I’ve got to say that bringing such cases against individuals seems pretty low to me as a general rule.
Doesn’t it depend somewhat on whether he was acting within his own competence* and/or with the approval of the appropriate manager?
My understanding is that SPADs are technically employed by the MP in question, and if that is so, there would seem to be a reasonable case that he acted without authority and therefore is personally liable for any breaches.
*I know Cummings is totally incompetent. That isn’t what I meant!
Simplistically speaking, employees will be liable for their own acts if such acts are done in contravention of the Equality Act 2010 and the course of their employment or with the authority of a principal. Beyond that I can’t really comment save to say that tactically it’s what I would have done if I were acting for her - although sometimes it can backfire as you’re making it personal and personal grudges tend to be less likely to settle.
Certainly Cummings will never, ever settle. It would mean at least a tacit acceptance that he did something wrong.
Yes. There are some extraordinary local anomalies (eg Leicestershire, for some reason). But the national and international trend is strongly downward.
This and the new Italian evidence would support the theory that Covid is a flat track bully.
Is the international trend "strongly downward" ? What about Brazil and Mexico?
Today's figures are encouraging (as they always are on a Monday). I would have liked to have seen deaths < 100 and new cases
It is difficult to know where we're at. Deaths are a lagging indicator but it is not clear how many of the new cases come from the community and whether as some Italian doctors are suggesting whether the virus itself is weakening so that these new cases are maybe less unwell overall than new patients were in April. Some suggest the disease is a 70 day wonder, still virulent in Brazil where it arrived later but easing elsewhere.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
Yebbut I voted Labour in 2015
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
The fastest daily rise in Covid deaths is now in Brazil followed by Sweden
Sweden picks up near 100% of covid deaths in its stats though. By Brazil's testing numbers it's probably 50% at best - for example, Italy was around that figure early on (and while doing hugely more tesings than Brazil).
We'll see when excess deaths are analysed, but I'd expect Brazil has already matched our 60k, and is heading towards an end number many times greater.
I’ve got to say that bringing such cases against individuals seems pretty low to me as a general rule.
Doesn’t it depend somewhat on whether he was acting within his own competence* and/or with the approval of the appropriate manager?
My understanding is that SPADs are technically employed by the MP in question, and if that is so, there would seem to be a reasonable case that he acted without authority and therefore is personally liable for any breaches.
*I know Cummings is totally incompetent. That isn’t what I meant!
Simplistically speaking, employees will be liable for their own acts if such acts are done in contravention of the Equality Act 2010 and the course of their employment or with the authority of a principal. Beyond that I can’t really comment save to say that tactically it’s what I would have done if I were acting for her - although sometimes it can backfire as you’re making it personal and personal grudges tend to be less likely to settle.
Certainly Cummings will never, ever settle. It would mean at least a tacit acceptance that he did something wrong.
Yes - that thought occurred to me after I posted. Could be a tactical mistake then - unless the strategy is to get him on the witness stand and embarrass the shit out of the govt.
It is difficult to know where we're at. Deaths are a lagging indicator but it is not clear how many of the new cases come from the community and whether as some Italian doctors are suggesting whether the virus itself is weakening so that these new cases are maybe less unwell overall than new patients were in April. Some suggest the disease is a 70 day wonder, still virulent in Brazil where it arrived later but easing elsewhere.
Yet we still don't really know how many have or have had the virus or how many are asymptomatic which may cause issues later in the year.
Yes. There are some extraordinary local anomalies (eg Leicestershire, for some reason). But the national and international trend is strongly downward.
This and the new Italian evidence would support the theory that Covid is a flat track bully.
Is the international trend "strongly downward" ? What about Brazil and Mexico?
Today's figures are encouraging (as they always are on a Monday). I would have liked to have seen deaths < 100 and new cases
It is difficult to know where we're at. Deaths are a lagging indicator but it is not clear how many of the new cases come from the community and whether as some Italian doctors are suggesting whether the virus itself is weakening so that these new cases are maybe less unwell overall than new patients were in April. Some suggest the disease is a 70 day wonder, still virulent in Brazil where it arrived later but easing elsewhere.
