I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
No. They have got a stonking majority on 33% of the vote themselves. They quite like the current set up. (As do all election winners under FPTP surprisingly enough).
Faced with polls that imply an absolute certainty of losing that majority (or much, much worse) at the next GE, a party with a large majority now might well decide that this is the time to go for PR/AV/Whatever.
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The should just bite the bullet, break a pledge or two, and raise income tax as well as looking at council tax bands/land tax for starters.
But it’s a mammoth task and not an easy one especially given they fold to their backbenchers when trying to make modest changes to spending as we saw with welfare. A so called cut was simply slowing the rate of growth.
As was discussed on here yesterday, the incoming government had one chance, at their first Budget, to say that the finances were much worse than they had been led to believe, and there’s going to have to be 2p on all income tax rates for the duration of this Parliament.
Instead, they went tinkering with a load of little things, and wasted huge amounts of political capital in exchange for very little additional income.
It was as if they’d spent the last five years doing no preparation for government at all.
See Nick Clegg/Tuition Fees for why they didn't choose that path.
They could have made it clear that it was temporary, and cut it at in the final Budget before the next election.
Instead, they’ve taken all the flak but not raised any money. They’re now both unpopular and broke, with bond rates slowly ticking up to make the situation even worse.
It is what the electorate persistently vote for so what we get. Teeter along with sticking plasters to eke out what we can before either we hit disaster or unexpected good fortune down the line.
Reform will be no different when they get their chance. May even fall faster in popularity as likely to be more chaotic.
It’s not just a UK problem either, much of the developed world is totally screwed, yet there remains little enthusiasm among the electorate to do anything about it.
Argentina appears to have mostly succeeded with the right-wing approach in recent years, others such as Denmark have succeeded with a more left-wing approach.
Meanwhile, many of the major economies have huge budget deficits and debt/GDP ratios above 100%. In many cases they hadn’t properly recovered from the 2008 recession when the pandemic hit.
The US had a good go at cutting out waste, but the Executive can’t do much without Congress, who are still as keen as ever to line their own pockets, and don’t dare vote to cut a penny from spending on their own constituents. They’ll still be adding more than a trillion dollars to the debt this year.
I can see that this cycle continues in many countries, with more and more extremist governments been elected over the next decade, until either economies crash or there’s the political will to actually fix the problems.
I think the end result will always been economies crashing because the political will will never exist - voters like sweeties and easy fixes too much
I guess the question is, for each country, just how bad things have to get before the electorate collectively understands that something serious needs to change.
I got told last night that a private school I used to work with is closing.
That however was nothing to do with VAT and is probably long overdue for reasons I won't go into here (as TSE might not like it).
So far since VAT came in most of the schools that are shutting seem to be marginal cases that were likely to fold soon anyway for unrelated reasons. I'm just not terribly optimistic about how long that will continue to be the case.
Mt St Marys and Barlborough Hall going near where I used to live (NE Derbs) was a bit of a surprise. But the grounds and buildings must have needed a fortune in maintenance. All the local athletics and running clubs use the track there, not sure what'll happen to it.
Hopefully the running track and athletics facilities can be kept alive with lottery money. They don’t need too much maintenance and much of the capital equipment can likely be purchased cheap from the liquidator.
Assuming those who are pro VAT on schools and are ultimately hoping for a UK where there are no private schools anymore got their wish, there is a question I would love them to answer.
What happens to these places? Obviously a number can be co-opted into existing state schools but it’s not that easy.
Firstly is the simple one, a lot of these private schools are in the middle of nowhere. They aren’t built for the convenience of bigger conurbations, they would at easiest need huge amounts of transport to get the children to these places on a daily basis and some would be frankly completely impractical.
My second query is about who pays for the upkeep? Say you suddenly have Winchester, Eton, Harrow, Stowe, Radley etc in the hands of the State. There are huge amounts of Grade 1 and 2 listed buildings there - to put it into perspective Winchester College has 18 grade 1 listed and over 70 grade 2 listed, the Greater Manchester has 15 grade 1 listed and 80 grade 2. So you can’t just let them rot, sell off as housing, build on protected grounds.
Does this money from from the education budget to upkeep them whilst using as state schools or does the taxpayer have to shell out for the upkeep of buildings, grounds and sports facilities separately?
It’s not the biggest issue about private/state but I would love to know what those who want private closed down would do about this.
Hasn't the number of private schools/pupils at private schools changed very little following the introduction of VAT, contrary to predictions many made? https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c2lk2p7wpr4o reports a 2% drop in pupil numbers, and that's compared to a 0.6% drop in pupils not at private schools. (In other words, the proportion of pupils at private schools went from 6.5% to 6.4%.) All those fears about state schools being swamped have proven not to be the case.
I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
No. They have got a stonking majority on 33% of the vote themselves. They quite like the current set up. (As do all election winners under FPTP surprisingly enough).
Faced with polls that imply an absolute certainty of losing that majority (or much, much worse) at the next GE, a party with a large majority now might well decide that this is the time to go for PR/AV/Whatever.
That's my pondering, yes. Oblivion insurance The establishment parties wrapping themselves in bubble wrap
This subject always seems to ba approached from a Western/Allies -v- Japanese national perspective. I think that's rather too limited. The Japanese EMPIRE had a stranglehold on South East Asia and parts of China. It wasn't a particularly benevolent or benign hegemon: it was brutal, and the civilain populations from the fringes of India to the Malay peninsula to Manchuria were delivered from an appalling serfdom by the dropping of the bomb. Those lives matter too.
It was also a bit odd to hear the BBC Radio 4 talks on the subject this morning, which portrayed Hiroshima as some sort of bucolic paradise (children going to school, grandparents tending gardens etc) whereas in fact the place was at the heart of the Japanese military-industrial complex. It was a shipbuilding centre, and the population was entirely devoted to the war effort, whether they were civilians or not.
And every day the war continued, more POW's in Japanese camps died, too.
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The should just bite the bullet, break a pledge or two, and raise income tax as well as looking at council tax bands/land tax for starters.
But it’s a mammoth task and not an easy one especially given they fold to their backbenchers when trying to make modest changes to spending as we saw with welfare. A so called cut was simply slowing the rate of growth.
As was discussed on here yesterday, the incoming government had one chance, at their first Budget, to say that the finances were much worse than they had been led to believe, and there’s going to have to be 2p on all income tax rates for the duration of this Parliament.
Instead, they went tinkering with a load of little things, and wasted huge amounts of political capital in exchange for very little additional income.
It was as if they’d spent the last five years doing no preparation for government at all.
See Nick Clegg/Tuition Fees for why they didn't choose that path.
They could have made it clear that it was temporary, and cut it at in the final Budget before the next election.
Instead, they’ve taken all the flak but not raised any money. They’re now both unpopular and broke, with bond rates slowly ticking up to make the situation even worse.
It is what the electorate persistently vote for so what we get. Teeter along with sticking plasters to eke out what we can before either we hit disaster or unexpected good fortune down the line.
Reform will be no different when they get their chance. May even fall faster in popularity as likely to be more chaotic.
It’s not just a UK problem either, much of the developed world is totally screwed, yet there remains little enthusiasm among the electorate to do anything about it.
Argentina appears to have mostly succeeded with the right-wing approach in recent years, others such as Denmark have succeeded with a more left-wing approach.
Meanwhile, many of the major economies have huge budget deficits and debt/GDP ratios above 100%. In many cases they hadn’t properly recovered from the 2008 recession when the pandemic hit.
The US had a good go at cutting out waste, but the Executive can’t do much without Congress, who are still as keen as ever to line their own pockets, and don’t dare vote to cut a penny from spending on their own constituents. They’ll still be adding more than a trillion dollars to the debt this year.
I can see that this cycle continues in many countries, with more and more extremist governments been elected over the next decade, until either economies crash or there’s the political will to actually fix the problems.
I don't understand how you seriously think the US had a good go at cutting waste. It was a chaotic sham to give Elon a platform to pretend to cut waste whilst giving him free access to masses of public data and shifting bureaucratic power from one part of the elite to another.
Nothing to do with cutting waste as will be shown by their deficit growing faster under Trump, as it did last time.
Look at actions, not words.
Also, "the Executive can’t do much without Congress" isn't much of an excuse, when Trump has more or less absolute control of Congress at least until the midterms.
It was impossible the budget to get passed, without the House and Senate adding their own piles of pork back into it. Much of which is to benefit the donors rather than the constituents.
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The should just bite the bullet, break a pledge or two, and raise income tax as well as looking at council tax bands/land tax for starters.
But it’s a mammoth task and not an easy one especially given they fold to their backbenchers when trying to make modest changes to spending as we saw with welfare. A so called cut was simply slowing the rate of growth.
As was discussed on here yesterday, the incoming government had one chance, at their first Budget, to say that the finances were much worse than they had been led to believe, and there’s going to have to be 2p on all income tax rates for the duration of this Parliament.
Instead, they went tinkering with a load of little things, and wasted huge amounts of political capital in exchange for very little additional income.
It was as if they’d spent the last five years doing no preparation for government at all.
See Nick Clegg/Tuition Fees for why they didn't choose that path.
They could have made it clear that it was temporary, and cut it at in the final Budget before the next election.
Instead, they’ve taken all the flak but not raised any money. They’re now both unpopular and broke, with bond rates slowly ticking up to make the situation even worse.
It is what the electorate persistently vote for so what we get. Teeter along with sticking plasters to eke out what we can before either we hit disaster or unexpected good fortune down the line.
Reform will be no different when they get their chance. May even fall faster in popularity as likely to be more chaotic.
It’s not just a UK problem either, much of the developed world is totally screwed, yet there remains little enthusiasm among the electorate to do anything about it.
Argentina appears to have mostly succeeded with the right-wing approach in recent years, others such as Denmark have succeeded with a more left-wing approach.
Meanwhile, many of the major economies have huge budget deficits and debt/GDP ratios above 100%. In many cases they hadn’t properly recovered from the 2008 recession when the pandemic hit.
The US had a good go at cutting out waste, but the Executive can’t do much without Congress, who are still as keen as ever to line their own pockets, and don’t dare vote to cut a penny from spending on their own constituents. They’ll still be adding more than a trillion dollars to the debt this year.
I can see that this cycle continues in many countries, with more and more extremist governments been elected over the next decade, until either economies crash or there’s the political will to actually fix the problems.
I think the end result will always been economies crashing because the political will will never exist - voters like sweeties and easy fixes too much
I guess the question is, for each country, just how bad things have to get before the electorate collectively understands that something serious needs to change.
I suspect Argentina leaves of bad - Turkey may well be an interesting example to watch but I suspect things need to get very bad (the sweeties will have to disappear) before the problem becomes obvious to many voters.
And even then a lot of voters will go for the person offering easy fixes for their issues (I.e. a better pension or similar) rather than fixing the fundamental overall problem
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The should just bite the bullet, break a pledge or two, and raise income tax as well as looking at council tax bands/land tax for starters.
But it’s a mammoth task and not an easy one especially given they fold to their backbenchers when trying to make modest changes to spending as we saw with welfare. A so called cut was simply slowing the rate of growth.
As was discussed on here yesterday, the incoming government had one chance, at their first Budget, to say that the finances were much worse than they had been led to believe, and there’s going to have to be 2p on all income tax rates for the duration of this Parliament.
Instead, they went tinkering with a load of little things, and wasted huge amounts of political capital in exchange for very little additional income.
It was as if they’d spent the last five years doing no preparation for government at all.
See Nick Clegg/Tuition Fees for why they didn't choose that path.
They could have made it clear that it was temporary, and cut it at in the final Budget before the next election.
