, and they don't like that. See also: self-checkouts in supermarkets. You can (and many places elsewhere do) have systems where you take your rubbish bags to a local collection point (something like this: https://resource.co/article/could-underground-waste-collection-come-uk-11351) but good luck getting it through in an election year.
They're all weak - but then Starmer is terrible and has an appallingly untalented cabinet. And they only have to beat the opposition, not the love child of Thatcher and Abe Lincoln
I'm not sure I care if Jenrick can build a good team and do the job.
He needs to not be solely obsessed with Rwanda/boats, though; that's important, and a big issue, but there will be huge opportunities to regain lots of DNV Tories and LD switchers on quasi-socialist economics.
I'd keep Hunt as Shadow Chancellor and go hard on Labour on tax & spend.
I think while in government the Rwanda policy only served to highlight how badly the government were failing on reducing those arrivals. Now that the Tories aren't in government they will need to work the boats angle hard to drive Labour voters to Reform and Reform voters back to the Tories. I think they also need an answer on winning back Lib Dem voters in the south of England but I'm not sure Jenrick would be well placed for it.
Are there really tonnes of Boris Johnson 'Get Brexit Done' 2019 fans who've gone over to the Lib Dems? It has never struck me as likely. Surely Lib Dem growth is mostly tactical Labour voters. And why go after them, when they represent a tiny number - Lib Dems underpolled Reform.
Because they hold 72 seats, most (but not all) of which had pretty low Reform totals. The Tories will inevitably win a lot of those back in due course. I don't see Reform displacing them as the main challengers in blue wall seats. But the Tories will certainly need to look competent for a bit first.
As to what they should do now. I think they should have a bit of fun. It's too early to start trying to elect a leader who looks like a PM in waiting. Have a go with Kemi Badenoch. She will entertain the base, give Labour some discomfort in PMQs, and keep the party in the headlines. I find her unappealing and antagonistic as a politician but that needn't matter yet, and I'm not the target audience.
What Conservatives can embrace now, which we've already seen on PB, is the joy of being in opposition. You can no longer be blamed for everything, that's someone else's problem. You can focus on policies and platforms that you really believe in, and you can really lay into the new government. It's a sort of release. It can be electorally disastrous - see both Corbyn and Swinson in 2019 - but quite cathartic. I would say they should lean into that for now. Do the whole triangulation and hugging of huskies later if they need to.
The Conservatives are likely to be called upon to govern very soon. I'm not saying this as some sort of Casino Royalesque bravado; I didn't even vote for them. SKS is genuinely a bit shit. He may also have fairly significant skeletons that may or may not have an impact on his already severely waning popularity.
But Labour have a Commons majority of 9,823. How on earth are they toppled outside war/plague/civil strife?
Curious maths and vote splitting got Labour where they are on a tiny % of the vote; similar forces could turn it the other way. FWIW I think next time will possibly depend on whether the nation veers in one of two ways, both possible:
To shore up the centre left mainstream, with Labour and LD being in fact unacknowledged allies (possible because English seats split up handily mostly either Con v Lab or Con v LD and not LD v Lab).
Or to look to a some form of Toryreform party (currently of course splitting votes) under the name Conservative, offering a really different, though thought out and costed (ie not Truss) alternative.
I want neither of these, but I'm a One Nation Tory.
It's a bit early to speculate, but I think it is certain the next election will be a cracker psephologically. It might even offer real alternatives policywise too.
A One Nation Tory who voted, um, Labour.
Yes. My guess is there were about 1-2 million of us. Maybe more. I have voted Tory for nearly 50 years. The Tory vote went from 14 m (2019) to just under 7 m (2024). And we were right.
No, you weren't. You made a fucking stupid decision and enabled a socialist.
I will never let you forget it.
Thanks. Lear puts it better:
I will have such revenges on you both, That all the world shall—I will do such things,— What they are, yet I know not: but they shall be The terrors of the earth.
I don't mind floating voters deciding to vote Labour. I can understand centrists deciding differently.
But what really grates my goat is people who have the temerity to claim to be loyal lifelong Tories who, when the chips are down, actually voter Labour without a flicker.
Yup, unless you voted Tory in 2019 AND 2024 you ain't a true Tory.
Just as unless you voted Labour in 2019 AND 2024 you ain't true Labour.
If you fall in neither of the above categories you are a floating voter really (unless say you voted for a minor party like the LDs or SNP in both GEs)
But who proudly claims loyalty to a party, aside from a few at the extremes? I didn't vote Tory in 2024. I don't mind you calling me not a true Tory. Because I'm not. I happened to vote Tory 2001-2019, but not out of any sort of loyalty - it was because for varying reasons I favoured either the Con candidate or a Con government over the realistic alternative. You can't shame people into voting Tory.
I do. I see loyalty as a virtue.
It's a shame it's not more common IMHO
I also value loyalty, but, to paraphrase something I read on a different website earlier today:
What does “loyalty” mean in a country where the people you failed are angry, and you despise what the party has become?
That's when you need to call on loyalty the most.
Look, I yielded to no-one in my criticism before the election but I backed my side because I thought Sunak was the better PM, my MP was a good egg, and I believe in Conservative values.
If I didn't I would have voted for someone else, or abstained, but I wouldn't have said I'm a lifelong Tory because I wouldn't have been.
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Where would you put the zero longitude line?
Greenwich.
What the fuck is wrong with being Eurocentric?
Britain helped the modern world and set international maritime standards and law, so why shouldn't the meridian be here. It's one reason our financial markets are so well placed.
Other countries might like to see themselves as the centre. Tough. They're not. But they might have better weather or some interesting geography or antiquities instead.
Thems the breaks.
I don't think there is [anything wrong with being Eurocentric*], but a previous poster was suggesting that Eurocentrism was a fiction, but it's right there in the Greenwich meridian and the definition of East and West.
* I'd much rather have a Eurocentric world, based on democracy and the rule of law, than a world where other values held sway. It would help if Europe were to hold true to the best of its history though.
First! All the way from sunny breakfast time Colorado…
No dog?
Breakfast?
Hello JohnO, who are you supporting in this clash of the titans?
Preferences are Stride, Cleverly, Tugendhat….shrugs shoulders…then Badenoch but NEVER Jenrick.
I will never get over Jenrick's decision to paint over Disney characters at an Asylum detention centre. I just cannot relate to someone who would want to do that. Frightened, bewildered children and he wants to remove any sense of joy for something more dystopian. It is beyond vile. It is sick. Such an unbelievable lack of empathy makes him barely fit to be a member of the human race, let alone the leader of a political party.
Agreed, and I've never believed his excuse for that either.
I was implacably opposed to Grayling after he took books away from prisoners too.
Being tough and firm on political issues doesn't mean being a c**t as a virtue.
One thing I have noticed, and this is purely based on anecdote, is many people who were previously very sure in themselves about voting to oust the Tories are now much less sure about their decision. If the next leader can harness this sentiment I think a win in 2029 isn't off the table.
People who are natural small c conservatives abandoned the party in July but even this small taste of their first Labour government since they were teenagers or in their early 20s has begun to make them see sense.
Yep, the best antidote to Labour is seeing Labour in office.
So many people I know are properly shitting it about this budget at the end of October.
Everybody knew there was going to be a reckoning - there should have been one immediately after the pandemic, a one off tax raid to try and recoup some of the millions thrown at the economy by Sunak when Chancellor (parts of which were defrauded by some).
We are still borrowing £80-£90 billion a year - the priority must be to get the public finances back somewhere near balance and that's going to need a mix of tax rises and spending cuts and that's what October will be about.
You don't like the answer but it involves cutting state employment by a substantial number and completely reworking the benefits system. There is no path to a balanced budget while 3m people sit in sickness benefits and 1/5 people are on the state payroll, the other 4 people simply don't pay enough tax to cover it all.
All a bit glib and predictable from the Conservative end of the fence - call it "austerity" or just having another pop at the "public sector".
Let's have some specifics - which "state payroll" jobs are you going to lose, Police, Fire, Armed Forces, School Teachers? As an aside, everyone on the "state payroll" pays taxes as well and spends money and contributes to the economy even if they are paid from public funds.
50% cuts across the board in the NHS to anyone who doesn't have a patient facing role. A 50% cut in the civil service in all departments, see what breaks if anything and then move from there.
I'd also freeze public sector pay in the middle for a period of 5 years, the only way to move up the pay scale is to get promoted or leave for the private sector.
Another easy cut is banning the use of agency staff across the state, no more locums being paid 4x the rate and doctors and nurses being lured into agency work. Just kill the entire sector. I have no issue with them working in the private sector or if the private hospitals want to waste money on locums but the agency rip off merchants need to be cut asap. Another easy cut is putting a hard cap on consultancy fees and the use of external consultants.
I would also cut a deal with OpenAI to introduce AI chat bots across all departments so that phone agents are free to actually talk to people who need it.
A 50% cut across the civil service would mean around 260,000 dismissals - presuming that would do wonders for processing asylum claims, sorting out planning appeals etc.
I can't speak to the use of agency staff in terms of numbers but as for consultants, they are often used in local Government to provide a specialism or fill a short term gap in a particular area. A Council isn't going to make a full time role of what a Consultant provides - often, Members want Consultants because they can't or won't believe what Officers tell them and want an "independent" view. If you can spare £1,500 a day you can get a lot of independent view.
To be fair, with most Councils short of money, the days of easy money for Consultants are probably over. As for Chat bots, already being used by Councils to resolve simple transactions.
Most of what you propose is impractical and would cause huge disruption but fine if you can persuade the Conservative Party it's "the answer" - it hasn't been up to now.
I'm not saying there's no fat to cut in parts of the "public sector" but there isn't a pot of gold at the end of that rainbow.
I regularly work with teams of council direct labour kerbside refuse collectors. When new journeymen Directors of Frontline Services are recruited, their remit is to cut costs without reducing service provision. So in they come realising their only costs to cut are the Labour force. Say they start with 100 collectors and their cost cutting target is a 30% reduction so 30 are laid off. The new Service Director polishes his halo and probably gets a promotion elsewhere. He has after all cut costs by 30%. However, the service provision is sub-standard and the complaints are up 500%. So in order to equalise the service 10 agency staff are employed, still the complaints come in, so another 10 are recruited, and then another 10. So we are back up to 100 heads but the costs for those 30 agency heads are 40% higher per head than the DLO 70. So the 30 are given permanent contracts. We have a 100 headcount just as we started. Then the Chief Executive recruits another Section Director and the cycle starts again.
PB armchair economists know the cost of everything and the value of nothing.
Exactly the same stupid approach applied in the retail bank I used to work for.
Directors were forever lauding their own success in 'streamlining', 'de-layering', and 'productivity improvements' but the total number of staff, employees + contract, only ever seemed to go up even though the business was not growing.
Productivity has only ever improved by improving the process - generally through mechanisation.
So, when it comes to kerbside refuse collection - how can we make it possible for the employee to collect the more refuse for the same or *less* effort and time? Better trucks? Better bins that can be automatically emptied into the trucks?
First! All the way from sunny breakfast time Colorado…
No dog?
Breakfast?
Hello JohnO, who are you supporting in this clash of the titans?
Preferences are Stride, Cleverly, Tugendhat….shrugs shoulders…then Badenoch but NEVER Jenrick.