I pondered on these pages many many weeks ago that Covid might peak in 60 days and fizzle out by 120. I remember @eadric being interested by the notion.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
I'm not a conservative Conservative, I'm a liberal Conservative.
I'm not sure if any of those six would identify as a conservative Conservative.
I'm definitely more socially conservative than most people realise. Personal liberty, but not liberty to impose onto others. Collective responsibility and personal responsibility are important.
For example, I don't think TfL getting involved with pride and asking their employees to support it is fair or should be allowed. Employees can and should support it as private citizens, TfL shouldn't be making employees wear rainbow lanyards or paving roads with rainbows etc... I couldn't give a fuck about whether someone is gay or not but pride is a blatantly political event and companies/agencies forcing political views onto their employees and the public is simply wrong.
It's also something I've probably shifted to the right on in the last few years, I'm much less accepting of companies and agencies supporting liberal political causes publicly and have chosen not to use services of a few who have come out on favour of one side or the other, same as I have stopped supporting companies who came out against equal marriage.
I am quite socially conservative too. I believe in marriage as the cornerstone of life, and adultery a shameful betrayal. That the nation would be a better place if more were religious, and Christian in particular. I believe in the work ethic, at study and employment, that sound money and finances are the cornerstone of prosperity at both household and national level. Etc etc.
I cannot see myself voting for the Conservative party again though.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Sean Fear. And didn’t Max (not a party member since last week) also voted leave? And GIN too? And of course Casino!!
Yes, I campaigned and voted for Leave and and then Boris at the GE. To say that I'm some kind of liberal or globalist is misrepresentation of my position.
Sorry I should have more clearly separated the points, but am I right you weren't much of a fan of Cummings or Boris before?
I distinctly remember in the run up to the Tory leadership election when there was so much vitriol on this site against Boris (much of it from PB Tories) making the comment that they were afraid he would win the next GE.
My point is the reaction of people on this site simply isn't going to be representative of the wider public.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
Yebbut I voted Labour in 2015
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
It certainly counts. I don't think Sunil identifies as a Conservative.
I’ve got to say that bringing such cases against individuals seems pretty low to me as a general rule.
Doesn’t it depend somewhat on whether he was acting within his own competence* and/or with the approval of the appropriate manager?
My understanding is that SPADs are technically employed by the MP in question, and if that is so, there would seem to be a reasonable case that he acted without authority and therefore is personally liable for any breaches.
*I know Cummings is totally incompetent. That isn’t what I meant!
Simplistically speaking, employees will be liable for their own acts if such acts are done in contravention of the Equality Act 2010 and the course of their employment or with the authority of a principal. Beyond that I can’t really comment save to say that tactically it’s what I would have done if I were acting for her - although sometimes it can backfire as you’re making it personal and personal grudges tend to be less likely to settle.
Certainly Cummings will never, ever settle. It would mean at least a tacit acceptance that he did something wrong.
Yes - that thought occurred to me after I posted. Could be a tactical mistake then - unless the strategy is to get him on the witness stand and embarrass the shit out of the govt.
Having done a little further research, it appears that under her contract she was employed by the PM directly. But after she was sacked, the rules were changed so that Cummings was made line manager for all SPADs.
The parallels with the rewriting of quarantine rules are all too uncomfortably obvious.
There is something very, very wrong with a government that feels the need to protect somebody as out of control as this.
You could understand for somebody with extraordinary talent - but for Cummings?
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
A lot more of them would have had the chance, had they been resident in the country at the time.
The sensible Torues voted remain but accepted the result when it went the other way. Move on.
On the other side how many PBers voted Remain in 2016 and Labour in 2019?
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
Yebbut I voted Labour in 2015
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
Oh and I voted Labour in 1997, LibDem in 2001 and 2005
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
A lot more of them would have had the chance, had they been resident in the country at the time.