Instead, they’ve taken all the flak but not raised any money. They’re now both unpopular and broke, with bond rates slowly ticking up to make the situation even worse.
It is what the electorate persistently vote for so what we get. Teeter along with sticking plasters to eke out what we can before either we hit disaster or unexpected good fortune down the line.
Reform will be no different when they get their chance. May even fall faster in popularity as likely to be more chaotic.
It’s not just a UK problem either, much of the developed world is totally screwed, yet there remains little enthusiasm among the electorate to do anything about it.
Argentina appears to have mostly succeeded with the right-wing approach in recent years, others such as Denmark have succeeded with a more left-wing approach.
Meanwhile, many of the major economies have huge budget deficits and debt/GDP ratios above 100%. In many cases they hadn’t properly recovered from the 2008 recession when the pandemic hit.
The US had a good go at cutting out waste, but the Executive can’t do much without Congress, who are still as keen as ever to line their own pockets, and don’t dare vote to cut a penny from spending on their own constituents. They’ll still be adding more than a trillion dollars to the debt this year.
I can see that this cycle continues in many countries, with more and more extremist governments been elected over the next decade, until either economies crash or there’s the political will to actually fix the problems.
Congress added more than a trillion dollars to the debt because the Executive told them to. It seems odd to blame Congress and not Trump when it was Trump who was pushing for it.
"RFK Jr cancels $500m in funding for mRNA vaccines that counter viruses like Covid"
"The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) plans to cancel $500m (£376m) in funding for mRNA vaccines being developed to counter viruses like the flu and Covid-19.
The move will impact 22 projects being led by major pharmaceutical companies, including Pfizer and Moderna, for vaccines against bird flu and other viruses, HHS said."
There's a possibility that RFK Jr's hands will be bloodier than Stalin's or Hitler's. All it will take is another pandemic. And perhaps not even that.
It's a huge blow to healthcare and the culmination of the Republican Party's descent into conspiracy theories and feelings over facts. This is why I hope very much that people in the UK will vote tactically against Reform UK, who's 2024 manifesto was already pandering to anti-vax sentiment.
I'll probably vote Conservative, for the first time ever, in the next GE. This is not out of any love for the Tories, but purely to keep Reform out of my solidly Tory constituency. While I disagree with many of the policies pursued by the other parties, they do at least have some grounding in reality, albeit rather tenuous in some cases. Reform, though, are qualitatively different; they are dangerous fantasists and possibly a threat to our democracy.
That is why the headline Tory voteshare is likely an underestimate, as in Tory held seats like mine where Reform were second last time or where Reform are the likely main challengers some Labour and LD and Green voters will tactically vote Tory to keep out Farage.
Same as the Labour voteshare is likely an underestimate given the LD and Green voters who will tactically vote Labour in Labour held marginal seats they gained last year to keep out Reform
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The should just bite the bullet, break a pledge or two, and raise income tax as well as looking at council tax bands/land tax for starters.
But it’s a mammoth task and not an easy one especially given they fold to their backbenchers when trying to make modest changes to spending as we saw with welfare. A so called cut was simply slowing the rate of growth.
As was discussed on here yesterday, the incoming government had one chance, at their first Budget, to say that the finances were much worse than they had been led to believe, and there’s going to have to be 2p on all income tax rates for the duration of this Parliament.
Instead, they went tinkering with a load of little things, and wasted huge amounts of political capital in exchange for very little additional income.
It was as if they’d spent the last five years doing no preparation for government at all.
See Nick Clegg/Tuition Fees for why they didn't choose that path.
They could have made it clear that it was temporary, and cut it at in the final Budget before the next election.
Instead, they’ve taken all the flak but not raised any money. They’re now both unpopular and broke, with bond rates slowly ticking up to make the situation even worse.
It is what the electorate persistently vote for so what we get. Teeter along with sticking plasters to eke out what we can before either we hit disaster or unexpected good fortune down the line.
Reform will be no different when they get their chance. May even fall faster in popularity as likely to be more chaotic.
It’s not just a UK problem either, much of the developed world is totally screwed, yet there remains little enthusiasm among the electorate to do anything about it.
Argentina appears to have mostly succeeded with the right-wing approach in recent years, others such as Denmark have succeeded with a more left-wing approach.
Meanwhile, many of the major economies have huge budget deficits and debt/GDP ratios above 100%. In many cases they hadn’t properly recovered from the 2008 recession when the pandemic hit.
The US had a good go at cutting out waste, but the Executive can’t do much without Congress, who are still as keen as ever to line their own pockets, and don’t dare vote to cut a penny from spending on their own constituents. They’ll still be adding more than a trillion dollars to the debt this year.
I can see that this cycle continues in many countries, with more and more extremist governments been elected over the next decade, until either economies crash or there’s the political will to actually fix the problems.
I don't understand how you seriously think the US had a good go at cutting waste. It was a chaotic sham to give Elon a platform to pretend to cut waste whilst giving him free access to masses of public data and shifting bureaucratic power from one part of the elite to another.
Nothing to do with cutting waste as will be shown by their deficit growing faster under Trump, as it did last time.
Look at actions, not words.
Also, "the Executive can’t do much without Congress" isn't much of an excuse, when Trump has more or less absolute control of Congress at least until the midterms.
It was impossible the budget to get passed, without the House and Senate adding their own piles of pork back into it. Much of which is to benefit the donors rather than the constituents.
The reality is that Trump wanted his tax cut, and didn't really care about the rest. Hence the large uplift in the debt limit to accommodate that.
The administration hasn't had any kind of good go at cutting waste. It's just cut stuff it doesn't like - including a very large amount of economically useful science research funding.
I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
No. They have got a stonking majority on 33% of the vote themselves. They quite like the current set up. (As do all election winners under FPTP surprisingly enough).
Faced with polls that imply an absolute certainty of losing that majority (or much, much worse) at the next GE, a party with a large majority now might well decide that this is the time to go for PR/AV/Whatever.
It will be easier to get through a change to PR if the government has been elected with a large majority under FPTP.
@TSE "My view is that the bombings ultimately saved more lives than they killed"
Including those that died from radiation long after the Japanese surrender?
Yes
The Japanese plan was to die fighting the invasion - mass suicide attacks. Including the civilian population, armed with bamboo spears.
There was also a famine coming - the Japanese Military plan to deal with that was to reserve food for the military and let the civilians starve.
The US military casualties were computed using the results of previous battles. They were stilling using the Purple Hearts (medals for the wounded) made in response to the expected numbers, today.
The invasion of Japan would have been a mass slaughter. It would have killed millions of Japanese - probably a serious percentage of the entire population.
My step dad was doing amphibious landing training in the Spring of 1945 so he was convinced that he would have been on the Japanese version of D-Day and he was equally convinced he would die in the process. He was with his future first wife at the pictures when the news came out of the Japanese surrender and emerged out of the cinema to discover what happened and then he knew that he did have a rest of his life to live.
Over a million British and Imperial soldiers were earmarked for the invasion, along with the British Pacific Fleet (the largest navy we ever assembled). It's usually overlooked that the Royal Navy had a big role in the Battle of Okinawa.
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The should just bite the bullet, break a pledge or two, and raise income tax as well as looking at council tax bands/land tax for starters.
But it’s a mammoth task and not an easy one especially given they fold to their backbenchers when trying to make modest changes to spending as we saw with welfare. A so called cut was simply slowing the rate of growth.
As was discussed on here yesterday, the incoming government had one chance, at their first Budget, to say that the finances were much worse than they had been led to believe, and there’s going to have to be 2p on all income tax rates for the duration of this Parliament.
Instead, they went tinkering with a load of little things, and wasted huge amounts of political capital in exchange for very little additional income.
It was as if they’d spent the last five years doing no preparation for government at all.
See Nick Clegg/Tuition Fees for why they didn't choose that path.
They could have made it clear that it was temporary, and cut it at in the final Budget before the next election.
Instead, they’ve taken all the flak but not raised any money. They’re now both unpopular and broke, with bond rates slowly ticking up to make the situation even worse.
It is what the electorate persistently vote for so what we get. Teeter along with sticking plasters to eke out what we can before either we hit disaster or unexpected good fortune down the line.
Reform will be no different when they get their chance. May even fall faster in popularity as likely to be more chaotic.
It’s not just a UK problem either, much of the developed world is totally screwed, yet there remains little enthusiasm among the electorate to do anything about it.
Argentina appears to have mostly succeeded with the right-wing approach in recent years, others such as Denmark have succeeded with a more left-wing approach.
Meanwhile, many of the major economies have huge budget deficits and debt/GDP ratios above 100%. In many cases they hadn’t properly recovered from the 2008 recession when the pandemic hit.
The US had a good go at cutting out waste, but the Executive can’t do much without Congress, who are still as keen as ever to line their own pockets, and don’t dare vote to cut a penny from spending on their own constituents. They’ll still be adding more than a trillion dollars to the debt this year.
I can see that this cycle continues in many countries, with more and more extremist governments been elected over the next decade, until either economies crash or there’s the political will to actually fix the problems.
I think we’ve yet to see this supposed Argentine economic miracle show up in the actual numbers:
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The should just bite the bullet, break a pledge or two, and raise income tax as well as looking at council tax bands/land tax for starters.
But it’s a mammoth task and not an easy one especially given they fold to their backbenchers when trying to make modest changes to spending as we saw with welfare. A so called cut was simply slowing the rate of growth.
As was discussed on here yesterday, the incoming government had one chance, at their first Budget, to say that the finances were much worse than they had been led to believe, and there’s going to have to be 2p on all income tax rates for the duration of this Parliament.
Instead, they went tinkering with a load of little things, and wasted huge amounts of political capital in exchange for very little additional income.
It was as if they’d spent the last five years doing no preparation for government at all.
See Nick Clegg/Tuition Fees for why they didn't choose that path.
They could have made it clear that it was temporary, and cut it at in the final Budget before the next election.
Instead, they’ve taken all the flak but not raised any money. They’re now both unpopular and broke, with bond rates slowly ticking up to make the situation even worse.
It is what the electorate persistently vote for so what we get. Teeter along with sticking plasters to eke out what we can before either we hit disaster or unexpected good fortune down the line.
Reform will be no different when they get their chance. May even fall faster in popularity as likely to be more chaotic.
It’s not just a UK problem either, much of the developed world is totally screwed, yet there remains little enthusiasm among the electorate to do anything about it.
Argentina appears to have mostly succeeded with the right-wing approach in recent years, others such as Denmark have succeeded with a more left-wing approach.
Meanwhile, many of the major economies have huge budget deficits and debt/GDP ratios above 100%. In many cases they hadn’t properly recovered from the 2008 recession when the pandemic hit.
The US had a good go at cutting out waste, but the Executive can’t do much without Congress, who are still as keen as ever to line their own pockets, and don’t dare vote to cut a penny from spending on their own constituents. They’ll still be adding more than a trillion dollars to the debt this year.
I can see that this cycle continues in many countries, with more and more extremist governments been elected over the next decade, until either economies crash or there’s the political will to actually fix the problems.
I think the end result will always been economies crashing because the political will will never exist - voters like sweeties and easy fixes too much
I guess the question is, for each country, just how bad things have to get before the electorate collectively understands that something serious needs to change.
I suspect Argentina leaves of bad - Turkey may well be an interesting example to watch but I suspect things need to get very bad (the sweeties will have to disappear) before the problem becomes obvious to many voters.
And even then a lot of voters will go for the person offering easy fixes for their issues (I.e. a better pension or similar) rather than fixing the fundamental overall problem
See Greece. That stage of denial doesn't last long, though. See also Greece.