I will never get over Jenrick's decision to paint over Disney characters at an Asylum detention centre. I just cannot relate to someone who would want to do that. Frightened, bewildered children and he wants to remove any sense of joy for something more dystopian. It is beyond vile. It is sick. Such an unbelievable lack of empathy makes him barely fit to be a member of the human race, let alone the leader of a political party.
I liked the description I saw of Jenrick as "not the school bully, but the school bully's minion". I don't know how much he believes this stuff, as opposed to believing he has to act this way to get on, but it would be consistent with the overacting. One of the sad things about this process has been seeing Tugendhat showing a bit of leg to the right... and for what?
They're all weak - but then Starmer is terrible and has an appallingly untalented cabinet. And they only have to beat the opposition, not the love child of Thatcher and Abe Lincoln
I'm not sure I care if Jenrick can build a good team and do the job.
He needs to not be solely obsessed with Rwanda/boats, though; that's important, and a big issue, but there will be huge opportunities to regain lots of DNV Tories and LD switchers on quasi-socialist economics.
I'd keep Hunt as Shadow Chancellor and go hard on Labour on tax & spend.
I think while in government the Rwanda policy only served to highlight how badly the government were failing on reducing those arrivals. Now that the Tories aren't in government they will need to work the boats angle hard to drive Labour voters to Reform and Reform voters back to the Tories. I think they also need an answer on winning back Lib Dem voters in the south of England but I'm not sure Jenrick would be well placed for it.
Are there really tonnes of Boris Johnson 'Get Brexit Done' 2019 fans who've gone over to the Lib Dems? It has never struck me as likely. Surely Lib Dem growth is mostly tactical Labour voters. And why go after them, when they represent a tiny number - Lib Dems underpolled Reform.
Because they hold 72 seats, most (but not all) of which had pretty low Reform totals. The Tories will inevitably win a lot of those back in due course. I don't see Reform displacing them as the main challengers in blue wall seats. But the Tories will certainly need to look competent for a bit first.
As to what they should do now. I think they should have a bit of fun. It's too early to start trying to elect a leader who looks like a PM in waiting. Have a go with Kemi Badenoch. She will entertain the base, give Labour some discomfort in PMQs, and keep the party in the headlines. I find her unappealing and antagonistic as a politician but that needn't matter yet, and I'm not the target audience.
What Conservatives can embrace now, which we've already seen on PB, is the joy of being in opposition. You can no longer be blamed for everything, that's someone else's problem. You can focus on policies and platforms that you really believe in, and you can really lay into the new government. It's a sort of release. It can be electorally disastrous - see both Corbyn and Swinson in 2019 - but quite cathartic. I would say they should lean into that for now. Do the whole triangulation and hugging of huskies later if they need to.
The Conservatives are likely to be called upon to govern very soon. I'm not saying this as some sort of Casino Royalesque bravado; I didn't even vote for them. SKS is genuinely a bit shit. He may also have fairly significant skeletons that may or may not have an impact on his already severely waning popularity.
But Labour have a Commons majority of 9,823. How on earth are they toppled outside war/plague/civil strife?
Curious maths and vote splitting got Labour where they are on a tiny % of the vote; similar forces could turn it the other way. FWIW I think next time will possibly depend on whether the nation veers in one of two ways, both possible:
To shore up the centre left mainstream, with Labour and LD being in fact unacknowledged allies (possible because English seats split up handily mostly either Con v Lab or Con v LD and not LD v Lab).
Or to look to a some form of Toryreform party (currently of course splitting votes) under the name Conservative, offering a really different, though thought out and costed (ie not Truss) alternative.
I want neither of these, but I'm a One Nation Tory.
It's a bit early to speculate, but I think it is certain the next election will be a cracker psephologically. It might even offer real alternatives policywise too.
A One Nation Tory who voted, um, Labour.
Yes. My guess is there were about 1-2 million of us. Maybe more. I have voted Tory for nearly 50 years. The Tory vote went from 14 m (2019) to just under 7 m (2024). And we were right.
No, you weren't. You made a fucking stupid decision and enabled a socialist.
I will never let you forget it.
Thanks. Lear puts it better:
I will have such revenges on you both, That all the world shall—I will do such things,— What they are, yet I know not: but they shall be The terrors of the earth.
I don't mind floating voters deciding to vote Labour. I can understand centrists deciding differently.
But what really grates my goat is people who have the temerity to claim to be loyal lifelong Tories who, when the chips are down, actually voter Labour without a flicker.
Yup, unless you voted Tory in 2019 AND 2024 you ain't a true Tory.
Just as unless you voted Labour in 2019 AND 2024 you ain't true Labour.
If you fall in neither of the above categories you are a floating voter really (unless say you voted for a minor party like the LDs or SNP in both GEs)
But who proudly claims loyalty to a party, aside from a few at the extremes? I didn't vote Tory in 2024. I don't mind you calling me not a true Tory. Because I'm not. I happened to vote Tory 2001-2019, but not out of any sort of loyalty - it was because for varying reasons I favoured either the Con candidate or a Con government over the realistic alternative. You can't shame people into voting Tory.
I do. I see loyalty as a virtue.
It's a shame it's not more common IMHO
Well, up to a point. I'm loyal to my family. (Though they've never given me any reason not to be.) I'm loyal to my friends. (Ditto.) I'd say that's virtuous, in a keeping-your-implied-promises way. I understand those who are loyal to a sports team - though at its best that's just another flavour of loyalty to one's friends. And if it's not that, it's slightly risible.
Some people are loyal to brands. But that's daft. Brands aren't human. They can't return or reward your loyalty and don't want to; they just want your money.
Loyalty to a political party strikes me as more like loyalty to a brand. I don't really understand it, and don't see the virtue. Indeed, political parties shouldn't be rewarding their voters' loyalty; they should be governing for the whole country, not just their voters.
If you are a member of a party, and have friends in the organisation, I suppose it becomes more like the better sort of loyalty to a sports team. But electing the government ought to be a bit more serious than that and I don't see coming to a judgement that someone else deserves yoir vote more as 'disloyal'.
They're all weak - but then Starmer is terrible and has an appallingly untalented cabinet. And they only have to beat the opposition, not the love child of Thatcher and Abe Lincoln
I'm not sure I care if Jenrick can build a good team and do the job.
He needs to not be solely obsessed with Rwanda/boats, though; that's important, and a big issue, but there will be huge opportunities to regain lots of DNV Tories and LD switchers on quasi-socialist economics.
I'd keep Hunt as Shadow Chancellor and go hard on Labour on tax & spend.
I think while in government the Rwanda policy only served to highlight how badly the government were failing on reducing those arrivals. Now that the Tories aren't in government they will need to work the boats angle hard to drive Labour voters to Reform and Reform voters back to the Tories. I think they also need an answer on winning back Lib Dem voters in the south of England but I'm not sure Jenrick would be well placed for it.
Are there really tonnes of Boris Johnson 'Get Brexit Done' 2019 fans who've gone over to the Lib Dems? It has never struck me as likely. Surely Lib Dem growth is mostly tactical Labour voters. And why go after them, when they represent a tiny number - Lib Dems underpolled Reform.
Because they hold 72 seats, most (but not all) of which had pretty low Reform totals. The Tories will inevitably win a lot of those back in due course. I don't see Reform displacing them as the main challengers in blue wall seats. But the Tories will certainly need to look competent for a bit first.
As to what they should do now. I think they should have a bit of fun. It's too early to start trying to elect a leader who looks like a PM in waiting. Have a go with Kemi Badenoch. She will entertain the base, give Labour some discomfort in PMQs, and keep the party in the headlines. I find her unappealing and antagonistic as a politician but that needn't matter yet, and I'm not the target audience.
What Conservatives can embrace now, which we've already seen on PB, is the joy of being in opposition. You can no longer be blamed for everything, that's someone else's problem. You can focus on policies and platforms that you really believe in, and you can really lay into the new government. It's a sort of release. It can be electorally disastrous - see both Corbyn and Swinson in 2019 - but quite cathartic. I would say they should lean into that for now. Do the whole triangulation and hugging of huskies later if they need to.
The Conservatives are likely to be called upon to govern very soon. I'm not saying this as some sort of Casino Royalesque bravado; I didn't even vote for them. SKS is genuinely a bit shit. He may also have fairly significant skeletons that may or may not have an impact on his already severely waning popularity.
But Labour have a Commons majority of 9,823. How on earth are they toppled outside war/plague/civil strife?
Curious maths and vote splitting got Labour where they are on a tiny % of the vote; similar forces could turn it the other way. FWIW I think next time will possibly depend on whether the nation veers in one of two ways, both possible:
To shore up the centre left mainstream, with Labour and LD being in fact unacknowledged allies (possible because English seats split up handily mostly either Con v Lab or Con v LD and not LD v Lab).
Or to look to a some form of Toryreform party (currently of course splitting votes) under the name Conservative, offering a really different, though thought out and costed (ie not Truss) alternative.
I want neither of these, but I'm a One Nation Tory.
It's a bit early to speculate, but I think it is certain the next election will be a cracker psephologically. It might even offer real alternatives policywise too.
A One Nation Tory who voted, um, Labour.
Yes. My guess is there were about 1-2 million of us. Maybe more. I have voted Tory for nearly 50 years. The Tory vote went from 14 m (2019) to just under 7 m (2024). And we were right.
No, you weren't. You made a fucking stupid decision and enabled a socialist.
I will never let you forget it.
Is this the beginning of the Tory charm offensive to win back lost voters?
If so I would recommend more charm and less offensiveness.
Both CR and MPB are enjoying a moment of vindication for supporting the world championship election loser. It's very obliging of Starmer to be so God-awful to allow them to wax lyrical about the halcyon days of Sunak and Hunt.
Says the supporter of lettuce Liz. She destroyed our party in the first place. If Rishi had won with the idiot members rather than Liz the Tories would have 100 more seats than now and the path back to power would be much easier.
His ongoing defence and veneration of Liz Truss is truly weird.
He must be the only one in the whole country.
What I don't understand about it is that she really wasn't very good. It's not like she was some misunderstood soul that will be appreciated in the future as a visionary. She was just crap, inarticulate, gave her boyfriend the second most important job in the country and then proceeded to just wreck the country's reputation for fiscal responsibility that had been hard won by the Tories over the 12 years prior to her after Labour trashed it in 2007-2009.
He thinks she represents the purest form of Thatcher's spirit and she was only blocked by the blob.
He possibly fancies her as well.
I don't venerate Truss at all. I have said fairly consistently that politically she was gauche. But her time in office does raise a lot of debates about political, economical and legal structures, and on almost all of those debates, I side with Truss. Tories like @MaxPB and @CasinoRoyale just hear noise when Truss talks, but if they listened, they'd realise that the sort of Government that they themselves want to see is going to run slap bang into the same barriers, the same condemnation, probably the same ridicule that Truss received, because the very adoption of those policies makes you a radical and an outsider. Buying in to Labour attack lines about her is completely the wrong approach.
They're all weak - but then Starmer is terrible and has an appallingly untalented cabinet. And they only have to beat the opposition, not the love child of Thatcher and Abe Lincoln
I'm not sure I care if Jenrick can build a good team and do the job.
He needs to not be solely obsessed with Rwanda/boats, though; that's important, and a big issue, but there will be huge opportunities to regain lots of DNV Tories and LD switchers on quasi-socialist economics.
I'd keep Hunt as Shadow Chancellor and go hard on Labour on tax & spend.