The sensible Torues voted remain but accepted the result when it went the other way. Move on.
On the other side how many PBers voted Remain in 2016 and Labour in 2019?
Obvs.
Our genial host did as well, I think, although if he voted Labour in 2019 it was obviously with some reluctance.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
I'm not a conservative Conservative, I'm a liberal Conservative.
I'm not sure if any of those six would identify as a conservative Conservative.
I'm definitely more socially conservative than most people realise. Personal liberty, but not liberty to impose onto others. Collective responsibility and personal responsibility are important.
For example, I don't think TfL getting involved with pride and asking their employees to support it is fair or should be allowed. Employees can and should support it as private citizens, TfL shouldn't be making employees wear rainbow lanyards or paving roads with rainbows etc... I couldn't give a fuck about whether someone is gay or not but pride is a blatantly political event and companies/agencies forcing political views onto their employees and the public is simply wrong.
It's also something I've probably shifted to the right on in the last few years, I'm much less accepting of companies and agencies supporting liberal political causes publicly and have chosen not to use services of a few who have come out on favour of one side or the other, same as I have stopped supporting companies who came out against equal marriage.
I am quite socially conservative too. I believe in marriage as the cornerstone of life, and adultery a shameful betrayal. That the nation would be a better place if more were religious, and Christian in particular. I believe in the work ethic, at study and employment, that sound money and finances are the cornerstone of prosperity at both household and national level. Etc etc.
I cannot see myself voting for the Conservative party again though.
Things don’t stack up neatly. You have to pick the party that is the best approximation of your views.
I could not be described as conservative in any way. Some of the most conservative people I know are on the left of the Labour Party.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
I'm not a conservative Conservative, I'm a liberal Conservative.
I'm not sure if any of those six would identify as a conservative Conservative.
I'm definitely more socially conservative than most people realise. Personal liberty, but not liberty to impose onto others. Collective responsibility and personal responsibility are important.
For example, I don't think TfL getting involved with pride and asking their employees to support it is fair or should be allowed. Employees can and should support it as private citizens, TfL shouldn't be making employees wear rainbow lanyards or paving roads with rainbows etc... I couldn't give a fuck about whether someone is gay or not but pride is a blatantly political event and companies/agencies forcing political views onto their employees and the public is simply wrong.
It's also something I've probably shifted to the right on in the last few years, I'm much less accepting of companies and agencies supporting liberal political causes publicly and have chosen not to use services of a few who have come out on favour of one side or the other, same as I have stopped supporting companies who came out against equal marriage.
I am quite socially conservative too. I believe in marriage as the cornerstone of life, and adultery a shameful betrayal. That the nation would be a better place if more were religious, and Christian in particular. I believe in the work ethic, at study and employment, that sound money and finances are the cornerstone of prosperity at both household and national level. Etc etc.
I cannot see myself voting for the Conservative party again though.
Things don’t stack up neatly. You have to pick the party that is the best approximation of your views.
I could not be described as conservative in any way. Some of the most conservative people I know are on the left of the Labour Party.
Or you can do what I did as (in @kinabalu’s words) a highly partisan raging centrist, and abstain.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
I'm not a conservative Conservative, I'm a liberal Conservative.
I'm not sure if any of those six would identify as a conservative Conservative.
Mortimer is as fogeyish as they come, despite his tender years.
Haha! I've actually become much more left wing as I've aged. I suspect by the time I retire I'll be wearing hush puppies and smoking cigars whilst listening to Jazz.
The British enjoy queuing and that's the way of the future - "back to the USSR" as someone might have once said.
I was thinking about this today. You often queue to get in (though not if you can shop at an unpopular time), but there is rarely much of a line at the checkouts.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
Yebbut I voted Labour in 2015
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
It certainly counts. I don't think Sunil identifies as a Conservative.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
I'm not a conservative Conservative, I'm a liberal Conservative.
I'm not sure if any of those six would identify as a conservative Conservative.