"RFK Jr cancels $500m in funding for mRNA vaccines that counter viruses like Covid"
"The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) plans to cancel $500m (£376m) in funding for mRNA vaccines being developed to counter viruses like the flu and Covid-19.
The move will impact 22 projects being led by major pharmaceutical companies, including Pfizer and Moderna, for vaccines against bird flu and other viruses, HHS said."
There's a possibility that RFK Jr's hands will be bloodier than Stalin's or Hitler's. All it will take is another pandemic. And perhaps not even that.
It's a huge blow to healthcare and the culmination of the Republican Party's descent into conspiracy theories and feelings over facts. This is why I hope very much that people in the UK will vote tactically against Reform UK, who's 2024 manifesto was already pandering to anti-vax sentiment.
I'll probably vote Conservative, for the first time ever, in the next GE. This is not out of any love for the Tories, but purely to keep Reform out of my solidly Tory constituency. While I disagree with many of the policies pursued by the other parties, they do at least have some grounding in reality, albeit rather tenuous in some cases. Reform, though, are qualitatively different; they are dangerous fantasists and possibly a threat to our democracy.
That is why the headline Tory voteshare is likely an underestimate, as in Tory held seats like mine where Reform were second last time or where Reform are the likely main challengers some Labour and LD voters will tactically vote Tory to keep out Farage.
Same as the Labour voteshare is likely an underestimate given the LD and Green voters who will tactically vote Labour in Labour held marginal seats they gained last year to keep out Reform
Yes. Same reason that people knocking the current government for ”only getting 33% of the vote” (or whatever it was) are misguided: there’s plenty of pro-Labour voters who could see that the Tory vote was AWOL & if that meant that their constituency was a Labour certainty then why bother to vote? Those voters might well turn out (although maybe not for Labour!) at the next GE if it looks like being a close one.
I got told last night that a private school I used to work with is closing.
That however was nothing to do with VAT and is probably long overdue for reasons I won't go into here (as TSE might not like it).
So far since VAT came in most of the schools that are shutting seem to be marginal cases that were likely to fold soon anyway for unrelated reasons. I'm just not terribly optimistic about how long that will continue to be the case.
Mt St Marys and Barlborough Hall going near where I used to live (NE Derbs) was a bit of a surprise. But the grounds and buildings must have needed a fortune in maintenance. All the local athletics and running clubs use the track there, not sure what'll happen to it.
Hopefully the running track and athletics facilities can be kept alive with lottery money. They don’t need too much maintenance and much of the capital equipment can likely be purchased cheap from the liquidator.
Assuming those who are pro VAT on schools and are ultimately hoping for a UK where there are no private schools anymore got their wish, there is a question I would love them to answer.
What happens to these places? Obviously a number can be co-opted into existing state schools but it’s not that easy.
Firstly is the simple one, a lot of these private schools are in the middle of nowhere. They aren’t built for the convenience of bigger conurbations, they would at easiest need huge amounts of transport to get the children to these places on a daily basis and some would be frankly completely impractical.
My second query is about who pays for the upkeep? Say you suddenly have Winchester, Eton, Harrow, Stowe, Radley etc in the hands of the State. There are huge amounts of Grade 1 and 2 listed buildings there - to put it into perspective Winchester College has 18 grade 1 listed and over 70 grade 2 listed, the Greater Manchester has 15 grade 1 listed and 80 grade 2. So you can’t just let them rot, sell off as housing, build on protected grounds.
Does this money from from the education budget to upkeep them whilst using as state schools or does the taxpayer have to shell out for the upkeep of buildings, grounds and sports facilities separately?
It’s not the biggest issue about private/state but I would love to know what those who want private closed down would do about this.
Hasn't the number of private schools/pupils at private schools changed very little following the introduction of VAT, contrary to predictions many made? https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c2lk2p7wpr4o reports a 2% drop in pupil numbers, and that's compared to a 0.6% drop in pupils not at private schools. (In other words, the proportion of pupils at private schools went from 6.5% to 6.4%.) All those fears about state schools being swamped have proven not to be the case.
Not really my point, was just interested to hear from those who want an end to private education in the UK, of which the VAT addition could be a step towards if you want to make it too expensive to continue, what their answers to certain practicalities are?
Clearly Brexiters get a beating for not having a plan for things if they got their wish so just seeing what the plans are in the minds of those when we reach the glorious end of private education. Can’t imagine any objections as they’ve thought it through.
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The should just bite the bullet, break a pledge or two, and raise income tax as well as looking at council tax bands/land tax for starters.
But it’s a mammoth task and not an easy one especially given they fold to their backbenchers when trying to make modest changes to spending as we saw with welfare. A so called cut was simply slowing the rate of growth.
As was discussed on here yesterday, the incoming government had one chance, at their first Budget, to say that the finances were much worse than they had been led to believe, and there’s going to have to be 2p on all income tax rates for the duration of this Parliament.
Instead, they went tinkering with a load of little things, and wasted huge amounts of political capital in exchange for very little additional income.
It was as if they’d spent the last five years doing no preparation for government at all.
See Nick Clegg/Tuition Fees for why they didn't choose that path.
They could have made it clear that it was temporary, and cut it at in the final Budget before the next election.
Instead, they’ve taken all the flak but not raised any money. They’re now both unpopular and broke, with bond rates slowly ticking up to make the situation even worse.
It is what the electorate persistently vote for so what we get. Teeter along with sticking plasters to eke out what we can before either we hit disaster or unexpected good fortune down the line.
Reform will be no different when they get their chance. May even fall faster in popularity as likely to be more chaotic.
It’s not just a UK problem either, much of the developed world is totally screwed, yet there remains little enthusiasm among the electorate to do anything about it.
Argentina appears to have mostly succeeded with the right-wing approach in recent years, others such as Denmark have succeeded with a more left-wing approach.
Meanwhile, many of the major economies have huge budget deficits and debt/GDP ratios above 100%. In many cases they hadn’t properly recovered from the 2008 recession when the pandemic hit.
The US had a good go at cutting out waste, but the Executive can’t do much without Congress, who are still as keen as ever to line their own pockets, and don’t dare vote to cut a penny from spending on their own constituents. They’ll still be adding more than a trillion dollars to the debt this year.
I can see that this cycle continues in many countries, with more and more extremist governments been elected over the next decade, until either economies crash or there’s the political will to actually fix the problems.
I don't understand how you seriously think the US had a good go at cutting waste. It was a chaotic sham to give Elon a platform to pretend to cut waste whilst giving him free access to masses of public data and shifting bureaucratic power from one part of the elite to another.
Nothing to do with cutting waste as will be shown by their deficit growing faster under Trump, as it did last time.
Look at actions, not words.
Also, "the Executive can’t do much without Congress" isn't much of an excuse, when Trump has more or less absolute control of Congress at least until the midterms.
Indeed.
The way to cut waste would be a slow, steady reform of the systems and process of government over years.
Things like reducing the contracting pyramids - often work is contracted out 10 times through multiple companies. This builds in 10 layers of profit and makes changes difficult and expensive.
The problem there is that this structure perfectly aligns with spreading the money, politically. And obfusticating the payments from the pyramids back to the politicians.
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The should just bite the bullet, break a pledge or two, and raise income tax as well as looking at council tax bands/land tax for starters.
But it’s a mammoth task and not an easy one especially given they fold to their backbenchers when trying to make modest changes to spending as we saw with welfare. A so called cut was simply slowing the rate of growth.
As was discussed on here yesterday, the incoming government had one chance, at their first Budget, to say that the finances were much worse than they had been led to believe, and there’s going to have to be 2p on all income tax rates for the duration of this Parliament.
Instead, they went tinkering with a load of little things, and wasted huge amounts of political capital in exchange for very little additional income.
It was as if they’d spent the last five years doing no preparation for government at all.
See Nick Clegg/Tuition Fees for why they didn't choose that path.
They could have made it clear that it was temporary, and cut it at in the final Budget before the next election.
Instead, they’ve taken all the flak but not raised any money. They’re now both unpopular and broke, with bond rates slowly ticking up to make the situation even worse.
It is what the electorate persistently vote for so what we get. Teeter along with sticking plasters to eke out what we can before either we hit disaster or unexpected good fortune down the line.
Reform will be no different when they get their chance. May even fall faster in popularity as likely to be more chaotic.
It’s not just a UK problem either, much of the developed world is totally screwed, yet there remains little enthusiasm among the electorate to do anything about it.
Argentina appears to have mostly succeeded with the right-wing approach in recent years, others such as Denmark have succeeded with a more left-wing approach.
Meanwhile, many of the major economies have huge budget deficits and debt/GDP ratios above 100%. In many cases they hadn’t properly recovered from the 2008 recession when the pandemic hit.
The US had a good go at cutting out waste, but the Executive can’t do much without Congress, who are still as keen as ever to line their own pockets, and don’t dare vote to cut a penny from spending on their own constituents. They’ll still be adding more than a trillion dollars to the debt this year.
I can see that this cycle continues in many countries, with more and more extremist governments been elected over the next decade, until either economies crash or there’s the political will to actually fix the problems.
I don't understand how you seriously think the US had a good go at cutting waste. It was a chaotic sham to give Elon a platform to pretend to cut waste whilst giving him free access to masses of public data and shifting bureaucratic power from one part of the elite to another.
Nothing to do with cutting waste as will be shown by their deficit growing faster under Trump, as it did last time.
Look at actions, not words.
Also, "the Executive can’t do much without Congress" isn't much of an excuse, when Trump has more or less absolute control of Congress at least until the midterms.
It was impossible the budget to get passed, without the House and Senate adding their own piles of pork back into it. Much of which is to benefit the donors rather than the constituents.
The reality is that Trump wanted his tax cut, and didn't really care about the rest. Hence the large uplift in the debt limit to accommodate that.
The administration hasn't had any kind of good go at cutting waste. It's just cut stuff it doesn't like - including a very large amount of economically useful science research funding.
I don't think it's just that Trump didn't care. “The Debt Limit should be entirely scrapped to prevent an Economic catastrophe,” he said on Truth Social. He actively pushed for that.
"RFK Jr cancels $500m in funding for mRNA vaccines that counter viruses like Covid"
"The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) plans to cancel $500m (£376m) in funding for mRNA vaccines being developed to counter viruses like the flu and Covid-19.
The move will impact 22 projects being led by major pharmaceutical companies, including Pfizer and Moderna, for vaccines against bird flu and other viruses, HHS said."
There's a possibility that RFK Jr's hands will be bloodier than Stalin's or Hitler's. All it will take is another pandemic. And perhaps not even that.
It's a huge blow to healthcare and the culmination of the Republican Party's descent into conspiracy theories and feelings over facts. This is why I hope very much that people in the UK will vote tactically against Reform UK, who's 2024 manifesto was already pandering to anti-vax sentiment.
I'll probably vote Conservative, for the first time ever, in the next GE. This is not out of any love for the Tories, but purely to keep Reform out of my solidly Tory constituency. While I disagree with many of the policies pursued by the other parties, they do at least have some grounding in reality, albeit rather tenuous in some cases. Reform, though, are qualitatively different; they are dangerous fantasists and possibly a threat to our democracy.
Which constituency is it if you don't mind me asking?
It’s not the basic numbers that are really eye-opening (tho they are eye-opening), it’s the relentless rise of immigration as a major issue. It’s the purple line on the graph
Look at it. Unlike every other issue it has only one direction (absent brief glitches): upwards. It slowly and relentlessly ascends from 2022 (mid 20%) to 2025 (mid 50%). Is there any reason to believe this will stop?
