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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » In terms of leadership chances Jeremy Hunt emerges as the winn
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » In terms of leadership chances Jeremy Hunt emerges as the winner from the DGreen exit
Yesterday I had a bet for the first time on the Health Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, as next Conservative leader. I got 23/1 on Betfair.
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Having earlier in the year tipped variously Damien Green and Michael Fallon maybe it'll be third time lucky......
https://www.channel4.com/news/james-murdoch-gives-evidence-at-leveson-inquiry
I am sure that all those appalled by police misuse of confidential data will be equally appalled at this.
https://twitter.com/Jeremy_Hunt/status/941719094553972736
A brass neck and being friends with the Murdoch press are two further reasons to back Hunt.
I don't rate him as Health Secretary, but he is not the worst of my professional career. That would be Patricia Hewitt, closely followed by Alan Milburn, but I do have pretty low expectations of capability in the role.
He is disliked in the NHS for a variety of reasons. The junior doctors are obvious, bur his support of creeping privatisation is another. Mostly the steady erosion of pay and conditions affecting staff retention is driven by Treasury financial settlements, Hunt merely has to implement them.
Jeremy Hunt to make £17million from sale of internet business.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/active/10436237/Jeremy-Hunt-to-make-17million-from-sale-of-internet-business.html
*PBers of a certain vintage will understand.
Seems unlikely May would do it but it would solve many problems.
Moreover it would be hilarious to see the reaction of Carwyn Jones on being told his new link man is Boris...
Interesting piece on the US mid-terms next year:
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/12/21/16803050/latest-2018-midterms-polling-extremely-good-democrats
Had a look at Betfair on this - it's a very thin market, but Dems are 1.66, which doesn't look good enough odds. One point on gerrymandering - however you draw the boundaries, there comes a point where you lose big time, because you've fixed it so that in normal times you win narrowly in lots of seats while the other side piles up useless majorities in a few. If there's a big swing, you lose most of those narrow majorities and are suddenly in deep trouble.
I wasn't very well this summer, but I've got a general impression it didn't quite work as expected.
The fact is that while Hunt should have gone over the BSkyB scandal, he didn't, and his record as Health Secretary is actually not bad considering the cards he was dealt by Lansley - certainly better than Gove's at Education. So he is a plausible candidate.
A more serious objection to my mind is that May tried to replace him with Crabb last year before Crabb had to resign, which suggests she doesn't like him very much. This is a post she offered to her friends - Rudd and Green. So perhaps we should consider those she is closest to as contenders in which case we might still be looking at Williamson.
Backed Hunt a little myself (mostly at similar odds, might have a pound or two longer). As Mr. Root said, he does seem characterless. On the other hand, Boris is full of character. And I would certainly prefer Hunt to him.
Hunt is slippery, mendacious and ruthless, but at least has a degree of competence and work ethic lacking in his rivals. For example, after the Junior doctor dispute he quietly kicked into touch plans to change the Consultants, Speciality grades and GPs into touch. He knew it was a Phyrric victory.
He has many of Cameron's attributes as a communicator. He perhaps doesn't have the extra gears of sheer intellect that Cameron has but I can't think of anyone currently in public life that does. As a very definite Cameroon his star waned somewhat when May took the leadership and he was sidelined to a degree. His enthusiastic support for May yesterday showed how he has overcome that.
For me, he is a class apart from any of the contenders. A remainer determined to make Brexit work, a unifier, a team player with a bit of steel as we saw when he refused to be bullied by the junior doctors, a man who has handled a very difficult brief during the longest period of restraint in health spending since the NHS was formed without it destroying the government. It's not even close.
Let's appoint Hunt.
You couldn't make it up.
As a matter of interest, who would you rate as best and why?
What would your ideal Health Secretary do?
'Whatever you do, do not appoint Michael Ramsey. I was his headmaster and I know him well. He is a scholar, a theologian and a man of prayer, and therefore quite unsuited to being Archbishop of Canterbury.'
https://twitter.com/Amy_Greenbank/status/943944328539287552
It's stirred up all the mud, and forced people into doubling-down on each side, but I expect the long-term bracket of support is in a 15-25% box, and not a 30%+ one.
(Edited to remove Asquith, who wasn't a Tory.)