I'm definitely more socially conservative than most people realise. Personal liberty, but not liberty to impose onto others. Collective responsibility and personal responsibility are important.
For example, I don't think TfL getting involved with pride and asking their employees to support it is fair or should be allowed. Employees can and should support it as private citizens, TfL shouldn't be making employees wear rainbow lanyards or paving roads with rainbows etc... I couldn't give a fuck about whether someone is gay or not but pride is a blatantly political event and companies/agencies forcing political views onto their employees and the public is simply wrong.
It's also something I've probably shifted to the right on in the last few years, I'm much less accepting of companies and agencies supporting liberal political causes publicly and have chosen not to use services of a few who have come out on favour of one side or the other, same as I have stopped supporting companies who came out against equal marriage.
I am quite socially conservative too. I believe in marriage as the cornerstone of life, and adultery a shameful betrayal. That the nation would be a better place if more were religious, and Christian in particular. I believe in the work ethic, at study and employment, that sound money and finances are the cornerstone of prosperity at both household and national level. Etc etc.
I cannot see myself voting for the Conservative party again though.
Things don’t stack up neatly. You have to pick the party that is the best approximation of your views.
I could not be described as conservative in any way. Some of the most conservative people I know are on the left of the Labour Party.
Or you can do what I did as (in @kinabalu’s words) a highly partisan raging centrist, and abstain.
I hate the term centrist. Whereas the left and right define themselves relative to someone else, centrists define themselves relative to two others.
Prefer social democrat or progressive if you have to.
Anyway in reply to my comment earlier there clearly are some Leave voting conservative Conservatives on this site but it seems to be just a few.
Considering people regularly call this a conservative site there doesn't seem to be an abundance of Leave voting conservative Conservatives.
My view - for which I have no hard evidence - is that the commentators are a lot less partisan and particularly a lot less conservative than it was the start, but the reputation it had built up over the first 6/7 years still lingers.
Quite a number of reasons for that, including deaths, retirements, changes of view, bannings which tend to affect the hard right disproportionately because they get carried away fastest. But I think also the political upheaval has weakened the hold of the conservatives on their supporters, the likes of TSE and Morris Dancer (or me for that matter) while Labour were already pretty well at rock bottom so those that stayed are not going anywhere (Rochdale Pioneers being a notable exception).
I could be totally wrong, but that’s my impression.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
I'm not a conservative Conservative, I'm a liberal Conservative.
I'm not sure if any of those six would identify as a conservative Conservative.
I'm definitely more socially conservative than most people realise. Personal liberty, but not liberty to impose onto others. Collective responsibility and personal responsibility are important.
For example, I don't think TfL getting involved with pride and asking their employees to support it is fair or should be allowed. Employees can and should support it as private citizens, TfL shouldn't be making employees wear rainbow lanyards or paving roads with rainbows etc... I couldn't give a fuck about whether someone is gay or not but pride is a blatantly political event and companies/agencies forcing political views onto their employees and the public is simply wrong.
It's also something I've probably shifted to the right on in the last few years, I'm much less accepting of companies and agencies supporting liberal political causes publicly and have chosen not to use services of a few who have come out on favour of one side or the other, same as I have stopped supporting companies who came out against equal marriage.
I am quite socially conservative too. I believe in marriage as the cornerstone of life, and adultery a shameful betrayal. That the nation would be a better place if more were religious, and Christian in particular. I believe in the work ethic, at study and employment, that sound money and finances are the cornerstone of prosperity at both household and national level. Etc etc.
I cannot see myself voting for the Conservative party again though.
Things don’t stack up neatly. You have to pick the party that is the best approximation of your views.
I could not be described as conservative in any way. Some of the most conservative people I know are on the left of the Labour Party.
Or you can do what I did as (in @kinabalu’s words) a highly partisan raging centrist, and abstain.
I hate the term centrist. Whereas the left and right define themselves relative to someone else, centrists define themselves relative to two others. How weak is that?