I don’t think so because even if immigration finishes overnight and the boats all cease (not going to happen) there are ALREADY enough migrants here for concern to simply keep growing. It’s now baked in
And of course Labour won’t stop migration and won’t stop the boats
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The should just bite the bullet, break a pledge or two, and raise income tax as well as looking at council tax bands/land tax for starters.
But it’s a mammoth task and not an easy one especially given they fold to their backbenchers when trying to make modest changes to spending as we saw with welfare. A so called cut was simply slowing the rate of growth.
As was discussed on here yesterday, the incoming government had one chance, at their first Budget, to say that the finances were much worse than they had been led to believe, and there’s going to have to be 2p on all income tax rates for the duration of this Parliament.
Instead, they went tinkering with a load of little things, and wasted huge amounts of political capital in exchange for very little additional income.
It was as if they’d spent the last five years doing no preparation for government at all.
See Nick Clegg/Tuition Fees for why they didn't choose that path.
They could have made it clear that it was temporary, and cut it at in the final Budget before the next election.
Instead, they’ve taken all the flak but not raised any money. They’re now both unpopular and broke, with bond rates slowly ticking up to make the situation even worse.
It is what the electorate persistently vote for so what we get. Teeter along with sticking plasters to eke out what we can before either we hit disaster or unexpected good fortune down the line.
Reform will be no different when they get their chance. May even fall faster in popularity as likely to be more chaotic.
It’s not just a UK problem either, much of the developed world is totally screwed, yet there remains little enthusiasm among the electorate to do anything about it.
Argentina appears to have mostly succeeded with the right-wing approach in recent years, others such as Denmark have succeeded with a more left-wing approach.
Meanwhile, many of the major economies have huge budget deficits and debt/GDP ratios above 100%. In many cases they hadn’t properly recovered from the 2008 recession when the pandemic hit.
The US had a good go at cutting out waste, but the Executive can’t do much without Congress, who are still as keen as ever to line their own pockets, and don’t dare vote to cut a penny from spending on their own constituents. They’ll still be adding more than a trillion dollars to the debt this year.
I can see that this cycle continues in many countries, with more and more extremist governments been elected over the next decade, until either economies crash or there’s the political will to actually fix the problems.
I don't understand how you seriously think the US had a good go at cutting waste. It was a chaotic sham to give Elon a platform to pretend to cut waste whilst giving him free access to masses of public data and shifting bureaucratic power from one part of the elite to another.
Nothing to do with cutting waste as will be shown by their deficit growing faster under Trump, as it did last time.
Look at actions, not words.
Also, "the Executive can’t do much without Congress" isn't much of an excuse, when Trump has more or less absolute control of Congress at least until the midterms.
It was impossible the budget to get passed, without the House and Senate adding their own piles of pork back into it. Much of which is to benefit the donors rather than the constituents.
The reality is that Trump wanted his tax cut, and didn't really care about the rest. Hence the large uplift in the debt limit to accommodate that.
The administration hasn't had any kind of good go at cutting waste. It's just cut stuff it doesn't like - including a very large amount of economically useful science research funding.
I don't think it's just that Trump didn't care. “The Debt Limit should be entirely scrapped to prevent an Economic catastrophe,” he said on Truth Social. He actively pushed for that.
Scrapping the debt limit is actually a reasonable idea - but only in conjunction with a program of budget discipline.
"DOGE" was nothing to do with any kind of budgetary discipline; it was an exercise of arbitrary power, which will leave no lasting positive effects.
Although we've seen no nuclear bombs used since 1945 in anger, that genie is out the bottle.
It may be a long time coming, but someone, somewhere, one day, will use one again. I think nuclear terrorism is the most likely when a group, possibly state sponsered, manages to lay their hands on one.
There also is the possibility that Putin, as he realises it's just not going to happen conventionally in Ukraine and unwilling to have done to him what he's done to so many others for his failure, lobs one on Kyev to try to force a victory.
I think the chances of either are not as low as we'd all like.
It’s not the basic numbers that are really eye-opening (tho they are eye-opening), it’s the relentless rise of immigration as a major issue. It’s the purple line on the graph
Look at it. Unlike every other issue it has only one direction (absent brief glitches): upwards. It slowly and relentlessly ascends from 2022 (mid 20%) to 2025 (mid 50%). Is there any reason to believe this will stop?
I don’t think so because even if immigration finishes overnight and the boats all cease (not going to happen) there are ALREADY enough migrants here for concern to simply keep growing. It’s now baked in
And of course Labour won’t stop migration and won’t stop the boats
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
He is odds on to be the PM after the next election. He is not odds on to be the next PM, if here were then Starmer would be resigning and the bet would lose......
It was the whole point of it, hardly a loophole. Keep up!
Are the hearings going to be specifically for UK asylum or comingled with general French asylum. If they're comingled that's fine but specific hearings in France for UK asylum might lead to remarkably high acceptance rates compared to France's own average...
It’s not the basic numbers that are really eye-opening (tho they are eye-opening), it’s the relentless rise of immigration as a major issue. It’s the purple line on the graph
Look at it. Unlike every other issue it has only one direction (absent brief glitches): upwards. It slowly and relentlessly ascends from 2022 (mid 20%) to 2025 (mid 50%). Is there any reason to believe this will stop?
I don’t think so because even if immigration finishes overnight and the boats all cease (not going to happen) there are ALREADY enough migrants here for concern to simply keep growing. It’s now baked in
And of course Labour won’t stop migration and won’t stop the boats
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
He is odds on to be the PM after the next election. He is not odds on to be the next PM, if here were then Starmer would be resigning and the bet would lose......
It was the whole point of it, hardly a loophole. Keep up!
Are the hearings going to be specifically for UK asylum or comingled with general French asylum. If they're comingled that's fine but specific hearings in France for UK asylum might lead to remarkably high acceptance rates compared to France's own average...
"For migrants in France wanting to come to the UK legally, they will be able to submit an Expression of Interest application for the new legal route online and the Home Office will make a decision. They will need to satisfactorily establish their identity and nationality and will be subject to strict security and eligibility checks.
Anyone who arrives by small boat and is returned to France will not be eligible for the legal route to the UK, while anyone who tries to re-enter the UK having already been returned to France once will be returned again as a matter of priority."
It was the whole point of it, hardly a loophole. Keep up!
Are the hearings going to be specifically for UK asylum or comingled with general French asylum. If they're comingled that's fine but specific hearings in France for UK asylum might lead to remarkably high acceptance rates compared to France's own average...
"For migrants in France wanting to come to the UK legally, they will be able to submit an Expression of Interest application for the new legal route online and the Home Office will make a decision. They will need to satisfactorily establish their identity and nationality and will be subject to strict security and eligibility checks.
Anyone who arrives by small boat and is returned to France will not be eligible for the legal route to the UK, while anyone who tries to re-enter the UK having already been returned to France once will be returned again as a matter of priority."
OK - so so long as the Home Office is competent and timely at making these decisions and the whole thing can be ramped up, it might work.
Edit: Ah, can see why Nige isn't going to lose sleep over this
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
He'd have to be better than evens to be 'odds on'. At the moment he's 5/2 at just about every bookie.
This YouGov graph also gives the lie to the bed wetting centrist dad PBers who say I go on about immigration too much
I’m the one in tune with the British people, who now make it their number one concern. Not the pb centrist dorks
Good morning
I do not always agree with you, but it is very apparent that immigartion, the boats, and the way it is being handled by labour is just adding to Farage's narrative
We learn this morning the 'one in one out' scheme is already under legal challenge from human rights lawyers, and it again raises the question just how the boats are stopped short of unilateral action which is an anathema to the left, but it is also an issue that is not going away
Mind you, Lisa Nandy assures listeners to Sky this morning the legal challenges are not an issue
It was the whole point of it, hardly a loophole. Keep up!
Are the hearings going to be specifically for UK asylum or comingled with general French asylum. If they're comingled that's fine but specific hearings in France for UK asylum might lead to remarkably high acceptance rates compared to France's own average...
"For migrants in France wanting to come to the UK legally, they will be able to submit an Expression of Interest application for the new legal route online and the Home Office will make a decision. They will need to satisfactorily establish their identity and nationality and will be subject to strict security and eligibility checks.
Anyone who arrives by small boat and is returned to France will not be eligible for the legal route to the UK, while anyone who tries to re-enter the UK having already been returned to France once will be returned again as a matter of priority."
OK - so so long as the Home Office is competent and timely at making these decisions and the whole thing can be ramped up, it might work.
I doubt it will have much impact. We need to start speaking Welsh to reduce the demand.
Or streamline the processes, allow claimants to work and fund their own accomodation.
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
He'd have to be better than evens to be 'odds on'. At the moment he's 5/2 at just about every bookie.
They are presumably factoring in all the variables. Farage gets sick, hit by lightning, reform implodes, and so on. Which is fair enough. And three/four years is near eternity in politics
On a purely political perspective, he is absolutely the odds on favourite
It’s not the basic numbers that are really eye-opening (tho they are eye-opening), it’s the relentless rise of immigration as a major issue. It’s the purple line on the graph
Look at it. Unlike every other issue it has only one direction (absent brief glitches): upwards. It slowly and relentlessly ascends from 2022 (mid 20%) to 2025 (mid 50%). Is there any reason to believe this will stop?
I don’t think so because even if immigration finishes overnight and the boats all cease (not going to happen) there are ALREADY enough migrants here for concern to simply keep growing. It’s now baked in
And of course Labour won’t stop migration and won’t stop the boats
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
The power of the media, both traditional and social. The majority of people aren’t affected by immigration. They are just bombarded with information about those who are.
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
He'd have to be better than evens to be 'odds on'. At the moment he's 5/2 at just about every bookie.
I am still not convinced Farage will be PM but in this crazy world, crazier things have happened
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
He'd have to be better than evens to be 'odds on'. At the moment he's 5/2 at just about every bookie.
Because if he looks likely to lose Starmer will resign and someone like Rayner or Streeting get a chance for a reset.
"RFK Jr cancels $500m in funding for mRNA vaccines that counter viruses like Covid"
"The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) plans to cancel $500m (£376m) in funding for mRNA vaccines being developed to counter viruses like the flu and Covid-19.
The move will impact 22 projects being led by major pharmaceutical companies, including Pfizer and Moderna, for vaccines against bird flu and other viruses, HHS said."
There's a possibility that RFK Jr's hands will be bloodier than Stalin's or Hitler's. All it will take is another pandemic. And perhaps not even that.
It's a huge blow to healthcare and the culmination of the Republican Party's descent into conspiracy theories and feelings over facts. This is why I hope very much that people in the UK will vote tactically against Reform UK, who's 2024 manifesto was already pandering to anti-vax sentiment.
I'll probably vote Conservative, for the first time ever, in the next GE. This is not out of any love for the Tories, but purely to keep Reform out of my solidly Tory constituency. While I disagree with many of the policies pursued by the other parties, they do at least have some grounding in reality, albeit rather tenuous in some cases. Reform, though, are qualitatively different; they are dangerous fantasists and possibly a threat to our democracy.
I might vote Labour. Reform have no real chance around here, but I know they are on the rise, and I'd hate to see the Lord Sir Paul of Nuttall become our MP.
This YouGov graph also gives the lie to the bed wetting centrist dad PBers who say I go on about immigration too much
I’m the one in tune with the British people, who now make it their number one concern. Not the pb centrist dorks
You certainly go on about Reform too much. We get it, you regret voting for Starmer, but mentioning Reform and their electoral chances 43 times a day won't wipe that stain from your already motley record.