I think while in government the Rwanda policy only served to highlight how badly the government were failing on reducing those arrivals. Now that the Tories aren't in government they will need to work the boats angle hard to drive Labour voters to Reform and Reform voters back to the Tories. I think they also need an answer on winning back Lib Dem voters in the south of England but I'm not sure Jenrick would be well placed for it.
Are there really tonnes of Boris Johnson 'Get Brexit Done' 2019 fans who've gone over to the Lib Dems? It has never struck me as likely. Surely Lib Dem growth is mostly tactical Labour voters. And why go after them, when they represent a tiny number - Lib Dems underpolled Reform.
Because they hold 72 seats, most (but not all) of which had pretty low Reform totals. The Tories will inevitably win a lot of those back in due course. I don't see Reform displacing them as the main challengers in blue wall seats. But the Tories will certainly need to look competent for a bit first.
As to what they should do now. I think they should have a bit of fun. It's too early to start trying to elect a leader who looks like a PM in waiting. Have a go with Kemi Badenoch. She will entertain the base, give Labour some discomfort in PMQs, and keep the party in the headlines. I find her unappealing and antagonistic as a politician but that needn't matter yet, and I'm not the target audience.
What Conservatives can embrace now, which we've already seen on PB, is the joy of being in opposition. You can no longer be blamed for everything, that's someone else's problem. You can focus on policies and platforms that you really believe in, and you can really lay into the new government. It's a sort of release. It can be electorally disastrous - see both Corbyn and Swinson in 2019 - but quite cathartic. I would say they should lean into that for now. Do the whole triangulation and hugging of huskies later if they need to.
The Conservatives are likely to be called upon to govern very soon. I'm not saying this as some sort of Casino Royalesque bravado; I didn't even vote for them. SKS is genuinely a bit shit. He may also have fairly significant skeletons that may or may not have an impact on his already severely waning popularity.
But Labour have a Commons majority of 9,823. How on earth are they toppled outside war/plague/civil strife?
Curious maths and vote splitting got Labour where they are on a tiny % of the vote; similar forces could turn it the other way. FWIW I think next time will possibly depend on whether the nation veers in one of two ways, both possible:
To shore up the centre left mainstream, with Labour and LD being in fact unacknowledged allies (possible because English seats split up handily mostly either Con v Lab or Con v LD and not LD v Lab).
Or to look to a some form of Toryreform party (currently of course splitting votes) under the name Conservative, offering a really different, though thought out and costed (ie not Truss) alternative.
I want neither of these, but I'm a One Nation Tory.
It's a bit early to speculate, but I think it is certain the next election will be a cracker psephologically. It might even offer real alternatives policywise too.
A One Nation Tory who voted, um, Labour.
Yes. My guess is there were about 1-2 million of us. Maybe more. I have voted Tory for nearly 50 years. The Tory vote went from 14 m (2019) to just under 7 m (2024). And we were right.
No, you weren't. You made a fucking stupid decision and enabled a socialist.
I will never let you forget it.
Thanks. Lear puts it better:
I will have such revenges on you both, That all the world shall—I will do such things,— What they are, yet I know not: but they shall be The terrors of the earth.
I don't mind floating voters deciding to vote Labour. I can understand centrists deciding differently.
But what really grates my goat is people who have the temerity to claim to be loyal lifelong Tories who, when the chips are down, actually voter Labour without a flicker.
Yup, unless you voted Tory in 2019 AND 2024 you ain't a true Tory.
Just as unless you voted Labour in 2019 AND 2024 you ain't true Labour.
If you fall in neither of the above categories you are a floating voter really (unless say you voted for a minor party like the LDs or SNP in both GEs)
But who proudly claims loyalty to a party, aside from a few at the extremes? I didn't vote Tory in 2024. I don't mind you calling me not a true Tory. Because I'm not. I happened to vote Tory 2001-2019, but not out of any sort of loyalty - it was because for varying reasons I favoured either the Con candidate or a Con government over the realistic alternative. You can't shame people into voting Tory.
I do. I see loyalty as a virtue.
It's a shame it's not more common IMHO
I also value loyalty, but, to paraphrase something I read on a different website earlier today:
What does “loyalty” mean in a country where the people you failed are angry, and you despise what the party has become?
That's when you need to call on loyalty the most.
Look, I yielded to no-one in my criticism before the election but I backed my side because I thought Sunak was the better PM, my MP was a good egg, and I believe in Conservative values.
If I didn't I would have voted for someone else, or abstained, but I wouldn't have said I'm a lifelong Tory because I wouldn't have been.
Yes, okay.
I think you can extend that to party membership too. I think one reason that party memberships have become more extreme in general in Britain is because people have decided that the right response to the temporary leadership doing something they disagree with is to leave the party in protest, but that leaves the party only with its most committed core, and it has them lost the diversity that would keep it more connected to the communities it should be part of, so that it can change with them.
First! All the way from sunny breakfast time Colorado…
No dog?
Breakfast?
Hello JohnO, who are you supporting in this clash of the titans?
Preferences are Stride, Cleverly, Tugendhat….shrugs shoulders…then Badenoch but NEVER Jenrick.
I will never get over Jenrick's decision to paint over Disney characters at an Asylum detention centre. I just cannot relate to someone who would want to do that. Frightened, bewildered children and he wants to remove any sense of joy for something more dystopian. It is beyond vile. It is sick. Such an unbelievable lack of empathy makes him barely fit to be a member of the human race, let alone the leader of a political party.
Agreed, and I've never believed his excuse for that either.
I was implacably opposed to Grayling after he took books away from prisoners too.
Being tough and firm on political issues doesn't mean being a c**t as a virtue.
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Where would you put the zero longitude line?
Maybe anywhere which uses the Latin alphabet is in the west. That seems to largely work. Though perhaps recent events have dragged Ukraine into the west, and sub-Saharan Africa is sui generis.
First! All the way from sunny breakfast time Colorado…
No dog?
Breakfast?
Hello JohnO, who are you supporting in this clash of the titans?
Preferences are Stride, Cleverly, Tugendhat….shrugs shoulders…then Badenoch but NEVER Jenrick.
I will never get over Jenrick's decision to paint over Disney characters at an Asylum detention centre. I just cannot relate to someone who would want to do that. Frightened, bewildered children and he wants to remove any sense of joy for something more dystopian. It is beyond vile. It is sick. Such an unbelievable lack of empathy makes him barely fit to be a member of the human race, let alone the leader of a political party.
I liked the description I saw of Jenrick as "not the school bully, but the school bully's minion". I don't know how much he believes this stuff, as opposed to believing he has to act this way to get on, but it would be consistent with the overacting. One of the sad things about this process has been seeing Tugendhat showing a bit of leg to the right... and for what?
There is a simple difference between being firm and clear and just being obnoxious and vindictive. That vindictive flaw was one of May's major failings. Being gratuitously unpleasant just to try and score some political point with the scum of the earth is a line no decent politician should cross. Jenrick did. It troubles me that this is not seen as a red line by his fellow MPs.
First! All the way from sunny breakfast time Colorado…
No dog?
Breakfast?
Hello JohnO, who are you supporting in this clash of the titans?
Preferences are Stride, Cleverly, Tugendhat….shrugs shoulders…then Badenoch but NEVER Jenrick.
I will never get over Jenrick's decision to paint over Disney characters at an Asylum detention centre. I just cannot relate to someone who would want to do that. Frightened, bewildered children and he wants to remove any sense of joy for something more dystopian. It is beyond vile. It is sick. Such an unbelievable lack of empathy makes him barely fit to be a member of the human race, let alone the leader of a political party.
I liked the description I saw of Jenrick as "not the school bully, but the school bully's minion". I don't know how much he believes this stuff, as opposed to believing he has to act this way to get on, but it would be consistent with the overacting. One of the sad things about this process has been seeing Tugendhat showing a bit of leg to the right... and for what?
There is a simple difference between being firm and clear and just being obnoxious and vindictive. That vindictive flaw was one of May's major failings. Being gratuitously unpleasant just to try and score some political point with the scum of the earth is a line no decent politician should cross. Jenrick did. It troubles me that this is not seen as a red line by his fellow MPs.
If you subscribe to my view that Sunak's unpopularity was largely down to people thinking he was an arsehole, Jenrick is more of the same.
It's a shame really because I don't think Sunak really was an arsehole, just that for some reason he seemed to think that behaviour or perception was politically necessary. Same with May I think. Not sure about Jenrick.
The Irish Naval Service has commissioned two new ships today. One of the key advantages of the new ships is that they need fewer crew to put to sea than the other ships in the Irish fleet.
Which is just as well, because it won't be long until Chelsea employ more footballers than the Irish Naval Service have sailors.
The Irish Naval Service has commissioned two new ships today. One of the key advantages of the new ships is that they need fewer crew to put to sea than the other ships in the Irish fleet.
Which is just as well, because it won't be long until Chelsea employ more footballers than the Irish Naval Service have sailors.
But don't worry, through all the cutbacks and reductions, there will continue to be the same number of Admirals and Commodores.
One thing I have noticed, and this is purely based on anecdote, is many people who were previously very sure in themselves about voting to oust the Tories are now much less sure about their decision. If the next leader can harness this sentiment I think a win in 2029 isn't off the table.
People who are natural small c conservatives abandoned the party in July but even this small taste of their first Labour government since they were teenagers or in their early 20s has begun to make them see sense.
Yep, the best antidote to Labour is seeing Labour in office.
So many people I know are properly shitting it about this budget at the end of October.
Everybody knew there was going to be a reckoning - there should have been one immediately after the pandemic, a one off tax raid to try and recoup some of the millions thrown at the economy by Sunak when Chancellor (parts of which were defrauded by some).
We are still borrowing £80-£90 billion a year - the priority must be to get the public finances back somewhere near balance and that's going to need a mix of tax rises and spending cuts and that's what October will be about.
Not really, the Tories weren't planning to massively jack up spending on pointless state largesse - and they did have a plan to get us back to black.
Did they bollocks. They put off having any realistic fiscal plan to the other side of the election, exactly as Starmer did.
Nonsense. More hysteria from you.
There was a fiscal plan to have debt dropping as a %GDP by 2028-29 when the tax thresholds would be unfrozen as well.
That plan was like my "have a hot date with Margot Robbie by 2028/9" plan.
Whatever one thinks of the ambition in either case, there wasn't the remotest hint of a series of steps that might turn that ambition onto reality.
A plan, in other words.
Absolute nonsense.
There was a serious plan to have our debt falling by 2028-29 with market credibility and it was well on its way to being met.
The plan was, and still is, for debt to be falling as a % of GDP by the fifth year moving forwards, ie in 2024 it is 28/29; next year it will be 29/30. The year itself is never reached. It suits both parties to be silent on this conjuring trick. One day it will come home to roost, as conjuring tricks always do. Like QE (another name for printing money) is in the end an engine of soaring asset prices and inflation.
First! All the way from sunny breakfast time Colorado…
No dog?
Breakfast?
Hello JohnO, who are you supporting in this clash of the titans?
Preferences are Stride, Cleverly, Tugendhat….shrugs shoulders…then Badenoch but NEVER Jenrick.
I will never get over Jenrick's decision to paint over Disney characters at an Asylum detention centre. I just cannot relate to someone who would want to do that. Frightened, bewildered children and he wants to remove any sense of joy for something more dystopian. It is beyond vile. It is sick. Such an unbelievable lack of empathy makes him barely fit to be a member of the human race, let alone the leader of a political party.