Prefer social democrat or progressive if you have to.
I am not a social democrat, nor do I think of myself as especially progressive.
I prefer centrist. I do not belong on either left or right, but borrow whichever ideas make sense from either.
That, incidentally, is why I was a pretty unabashed supporter of the Conservatives ten years ago and yet am totally estranged from them now.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
I'm not a conservative Conservative, I'm a liberal Conservative.
I'm not sure if any of those six would identify as a conservative Conservative.
Mortimer is as fogeyish as they come, despite his tender years.
Haha! I've actually become much more left wing as I've aged. I suspect by the time I retire I'll be wearing hush puppies and smoking cigars whilst listening to Jazz.
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
I'm not a conservative Conservative, I'm a liberal Conservative.
I'm not sure if any of those six would identify as a conservative Conservative.
I'm definitely more socially conservative than most people realise. Personal liberty, but not liberty to impose onto others. Collective responsibility and personal responsibility are important.
For example, I don't think TfL getting involved with pride and asking their employees to support it is fair or should be allowed. Employees can and should support it as private citizens, TfL shouldn't be making employees wear rainbow lanyards or paving roads with rainbows etc... I couldn't give a fuck about whether someone is gay or not but pride is a blatantly political event and companies/agencies forcing political views onto their employees and the public is simply wrong.
It's also something I've probably shifted to the right on in the last few years, I'm much less accepting of companies and agencies supporting liberal political causes publicly and have chosen not to use services of a few who have come out on favour of one side or the other, same as I have stopped supporting companies who came out against equal marriage.
I am quite socially conservative too. I believe in marriage as the cornerstone of life, and adultery a shameful betrayal. That the nation would be a better place if more were religious, and Christian in particular. I believe in the work ethic, at study and employment, that sound money and finances are the cornerstone of prosperity at both household and national level. Etc etc.
I cannot see myself voting for the Conservative party again though.
Things don’t stack up neatly. You have to pick the party that is the best approximation of your views.
I could not be described as conservative in any way. Some of the most conservative people I know are on the left of the Labour Party.
Or you can do what I did as (in @kinabalu’s words) a highly partisan raging centrist, and abstain.
I hate the term centrist. Whereas the left and right define themselves relative to someone else, centrists define themselves relative to two others. How weak is that?
Prefer social democrat or progressive if you have to.
I am not a social democrat, nor do I think of myself as especially progressive.
I prefer centrist. I do not belong on either left or right, but borrow whichever ideas make sense from either.
That, incidentally, is why I was a pretty unabashed supporter of the Conservatives ten years ago and yet am totally estranged from them now.
The problem with relative terms for me, left, right and centre is that the beliefs of others define you as much as you’re own. I am left compared to a Tory, right wing compared to Corbyn and centrist overall.
Btw I came across as a bit feisty. I am just a bit tired of our politics being defined by those on the extreme.
I’ve got to say that bringing such cases against individuals seems pretty low to me as a general rule.
Doesn’t it depend somewhat on whether he was acting within his own competence* and/or with the approval of the appropriate manager?
My understanding is that SPADs are technically employed by the MP in question, and if that is so, there would seem to be a reasonable case that he acted without authority and therefore is personally liable for any breaches.
*I know Cummings is totally incompetent. That isn’t what I meant!
Simplistically speaking, employees will be liable for their own acts if such acts are done in contravention of the Equality Act 2010 and the course of their employment or with the authority of a principal. Beyond that I can’t really comment save to say that tactically it’s what I would have done if I were acting for her - although sometimes it can backfire as you’re making it personal and personal grudges tend to be less likely to settle.
Certainly Cummings will never, ever settle. It would mean at least a tacit acceptance that he did something wrong.
Yes - that thought occurred to me after I posted. Could be a tactical mistake then - unless the strategy is to get him on the witness stand and embarrass the shit out of the govt.
Having done a little further research, it appears that under her contract she was employed by the PM directly. But after she was sacked, the rules were changed so that Cummings was made line manager for all SPADs.
