Isn't "Tory" / "Tories" more of a nickname / term of abuse? The Conservatives don't use "Tory" in any official capacity and I suspect even of they change their name from "Conservatives" people will still use "Tory" as a term of abuse... Lets face it, the name has survived since 1832 lol...
If the Tories elect their second consecutive non white leader (and fourth woman leader) then they should rename themselves as the Progressives as a contrast to the pale, stale, and male Labour party.
Shame British National Party is already taken. The Freedom Party? Some brothers in arms on the continent.
The MEGA Party. Make England Great Again would be current and capture the mood of a changing world.
Supreme Make England Great Again, keeping that essential Tory cheesiness.
The Party needs to find a way to appeal to younger voters and not just pensioners so maybe they could go down the Education, Education, Education route.
Supreme Make England Great Helping Everyone Achieve Dream Starts
There are mock elections at schools up and down the country being won by the Greens on the single issue of university fees. Leaning into this could garner a lot of votes from that generation and their parents.
There needs to be a change of approach to tertiary education. Encourage more degree apprenticeships and self-study options such as the OU, that aren’t three years living away from home and resulting in £50k+ of debt aged 21 or 22.
We do that already as a popular option.
There are hundreds of thousands of students who live at home (quick lookup says around half a million), and the Open University has 200,000 students.
I suspect that those numbers skew heavily to mature students rather than 18-year-olds. What’s needed is for schools to encourage such alternatives, government to incentivise companies to hire degree apprentice students, and for self-study options such as the OU to be significantly cheaper than a regular degree.
I think the OU may skew that way. I expect that more general students do not skew very heavily.
Absolutely agree on industry and Govt and Universities needing to push the alternatives - especially as its nothing new.
Back in the 1980s I did a thin sandwich course, and my Company (Plessey) had an arrangement with the local University for specialist training courses and a sponsorship agreement. A number of our graduate software / hardware engineers had come up through the factory floor, starting at 16 or 18 and working into the Design Areas by the time they were 30.
Cool story. Yes we need to see much more of that sort of thing, especially for STEM subjects. Let industry work with universities to tailor courses towards useful skills in their degrees.
The irony is that the taxes to pay for it are already raised. Is the Apprenticeship Levy now not up to several billion a year?
(Is that one of our rare hypothecated taxes?)
IIRC the Apprenticeship Levy doesn’t cover degrees though, only trades qualifications. Yes it should be expanded.
Well done to Andy_JS on his prediction! Also well done to Roger who at the start of the whole farrago confidently told us it would definitely be a white man.
It's all a bit like Lenny Henry's joke about changing the name of Windscale to Sellafield and nuclear fallout to magic moon beams.
The name Conservative is perfectly acceptable if they adopt one nation conservatism narratives, rather than fash-lite nonsense.
Talking of which. I disagree with DavidL (it wasn't me who flagged him) on rescinding the tiresome tourist's red card. This place has been far more civilised since his early bath.
Boris was the most ‘one nation’ conservative there was. Big spending, irresponsible government.
Big spending on PPE contracts for friends and family is not one nation Conservatism.
Labour would have done the same if they'd be in power during the Covid crisis.
Seriously. They said as much at the time, when they were advocating for unknown companies to get contracts in parliament (and using it as a stick too bash the government with).
And as we've seen with the good Lord Alli's 'donations'; they're not beyond a little personal grift.
The alternative was not to get any PPE, or at least in nowhere near as quick time. Yes, it was immensely wasteful; but I cannot see a way, in those fevered months, we could have got the PPE without waste. There was just too much worldwide demand, and ordinary processes just would not work.
Labour may prove incompetent over the next five years but the PPE fast lanes were venal, unbridled corruption. They were indefensible at the time and they are now.
Experienced NHS procurement organisations were left of the list whilst brothers and sisters of Ministers with AliExpress accounts were handed millions of tax pounds.
That is the accusation. But I'd point out we needed an unprecedented amount of PPE, and some/many of those 'experienced NHS procurement organisations' were unable to procure it - they had failed, which was *why* we had to find other methods to get it.
Labour MPs stood up in parliament and asked, straight-faced, why certain companies were not being asked to supply PPE, as they apparently had loads available. These companies were not, shall we say, established suppliers. Or even, in some cases, very established at all. This was pointed out at the time on here.
You seem to think that, if Labour had been in charge, that those companies would have automagically got the PPE. I'm saying that's rubbish. There was always going to be a large amount of waste, but it was an emergency situation.