I liked the description I saw of Jenrick as "not the school bully, but the school bully's minion". I don't know how much he believes this stuff, as opposed to believing he has to act this way to get on, but it would be consistent with the overacting. One of the sad things about this process has been seeing Tugendhat showing a bit of leg to the right... and for what?
There is a simple difference between being firm and clear and just being obnoxious and vindictive. That vindictive flaw was one of May's major failings. Being gratuitously unpleasant just to try and score some political point with the scum of the earth is a line no decent politician should cross. Jenrick did. It troubles me that this is not seen as a red line by his fellow MPs.
One of the things that went badly wrong at some point was the decomissioning of red line detectors. And it's not just about one party, or even about politics. But a more generalised "we can improve X by doing Y, and if anyone points out that Y is simply wrong we will say 'don't you care about X?' to them".
As for Jenrickism as a way of wooing Reformers back, the big risk is that Jenrickism will always be seen as diet Reform. Just one calorie, not evil enough...
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
They're all weak - but then Starmer is terrible and has an appallingly untalented cabinet. And they only have to beat the opposition, not the love child of Thatcher and Abe Lincoln
I'm not sure I care if Jenrick can build a good team and do the job.
He needs to not be solely obsessed with Rwanda/boats, though; that's important, and a big issue, but there will be huge opportunities to regain lots of DNV Tories and LD switchers on quasi-socialist economics.
I'd keep Hunt as Shadow Chancellor and go hard on Labour on tax & spend.
I think while in government the Rwanda policy only served to highlight how badly the government were failing on reducing those arrivals. Now that the Tories aren't in government they will need to work the boats angle hard to drive Labour voters to Reform and Reform voters back to the Tories. I think they also need an answer on winning back Lib Dem voters in the south of England but I'm not sure Jenrick would be well placed for it.
Are there really tonnes of Boris Johnson 'Get Brexit Done' 2019 fans who've gone over to the Lib Dems? It has never struck me as likely. Surely Lib Dem growth is mostly tactical Labour voters. And why go after them, when they represent a tiny number - Lib Dems underpolled Reform.
Because they hold 72 seats, most (but not all) of which had pretty low Reform totals. The Tories will inevitably win a lot of those back in due course. I don't see Reform displacing them as the main challengers in blue wall seats. But the Tories will certainly need to look competent for a bit first.
As to what they should do now. I think they should have a bit of fun. It's too early to start trying to elect a leader who looks like a PM in waiting. Have a go with Kemi Badenoch. She will entertain the base, give Labour some discomfort in PMQs, and keep the party in the headlines. I find her unappealing and antagonistic as a politician but that needn't matter yet, and I'm not the target audience.
What Conservatives can embrace now, which we've already seen on PB, is the joy of being in opposition. You can no longer be blamed for everything, that's someone else's problem. You can focus on policies and platforms that you really believe in, and you can really lay into the new government. It's a sort of release. It can be electorally disastrous - see both Corbyn and Swinson in 2019 - but quite cathartic. I would say they should lean into that for now. Do the whole triangulation and hugging of huskies later if they need to.
The Conservatives are likely to be called upon to govern very soon. I'm not saying this as some sort of Casino Royalesque bravado; I didn't even vote for them. SKS is genuinely a bit shit. He may also have fairly significant skeletons that may or may not have an impact on his already severely waning popularity.
But Labour have a Commons majority of 9,823. How on earth are they toppled outside war/plague/civil strife?
Curious maths and vote splitting got Labour where they are on a tiny % of the vote; similar forces could turn it the other way. FWIW I think next time will possibly depend on whether the nation veers in one of two ways, both possible:
To shore up the centre left mainstream, with Labour and LD being in fact unacknowledged allies (possible because English seats split up handily mostly either Con v Lab or Con v LD and not LD v Lab).
Or to look to a some form of Toryreform party (currently of course splitting votes) under the name Conservative, offering a really different, though thought out and costed (ie not Truss) alternative.
I want neither of these, but I'm a One Nation Tory.
It's a bit early to speculate, but I think it is certain the next election will be a cracker psephologically. It might even offer real alternatives policywise too.
A One Nation Tory who voted, um, Labour.
Yes. My guess is there were about 1-2 million of us. Maybe more. I have voted Tory for nearly 50 years. The Tory vote went from 14 m (2019) to just under 7 m (2024). And we were right.
No, you weren't. You made a fucking stupid decision and enabled a socialist.
I will never let you forget it.
As opposed to the incompetent Blairite-lite called R. Sunak?
The Tories had 9 years to show they could be Tories. They failed massively.
I disagree. Sunak was cutting tax towards the end, as far as he could in fiscal rules.
He had to deal with the aftermath of Covid, Boris and the Trussterfuck in the constraints of economic reality.
He also "cancelled" HS2(*) and copied NZ's smoking ban concept, to name two terrible ideas that immediately spring to mind.
(*) Inverted commas because in 20 years when the need is unarguable even to the muppets in the Treasury it will get revived, but by then at twice the cost.
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
They're all weak - but then Starmer is terrible and has an appallingly untalented cabinet. And they only have to beat the opposition, not the love child of Thatcher and Abe Lincoln
I'm not sure I care if Jenrick can build a good team and do the job.
He needs to not be solely obsessed with Rwanda/boats, though; that's important, and a big issue, but there will be huge opportunities to regain lots of DNV Tories and LD switchers on quasi-socialist economics.
I'd keep Hunt as Shadow Chancellor and go hard on Labour on tax & spend.
I think while in government the Rwanda policy only served to highlight how badly the government were failing on reducing those arrivals. Now that the Tories aren't in government they will need to work the boats angle hard to drive Labour voters to Reform and Reform voters back to the Tories. I think they also need an answer on winning back Lib Dem voters in the south of England but I'm not sure Jenrick would be well placed for it.
Are there really tonnes of Boris Johnson 'Get Brexit Done' 2019 fans who've gone over to the Lib Dems? It has never struck me as likely. Surely Lib Dem growth is mostly tactical Labour voters. And why go after them, when they represent a tiny number - Lib Dems underpolled Reform.
Because they hold 72 seats, most (but not all) of which had pretty low Reform totals. The Tories will inevitably win a lot of those back in due course. I don't see Reform displacing them as the main challengers in blue wall seats. But the Tories will certainly need to look competent for a bit first.
As to what they should do now. I think they should have a bit of fun. It's too early to start trying to elect a leader who looks like a PM in waiting. Have a go with Kemi Badenoch. She will entertain the base, give Labour some discomfort in PMQs, and keep the party in the headlines. I find her unappealing and antagonistic as a politician but that needn't matter yet, and I'm not the target audience.
What Conservatives can embrace now, which we've already seen on PB, is the joy of being in opposition. You can no longer be blamed for everything, that's someone else's problem. You can focus on policies and platforms that you really believe in, and you can really lay into the new government. It's a sort of release. It can be electorally disastrous - see both Corbyn and Swinson in 2019 - but quite cathartic. I would say they should lean into that for now. Do the whole triangulation and hugging of huskies later if they need to.
The Conservatives are likely to be called upon to govern very soon. I'm not saying this as some sort of Casino Royalesque bravado; I didn't even vote for them. SKS is genuinely a bit shit. He may also have fairly significant skeletons that may or may not have an impact on his already severely waning popularity.
But Labour have a Commons majority of 9,823. How on earth are they toppled outside war/plague/civil strife?
Curious maths and vote splitting got Labour where they are on a tiny % of the vote; similar forces could turn it the other way. FWIW I think next time will possibly depend on whether the nation veers in one of two ways, both possible:
To shore up the centre left mainstream, with Labour and LD being in fact unacknowledged allies (possible because English seats split up handily mostly either Con v Lab or Con v LD and not LD v Lab).
Or to look to a some form of Toryreform party (currently of course splitting votes) under the name Conservative, offering a really different, though thought out and costed (ie not Truss) alternative.
I want neither of these, but I'm a One Nation Tory.
It's a bit early to speculate, but I think it is certain the next election will be a cracker psephologically. It might even offer real alternatives policywise too.
A One Nation Tory who voted, um, Labour.
Yes. My guess is there were about 1-2 million of us. Maybe more. I have voted Tory for nearly 50 years. The Tory vote went from 14 m (2019) to just under 7 m (2024). And we were right.
No, you weren't. You made a fucking stupid decision and enabled a socialist.
I will never let you forget it.
As opposed to the incompetent Blairite-lite called R. Sunak?
The Tories had 9 years to show they could be Tories. They failed massively.
I disagree. Sunak was cutting tax towards the end, as far as he could in fiscal rules.
He had to deal with the aftermath of Covid, Boris and the Trussterfuck in the constraints of economic reality.
He also "cancelled" HS2(*) and copied NZ's smoking ban concept, to name two terrible ideas that immediately spring to mind.
(*) Inverted commas because in 20 years when the need is unarguable even to the muppets in the Treasury it will get revived, but by then at twice the cost.
A revision of the fiscal rules and HS2 to Manchester would be a gigantic rabbit-out-of-hat at the budget.
The Irish Naval Service has commissioned two new ships today. One of the key advantages of the new ships is that they need fewer crew to put to sea than the other ships in the Irish fleet.
Which is just as well, because it won't be long until Chelsea employ more footballers than the Irish Naval Service have sailors.
But don't worry, through all the cutbacks and reductions, there will continue to be the same number of Admirals and Commodores.
It looks like the current highest rank is Commodore, but if the Corporation Tax receipts keep flowing I wouldn't bet against an Admiral before too long.
They're all weak - but then Starmer is terrible and has an appallingly untalented cabinet. And they only have to beat the opposition, not the love child of Thatcher and Abe Lincoln
I'm not sure I care if Jenrick can build a good team and do the job.
He needs to not be solely obsessed with Rwanda/boats, though; that's important, and a big issue, but there will be huge opportunities to regain lots of DNV Tories and LD switchers on quasi-socialist economics.
I'd keep Hunt as Shadow Chancellor and go hard on Labour on tax & spend.
I think while in government the Rwanda policy only served to highlight how badly the government were failing on reducing those arrivals. Now that the Tories aren't in government they will need to work the boats angle hard to drive Labour voters to Reform and Reform voters back to the Tories. I think they also need an answer on winning back Lib Dem voters in the south of England but I'm not sure Jenrick would be well placed for it.
Are there really tonnes of Boris Johnson 'Get Brexit Done' 2019 fans who've gone over to the Lib Dems? It has never struck me as likely. Surely Lib Dem growth is mostly tactical Labour voters. And why go after them, when they represent a tiny number - Lib Dems underpolled Reform.
Because they hold 72 seats, most (but not all) of which had pretty low Reform totals. The Tories will inevitably win a lot of those back in due course. I don't see Reform displacing them as the main challengers in blue wall seats. But the Tories will certainly need to look competent for a bit first.
As to what they should do now. I think they should have a bit of fun. It's too early to start trying to elect a leader who looks like a PM in waiting. Have a go with Kemi Badenoch. She will entertain the base, give Labour some discomfort in PMQs, and keep the party in the headlines. I find her unappealing and antagonistic as a politician but that needn't matter yet, and I'm not the target audience.
What Conservatives can embrace now, which we've already seen on PB, is the joy of being in opposition. You can no longer be blamed for everything, that's someone else's problem. You can focus on policies and platforms that you really believe in, and you can really lay into the new government. It's a sort of release. It can be electorally disastrous - see both Corbyn and Swinson in 2019 - but quite cathartic. I would say they should lean into that for now. Do the whole triangulation and hugging of huskies later if they need to.