The parallels with the rewriting of quarantine rules are all too uncomfortably obvious.
There is something very, very wrong with a government that feels the need to protect somebody as out of control as this.
You could understand for somebody with extraordinary talent - but for Cummings?
Sonia Khan is apparently being backed by the FDA in her case against Cummings / the Cabinet Office. The FDA chooses its cases carefully and rarely backs losers. Looking back over the incident, it appears that she was unceremoniously sacked by Cummings, without following any normal procedures, for allegedly having the temerity to exchange messages with a former advisor to Philip Hammond. Sajid Javid was apparently most unhappy with the sacking and the absence of natural justice. Malcolm Tucker would have been very proud of Dom (provided the expletives used in the sacking were of similar quality). Interesting that it's being brought as a sex discrimination case, though. Less interesting that it's not until December.
Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.
That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters
That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.
The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.
You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?
You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.
Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.
It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents
Nixon - Criminal Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east. Trump - doing ok so far.
So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.
There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.
That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters
That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.
The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.
You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?
You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.
Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.
It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents
Nixon - Criminal Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east. Trump - doing ok so far.
So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.
There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
I'm not a conservative Conservative, I'm a liberal Conservative.
I'm not sure if any of those six would identify as a conservative Conservative.
I'm definitely more socially conservative than most people realise. Personal liberty, but not liberty to impose onto others. Collective responsibility and personal responsibility are important.
For example, I don't think TfL getting involved with pride and asking their employees to support it is fair or should be allowed. Employees can and should support it as private citizens, TfL shouldn't be making employees wear rainbow lanyards or paving roads with rainbows etc... I couldn't give a fuck about whether someone is gay or not but pride is a blatantly political event and companies/agencies forcing political views onto their employees and the public is simply wrong.
It's also something I've probably shifted to the right on in the last few years, I'm much less accepting of companies and agencies supporting liberal political causes publicly and have chosen not to use services of a few who have come out on favour of one side or the other, same as I have stopped supporting companies who came out against equal marriage.
I am quite socially conservative too. I believe in marriage as the cornerstone of life, and adultery a shameful betrayal. That the nation would be a better place if more were religious, and Christian in particular. I believe in the work ethic, at study and employment, that sound money and finances are the cornerstone of prosperity at both household and national level. Etc etc.
I cannot see myself voting for the Conservative party again though.
Things don’t stack up neatly. You have to pick the party that is the best approximation of your views.
I could not be described as conservative in any way. Some of the most conservative people I know are on the left of the Labour Party.
Or you can do what I did as (in @kinabalu’s words) a highly partisan raging centrist, and abstain.
I hate the term centrist. Whereas the left and right define themselves relative to someone else, centrists define themselves relative to two others.
Prefer social democrat or progressive if you have to.
I’ve got to say that bringing such cases against individuals seems pretty low to me as a general rule.
Doesn’t it depend somewhat on whether he was acting within his own competence* and/or with the approval of the appropriate manager?
My understanding is that SPADs are technically employed by the MP in question, and if that is so, there would seem to be a reasonable case that he acted without authority and therefore is personally liable for any breaches.
*I know Cummings is totally incompetent. That isn’t what I meant!
Simplistically speaking, employees will be liable for their own acts if such acts are done in contravention of the Equality Act 2010 and the course of their employment or with the authority of a principal. Beyond that I can’t really comment save to say that tactically it’s what I would have done if I were acting for her - although sometimes it can backfire as you’re making it personal and personal grudges tend to be less likely to settle.
Certainly Cummings will never, ever settle. It would mean at least a tacit acceptance that he did something wrong.
Yes - that thought occurred to me after I posted. Could be a tactical mistake then - unless the strategy is to get him on the witness stand and embarrass the shit out of the govt.
Having done a little further research, it appears that under her contract she was employed by the PM directly. But after she was sacked, the rules were changed so that Cummings was made line manager for all SPADs.