It’s not the basic numbers that are really eye-opening (tho they are eye-opening), it’s the relentless rise of immigration as a major issue. It’s the purple line on the graph
Look at it. Unlike every other issue it has only one direction (absent brief glitches): upwards. It slowly and relentlessly ascends from 2022 (mid 20%) to 2025 (mid 50%). Is there any reason to believe this will stop?
I don’t think so because even if immigration finishes overnight and the boats all cease (not going to happen) there are ALREADY enough migrants here for concern to simply keep growing. It’s now baked in
And of course Labour won’t stop migration and won’t stop the boats
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
The power of the media, both traditional and social. The majority of people aren’t affected by immigration. They are just bombarded with information about those who are.
I think that was true pre Boris wave. There is a big difference between 200-300k net migration and 1 million.
It’s not the basic numbers that are really eye-opening (tho they are eye-opening), it’s the relentless rise of immigration as a major issue. It’s the purple line on the graph
Look at it. Unlike every other issue it has only one direction (absent brief glitches): upwards. It slowly and relentlessly ascends from 2022 (mid 20%) to 2025 (mid 50%). Is there any reason to believe this will stop?
I don’t think so because even if immigration finishes overnight and the boats all cease (not going to happen) there are ALREADY enough migrants here for concern to simply keep growing. It’s now baked in
And of course Labour won’t stop migration and won’t stop the boats
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
The power of the media, both traditional and social. The majority of people aren’t affected by immigration. They are just bombarded with information about those who are.
Anyone who uses the NHS, or public transport, or worries about crime, or attempts to buy a house, or seeks a good school for their kids, or pays taxes to keep asylum seekers in 4 star hotels, etc etc - is affected by immigration. In other words: all of us
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
Unfortunately spot on. Mass immigration used to be an issue in certain large cities, but now there are very few parts of the UK not impacted.
The only chance Labour had to stop this being the overriding issue was to go in hard on immigration immediately after the election. Voters will understand it's a problem that can't be solved overnight, but they need to have confidence real action is being taken. But Labour don't have a clue, this 'deal' will just anger even more people because it looks like all the other useless, infective 'initiatives' that amount to nothing.
Meanwhile there's a steady drip of stories about immigrants raping young girls, of criminals allowed to stay in the UK because they need chicken nuggets or their cat likes Fray Bentos pies. Each one pushes more people to Reform.
It's a tragedy that Labour and the Tories have been so fucking useless they've managed to drive the usually moderate and reasonable British voter into the hands of a shit like Nigel Farage.
"RFK Jr cancels $500m in funding for mRNA vaccines that counter viruses like Covid"
"The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) plans to cancel $500m (£376m) in funding for mRNA vaccines being developed to counter viruses like the flu and Covid-19.
The move will impact 22 projects being led by major pharmaceutical companies, including Pfizer and Moderna, for vaccines against bird flu and other viruses, HHS said."
There's a possibility that RFK Jr's hands will be bloodier than Stalin's or Hitler's. All it will take is another pandemic. And perhaps not even that.
Can the EU not step in here? Maybe cut a deal as someone orange always likes to do.
The UK should be shovelling money at research Universities here , we have a number of the top ten global as it is, to set up Jobs to get these companies to relocate their research on these vaccines.
Not only is it a massive public good in creating vaccines, protecting the future public, attracting scientists, attracting jobs but it could also see windfalls such as the Covid vaccines did for those companies, the potential spin offs - we’ve seen the money that the fat jabs have generated and who knows what else will come from these vaccine research teams.
There could be few better uses of taxpayer money at the moment, could have used Chagos money of course but happily those millions are helping Mauritians escape the terror of income tax.
Shame the research institute and the emergency factory got closed by the last government, even as covid was still around.
Absolutely, not letting them off the hook for stupid decisions on research either. But we can’t go back and stop that, we can (the govt can) make good strategic decisions now however that will be a win/win and should be congratulated by anyone, regardless of party loyalties, if they did so.
The problem is the attitude of the permanent structure of government. Who regarded many of the successes of pandemic as threats to their ordered world.
For example, the dashboard team was disbanded and got rid of, the moment the idea was mooted (by the previous government) of doing the same thing across government data. Control of the truth is important to controlling policy.
The testing lab learnings were got rid of - faster, more automated, cheaper testing not wanted here, thank you.
A friend who was involved in getting one of the Nightingale hospitals constructed on schedule was told, when she was pushed out of her job, that her success was embarrassing for the department.
And so on.
This process resembled the way in which, after WWII, large numbers of things that were embarrassingly successful were shut down and got rid of. See RV Jews and scientific intelligence.
The trouble with #ClassicDom's plans to ignore data protection and collate all statistics into a central location, is that it starts with monitoring the pandemic but leads quickly to emailing the Taliban a hitlist of Afghans who'd helped us because a dataset compiled for one reason gets used for something completely different by people unaware of its origins or sensitivity.
HMG makes the same mistake with health data. Bundle it up and sell it to American Big Pharma. What could go wrong? Or burning everyone's tax status onto a couple of CDs and losing them.
But yes, on your wider point, cutting programmes that work is as ingrained and as stupid.
ETA as an aside, my job with a global megacorp included building dashboards and charts for private and public sector customers. It was very rare they showed any interest after the first couple of weeks. Once they've scratched their itch and solved the problem, they move straight on to the next project.
The data security/privacy argument is deployed by the turf protectors. It’s horse shit.
Collecting data, securing it, anonymising it and protecting it are all standard, solved problems.
Just because of epic incompetence by the existing idiots in creating “The NOC list” from Mission Impossible, doesn’t mean it has to be done that way.
Modern methods and tools make fine grained data control and protection much easier than at anytime previously.
In fact such systems lock down access as part of their operation - so exporting the original data is physically impossible.
Which is why the dashboard team could build the dashboard.
In theory, every IT-related balls-up from ransomware to data leaks to bankrupting the company could be prevented if everyone follows best practice (aside from the people whose misfortune led to that best practice).
And yet, we are where we are, up to our neck in superinjunctions and Afghani refugees and empty supermarket shelves.
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
He'd have to be better than evens to be 'odds on'. At the moment he's 5/2 at just about every bookie.
Because if he looks likely to lose Starmer will resign and someone like Rayner or Streeting get a chance for a reset.
Starmer replaced, Farage next PM = 0% Farage if fighting next GE = 46% prob to be PM Farage, fighting, losing narrowly then becoming PM in 2034 and no other PM replacing Starmer in the meantime = 4% ?
Gapping from 5-2 to Evens next PM is all in the first probability = 22%.
Chance of Starmer being replaced before next GE @ 4-1 maybe about right ?
It’s not the basic numbers that are really eye-opening (tho they are eye-opening), it’s the relentless rise of immigration as a major issue. It’s the purple line on the graph
Look at it. Unlike every other issue it has only one direction (absent brief glitches): upwards. It slowly and relentlessly ascends from 2022 (mid 20%) to 2025 (mid 50%). Is there any reason to believe this will stop?
I don’t think so because even if immigration finishes overnight and the boats all cease (not going to happen) there are ALREADY enough migrants here for concern to simply keep growing. It’s now baked in
And of course Labour won’t stop migration and won’t stop the boats
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
The power of the media, both traditional and social. The majority of people aren’t affected by immigration. They are just bombarded with information about those who are.
Anyone who uses the NHS, or public transport, or worries about crime, or attempts to buy a house, or seeks a good school for their kids, or pays taxes to keep asylum seekers in 4 star hotels, etc etc - is affected by immigration. In other words: all of us
I’m not. I don’t give a fuck about Londoners. When you stop sucking the lifeblood from the rest of the country, I might start to care. Those of us in more rural communities suffer from London immigrants buying up our property and making them unaffordable for locals.
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
He'd have to be better than evens to be 'odds on'. At the moment he's 5/2 at just about every bookie.
I am still not convinced Farage will be PM but in this crazy world, crazier things have happened
His political talent is outmatched only by the vespertine spite that lies at the core of his being. Three and a bit years is very long time for such a creature to keep the Fukker coalition of sociopathic libertarians and racist fucking idiots intact. He'll just have to pray to Belphegor, or to whichever of the Seven Princes of Hell to whom he sold his soul, that SKS doesn't sort the boats out or experience economic growth significant enough that Benefits Street feels the difference.
@TSE "My view is that the bombings ultimately saved more lives than they killed"
Including those that died from radiation long after the Japanese surrender?
Yes
The Japanese plan was to die fighting the invasion - mass suicide attacks. Including the civilian population, armed with bamboo spears.
There was also a famine coming - the Japanese Military plan to deal with that was to reserve food for the military and let the civilians starve.
The US military casualties were computed using the results of previous battles. They were stilling using the Purple Hearts (medals for the wounded) made in response to the expected numbers, today.
The invasion of Japan would have been a mass slaughter. It would have killed millions of Japanese - probably a serious percentage of the entire population.
My step dad was doing amphibious landing training in the Spring of 1945 so he was convinced that he would have been on the Japanese version of D-Day and he was equally convinced he would die in the process. He was with his future first wife at the pictures when the news came out of the Japanese surrender and emerged out of the cinema to discover what happened and then he knew that he did have a rest of his life to live.
Over a million British and Imperial soldiers were earmarked for the invasion, along with the British Pacific Fleet (the largest navy we ever assembled). It's usually overlooked that the Royal Navy had a big role in the Battle of Okinawa.
The Americans have a real problem communicating our role on D-Day and at Okinawa.
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
He'd have to be better than evens to be 'odds on'. At the moment he's 5/2 at just about every bookie.
Because if he looks likely to lose Starmer will resign and someone like Rayner or Streeting get a chance for a reset.
Starmer replaced, Farage next PM = 0% Farage if fighting next GE = 46% prob to be PM Farage, fighting, losing narrowly then becoming PM in 2034 and no other PM replacing Starmer in the meantime = 4% ?
Gapping from 5-2 to Evens next PM is all in the first probability = 22%.
Chance of Starmer being replaced before next GE @ 4-1 maybe about right ?
He is trading at 12% to be replaced in 2025 (which feels like a decent lay?) so 20% before the next GE is quite a bit too low imo.
At the end of all this, I suspect the same conclusion will be reached: Rwanda is the only real answer and the ECHR be damned, the cases (and the waiting) must be heard and done there and there is no right of return to the UK.
It’s not the basic numbers that are really eye-opening (tho they are eye-opening), it’s the relentless rise of immigration as a major issue. It’s the purple line on the graph
Look at it. Unlike every other issue it has only one direction (absent brief glitches): upwards. It slowly and relentlessly ascends from 2022 (mid 20%) to 2025 (mid 50%). Is there any reason to believe this will stop?
I don’t think so because even if immigration finishes overnight and the boats all cease (not going to happen) there are ALREADY enough migrants here for concern to simply keep growing. It’s now baked in
And of course Labour won’t stop migration and won’t stop the boats
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
It’s not the basic numbers that are really eye-opening (tho they are eye-opening), it’s the relentless rise of immigration as a major issue. It’s the purple line on the graph
Look at it. Unlike every other issue it has only one direction (absent brief glitches): upwards. It slowly and relentlessly ascends from 2022 (mid 20%) to 2025 (mid 50%). Is there any reason to believe this will stop?
I don’t think so because even if immigration finishes overnight and the boats all cease (not going to happen) there are ALREADY enough migrants here for concern to simply keep growing. It’s now baked in
And of course Labour won’t stop migration and won’t stop the boats
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
The power of the media, both traditional and social. The majority of people aren’t affected by immigration. They are just bombarded with information about those who are.