The Conservatives are likely to be called upon to govern very soon. I'm not saying this as some sort of Casino Royalesque bravado; I didn't even vote for them. SKS is genuinely a bit shit. He may also have fairly significant skeletons that may or may not have an impact on his already severely waning popularity.
But Labour have a Commons majority of 9,823. How on earth are they toppled outside war/plague/civil strife?
PM forced to resign, successor forced to resign, successor goes to the country. That's how it worked with Boris's stonking majority.
Yes; it's very fragile. 33.7% of the vote, and fewer actual votes than Corbyn in both 2017 and 2019 is precarious. But curiously all the parties are precarious. Put together Labour's low vote numbers. the Reform splitting Tory seats, the inevitable fragility of LDs massive numbers and SNP meltdown. The policy issues are all boring us to death, but the subterranean psephology and tactics is remarkable.
And it is not only the UK. Anyone heard how our USA friends are getting on? And France. And Germany. And Italy. And Canada.
What's interesting to me is that all of the traditional parties seem to be struggling with all the same problems and none of them will work together to formulate a plan to combat illegal immigration. Even within the EU there is so much disagreement on how to handle it with Italy the only country talking sense and more widely across the world countries on the receiving end of illegal immigration need to start discussions on reform the ECHR and UN convention on refugees to take into account modern mobility of people vs when those were written.
A smart Tory leader will go down this route rather than try and go it alone like they did last time with the Rwanda policy. There needs to be a much broader agreement on what to do about illegal immigration and it needs to come from the UK, Germany, France and Italy in Europe so the ECHR can be reformed and no longer used as a shield for deportation by illegal immigrants and foreign criminals.
Established elites across Europe and the West still think it's ick to deal with illegal/mass immigration, because they'd both be shunned in their social circles and they also benefit from it economically in their personal ones.
This is risible nonsense. Some bizarre culture war/great replacement theory mash-up. Governments across Europe and the West are working to tackle illegal immigration. The commentariat spend their whole time talking about immigration. And you, Casino, as a very high earner who sends his kids to private school, you are the elite.
Which western government has a policy of net zero migration?
And which western government has suggested reforming the ECHR? Anyone who talks about it gets shouted down as "evil" or "fascist". The document is 65 years old, it was written in a different era of travel, it needs to be modernised and the four major European nations need to come to an agreement and force through changes to make it easier to deport illegal immigrants and foreign criminals. Without it parties like AfD, Reform, NR, Vox, FdI will continue to make big gains across the continent and then the ECHR will just get thrown out.
It's not even the ECHR per se but the Strasbourg court's pernicious "living instrument doctrine" which allows them to make up entirely new rights that the judges think people should have.
One thing I have noticed, and this is purely based on anecdote, is many people who were previously very sure in themselves about voting to oust the Tories are now much less sure about their decision. If the next leader can harness this sentiment I think a win in 2029 isn't off the table.
People who are natural small c conservatives abandoned the party in July but even this small taste of their first Labour government since they were teenagers or in their early 20s has begun to make them see sense.
Yep, the best antidote to Labour is seeing Labour in office.
So many people I know are properly shitting it about this budget at the end of October.
Everybody knew there was going to be a reckoning - there should have been one immediately after the pandemic, a one off tax raid to try and recoup some of the millions thrown at the economy by Sunak when Chancellor (parts of which were defrauded by some).
We are still borrowing £80-£90 billion a year - the priority must be to get the public finances back somewhere near balance and that's going to need a mix of tax rises and spending cuts and that's what October will be about.
You don't like the answer but it involves cutting state employment by a substantial number and completely reworking the benefits system. There is no path to a balanced budget while 3m people sit in sickness benefits and 1/5 people are on the state payroll, the other 4 people simply don't pay enough tax to cover it all.
All a bit glib and predictable from the Conservative end of the fence - call it "austerity" or just having another pop at the "public sector".
Let's have some specifics - which "state payroll" jobs are you going to lose, Police, Fire, Armed Forces, School Teachers? As an aside, everyone on the "state payroll" pays taxes as well and spends money and contributes to the economy even if they are paid from public funds.
50% cuts across the board in the NHS to anyone who doesn't have a patient facing role. A 50% cut in the civil service in all departments, see what breaks if anything and then move from there.
I'd also freeze public sector pay in the middle for a period of 5 years, the only way to move up the pay scale is to get promoted or leave for the private sector.
Another easy cut is banning the use of agency staff across the state, no more locums being paid 4x the rate and doctors and nurses being lured into agency work. Just kill the entire sector. I have no issue with them working in the private sector or if the private hospitals want to waste money on locums but the agency rip off merchants need to be cut asap. Another easy cut is putting a hard cap on consultancy fees and the use of external consultants.
I would also cut a deal with OpenAI to introduce AI chat bots across all departments so that phone agents are free to actually talk to people who need it.
A 50% cut across the civil service would mean around 260,000 dismissals - presuming that would do wonders for processing asylum claims, sorting out planning appeals etc.
I can't speak to the use of agency staff in terms of numbers but as for consultants, they are often used in local Government to provide a specialism or fill a short term gap in a particular area. A Council isn't going to make a full time role of what a Consultant provides - often, Members want Consultants because they can't or won't believe what Officers tell them and want an "independent" view. If you can spare £1,500 a day you can get a lot of independent view.
To be fair, with most Councils short of money, the days of easy money for Consultants are probably over. As for Chat bots, already being used by Councils to resolve simple transactions.
Most of what you propose is impractical and would cause huge disruption but fine if you can persuade the Conservative Party it's "the answer" - it hasn't been up to now.
I'm not saying there's no fat to cut in parts of the "public sector" but there isn't a pot of gold at the end of that rainbow.
I regularly work with teams of council direct labour kerbside refuse collectors. When new journeymen Directors of Frontline Services are recruited, their remit is to cut costs without reducing service provision. So in they come realising their only costs to cut are the Labour force. Say they start with 100 collectors and their cost cutting target is a 30% reduction so 30 are laid off. The new Service Director polishes his halo and probably gets a promotion elsewhere. He has after all cut costs by 30%. However, the service provision is sub-standard and the complaints are up 500%. So in order to equalise the service 10 agency staff are employed, still the complaints come in, so another 10 are recruited, and then another 10. So we are back up to 100 heads but the costs for those 30 agency heads are 40% higher per head than the DLO 70. So the 30 are given permanent contracts. We have a 100 headcount just as we started. Then the Chief Executive recruits another Section Director and the cycle starts again.
PB armchair economists know the cost of everything and the value of nothing.
Exactly the same stupid approach applied in the retail bank I used to work for.
Directors were forever lauding their own success in 'streamlining', 'de-layering', and 'productivity improvements' but the total number of staff, employees + contract, only ever seemed to go up even though the business was not growing.
Productivity has only ever improved by improving the process - generally through mechanisation.
So, when it comes to kerbside refuse collection - how can we make it possible for the employee to collect the more refuse for the same or *less* effort and time? Better trucks? Better bins that can be automatically emptied into the trucks?
One thing I have noticed, and this is purely based on anecdote, is many people who were previously very sure in themselves about voting to oust the Tories are now much less sure about their decision. If the next leader can harness this sentiment I think a win in 2029 isn't off the table.
People who are natural small c conservatives abandoned the party in July but even this small taste of their first Labour government since they were teenagers or in their early 20s has begun to make them see sense.
Yep, the best antidote to Labour is seeing Labour in office.
So many people I know are properly shitting it about this budget at the end of October.
Everybody knew there was going to be a reckoning - there should have been one immediately after the pandemic, a one off tax raid to try and recoup some of the millions thrown at the economy by Sunak when Chancellor (parts of which were defrauded by some).
We are still borrowing £80-£90 billion a year - the priority must be to get the public finances back somewhere near balance and that's going to need a mix of tax rises and spending cuts and that's what October will be about.
Not really, the Tories weren't planning to massively jack up spending on pointless state largesse - and they did have a plan to get us back to black.
Did they bollocks. They put off having any realistic fiscal plan to the other side of the election, exactly as Starmer did.
Nonsense. More hysteria from you.
There was a fiscal plan to have debt dropping as a %GDP by 2028-29 when the tax thresholds would be unfrozen as well.
Always five years in the future, and always with policies that they knew they wouldn't implement, like increasing fuel duty. Deferred every budget.
It was a complete work of fiction. You're clever enough to see that.
It wasn't fiction. They were on course to deliver it.
The reason it slipped previously- see the budget of 2018 or 2019, for example - was because of the black swan event of Covid.
Then, we had the CoL crisis and inflationary spike with interest rates that destroyed the old plan, and a need for higher defence spending.
I don't expect everyone to be happy about all that but they are good reasons why the government had a very difficult wicket.
By "Covid", of course, you mean "lockdown". Another very un-Tory policy of the last Parliament.
First! All the way from sunny breakfast time Colorado…
No dog?
Breakfast?
Hello JohnO, who are you supporting in this clash of the titans?
Preferences are Stride, Cleverly, Tugendhat….shrugs shoulders…then Badenoch but NEVER Jenrick.
I will never get over Jenrick's decision to paint over Disney characters at an Asylum detention centre. I just cannot relate to someone who would want to do that. Frightened, bewildered children and he wants to remove any sense of joy for something more dystopian. It is beyond vile. It is sick. Such an unbelievable lack of empathy makes him barely fit to be a member of the human race, let alone the leader of a political party.
I liked the description I saw of Jenrick as "not the school bully, but the school bully's minion". I don't know how much he believes this stuff, as opposed to believing he has to act this way to get on, but it would be consistent with the overacting. One of the sad things about this process has been seeing Tugendhat showing a bit of leg to the right... and for what?
There is a simple difference between being firm and clear and just being obnoxious and vindictive. That vindictive flaw was one of May's major failings. Being gratuitously unpleasant just to try and score some political point with the scum of the earth is a line no decent politician should cross. Jenrick did. It troubles me that this is not seen as a red line by his fellow MPs.
One of the things that went badly wrong at some point was the decomissioning of red line detectors. And it's not just about one party, or even about politics. But a more generalised "we can improve X by doing Y, and if anyone points out that Y is simply wrong we will say 'don't you care about X?' to them".
As for Jenrickism as a way of wooing Reformers back, the big risk is that Jenrickism will always be seen as diet Reform. Just one calorie, not evil enough...
The Tory leadership contest is a race to the bottom . Tugendhats unedifying and desperate attempts to appeal to Tory members has been particularly tragic . Stride is probably the least vomit inducing followed by Cleverly.
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
He’s correct on both points.
You are aware of the history of council house sales, and what happened to the proceeds ?
Redwood was a Tory MP from 1987. It’s a bit bloody late for him to be coming to this stunning conclusion.
Harris proposes lower capital gains tax increase than Biden
https://thehill.com/business/4862125-harris-proposes-lower-capital-gains-tax/ … Harris said during a campaign speech in New Hampshire said she wants to increase the capital gains tax to 28 percent for those with $1 million or more in income, up from its current effective level of 23.6 percent. Harris’s proposal is well shy of the 44.6 percent rate proposed in a budget update from the Biden administration in July. It is also lower than the proposed increase to 39.6 percent included in the president’s most recent budget. “If you earn a million dollars a year or more, the tax rate on your long-term capital gains will be 28 percent under my plan, because we know when the government encourages investment, it leads to broad based economic growth,” Harris said in New Hampshire...