Hunt looks and sounds a bit like a shy swot who's a bit of a playground pushover, but he's actually extremely tough and resilient.
Ken Clarke used to be by far and away the least popular politician in the country.
Every time I see those staring eyes I think of the last moments of Edward 11.
Alan Milburn for his marketisation and target culture, which was completely against the 97 manifesto, and indirectly led to the box ticking and bureaucratic toxic NHS management culture. Reid was bad too, very much a bully who instigated the "lick up, kick down" NHS management behind a host of scandals.
He was a Junior Minister, but Norman Lamb did excellent work on mental health and social care during the coalition. He has the right combination of compassion and competence. Of Secretary of States, I rather liked Frank Dobson. He stuck to the budget and quietly reformed some areas under strain.
I left the Labour party in the early noughties fairly equally driven out by warmongering and health policy.
She's done precisely bugger all. It's blissful after the incompetence of Morgan, the intransigence of Gove and the hectoring arrogance of Balls.
I'm gutted that she's set to be moved.
Edit - it should be noted however that Anderson actually had charge of the government in Churchill's absence at Potsdam, as Eden was abroad as well.
It would be my biggest political payout ever.
Unless May plans to go soon. Hunt is breaking from the pack too early.
I think you're stretching this one.
In any case 1945 is before 1955.
Mr. Jonathan, by 'breaking from the pack', do you mean by any actual behaviour or simply by looking like he might be favourite?
The comments he was actually on to talk about yesterday in respect of injuries in antenatal care were typical. He said that he signs off on 2 settlements a week for a child born with brain injuries at a cost to the NHS of several million a go. It is an absolute tragedy for the child and family of course but that is several million a week available for more midwives if that can be stopped.
His address to EU NHS staff on his twitter feed on 13th December is also worth a look.
Sticking his head up without sticking the knife in could be a smart strategy. It will be interesting to watch any anti-hunt briefing. Will dacre fire warning shots?
In other words, it’s much better to spend money avoiding the accident in the first place - and not just for those directly involved either.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-42441721
A rather bigger vote for Wider-Yorkshire and on a higher turnout than I expected.
The Sheffield City region crossing into Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire was, even by George Osborne's standards, an idiotic idea and moving the HS2 station from Meadowhall to central Sheffield is not going to please anyone elsewhere in South Yorkshire.
They’ll be as pragmatic as they were in 2005 and would have been in 2016 if they’d have had the final vote.
I can’t see JRM making the final two.
Plus his Papist views will see him the victim of ‘aggressive’ campaigning during the MP stage.
DD has been crap, his excruciating detail reports show that Airbus make plans and fishing is based in coastal areas.
Boris as Foreign Secretary has failed his audition.
The recent Ipsos MORI polling shows even Tories don’t like the Govester.
Was very important to Dave.
Beware of believing some of the figures though, the devil is in the detail and the outcome measures often do not match good care. For example, over the last year I have been involved in a distant family members social care. The hospital mortality figures looked good because she was not admitted, though in a highly treatable infection induced delerium. We arranged some social care and she died in a nursing home a couple of weeks later, and I believe unnecessarily early. On the figures it looked good. Admission averted, tick. Hospital mortality rate, tick. Outcome, dead.
@xtophercook: Certainly, when I'm abroad, people often say "oh, Britain? The one with the British passports?"
I do. And Hunt has the least negatives of almost all the runners and riders.
The tick box, gold star approach driven by bureaucrats favoured by the likes of Milburn is absolutely the worst approach. Quality needs to be driven by those responsible for its delivery and who either have the relevant expertise or the knowledge to recognise that they don't.
This is not just a problem for health of course. We see the same in education, the care sector, local government....It would be nice to have a leader that understood that. It is beyond the ability of one person to change of course, it is too tied up with human nature, but it is a start.
"I don't care about the colour of passports" say people who keep talking about the colour of passports...
Nor can they remember when it was essential to wear a tie to the theatre.
More than anything else we want to win in 2022 and keep Corbyn out, do we need someone with a realistic chance of doing that, not someone wedded to a 2016 referendum view.
As long at it still has a crown on the front, it will continue to be accepted without a visa for travel to more countries than almost any other passport.
Like the old chestnut of a clever farmer who sold 'gluten free cider' at a higher price than standard cider.