Anyone who uses the NHS, or public transport, or worries about crime, or attempts to buy a house, or seeks a good school for their kids, or pays taxes to keep asylum seekers in 4 star hotels, etc etc - is affected by immigration. In other words: all of us
I’m not. I don’t give a fuck about Londoners. When you stop sucking the lifeblood from the rest of the country, I might start to care. Those of us in more rural communities suffer from London immigrants buying up our property and making them unaffordable for locals.
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
He'd have to be better than evens to be 'odds on'. At the moment he's 5/2 at just about every bookie.
Because if he looks likely to lose Starmer will resign and someone like Rayner or Streeting get a chance for a reset.
Starmer replaced, Farage next PM = 0% Farage if fighting next GE = 46% prob to be PM Farage, fighting, losing narrowly then becoming PM in 2034 and no other PM replacing Starmer in the meantime = 4% ?
Gapping from 5-2 to Evens next PM is all in the first probability = 22%.
Chance of Starmer being replaced before next GE @ 4-1 maybe about right ?
He is trading at 12% to be replaced in 2025 (which feels like a decent lay?) so 20% before the next GE is quite a bit too low imo.
Yeah I've laid that 8.4.
2029 or later at 3.2 is probably the back, but it's a while till then.
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
He'd have to be better than evens to be 'odds on'. At the moment he's 5/2 at just about every bookie.
Because if he looks likely to lose Starmer will resign and someone like Rayner or Streeting get a chance for a reset.
Starmer replaced, Farage next PM = 0% Farage if fighting next GE = 46% prob to be PM Farage, fighting, losing narrowly then becoming PM in 2034 and no other PM replacing Starmer in the meantime = 4% ?
Gapping from 5-2 to Evens next PM is all in the first probability = 22%.
Chance of Starmer being replaced before next GE @ 4-1 maybe about right ?
He is trading at 12% to be replaced in 2025 (which feels like a decent lay?) so 20% before the next GE is quite a bit too low imo.
Yeah I've laid that 8.4.
2029 or later at 3.2 is probably the back, but it's a while till then.
Not sure on the 3.2 but happy to back him to be in charge for 1 Jan 2026.
If you take Starmer exit odds and Farage next PM together with Betfair, absent an early GE (Why would Starmer go early if he was looking like losing ???!) his implied odds for PM after the next GE are 1-5
I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
No. They have got a stonking majority on 33% of the vote themselves. They quite like the current set up. (As do all election winners under FPTP surprisingly enough).
Faced with polls that imply an absolute certainty of losing that majority (or much, much worse) at the next GE, a party with a large majority now might well decide that this is the time to go for PR/AV/Whatever.
They should, but they never do. They assume (was it Tim - fotp - who raised this?) that 'swingback' will save them on the day. Although I think.... didn't the Conservative seat total and LD seat totals broadly mirror their % of vote last time around.
But yeah. They never do. Either because they think, "Well, we didn't put in the manifesto", "We don't agree with it." or more likely "We'll benefit from swingback"
But ultimately, neither Labour nor the Conservatives had championed PR. They're not going to do it, even with defeat staring them in the face.
Do they demolish housing and return it to farmland, such as it is in Japan?
No. I’ve seen these emptying towns in Japan (on my last visit). They are extraordinary
I went to one in the Honshu alps - a pretty, old sake making town (pretty by Japanese standards anyway). I only realised on day 3 that it was 3/4 empty. All the houses are maintained - many are used as summer homes in the country (they used to be permanent homes). Even those unused are kept in good nick - you have to look closely for the dust and cobwebs - but they are there
This gives these towns an unreal and ghostly air which is quite charming. The silence. The mist from the mountains. No cars. The fish in the canal. The one single izakaya open at the end of a moonlit street
Rare eagles now fly above the once busy town centre. I loved it
If you take Starmer exit odds and Farage next PM together with Betfair, absent an early GE (Why would Starmer go early if he was looking like losing ???!) his implied odds for PM after the next GE are 1-5
Something to be aware of if you've got a red number next to Farage next PM !
This YouGov graph also gives the lie to the bed wetting centrist dad PBers who say I go on about immigration too much
I’m the one in tune with the British people, who now make it their number one concern. Not the pb centrist dorks
You certainly go on about Reform too much. We get it, you regret voting for Starmer, but mentioning Reform and their electoral chances 43 times a day won't wipe that stain from your already motley record.
I’ll stop talking about reform if you stop talking about Scottish politics
I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
No. They have got a stonking majority on 33% of the vote themselves. They quite like the current set up. (As do all election winners under FPTP surprisingly enough).
Faced with polls that imply an absolute certainty of losing that majority (or much, much worse) at the next GE, a party with a large majority now might well decide that this is the time to go for PR/AV/Whatever.
They should, but they never do. They assume (was it Tim - fotp - who raised this?) that 'swingback' will save them on the day. Although I think.... didn't the Conservative seat total and LD seat totals broadly mirror their % of vote last time around.
But yeah. They never do. Either because they think, "Well, we didn't put in the manifesto", "We don't agree with it." or more likely "We'll benefit from swingback"
But ultimately, neither Labour nor the Conservatives had championed PR. They're not going to do it, even with defeat staring them in the face.
They'll still believe Labour will be the largest party on the left of politics, so when Reform fail they'll get buggins turn in 2034. There'll be enough belief in that (Whether it is true or not, who knows) to not go for PR.
By 1944, some 400,000 civilians a month were dying from famine in areas of East Asia, the Pacific, and Southeast Asia that were occupied by Japanese forces. The Allies also wanted to save the American, Australian, and British prisoners of war who were starving to death in Japanese camps — or being slaughtered by their captors on Tokyo’s orders.
I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
No. They have got a stonking majority on 33% of the vote themselves. They quite like the current set up. (As do all election winners under FPTP surprisingly enough).
Faced with polls that imply an absolute certainty of losing that majority (or much, much worse) at the next GE, a party with a large majority now might well decide that this is the time to go for PR/AV/Whatever.
Although I think.... didn't the Conservative seat total and LD seat totals broadly mirror their % of vote last time around.
LD was, for once, a very.close match Tories got just under 1/4 of the vote and a bit under 1/5 seats
I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
I've been saying this for a while. They might bring in PR if they're doing so badly that they would win more seats under than system than the current one. You give up the chance of winning a majority again, but at least you avoid being reduced to a very small number of seats.
I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
I've been saying this for a while. They might bring in PR if they're doing so badly that they would win more seats under than system than the current one. You give up the chance of winning a majority again, but at least you avoid being reduced to a very small number of seats.
Politicians tend to be an optimistic bunch when it comes to their own electoral chances. That I reckon rules out PR.
I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
No. They have got a stonking majority on 33% of the vote themselves. They quite like the current set up. (As do all election winners under FPTP surprisingly enough).
Faced with polls that imply an absolute certainty of losing that majority (or much, much worse) at the next GE, a party with a large majority now might well decide that this is the time to go for PR/AV/Whatever.
Although I think.... didn't the Conservative seat total and LD seat totals broadly mirror their % of vote last time around.
LD was, for once, a very.close match Tories got just under 1/4 of the vote and a bit under 1/5 seats
Ironically the Tories would now be much more likely to be in government with PR than FPTP.
With PR Farage could not possibly form a government without Tory support, whereas with FPTP he might well win a majority.
With PR Starmer might also need Tory and LD support to keep out Farage and Corbyn /Polanski from power
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The ghost of Theresa May's 2017 campaign would beg to differ.
The problem with Theresa May's 2017 campaign was not social care but that Lynton Crosby had apparently not been told there was a new leader so crafted the campaign for David Cameron – confident in front of crowds and the camera, with no support from a sidelined Cabinet.
What killed the Conservative majority in 2017 was the two terrorist outrages during the campaign itself, alongside insistence that Tory police cuts had made no difference. Suddenly Labour was the party of Law and Order.
And parroting Crosby's slogan ‘strong and stable’ does not work when you are neither.
I will go to my grave insisting that the terrorist outrages had little effect on the polls in 2017. If you look at the trend line across all polls it looks like there was an effect, but if you ignore the trend line and compare by polling company before-and-after you'll see it's an artefact.
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The ghost of Theresa May's 2017 campaign would beg to differ.
The latter 8mmtalking about now, post election, the former all they had to say was ‘no plans’.
Is that rationale that it's for their future last line of retreat ?
Being cynical, I think it's the following:
*) We really want this bridge, but it'll cost a fortune. *) The Mafia want their kickbacks. *) We have committed to increase NATO spending. *) So put the bridge on the defence budget. *) Villas all round!
"However, police said misinformation had been spread online that one of the men - and the woman - were Somali migrants, which the English Defence League (EDL) founder, Tommy Robinson, similarly claimed."
I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
No. They have got a stonking majority on 33% of the vote themselves. They quite like the current set up. (As do all election winners under FPTP surprisingly enough).
As we move to five/six party politics FPTP will not be sustainable.
@TSE "My view is that the bombings ultimately saved more lives than they killed"
Including those that died from radiation long after the Japanese surrender?
Yes
The Japanese plan was to die fighting the invasion - mass suicide attacks. Including the civilian population, armed with bamboo spears.
There was also a famine coming - the Japanese Military plan to deal with that was to reserve food for the military and let the civilians starve.
The US military casualties were computed using the results of previous battles. They were stilling using the Purple Hearts (medals for the wounded) made in response to the expected numbers, today.
The invasion of Japan would have been a mass slaughter. It would have killed millions of Japanese - probably a serious percentage of the entire population.
My step dad was doing amphibious landing training in the Spring of 1945 so he was convinced that he would have been on the Japanese version of D-Day and he was equally convinced he would die in the process. He was with his future first wife at the pictures when the news came out of the Japanese surrender and emerged out of the cinema to discover what happened and then he knew that he did have a rest of his life to live.
Over a million British and Imperial soldiers were earmarked for the invasion, along with the British Pacific Fleet (the largest navy we ever assembled). It's usually overlooked that the Royal Navy had a big role in the Battle of Okinawa.
The Americans have a real problem communicating our role on D-Day and at Okinawa.
You'd think it was all them.
As Spielberg said when asked why Saving Private Ryan did not show British troops, why doesn't Britain make films about that? (Ring ring, ring ring, Monty here, get Ryan off the boat and in a jeep back to London. Roll credits.)
It’s not the basic numbers that are really eye-opening (tho they are eye-opening), it’s the relentless rise of immigration as a major issue. It’s the purple line on the graph
Look at it. Unlike every other issue it has only one direction (absent brief glitches): upwards. It slowly and relentlessly ascends from 2022 (mid 20%) to 2025 (mid 50%). Is there any reason to believe this will stop?
I don’t think so because even if immigration finishes overnight and the boats all cease (not going to happen) there are ALREADY enough migrants here for concern to simply keep growing. It’s now baked in
And of course Labour won’t stop migration and won’t stop the boats
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
The power of the media, both traditional and social. The majority of people aren’t affected by immigration. They are just bombarded with information about those who are.
Anyone who uses the NHS, or public transport, or worries about crime, or attempts to buy a house, or seeks a good school for their kids, or pays taxes to keep asylum seekers in 4 star hotels, etc etc - is affected by immigration. In other words: all of us
I’m not. I don’t give a fuck about Londoners. When you stop sucking the lifeblood from the rest of the country, I might start to care. Those of us in more rural communities suffer from London immigrants buying up our property and making them unaffordable for locals.
Why do you think Londoners move out?
Because this is what you can buy in Scotland for the price of a 2 bedroom flat in Camden.
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The should just bite the bullet, break a pledge or two, and raise income tax as well as looking at council tax bands/land tax for starters.