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
He’s correct on both points.
You are aware of the history of council house sales, and what happened to the proceeds ?
Redwood was a Tory MP from 1987. It’s a bit bloody late for him to be coming to this stunning conclusion.
Yes but it remains true that council house sales didn’t cause a housing shortage.
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Where would you put the zero longitude line?
Maybe anywhere which uses the Latin alphabet is in the west. That seems to largely work. Though perhaps recent events have dragged Ukraine into the west, and sub-Saharan Africa is sui generis.
In arguing that the West is an direction rather than a place I think I have kicked off the most pointless argument ever on PB. Is there a prize?
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Where would you put the zero longitude line?
Maybe anywhere which uses the Latin alphabet is in the west. That seems to largely work. Though perhaps recent events have dragged Ukraine into the west, and sub-Saharan Africa is sui generis.
In arguing that the West is an direction rather than a place I think I have kicked off the most pointless argument ever on PB. Is there a prize?
A prize?!?! More like an indelible blot upon your immortal (or is it immoral?) soul!
Orwellian debate (up to and including debate on Himself) is PB privlege AND purgatgory.
They're all weak - but then Starmer is terrible and has an appallingly untalented cabinet. And they only have to beat the opposition, not the love child of Thatcher and Abe Lincoln
I'm not sure I care if Jenrick can build a good team and do the job.
He needs to not be solely obsessed with Rwanda/boats, though; that's important, and a big issue, but there will be huge opportunities to regain lots of DNV Tories and LD switchers on quasi-socialist economics.
I'd keep Hunt as Shadow Chancellor and go hard on Labour on tax & spend.
I think while in government the Rwanda policy only served to highlight how badly the government were failing on reducing those arrivals. Now that the Tories aren't in government they will need to work the boats angle hard to drive Labour voters to Reform and Reform voters back to the Tories. I think they also need an answer on winning back Lib Dem voters in the south of England but I'm not sure Jenrick would be well placed for it.
Are there really tonnes of Boris Johnson 'Get Brexit Done' 2019 fans who've gone over to the Lib Dems? It has never struck me as likely. Surely Lib Dem growth is mostly tactical Labour voters. And why go after them, when they represent a tiny number - Lib Dems underpolled Reform.
Because they hold 72 seats, most (but not all) of which had pretty low Reform totals. The Tories will inevitably win a lot of those back in due course. I don't see Reform displacing them as the main challengers in blue wall seats. But the Tories will certainly need to look competent for a bit first.
As to what they should do now. I think they should have a bit of fun. It's too early to start trying to elect a leader who looks like a PM in waiting. Have a go with Kemi Badenoch. She will entertain the base, give Labour some discomfort in PMQs, and keep the party in the headlines. I find her unappealing and antagonistic as a politician but that needn't matter yet, and I'm not the target audience.
What Conservatives can embrace now, which we've already seen on PB, is the joy of being in opposition. You can no longer be blamed for everything, that's someone else's problem. You can focus on policies and platforms that you really believe in, and you can really lay into the new government. It's a sort of release. It can be electorally disastrous - see both Corbyn and Swinson in 2019 - but quite cathartic. I would say they should lean into that for now. Do the whole triangulation and hugging of huskies later if they need to.
The Conservatives are likely to be called upon to govern very soon. I'm not saying this as some sort of Casino Royalesque bravado; I didn't even vote for them. SKS is genuinely a bit shit. He may also have fairly significant skeletons that may or may not have an impact on his already severely waning popularity.
But Labour have a Commons majority of 9,823. How on earth are they toppled outside war/plague/civil strife?
Curious maths and vote splitting got Labour where they are on a tiny % of the vote; similar forces could turn it the other way. FWIW I think next time will possibly depend on whether the nation veers in one of two ways, both possible:
To shore up the centre left mainstream, with Labour and LD being in fact unacknowledged allies (possible because English seats split up handily mostly either Con v Lab or Con v LD and not LD v Lab).
Or to look to a some form of Toryreform party (currently of course splitting votes) under the name Conservative, offering a really different, though thought out and costed (ie not Truss) alternative.
I want neither of these, but I'm a One Nation Tory.
It's a bit early to speculate, but I think it is certain the next election will be a cracker psephologically. It might even offer real alternatives policywise too.
A One Nation Tory who voted, um, Labour.
Yes. My guess is there were about 1-2 million of us. Maybe more. I have voted Tory for nearly 50 years. The Tory vote went from 14 m (2019) to just under 7 m (2024). And we were right.
No, you weren't. You made a fucking stupid decision and enabled a socialist.
I will never let you forget it.
Thanks. Lear puts it better:
I will have such revenges on you both, That all the world shall—I will do such things,— What they are, yet I know not: but they shall be The terrors of the earth.
I don't mind floating voters deciding to vote Labour. I can understand centrists deciding differently.
But what really grates my goat is people who have the temerity to claim to be loyal lifelong Tories who, when the chips are down, actually voter Labour without a flicker.
Yup, unless you voted Tory in 2019 AND 2024 you ain't a true Tory.
Just as unless you voted Labour in 2019 AND 2024 you ain't true Labour.
If you fall in neither of the above categories you are a floating voter really (unless say you voted for a minor party like the LDs or SNP in both GEs)
But who proudly claims loyalty to a party, aside from a few at the extremes? I didn't vote Tory in 2024. I don't mind you calling me not a true Tory. Because I'm not. I happened to vote Tory 2001-2019, but not out of any sort of loyalty - it was because for varying reasons I favoured either the Con candidate or a Con government over the realistic alternative. You can't shame people into voting Tory.
I do. I see loyalty as a virtue.
It's a shame it's not more common IMHO
I couldn't disagree more strongly. If you always vote for a party in any circumstances it's pretty clear you aren't thinking about your vote and are just tribally marking your X.
The country has a roughly equal share of these people on each side, which is good because they cancel each other out, but the numbers are high enough to be bad because it makes it almost impossible for either main party to be replaced.
First! All the way from sunny breakfast time Colorado…
No dog?
Breakfast?
Hello JohnO, who are you supporting in this clash of the titans?
Preferences are Stride, Cleverly, Tugendhat….shrugs shoulders…then Badenoch but NEVER Jenrick.
Why never Jenrick?
Borderline corruption over the Richard Desmond Westferry planning application; breaching COVID rules, that mural, and open public support for Trump (I’m not sure which is worse: his actually endorses MAGA or cynically that will heighten his appeal to the membership).
Labour and LDs would have a field day…
Jenrick is the best positioned to be able to deliver poll leads by suppressing the Reform vote and then pivoting to the centre for the next election. The others all risk oblivion for the party.
They ALL risk oblivion.
Even Kemi Badenoch who appears slightly less weird will toil to get a hearing. Robert Generic is exactly who I want as Tory leader, but then, I never want to see another Tory government ever.
(I thought @SeaShantyIrish2 was resident in Washington State. Is he not?)
As a proud American he (quite rightly) takes issue on behalf of the sunshine state, as I would if someone was gratuitously offensive about Rutland or The Vale of Glamorgan.
https://www.populationpyramid.net/united-kingdom/1990/ is the place to look at the changing demograpcs by age of our countryby years. The chart can hop by single tears or jumps of 5. Watch the shape change over time and it is clear that the growth is in the over 65s, despite assumptions on migration continuing at large scale.
If the oldies want their WFP back and the Triple lock, then they need to import workers. That's the choice, and the debate needed on immigration.
Reform and the Tory's Zero migration policy means major cuts in state provision to the elderly.
https://www.populationpyramid.net/united-kingdom/1990/ is the place to look at the changing demograpcs by age of our countryby years. The chart can hop by single tears or jumps of 5. Watch the shape change over time and it is clear that the growth is in the over 65s, despite assumptions on migration continuing at large scale.
If the oldies want their WFP back and the Triple lock, then they need to import workers. That's the choice, and the debate needed on immigration.
Reform and the Tory's Zero migration policy means major cuts in state provision to the elderly.
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Where would you put the zero longitude line?
Maybe anywhere which uses the Latin alphabet is in the west. That seems to largely work. Though perhaps recent events have dragged Ukraine into the west, and sub-Saharan Africa is sui generis.
In arguing that the West is an direction rather than a place I think I have kicked off the most pointless argument ever on PB. Is there a prize?
There have been far, far more pointless discussions than this one. I think it's quite illuminating!
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
Except Maggie banned councils from spending receipts on building replacement council housing because of her fiscal policies.
The long term effect of selling council houses was to transfer council houses to private BTLblandlords, after a short period of owner occupiers. Hence the declining rates of home ownership, and falling Tory vote share in the working age population.
Harris proposes lower capital gains tax increase than Biden
https://thehill.com/business/4862125-harris-proposes-lower-capital-gains-tax/ … Harris said during a campaign speech in New Hampshire said she wants to increase the capital gains tax to 28 percent for those with $1 million or more in income, up from its current effective level of 23.6 percent. Harris’s proposal is well shy of the 44.6 percent rate proposed in a budget update from the Biden administration in July. It is also lower than the proposed increase to 39.6 percent included in the president’s most recent budget. “If you earn a million dollars a year or more, the tax rate on your long-term capital gains will be 28 percent under my plan, because we know when the government encourages investment, it leads to broad based economic growth,” Harris said in New Hampshire...
https://www.populationpyramid.net/united-kingdom/1990/ is the place to look at the changing demograpcs by age of our countryby years. The chart can hop by single tears or jumps of 5. Watch the shape change over time and it is clear that the growth is in the over 65s, despite assumptions on migration continuing at large scale.
If the oldies want their WFP back and the Triple lock, then they need to import workers. That's the choice, and the debate needed on immigration.
Reform and the Tory's Zero migration policy means major cuts in state provision to the elderly.
Why do the oldies get to choose?
We all get to choose, but the active electorate is heavily weighted to the elderly.
If we working age voters get Zero net migration then we are making our own retirement enviable.
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Where would you put the zero longitude line?
Maybe anywhere which uses the Latin alphabet is in the west. That seems to largely work. Though perhaps recent events have dragged Ukraine into the west, and sub-Saharan Africa is sui generis.
In arguing that the West is an direction rather than a place I think I have kicked off the most pointless argument ever on PB. Is there a prize?
There have been far, far more pointless discussions than this one. I think it's quite illuminating!
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Where would you put the zero longitude line?
Maybe anywhere which uses the Latin alphabet is in the west. That seems to largely work. Though perhaps recent events have dragged Ukraine into the west, and sub-Saharan Africa is sui generis.
In arguing that the West is an direction rather than a place I think I have kicked off the most pointless argument ever on PB. Is there a prize?
There have been far, far more pointless discussions than this one. I think it's quite illuminating!
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Where would you put the zero longitude line?
Maybe anywhere which uses the Latin alphabet is in the west. That seems to largely work. Though perhaps recent events have dragged Ukraine into the west, and sub-Saharan Africa is sui generis.
In arguing that the West is an direction rather than a place I think I have kicked off the most pointless argument ever on PB. Is there a prize?
There have been far, far more pointless discussions than this one. I think it's quite illuminating!
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
Except Maggie banned councils from spending receipts on building replacement council housing because of her fiscal policies.
The long term effect of selling council houses was to transfer council houses to private BTLblandlords, after a short period of owner occupiers. Hence the declining rates of home ownership, and falling Tory vote share in the working age population.
Why was this decline most pronounced under New Labour?