You are putting words on the page on my behalf. The whataboutary of Labour 's PPE procurement is of no relevance. Millions of taxpayer pounds were spent on faulty PPE, which in itself is a scandal but when allied to the fact this faulty PPE was sold to the NHS at three times the retail price on AliExpress by friends and family of Ministers it is corruption pure and simple.
Couldn't NHS procurement departments facilitate their own AliExpress accounts to buy faulty PPE?
Which friends and family of ministers? If there is a line between them and any fraud corruption, every one of those former ministers will be going to jail for a long time. Do you have any names ?
There are well documented relationships which I wouldn't dare to mention on here. I am sure a public inquiry will reveal the names you need.
If there was any kind of evidence of criminal conspiracy I’m pretty sure we won’t be needing a public enquiry. What happened was all members of parliament and the lords were actively canvassed to forward potential suppliers to a website and email address. And erm, that was it. The notorious pub landlord story was exactly that “hello Mat, you might remember me, I am the custodian at the pub in your constituency, I also run a packaging company, I think it might be possible to convert it to create packaging for vaccines, who do I contact” At which point Matt responded back with a hi and sent him the web address.
Why were MPs and Lords canvassed? Why not canvass local councils, NHS suppliers, trades unions and public health experts?
Isn't "Tory" / "Tories" more of a nickname / term of abuse? The Conservatives don't use "Tory" in any official capacity and I suspect even of they change their name from "Conservatives" people will still use "Tory" as a term of abuse... Lets face it, the name has survived since 1832 lol...
If the Tories elect their second consecutive non white leader (and fourth woman leader) then they should rename themselves as the Progressives as a contrast to the pale, stale, and male Labour party.
Shame British National Party is already taken. The Freedom Party? Some brothers in arms on the continent.
The MEGA Party. Make England Great Again would be current and capture the mood of a changing world.
Supreme Make England Great Again, keeping that essential Tory cheesiness.
The Party needs to find a way to appeal to younger voters and not just pensioners so maybe they could go down the Education, Education, Education route.
Supreme Make England Great Helping Everyone Achieve Dream Starts
There are mock elections at schools up and down the country being won by the Greens on the single issue of university fees. Leaning into this could garner a lot of votes from that generation and their parents.
There needs to be a change of approach to tertiary education. Encourage more degree apprenticeships and self-study options such as the OU, that aren’t three years living away from home and resulting in £50k+ of debt aged 21 or 22.
We do that already as a popular option.
There are hundreds of thousands of students who live at home (quick lookup says around half a million), and the Open University has 200,000 students.
I suspect that those numbers skew heavily to mature students rather than 18-year-olds. What’s needed is for schools to encourage such alternatives, government to incentivise companies to hire degree apprentice students, and for self-study options such as the OU to be significantly cheaper than a regular degree.
I think the OU may skew that way. I expect that more general students do not skew very heavily.
Absolutely agree on industry and Govt and Universities needing to push the alternatives - especially as its nothing new.
Back in the 1980s I did a thin sandwich course, and my Company (Plessey) had an arrangement with the local University for specialist training courses and a sponsorship agreement. A number of our graduate software / hardware engineers had come up through the factory floor, starting at 16 or 18 and working into the Design Areas by the time they were 30.
Cool story. Yes we need to see much more of that sort of thing, especially for STEM subjects. Let industry work with universities to tailor courses towards useful skills in their degrees.
The irony is that the taxes to pay for it are already raised. Is the Apprenticeship Levy now not up to several billion a year?
(Is that one of our rare hypothecated taxes?)
IIRC the Apprenticeship Levy doesn’t cover degrees though, only trades qualifications. Yes it should be expanded.
Make apprenticeships degrees. And degrees, apprenticeships.
"As someone studying Poetry at Cambridge, what are you gong to take as your minor? - shipyard welding, explosive metal forming or crane operation are popular this year."
"As someone studying shipped welding, what are you gong to take as your minor? Minoan culture, Poetry and Post Rational Discourse are of the moment...."
But dear oh dear - 'we don't actually disagree on very much' is a worrying thing to say.
That's the bit everyone says, in every political party. Before hiring the Inquisition to find all those in the party opposed to the new leader and cleanse them, with fire.
Is @Leon facing a life time ban rather than sin bin by the way?
The focus of PB over the next week or so will be on the US presidential election.
We are not going to let the dribblings of a soaked up racist popinjay distract PB from one of the biggest betting markets ever.