But it’s a mammoth task and not an easy one especially given they fold to their backbenchers when trying to make modest changes to spending as we saw with welfare. A so called cut was simply slowing the rate of growth.
As was discussed on here yesterday, the incoming government had one chance, at their first Budget, to say that the finances were much worse than they had been led to believe, and there’s going to have to be 2p on all income tax rates for the duration of this Parliament.
Instead, they went tinkering with a load of little things, and wasted huge amounts of political capital in exchange for very little additional income.
It was as if they’d spent the last five years doing no preparation for government at all.
See Nick Clegg/Tuition Fees for why they didn't choose that path.
They could have made it clear that it was temporary, and cut it at in the final Budget before the next election.
Instead, they’ve taken all the flak but not raised any money. They’re now both unpopular and broke, with bond rates slowly ticking up to make the situation even worse.
It is what the electorate persistently vote for so what we get. Teeter along with sticking plasters to eke out what we can before either we hit disaster or unexpected good fortune down the line.
Reform will be no different when they get their chance. May even fall faster in popularity as likely to be more chaotic.
It’s not just a UK problem either, much of the developed world is totally screwed, yet there remains little enthusiasm among the electorate to do anything about it.
Argentina appears to have mostly succeeded with the right-wing approach in recent years, others such as Denmark have succeeded with a more left-wing approach.
Meanwhile, many of the major economies have huge budget deficits and debt/GDP ratios above 100%. In many cases they hadn’t properly recovered from the 2008 recession when the pandemic hit.
The US had a good go at cutting out waste, but the Executive can’t do much without Congress, who are still as keen as ever to line their own pockets, and don’t dare vote to cut a penny from spending on their own constituents. They’ll still be adding more than a trillion dollars to the debt this year.
I can see that this cycle continues in many countries, with more and more extremist governments been elected over the next decade, until either economies crash or there’s the political will to actually fix the problems.
I think the end result will always been economies crashing because the political will will never exist - voters like sweeties and easy fixes too much
Just look at what happened when Labour tried to trim a small amount from the rise of the benefits bill
They have a stonking majority and could not get it through.
Do they demolish housing and return it to farmland, such as it is in Japan?
Saw this in action in April. You go through rural communities which have been closed/moved as the local authority don't want to spend any more money e.g. roads on diminishing numbers. It's backed by legislation and probably agreement. But I have to say that in the rural communities I did walk through, the roads were pothole free and the buses worked.
I'll see if I can find a pic of the sign explaining it in English.
Further details of the Anglo-French migrants deal, this time from The Guardian
▪️ The UK pays all transport and admin costs, both directions.
▪️ France can veto any migrant we want to return, no reason required.
▪️ We can’t cross-check fingerprints of the ones they send, and they won’t run Eurodac checks for us.
▪️ We must process removals within 14 days of arrival or we lose the right to remove them.
▪️ Only around 50 migrants a week can be returned about 5% of weekly crossings.
▪️ Migrants can block their return using human rights appeals.
▪️ We can’t return those citing vague “public interest” concerns.
▪️ The UK MUST accept asylum seekers France chooses, with no independent vetting.
Then again, this is what you voted for. Sovereign nations being sovereign. Huzzah.
I'll keep my eye out for Lord Horatio Farage, Lieutenant Tice, and Midshipman Anderson commenting on this one ...
Do you still believe the Chinese robot dog was AI fakery?
lol
"The Solactive China Humanoid Robotics Index - a thematic equity index tracking Chinese companies involved in the commercialization of humanoid and robotics technologies - jumped more than 4% on Wednesday after Chinese robotics firm Unitree released a stunning video of its new robot dog. "
I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
No. They have got a stonking majority on 33% of the vote themselves. They quite like the current set up. (As do all election winners under FPTP surprisingly enough).
As we move to five/six party politics FPTP will not be sustainable.
Perhaps it is the Conservatives who will not be sustainable.
Do they demolish housing and return it to farmland, such as it is in Japan?
Saw this in action in April. You go through rural communities which have been closed/moved as the local authority don't want to spend any more money e.g. roads on diminishing numbers. It's backed by legislation and probably agreement. But I have to say that in the rural communities I did walk through, the roads were pothole free and the buses worked.
I'll see if I can find a pic of the sign explaining it in English.
Hasn't Japan always done this, building new homes instead of moving into old ones as we do, or am I mixing them up with somewhere else?
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The ghost of Theresa May's 2017 campaign would beg to differ.
The problem with Theresa May's 2017 campaign was not social care but that Lynton Crosby had apparently not been told there was a new leader so crafted the campaign for David Cameron – confident in front of crowds and the camera, with no support from a sidelined Cabinet.
What killed the Conservative majority in 2017 was the two terrorist outrages during the campaign itself, alongside insistence that Tory police cuts had made no difference. Suddenly Labour was the party of Law and Order.
And parroting Crosby's slogan ‘strong and stable’ does not work when you are neither.
I will go to my grave insisting that the terrorist outrages had little effect on the polls in 2017. If you look at the trend line across all polls it looks like there was an effect, but if you ignore the trend line and compare by polling company before-and-after you'll see it's an artefact.
My memory is that the Grande attack happened just as it became clear the dementia tax position was untenable. I was fully expecting a reverse ferret to defuse the issue. But Grande paused all campaigning for a week and what was a saveable situation ossified into catastrophe for the Tories.
Do they demolish housing and return it to farmland, such as it is in Japan?
Saw this in action in April. You go through rural communities which have been closed/moved as the local authority don't want to spend any more money e.g. roads on diminishing numbers. It's backed by legislation and probably agreement. But I have to say that in the rural communities I did walk through, the roads were pothole free and the buses worked.
I'll see if I can find a pic of the sign explaining it in English.
I can combine this with another PB favourite; railways. Many rural railway lines have closed in Japan over the last couple of decades.
@TSE "My view is that the bombings ultimately saved more lives than they killed"
Including those that died from radiation long after the Japanese surrender?
Yes
The Japanese plan was to die fighting the invasion - mass suicide attacks. Including the civilian population, armed with bamboo spears.
There was also a famine coming - the Japanese Military plan to deal with that was to reserve food for the military and let the civilians starve.
The US military casualties were computed using the results of previous battles. They were stilling using the Purple Hearts (medals for the wounded) made in response to the expected numbers, today.
The invasion of Japan would have been a mass slaughter. It would have killed millions of Japanese - probably a serious percentage of the entire population.
My step dad was doing amphibious landing training in the Spring of 1945 so he was convinced that he would have been on the Japanese version of D-Day and he was equally convinced he would die in the process. He was with his future first wife at the pictures when the news came out of the Japanese surrender and emerged out of the cinema to discover what happened and then he knew that he did have a rest of his life to live.
Over a million British and Imperial soldiers were earmarked for the invasion, along with the British Pacific Fleet (the largest navy we ever assembled). It's usually overlooked that the Royal Navy had a big role in the Battle of Okinawa.
The Americans have a real problem communicating our role on D-Day and at Okinawa.
You'd think it was all them.
As Spielberg said when asked why Saving Private Ryan did not show British troops, why doesn't Britain make films about that? (Ring ring, ring ring, Monty here, get Ryan off the boat and in a jeep back to London. Roll credits.)
Dunkirk was purely because of Christopher Nolan. Since Inception the guy has a blank cheque to film whatever he wants. Bear in mind he made a film about a physicist into a blockbuster.
Do they demolish housing and return it to farmland, such as it is in Japan?
A lot of the time in the countryside that people are moving out of houses will just be left to rot. It costs a bit of money to knock them down and often the ownership is a mess.
The depopulating towns don't have replacement-level farmers either. Farmer's kids fuck off to the cities and get proper civilized jobs and they have restrictive rules on buying farmland where you have to already be a local farmer to buy local farmland so new people couldn't move in and start farming even if they wanted to live in a dead town.
I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
No. They have got a stonking majority on 33% of the vote themselves. They quite like the current set up. (As do all election winners under FPTP surprisingly enough).
As we move to five/six party politics FPTP will not be sustainable.
Perhaps it is the Conservatives who will not be sustainable.
PR would make them perfectly sustainable, even just 15% of the vote would give the Conservatives 90-100 odd MPs at least and they could well then be Kingmakers between whether Farage or Starmer becomes PM.
Whereas unless the Tories get back over 20% with Kemi or a new leader then they will be down to less than 50 MPs with FPTP and 15% of the vote would see the Tories near wiped out
There was a time when those of us concerned about Government borrowing were slapped down by Government supporters (now Opposition supporters) who asserted borrowing was fine and we could just keep doing it.
£50 billion by 2028/9 isn't quite as bad as it sounds and it'll be easy for some to think that means £50 billion of tax rises now which it doesn't.
Again, we come back to the questions which have afflicted us since 2008 - to reduce the deficit and reduce borrowing, what do we do? Do we raise taxes, do we cut spending? Do we do both? If we do the former, which taxes do we raise? If we do the latter, which areas of public spending do we cut and what will be the impact of both the tax rises and the spending cuts?
Rather like the "boats", plenty of complaining and plenty pointing out the problem but little in the way of practical, workable and coherent solutions. I do think Starmer and Reeves were unwise in ruling out changes to Income Tax and VAT before the election - that was boxing themselves into a corner for no reason.
You’re quite right. The Ming vase strategy was an error. They’re also unwise ruling out reform to The Triple Lock and the public sector pensions that are unfunded.
The should just bite the bullet, break a pledge or two, and raise income tax as well as looking at council tax bands/land tax for starters.
But it’s a mammoth task and not an easy one especially given they fold to their backbenchers when trying to make modest changes to spending as we saw with welfare. A so called cut was simply slowing the rate of growth.
As was discussed on here yesterday, the incoming government had one chance, at their first Budget, to say that the finances were much worse than they had been led to believe, and there’s going to have to be 2p on all income tax rates for the duration of this Parliament.
Instead, they went tinkering with a load of little things, and wasted huge amounts of political capital in exchange for very little additional income.
It was as if they’d spent the last five years doing no preparation for government at all.
See Nick Clegg/Tuition Fees for why they didn't choose that path.
They could have made it clear that it was temporary, and cut it at in the final Budget before the next election.
Instead, they’ve taken all the flak but not raised any money. They’re now both unpopular and broke, with bond rates slowly ticking up to make the situation even worse.
It is what the electorate persistently vote for so what we get. Teeter along with sticking plasters to eke out what we can before either we hit disaster or unexpected good fortune down the line.
Reform will be no different when they get their chance. May even fall faster in popularity as likely to be more chaotic.
It’s not just a UK problem either, much of the developed world is totally screwed, yet there remains little enthusiasm among the electorate to do anything about it.
Argentina appears to have mostly succeeded with the right-wing approach in recent years, others such as Denmark have succeeded with a more left-wing approach.
Meanwhile, many of the major economies have huge budget deficits and debt/GDP ratios above 100%. In many cases they hadn’t properly recovered from the 2008 recession when the pandemic hit.
The US had a good go at cutting out waste, but the Executive can’t do much without Congress, who are still as keen as ever to line their own pockets, and don’t dare vote to cut a penny from spending on their own constituents. They’ll still be adding more than a trillion dollars to the debt this year.
I can see that this cycle continues in many countries, with more and more extremist governments been elected over the next decade, until either economies crash or there’s the political will to actually fix the problems.
I think the end result will always been economies crashing because the political will will never exist - voters like sweeties and easy fixes too much
Just look at what happened when Labour tried to trim a small amount from the rise of the benefits bill
They have a stonking majority and could not get it through.
There comes a point at which force majeure applies. perhaps they are all waiting for the IMF/western nations all default together or some similar moment.