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
Except Maggie banned councils from spending receipts on building replacement council housing because of her fiscal policies.
The long term effect of selling council houses was to transfer council houses to private BTLblandlords, after a short period of owner occupiers. Hence the declining rates of home ownership, and falling Tory vote share in the working age population.
Why was this decline most pronounced under New Labour?
Really collapsed under Brown's government and early years Cameron's government above all
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Where would you put the zero longitude line?
Maybe anywhere which uses the Latin alphabet is in the west. That seems to largely work. Though perhaps recent events have dragged Ukraine into the west, and sub-Saharan Africa is sui generis.
In arguing that the West is an direction rather than a place I think I have kicked off the most pointless argument ever on PB. Is there a prize?
There have been far, far more pointless discussions than this one. I think it's quite illuminating!
There was the one on when autumn starts...
Guess Boris’ Weight was the classic of the genre
Indeed! And worthy of revival?
SO just how much does Boris Johnson weigh in at these days?
My guess is, seventeen stone and a cinder block, plus a couple of bricks, and a clenched fist full of gravel.
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
He’s correct on both points.
You are aware of the history of council house sales, and what happened to the proceeds ?
Redwood was a Tory MP from 1987. It’s a bit bloody late for him to be coming to this stunning conclusion.
Yes but it remains true that council house sales didn’t cause a housing shortage.
It wrecked the capital structure of local authorities, and represented one of the biggest transfers of power from local to central government in the last four decades.
I was an enthusiastic supporter of the council house sale policy until I realised that the proceeds would go to the Treasury.
And it certainly contributed to today's housing shortage. The annual figures for private sector house completions haven't changed all that much over the last four decades - but we used to build rather a lot of council homes in addition. Housing associations have replaced only a tiny fraction of that.
One of Thatchers worst policies - continued by Blair.
Here is my guess at the transfers. Cleverly and Tugendhat to go to the members.
That looks like a wishcast. How is Tugendhat going to get any momentum from here and why do you think Patel's supports will be split evenly rather than going for Jenrick?
And why so few of Badenoch's supporters going to Jenrick?
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
Except Maggie banned councils from spending receipts on building replacement council housing because of her fiscal policies.
The long term effect of selling council houses was to transfer council houses to private BTLblandlords, after a short period of owner occupiers. Hence the declining rates of home ownership, and falling Tory vote share in the working age population.
Why was this decline most pronounced under New Labour?
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
He’s correct on both points.
You are aware of the history of council house sales, and what happened to the proceeds ?
Redwood was a Tory MP from 1987. It’s a bit bloody late for him to be coming to this stunning conclusion.
Yes but it remains true that council house sales didn’t cause a housing shortage.
Perhaps. But council house sales caused a shortage of council houses.
One thing I have noticed, and this is purely based on anecdote, is many people who were previously very sure in themselves about voting to oust the Tories are now much less sure about their decision. If the next leader can harness this sentiment I think a win in 2029 isn't off the table.
People who are natural small c conservatives abandoned the party in July but even this small taste of their first Labour government since they were teenagers or in their early 20s has begun to make them see sense.
Yep, the best antidote to Labour is seeing Labour in office.
So many people I know are properly shitting it about this budget at the end of October.
Everybody knew there was going to be a reckoning - there should have been one immediately after the pandemic, a one off tax raid to try and recoup some of the millions thrown at the economy by Sunak when Chancellor (parts of which were defrauded by some).
We are still borrowing £80-£90 billion a year - the priority must be to get the public finances back somewhere near balance and that's going to need a mix of tax rises and spending cuts and that's what October will be about.
Not really, the Tories weren't planning to massively jack up spending on pointless state largesse - and they did have a plan to get us back to black.
Did they bollocks. They put off having any realistic fiscal plan to the other side of the election, exactly as Starmer did.
Nonsense. More hysteria from you.
There was a fiscal plan to have debt dropping as a %GDP by 2028-29 when the tax thresholds would be unfrozen as well.
Always five years in the future, and always with policies that they knew they wouldn't implement, like increasing fuel duty. Deferred every budget.
It was a complete work of fiction. You're clever enough to see that.
It wasn't fiction. They were on course to deliver it.
The reason it slipped previously- see the budget of 2018 or 2019, for example - was because of the black swan event of Covid.
Then, we had the CoL crisis and inflationary spike with interest rates that destroyed the old plan, and a need for higher defence spending.
I don't expect everyone to be happy about all that but they are good reasons why the government had a very difficult wicket.
By "Covid", of course, you mean "lockdown". Another very un-Tory policy of the last Parliament.
The UK government implemented ridiculously over the top restrictions, that made me very glad to be in Southern California.
WITH THAT SAID: places with no restrictions in the US (like Arizona) didn't perform markedly better economically than places with lots of restrictions (like New York), because people locked themselves up whether the politicians mandated it or not.
I'd also point out that the best (economically) performing place - by far - in Europe was Denmark, which had a pretty sophisticated set of measures.
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
Except Maggie banned councils from spending receipts on building replacement council housing because of her fiscal policies.
The long term effect of selling council houses was to transfer council houses to private BTLblandlords, after a short period of owner occupiers. Hence the declining rates of home ownership, and falling Tory vote share in the working age population.
Why was this decline most pronounced under New Labour?
Next I look forward to Redwood explaining tfat privatising a monopoly utility, setting it up with a toothless regulator, and allowing it to be taken over by a foreign hedge fund which specialises in extracting capital from utilities ... might not be a great idea.
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
He’s correct on both points.
You are aware of the history of council house sales, and what happened to the proceeds ?
Redwood was a Tory MP from 1987. It’s a bit bloody late for him to be coming to this stunning conclusion.
Yes but it remains true that council house sales didn’t cause a housing shortage.
Perhaps. But council house sales caused a shortage of council houses.
Yes, this is a better argument. Having the state pour money into the private rental market through housing benefit is disastrous.
Prediction: Jenrick would gain roughly as many seats as Hague.
It seems obvious to me from limited research that the only viable roll of the dice from this crowd for the Tories is Badenoch. She might implode. But she might grow over the next 4-5 years into not just an election winner but actually a successful PM.
TT is a good egg but his schtick didn’t work last time and won’t win this time, nor would it move the dial with the lost voters. Perhaps Cleverly would show some aptitude that somehow escaped him in cabinet. But let’s assume not. And I agree with others that Jenrick doesn’t pass the photogenic / televisual test, public life is as glib as that I’m afraid. Don’t even know who the other guy is, not worth even worrying about.
Ps Someone said earlier that SKS might not have long in the job and there was understandable scepticism given his majority and the UK system. It’s not impossible but I think depends on events in America in a category most here don’t want to consider. But are far from non zero probability if Schumer retains his positions and other chips fall into place.
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
Except Maggie banned councils from spending receipts on building replacement council housing because of her fiscal policies.
The long term effect of selling council houses was to transfer council houses to private BTLblandlords, after a short period of owner occupiers. Hence the declining rates of home ownership, and falling Tory vote share in the working age population.
Why was this decline most pronounced under New Labour?
Because they carried on with the policy.
And because cause and effect can be separated by time. In this case, the short-run effect was to increase the number of owner-occupiers. But gradually over time, those owners became landlords instead, so the houses became home to tenants instead.
("The human condition is to overvalue the present and undervalue the future. Discuss." See also the reluctance to put money into capital expenditure now, even if it will save loads in years to come. A fair few of our current problems are chickens coming home to roost.)
One thing I have noticed, and this is purely based on anecdote, is many people who were previously very sure in themselves about voting to oust the Tories are now much less sure about their decision. If the next leader can harness this sentiment I think a win in 2029 isn't off the table.
People who are natural small c conservatives abandoned the party in July but even this small taste of their first Labour government since they were teenagers or in their early 20s has begun to make them see sense.
Yep, the best antidote to Labour is seeing Labour in office.
So many people I know are properly shitting it about this budget at the end of October.
Everybody knew there was going to be a reckoning - there should have been one immediately after the pandemic, a one off tax raid to try and recoup some of the millions thrown at the economy by Sunak when Chancellor (parts of which were defrauded by some).
We are still borrowing £80-£90 billion a year - the priority must be to get the public finances back somewhere near balance and that's going to need a mix of tax rises and spending cuts and that's what October will be about.
You don't like the answer but it involves cutting state employment by a substantial number and completely reworking the benefits system. There is no path to a balanced budget while 3m people sit in sickness benefits and 1/5 people are on the state payroll, the other 4 people simply don't pay enough tax to cover it all.
All a bit glib and predictable from the Conservative end of the fence - call it "austerity" or just having another pop at the "public sector".
Let's have some specifics - which "state payroll" jobs are you going to lose, Police, Fire, Armed Forces, School Teachers? As an aside, everyone on the "state payroll" pays taxes as well and spends money and contributes to the economy even if they are paid from public funds.
Well, since a certain event in June 2016, when civil service FTEs were at a low, we have employed 100,000 extra civil servants to do what 30,000 do for the whole of Europe.
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Where would you put the zero longitude line?
Maybe anywhere which uses the Latin alphabet is in the west. That seems to largely work. Though perhaps recent events have dragged Ukraine into the west, and sub-Saharan Africa is sui generis.
In arguing that the West is an direction rather than a place I think I have kicked off the most pointless argument ever on PB. Is there a prize?
There have been far, far more pointless discussions than this one. I think it's quite illuminating!
There was the one on when autumn starts...
Guess Boris’ Weight was the classic of the genre
Indeed! And worthy of revival?
SO just how much does Boris Johnson weigh in at these days?
My guess is, seventeen stone and a cinder block, plus a couple of bricks, and a clenched fist full of gravel.
Dear god, where has John Redwood been for the last four decades ? Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes. https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
He’s correct on both points.
You are aware of the history of council house sales, and what happened to the proceeds ?
Redwood was a Tory MP from 1987. It’s a bit bloody late for him to be coming to this stunning conclusion.
Yes but it remains true that council house sales didn’t cause a housing shortage.
Perhaps. But council house sales caused a shortage of council houses.
Yes, this is a better argument. Having the state pour money into the private rental market through housing benefit is disastrous.
Right to buy would be fine if the state still built houses. Look back to 1950 and the only periods we build sufficient stock was through the state / lha model, private sector just isn’t doing it by itself. I’d rather see the taxpayer take the equity risk at the start of projects to get things off the ground, bank the equity gain when things get signed off and derisked, and move to the next one.
No doubt this somehow makes me “authoritarian right”.
(I thought @SeaShantyIrish2 was resident in Washington State. Is he not?)
As a proud American he (quite rightly) takes issue on behalf of the sunshine state, as I would if someone was gratuitously offensive about Rutland or The Vale of Glamorgan.
My defense of the great Sunshine State of Florida:
One thing I have noticed, and this is purely based on anecdote, is many people who were previously very sure in themselves about voting to oust the Tories are now much less sure about their decision. If the next leader can harness this sentiment I think a win in 2029 isn't off the table.
People who are natural small c conservatives abandoned the party in July but even this small taste of their first Labour government since they were teenagers or in their early 20s has begun to make them see sense.
Yep, the best antidote to Labour is seeing Labour in office.
So many people I know are properly shitting it about this budget at the end of October.
Everybody knew there was going to be a reckoning - there should have been one immediately after the pandemic, a one off tax raid to try and recoup some of the millions thrown at the economy by Sunak when Chancellor (parts of which were defrauded by some).