Oh come on, if you can't get drunk and stoned and complain about Britain not being white enough on pb.com, where the heck CAN you get drunk and stoned and complain about Britain not being white enough?
If you read the final straw post it really was quite disgusting.
Di you have a link? Because honestly as I recall it it was something to the effect of "I don't want white people to die out".
I don't see the problem with this view personally, and nor do I think it is likely to be particularly unusual worldwide (or its equivalent).
If you have two babies in front of you, one with white skin and one with brown skin, and you value the one with white skin more, just because it has white skin, that is racism.
"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."
(there are a handful listed on another page, but very few).
Originally - at merger - it was Social and Liberal Democrats as a mix of both parties identities, but rather a mouthful so shortened to Liberal Democrats after a couple of years
The old Spitting Image joke. “We’ll take the word ‘liberal’ from the Liberal Party and the word ‘party’ from the Social Democratic Party”.
She’s curious. A bit of an empty vessel today. Lots of attitude. I can see her leading the Tories to third place. Equally I can see her doing well. Not dull.
She’s curious. A bit of an empty vessel today. Lots of attitude. I can see her leading the Tories to third place. Equally I can see her doing well. Not dull.
Team Kemi. Those familiar with the Bobiverse sci-fi series will recognise her as a Crazy Eddie candidate.
Crazy Eddie was the Motie name for someone who thought they could actually fix things, rather than have a cycle of disaster. Spreading to the whole universe.
By far the best option remaining to them. Well done to Badenoch. I don’t know how well she’ll go down with the country at large, but they’ve dodged a bullet with Bobby J.
Team Kemi. Those familiar with the Bobiverse sci-fi series will recognise her as a Crazy Eddie candidate.
Crazy Eddie was the Motie name for someone who thought they could actually fix things, rather than have a cycle of disaster. Spreading to the whole universe.
I know. Someone who would think the unthinkable and do the unexpected to achieve what they need to.
By far the best option remaining to them. Well done to Badenoch. I don’t know how well she’ll go down with the country at large, but they’ve dodged a bullet with Bobby J.
Just goes to show, the Conservatives still have an instinct for a winner... In theory Bobby J ticked all the right preconceived notions of Tory members but still a majority of members went for Kemi.
But dear oh dear - 'we don't actually disagree on very much' is a worrying thing to say.
It's just what you are supposed to say. Like when people say they want unity but their opponent wants division, when in fact the whole point is to divide ourselves up.
It's a pretty stunning personal achievement. Leader at 44.
Rishi 42, Cameron 39, Hague 36. 44 in the younger half of modern leaders but not unusual.
So depending on when her birthday is, 49 were she to become PM at the first attempt. Probably about the right age range.
I'm not sure it really matters, within reason. What is more problematic is when nearly the whole cabinet is a similar age. I'd like some 65+ and some <40s included.
Fewer votes than Ken Clarke, David Davis and Rishi Sunak. All of whom lost.
It's the closest margin of victory in a Tory leadership campaign. She won by less than Truss did.
This implies that Kemi is right when she says that Jenrick and herself disagree on very little, and there was not much to choose between them. Had Cleverly made the final two there would have been more of a choice for the party to make.
It’s also a huge moment to have a female and black leader of a party. That’s credit to the Tories.
Indeed.
Watching Starmer talk about issues such as “reparations” is going to be hilarious, when there’s an African woman standing opposite him with the opposing view.
A result that seems to have united PB as being the right result.
If only because the one person worse than Bad Enoch is Paint over Mickey Mouse Jenrick.
It will be interesting to see what the key message is that she tries to communicate to the public.
The problem as Sunak found is that without Brexit there is little to unite the 2019 coalition.
Going after Reform voters will not work in my view.
Hence why I said she needs to re-orient the party towards “working people” under the age of 60. There are votes to be won there.
Going after the grey vote is understandably tempting, it votes more after all, and can really punish you if they take against you. But you do need to make inroads lower down if you are to have a longterm chance. Isn't that what the Canadian Tory leader has done?
That's advice for left and right btw, so I hope it is acceptable.
Also from that site, a quote from Dan Hannan: "Kemi Badenoch is the party’s second non-white and third female leader. And you know what? It’s no big deal."
Clearly Liz Truss already being airbrushed from history.
By far the best option remaining to them. Well done to Badenoch. I don’t know how well she’ll go down with the country at large, but they’ve dodged a bullet with Bobby J.