The most unaddressed question remains this: Reform have a 30%+ chance of governing from 2029. What will they actually do in government - how, broadly, will they govern? It isn't possible to govern on completely fantasy economics (see Truss), so what will they actually do from Day 1 when the fast bowling starts? The lack of interrogation of this question is remarkable.
Do they demolish housing and return it to farmland, such as it is in Japan?
Saw this in action in April. You go through rural communities which have been closed/moved as the local authority don't want to spend any more money e.g. roads on diminishing numbers. It's backed by legislation and probably agreement. But I have to say that in the rural communities I did walk through, the roads were pothole free and the buses worked.
I'll see if I can find a pic of the sign explaining it in English.
This is described as a Park and Garden but were the fields of a small village that was moved on to a larger village. A sort of voluntarily managed clearances. Some village life is preserved through tourism as it is part of a walking route called the Komano Kodo.
I was just out and about and a thought occurred to me..... if the launch of Corbyns party really hammers Labour, might they try a really out there imposition of PR (with presumably Tory and LD support if the former are still dying horribly and the latter stick to their guns plus SNP and Plaid will be fairly keen i think) - to impose it before the next election they could just keep existing boundaries, have Orkney/Shetland and Western Isles retain their special fptp individual status and split the remaining 648 constituencies into 108 groups of 6 with 6 to be elected in each on D'hondt basis like Wales. Hail Mary shut out Reform from majority effort?
No. They have got a stonking majority on 33% of the vote themselves. They quite like the current set up. (As do all election winners under FPTP surprisingly enough).
As we move to five/six party politics FPTP will not be sustainable.
Perhaps it is the Conservatives who will not be sustainable.
PR would make them perfectly sustainable, even just 15% of the vote would give the Conservatives 90-100 odd MPs at least and they could well then be Kingmakers between whether Farage or Starmer becomes PM.
Whereas unless the Tories get back over 20% with Kemi or a new leader then they will be down to less than 50 MPs with FPTP and 15% of the vote would see the Tories near wiped out
When PR would have helped the LDs or the SDP or the Greens out none of the bigger parties could have cared less. It will be the same if the only thing that will work for the Conservatives is PR, the powers that be won't care.
Comments
The establishment parties wrapping themselves in bubble wrap
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Japan
And even then a lot of voters will go for the person offering easy fixes for their issues (I.e. a better pension or similar) rather than fixing the fundamental overall problem
Same as the Labour voteshare is likely an underestimate given the LD and Green voters who will tactically vote Labour in Labour held marginal seats they gained last year to keep out Reform
Hence the large uplift in the debt limit to accommodate that.
The administration hasn't had any kind of good go at cutting waste.
It's just cut stuff it doesn't like - including a very large amount of economically useful science research funding.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/NGDPRSAXDCARQ#
Like us, they seem to have flatlined roughly since the 2008 crash.
Westminster Voting Intention:
RFM: 31% (+2)
LAB: 22% (-1)
CON: 18% (-2)
LDM: 14% (+1)
GRN: 7% (=)
SNP: 3% (=)
Via @moreincommon, 1-3 Aug.
Changes w/ 26-28 Jul"
x.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/1953037106537714097
That stage of denial doesn't last long, though. See also Greece.
Clearly Brexiters get a beating for not having a plan for things if they got their wish so just seeing what the plans are in the minds of those when we reach the glorious end of private education. Can’t imagine any objections as they’ve thought it through.
Culture secretary says the claims will not be a loophole, adding to confusion about the ‘one in, one out’ returns treaty" (£)
https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/lisa-nandy-migrants-human-rights-53lpxbvs0
The way to cut waste would be a slow, steady reform of the systems and process of government over years.
Things like reducing the contracting pyramids - often work is contracted out 10 times through multiple companies. This builds in 10 layers of profit and makes changes difficult and expensive.
The problem there is that this structure perfectly aligns with spreading the money, politically. And obfusticating the payments from the pyramids back to the politicians.
Also, look at this startling graph
“56% of Britons say that immigration is one of the most important issues facing the country, the highest level since June 2016
Immigration: 56% (+4 from 19-21 July)
Economy: 46% (-5)
Health: 34% (+2)
Crime: 24% (+3)
Defence: 19% (-2)
Housing: 18% (+1)
Environment: 17% (-1)
Tax: 13% (-1)
Welfare: 13% (-2)”
https://x.com/yougov/status/1952691575051395287?s=46&t=bulOICNH15U6kB0MwE6Lfw
It’s not the basic numbers that are really eye-opening (tho they are eye-opening), it’s the relentless rise of immigration as a major issue. It’s the purple line on the graph
Look at it. Unlike every other issue it has only one direction (absent brief glitches): upwards. It slowly and relentlessly ascends from 2022 (mid 20%) to 2025 (mid 50%). Is there any reason to believe this will stop?
I don’t think so because even if immigration finishes overnight and the boats all cease (not going to happen) there are ALREADY enough migrants here for concern to simply keep growing. It’s now baked in
And of course Labour won’t stop migration and won’t stop the boats
On this trajectory immigration will be overwhelmingly the biggest concern in a few years. Absolutely dominant. Perfect timing for Farage. If he avoids getting run over (etc) he is odds-on to be the next prime minister
"DOGE" was nothing to do with any kind of budgetary discipline; it was an exercise of arbitrary power, which will leave no lasting positive effects.
It may be a long time coming, but someone, somewhere, one day, will use one again. I think nuclear terrorism is the most likely when a group, possibly state sponsered, manages to lay their hands on one.
There also is the possibility that Putin, as he realises it's just not going to happen conventionally in Ukraine and unwilling to have done to him what he's done to so many others for his failure, lobs one on Kyev to try to force a victory.
I think the chances of either are not as low as we'd all like.
I’m the one in tune with the British people, who now make it their number one concern. Not the pb centrist dorks
Odds on after the next GE
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-france-treaty-targeting-illegal-crossings-comes-into-force
"For migrants in France wanting to come to the UK legally, they will be able to submit an Expression of Interest application for the new legal route online and the Home Office will make a decision. They will need to satisfactorily establish their identity and nationality and will be subject to strict security and eligibility checks.
Anyone who arrives by small boat and is returned to France will not be eligible for the legal route to the UK, while anyone who tries to re-enter the UK having already been returned to France once will be returned again as a matter of priority."
Edit: Ah, can see why Nige isn't going to lose sleep over this
I do not always agree with you, but it is very apparent that immigartion, the boats, and the way it is being handled by labour is just adding to Farage's narrative
We learn this morning the 'one in one out' scheme is already under legal challenge from human rights lawyers, and it again raises the question just how the boats are stopped short of unilateral action which is an anathema to the left, but it is also an issue that is not going away
Mind you, Lisa Nandy assures listeners to Sky this morning the legal challenges are not an issue
Or streamline the processes, allow claimants to work and fund their own accomodation.
On a purely political perspective, he is absolutely the odds on favourite
https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/sicily-bridge-messina-italy-meloni-b2802786.html
That's going to be quite a spectacular project.
I think I see the problem
Turns out people find the streets safer than ever. Something the Conservatives should shout more about.
The only chance Labour had to stop this being the overriding issue was to go in hard on immigration immediately after the election. Voters will understand it's a problem that can't be solved overnight, but they need to have confidence real action is being taken. But Labour don't have a clue, this 'deal' will just anger even more people because it looks like all the other useless, infective 'initiatives' that amount to nothing.
Meanwhile there's a steady drip of stories about immigrants raping young girls, of criminals allowed to stay in the UK because they need chicken nuggets or their cat likes Fray Bentos pies. Each one pushes more people to Reform.
It's a tragedy that Labour and the Tories have been so fucking useless they've managed to drive the usually moderate and reasonable British voter into the hands of a shit like Nigel Farage.
And yet, we are where we are, up to our neck in superinjunctions and Afghani refugees and empty supermarket shelves.
Do they demolish housing and return it to farmland, such as it is in Japan?
Starmer replaced, Farage next PM = 0%
Farage if fighting next GE = 46% prob to be PM
Farage, fighting, losing narrowly then becoming PM in 2034 and no other PM replacing Starmer in the meantime = 4% ?
Gapping from 5-2 to Evens next PM is all in the first probability = 22%.
Chance of Starmer being replaced before next GE @ 4-1 maybe about right ?
You'd think it was all them.
The law would need to change for this.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_next_United_Kingdom_general_election
2029 or later at 3.2 is probably the back, but it's a while till then.
Although I think.... didn't the Conservative seat total and LD seat totals broadly mirror their % of vote last time around.
But yeah. They never do. Either because they think, "Well, we didn't put in the manifesto", "We don't agree with it." or more likely "We'll benefit from swingback"
But ultimately, neither Labour nor the Conservatives had championed PR. They're not going to do it, even with defeat staring them in the face.
I went to one in the Honshu alps - a pretty, old sake making town (pretty by Japanese standards anyway). I only realised on day 3 that it was 3/4 empty. All the houses are maintained - many are used as summer homes in the country (they used to be permanent homes). Even those unused are kept in good nick - you have to look closely for the dust and cobwebs - but they are there
This gives these towns an unreal and ghostly air which is quite charming. The silence. The mist from the mountains. No cars. The fish in the canal. The one single izakaya open at the end of a moonlit street
Rare eagles now fly above the once busy town centre. I loved it
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rape_of_Nanking_(book)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manila_massacre
In a recent column, George Will observed:
Tories got just under 1/4 of the vote and a bit under 1/5 seats
With PR Farage could not possibly form a government without Tory support, whereas with FPTP he might well win a majority.
With PR Starmer might also need Tory and LD support to keep out Farage and Corbyn /Polanski from power
*) We really want this bridge, but it'll cost a fortune.
*) The Mafia want their kickbacks.
*) We have committed to increase NATO spending.
*) So put the bridge on the defence budget.
*) Villas all round!
Now I’ve seen this I’ll never unsee it !!!
Since then, to be fair, we have had Dunkirk and The Imitation Game so all is not lost.
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls043909228/?sort=release_date,desc
US taking advantage of the UKs investment in Rwanda ?
They have a stonking majority and could not get it through.
I'll see if I can find a pic of the sign explaining it in English.
lol
"The Solactive China Humanoid Robotics Index - a thematic equity index tracking Chinese companies involved in the commercialization of humanoid and robotics technologies - jumped more than 4% on Wednesday after Chinese robotics firm Unitree released a stunning video of its new robot dog. "
https://www.zerohedge.com/ai/china-reveals-ever-scarier-robot-called-stellar-hunter
https://www.economist.com/asia/2020/09/10/japans-rural-railways-are-disappearing
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/shows/2049135/
Janan Ganesh calls peak Trump
https://x.com/JohnRentoul/status/1953061655350309023
The depopulating towns don't have replacement-level farmers either. Farmer's kids fuck off to the cities and get proper civilized jobs and they have restrictive rules on buying farmland where you have to already be a local farmer to buy local farmland so new people couldn't move in and start farming even if they wanted to live in a dead town.
Whereas unless the Tories get back over 20% with Kemi or a new leader then they will be down to less than 50 MPs with FPTP and 15% of the vote would see the Tories near wiped out
Bit by bit the romance of travel is sacrificed in the name of mass market efficiency.
The most unaddressed question remains this: Reform have a 30%+ chance of governing from 2029. What will they actually do in government - how, broadly, will they govern? It isn't possible to govern on completely fantasy economics (see Truss), so what will they actually do from Day 1 when the fast bowling starts? The lack of interrogation of this question is remarkable.
https://maps.app.goo.gl/kGYz2LHtULxoodf39