We are still borrowing £80-£90 billion a year - the priority must be to get the public finances back somewhere near balance and that's going to need a mix of tax rises and spending cuts and that's what October will be about.
Not really, the Tories weren't planning to massively jack up spending on pointless state largesse - and they did have a plan to get us back to black.
Did they bollocks. They put off having any realistic fiscal plan to the other side of the election, exactly as Starmer did.
Nonsense. More hysteria from you.
There was a fiscal plan to have debt dropping as a %GDP by 2028-29 when the tax thresholds would be unfrozen as well.
Always five years in the future, and always with policies that they knew they wouldn't implement, like increasing fuel duty. Deferred every budget.
It was a complete work of fiction. You're clever enough to see that.
It wasn't fiction. They were on course to deliver it.
The reason it slipped previously- see the budget of 2018 or 2019, for example - was because of the black swan event of Covid.
Then, we had the CoL crisis and inflationary spike with interest rates that destroyed the old plan, and a need for higher defence spending.
I don't expect everyone to be happy about all that but they are good reasons why the government had a very difficult wicket.
By "Covid", of course, you mean "lockdown". Another very un-Tory policy of the last Parliament.
The UK government implemented ridiculously over the top restrictions, that made me very glad to be in Southern California.
WITH THAT SAID: places with no restrictions in the US (like Arizona) didn't perform markedly better economically than places with lots of restrictions (like New York), because people locked themselves up whether the politicians mandated it or not.
I'd also point out that the best (economically) performing place - by far - in Europe was Denmark, which had a pretty sophisticated set of measures.
The grim paradox of the Johnson/Sunak government's approach was that, by wanting to keep things open, they kept creating situations where it became necessary to close everything right away.
Parallels with urban driving. The British approach was to try to go at maximum speed, only to repeatedly have to slam on the brakes. Much less stressful (and no slower) to go slower but without the stop-starts.
We don't see it as Western because of our Eurocentric maps.
An illiterate comment. If we were “Eurocentric” then Europe would be the centre, not the West, in the same manner as China sees itself as the centre.
Where would you put the zero longitude line?
Maybe anywhere which uses the Latin alphabet is in the west. That seems to largely work. Though perhaps recent events have dragged Ukraine into the west, and sub-Saharan Africa is sui generis.
In arguing that the West is an direction rather than a place I think I have kicked off the most pointless argument ever on PB. Is there a prize?
There have been far, far more pointless discussions than this one. I think it's quite illuminating!
There was the one on when autumn starts...
Guess Boris’ Weight was the classic of the genre
Indeed! And worthy of revival?
SO just how much does Boris Johnson weigh in at these days?
My guess is, seventeen stone and a cinder block, plus a couple of bricks, and a clenched fist full of gravel.
It’s all muscle
Believe you're once again victim of auto(in)correct - you doubless mean "mussel".
Comments
What does “loyalty” mean in a country where the people you failed are angry, and you despise what the party has become?
The underlyingies are here: https://www.oecd.org/en/data/indicators/employment-rate.html
After I've had a good night's sleep I'm well-rested.
2. She was a massive disappointment in office, and didn't seem to achieve anything but was adept at blaming others
3. She has a history of dishonesty
4. She is full of self-confidence but it seems to be baseless.
5. She has a nice laugh and smile.
Which will probably accelerate.
Why wouldn't any decent forum platform give a signed-in user the ability to set comment first on top or last on top as they preferred?
What the fuck is wrong with being Eurocentric?
Britain helped the modern world and set international maritime standards and law, so why shouldn't the meridian be here. It's one reason our financial markets are so well placed.
Other countries might like to see themselves as the centre. Tough. They're not. But they might have better weather or some interesting geography or antiquities instead.
Thems the breaks.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0JtoSafhvLM
Above-ground bins that lead to large underground vaults that are lifted entire into a bin lorry whenever they fill up.
One is that mechanisation means spending upfront to save over the following decades.
The other is that changing processes makes people unhappy, and they don't like that. See also: self-checkouts in supermarkets. You can (and many places elsewhere do) have systems where you take your rubbish bags to a local collection point (something like this: https://resource.co/article/could-underground-waste-collection-come-uk-11351) but good luck getting it through in an election year.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/sep/04/alabama-man-death-wrong-organ-surgery
Look, I yielded to no-one in my criticism before the election but I backed my side because I thought Sunak was the better PM, my MP was a good egg, and I believe in Conservative values.
If I didn't I would have voted for someone else, or abstained, but I wouldn't have said I'm a lifelong Tory because I wouldn't have been.
* I'd much rather have a Eurocentric world, based on democracy and the rule of law, than a world where other values held sway. It would help if Europe were to hold true to the best of its history though.
Not writing: "Flgjaghgrhhhagjkadgvk;vjk"
I was implacably opposed to Grayling after he took books away from prisoners too.
Being tough and firm on political issues doesn't mean being a c**t as a virtue.
I understand those who are loyal to a sports team - though at its best that's just another flavour of loyalty to one's friends. And if it's not that, it's slightly risible.
Some people are loyal to brands. But that's daft. Brands aren't human. They can't return or reward your loyalty and don't want to; they just want your money.
Loyalty to a political party strikes me as more like loyalty to a brand. I don't really understand it, and don't see the virtue. Indeed, political parties shouldn't be rewarding their voters' loyalty; they should be governing for the whole country, not just their voters.
If you are a member of a party, and have friends in the organisation, I suppose it becomes more like the better sort of loyalty to a sports team. But electing the government ought to be a bit more serious than that and I don't see coming to a judgement that someone else deserves yoir vote more as 'disloyal'.
I think you can extend that to party membership too. I think one reason that party memberships have become more extreme in general in Britain is because people have decided that the right response to the temporary leadership doing something they disagree with is to leave the party in protest, but that leaves the party only with its most committed core, and it has them lost the diversity that would keep it more connected to the communities it should be part of, so that it can change with them.
It's a shame really because I don't think Sunak really was an arsehole, just that for some reason he seemed to think that behaviour or perception was politically necessary. Same with May I think. Not sure about Jenrick.
Which is just as well, because it won't be long until Chelsea employ more footballers than the Irish Naval Service have sailors.
A sad day.
I definitely won't be voting Conservative.
(I thought @SeaShantyIrish2 was resident in Washington State. Is he not?)
Maybe 'anywhere which, circa 1900, used the Latin Alphabet'.
As for Jenrickism as a way of wooing Reformers back, the big risk is that Jenrickism will always be seen as diet Reform. Just one calorie, not evil enough...
They do add a lot of extra twiddles to the Latin alphabet.
Or is he just senile now ?
Selling a Council home to the people who live in it does not add to the shortage of homes. If the Council uses the money from the sale to build another it adds to the supply of homes.
https://x.com/johnredwood/status/1831203784514535602
(*) Inverted commas because in 20 years when the need is unarguable even to the muppets in the Treasury it will get revived, but by then at twice the cost.
Pure wishcasting from me.
Redwood was a Tory MP from 1987. It’s a bit bloody late for him to be coming to this stunning conclusion.
https://thehill.com/business/4862125-harris-proposes-lower-capital-gains-tax/
… Harris said during a campaign speech in New Hampshire said she wants to increase the capital gains tax to 28 percent for those with $1 million or more in income, up from its current effective level of 23.6 percent.
Harris’s proposal is well shy of the 44.6 percent rate proposed in a budget update from the Biden administration in July. It is also lower than the proposed increase to 39.6 percent included in the president’s most recent budget.
“If you earn a million dollars a year or more, the tax rate on your long-term capital gains will be 28 percent under my plan, because we know when the government encourages investment, it leads to broad based economic growth,” Harris said in New Hampshire...
Orwellian debate (up to and including debate on Himself) is PB privlege AND purgatgory.
The country has a roughly equal share of these people on each side, which is good because they cancel each other out, but the numbers are high enough to be bad because it makes it almost impossible for either main party to be replaced.
Even Kemi Badenoch who appears slightly less weird will toil to get a hearing. Robert Generic is exactly who I want as Tory leader, but then, I never want to see another Tory government ever.
If the oldies want their WFP back and the Triple lock, then they need to import workers. That's the choice, and the debate needed on immigration.
Reform and the Tory's Zero migration policy means major cuts in state provision to the elderly.
Yougov Harris 47% Trump 45% Stein 1%
https://d3nkl3psvxxpe9.cloudfront.net/documents/econTabReport_HIwtch9.pdf
Big Data Harris 50% Trump 50%
https://www.youtube.com/live/vN15UFzVuPU
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0022nbr/amol-rajan-interviews-tony-blair
The long term effect of selling council houses was to transfer council houses to private BTLblandlords, after a short period of owner occupiers. Hence the declining rates of home ownership, and falling Tory vote share in the working age population.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/sep/04/trump-kamala-election
If we working age voters get Zero net migration then we are making our own retirement enviable.
A
S
H
https://angusreid.org/federal-politics-concern-over-immigration-quadruples-over-last-48-months/
SO just how much does Boris Johnson weigh in at these days?
My guess is, seventeen stone and a cinder block, plus a couple of bricks, and a clenched fist full of gravel.
I was an enthusiastic supporter of the council house sale policy until I realised that the proceeds would go to the Treasury.
And it certainly contributed to today's housing shortage. The annual figures for private sector house completions haven't changed all that much over the last four decades - but we used to build rather a lot of council homes in addition.
Housing associations have replaced only a tiny fraction of that.
One of Thatchers worst policies - continued by Blair.
Guardian news
@guardiannews
·
12h
‘I am evil I did this’: Lucy Letby’s so-called confessions were written on advice of counsellors
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/article/2024/sep/03/i-am-evil-i-did-this-lucy-letbys-so-called-confessions-were-written-on-advice-of-counsellors
@StillWaters AN ILLITERATE COMMENT
See I wrote it. In capitals as well. Do I get a prize?
WITH THAT SAID: places with no restrictions in the US (like Arizona) didn't perform markedly better economically than places with lots of restrictions (like New York), because people locked themselves up whether the politicians mandated it or not.
I'd also point out that the best (economically) performing place - by far - in Europe was Denmark, which had a pretty sophisticated set of measures.
Pretty quick in the uptake, is old John.
It seems obvious to me from limited research that the only viable roll of the dice from this crowd for the Tories is Badenoch. She might implode. But she might grow over the next 4-5 years into not just an election winner but actually a successful PM.
TT is a good egg but his schtick didn’t work last time and won’t win this time, nor would it move the dial with the lost voters. Perhaps Cleverly would show some aptitude that somehow escaped him in cabinet. But let’s assume not. And I agree with others that Jenrick doesn’t pass the photogenic / televisual test, public life is as glib as that I’m afraid. Don’t even know who the other guy is, not worth even worrying about.
Ps
Someone said earlier that SKS might not have long in the job and there was understandable scepticism given his majority and the UK system. It’s not impossible but I think depends on events in America in a category most here don’t want to consider. But are far from non zero probability if Schumer retains his positions and other chips fall into place.
("The human condition is to overvalue the present and undervalue the future. Discuss." See also the reluctance to put money into capital expenditure now, even if it will save loads in years to come. A fair few of our current problems are chickens coming home to roost.)
No doubt this somehow makes me “authoritarian right”.
Seminole WInd - John Anderson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZxJsTN1848
Parallels with urban driving. The British approach was to try to go at maximum speed, only to repeatedly have to slam on the brakes. Much less stressful (and no slower) to go slower but without the stop-starts.