Just goes to show, the Conservatives still have an instinct for a winner... In theory Bobby J ticked all the right preconceived notions of Tory members but still a majority of members went for Kemi.
Kemi is a fascinating politician and certainly was the right choice
Politics just got a whole lot more interesting
And fantastic the conservatives have elected the 4th female leader and first black woman
Also from that site, a quote from Dan Hannan: "Kemi Badenoch is the party’s second non-white and third female leader. And you know what? It’s no big deal."
Clearly Liz Truss already being airbrushed from history.
A result that seems to have united PB as being the right result.
If only because the one person worse than Bad Enoch is Paint over Mickey Mouse Jenrick.
It will be interesting to see what the key message is that she tries to communicate to the public.
The problem as Sunak found is that without Brexit there is little to unite the 2019 coalition.
Going after Reform voters will not work in my view.
Hence why I said she needs to re-orient the party towards “working people” under the age of 60. There are votes to be won there.
Going after the grey vote is understandably tempting, it votes more after all, and can really punish you if they take against you. But you do need to make inroads lower down if you are to have a longterm chance. Isn't that what the Canadian Tory leader has done?
That's advice for left and right btw, so I hope it is acceptable.
As best I can work out the Canadian guy has gone after housing.
Comments
Badenoch 1.07 / 1.12
Jenrick 7 / 18
https://www.betfair.com/exchange/plus/politics/market/1.205526560
They do love the sound of their own voice, don't they?
Really pointless this.
India will win before this bloody nonsense finishes!
@SophyRidgeSky
Judging by the faces it looks like Kemi Badenoch has won #famouslastwords
Full result any moment on Sky News"
Which is not a bad comparison for the contemporary Conservative Party !
Jenrick 41,318
Desperately bad turnout though.
And presumably the people who voted for both were protesting?
All the very best to Kemi
Eventually...
Something on tuition fees would be a good start.
They’d also need to give up on this w word stuff which people are fed up with.
Perhaps they should also look at how SKS turned it around in only five years for some inspiration.
Also well done to Roger who at the start of the whole farrago confidently told us it would definitely be a white man.
I was out by a 20k underestimate.
But that's down by nearly a quarter since September 2022.
Thanks Kemi!!!
No change there.
But dear oh dear - 'we don't actually disagree on very much' is a worrying thing to say.
"As someone studying Poetry at Cambridge, what are you gong to take as your minor? - shipyard welding, explosive metal forming or crane operation are popular this year."
"As someone studying shipped welding, what are you gong to take as your minor? Minoan culture, Poetry and Post Rational Discourse are of the moment...."
Oh, sorry, misunderstanding there.
Jenrick 43.44%
If only because the one person worse than Bad Enoch is Paint over Mickey Mouse Jenrick.
That's ageing faster than my famous comment that Cook was mad to put the Aussies in at Trent Bridge in 2015.
bets by @viewcode on Kemi Badenoch
Staked: £100@ 5/11, £5@ 11/8, £100@ 1/6, total = £205
Returns: 145.45+11.88+116.67 =. £274.00
Profit £74
Hmm. Not last of the big spenders, moi. Still #BigBoyPants worn and profit made, so job done. To the next market...
John Major: 48,662 (1992 General election).
Though to be fair John was restricted to people living in Huntingdon.
"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."
Well done the members, a great choice.
But that's not because he lost, that's because he's an arsehole.
Going after Reform voters will not work in my view.
Hence why I said she needs to re-orient the party towards “working people” under the age of 60. There are votes to be won there.
The Bad Enoch thing doesn't even work.
Hard to disagree with that.
(Quotation from The Guardian, all errors are there's.)
All of whom lost.
I haven't been watching. But if anyone else is wondering about the expression on Mrs. Jenrick's face, have a look at this:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/11/02/tory-leadership-race-kemi-badenoch-robert-jenrick/
This implies that Kemi is right when she says that Jenrick and herself disagree on very little, and there was not much to choose between them. Had Cleverly made the final two there would have been more of a choice for the party to make.
Watching Starmer talk about issues such as “reparations” is going to be hilarious, when there’s an African woman standing opposite him with the opposing view.
That's advice for left and right btw, so I hope it is acceptable.
"Kemi Badenoch is the party’s second non-white and third female leader. And you know what? It’s no big deal."
Clearly Liz Truss already being airbrushed from history.
Politics just got a whole lot more interesting
And fantastic the conservatives have elected the 4th female leader and first black woman
Really proud of that achievement
Badenoch would be wise to do the same.