The parallels with the rewriting of quarantine rules are all too uncomfortably obvious.
There is something very, very wrong with a government that feels the need to protect somebody as out of control as this.
You could understand for somebody with extraordinary talent - but for Cummings?
Sonia Khan is apparently being backed by the FDA in her case against Cummings / the Cabinet Office. The FDA chooses its cases carefully and rarely backs losers. Looking back over the incident, it appears that she was unceremoniously sacked by Cummings, without following any normal procedures, for allegedly having the temerity to exchange messages with a former advisor to Philip Hammond. Sajid Javid was apparently most unhappy with the sacking and the absence of natural justice. Malcolm Tucker would have been very proud of Dom (provided the expletives used in the sacking were of similar quality). Interesting that it's being brought as a sex discrimination case, though. Less interesting that it's not until December.
Might not even get on then given the backlog caused by Covid-19. The tribunal asked me for dates to avoid in 2021 when listing a hearing yesterday.
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
I respectively disagree with you entirely.
We’re going to be on “WTO terms” very soon. At that point, there will be no single market v WTO debate. Either everything is fine, and we’ll stay on WTO indefinitely as there will be little appetite to change, or everything is not fine, and suddenly nobody will admit to supporting them.
Anyway in reply to my comment earlier there clearly are some Leave voting conservative Conservatives on this site but it seems to be just a few.
Considering people regularly call this a conservative site there doesn't seem to be an abundance of Leave voting conservative Conservatives.
My view - for which I have no hard evidence - is that the commentators are a lot less partisan and particularly a lot less conservative than it was the start, but the reputation it had built up over the first 6/7 years still lingers.
Quite a number of reasons for that, including deaths, retirements, changes of view, bannings which tend to affect the hard right disproportionately because they get carried away fastest. But I think also the political upheaval has weakened the hold of the conservatives on their supporters, the likes of TSE and Morris Dancer (or me for that matter) while Labour were already pretty well at rock bottom so those that stayed are not going anywhere (Rochdale Pioneers being a notable exception).
I could be totally wrong, but that’s my impression.
I think we also tend to skim over the posts of those we agree with, and fixate on those we disagree with.
This results in us seeing the site as being much more "hostile" than it is.
(Of course, you also need to look not just at the number of posters, but the number of posts. @HYUFD has almost 80,000 posts, for example.)
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
I'm not a conservative Conservative, I'm a liberal Conservative.
I'm not sure if any of those six would identify as a conservative Conservative.
Mortimer is as fogeyish as they come, despite his tender years.
Haha! I've actually become much more left wing as I've aged. I suspect by the time I retire I'll be wearing hush puppies and smoking cigars whilst listening to Jazz.
Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.
That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters
That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.
The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.
You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?
You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.
Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.
It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents
Nixon - Criminal Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east. Trump - doing ok so far.
So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.
There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
Or the Nuremburg judges?
I don't think WW2 was illegal.
They held it to be so. Counts 1 and 2 were ‘conspiring to commit crimes against peace’ and ‘waging aggressive war.’
Anyway in reply to my comment earlier there clearly are some Leave voting conservative Conservatives on this site but it seems to be just a few.
Considering people regularly call this a conservative site there doesn't seem to be an abundance of Leave voting conservative Conservatives.
My view - for which I have no hard evidence - is that the commentators are a lot less partisan and particularly a lot less conservative than it was the start, but the reputation it had built up over the first 6/7 years still lingers.
Quite a number of reasons for that, including deaths, retirements, changes of view, bannings which tend to affect the hard right disproportionately because they get carried away fastest. But I think also the political upheaval has weakened the hold of the conservatives on their supporters, the likes of TSE and Morris Dancer (or me for that matter) while Labour were already pretty well at rock bottom so those that stayed are not going anywhere (Rochdale Pioneers being a notable exception).
I could be totally wrong, but that’s my impression.
I think we also tend to skim over the posts of those we agree with, and fixate on those we disagree with.
This results in us seeing the site as being much more "hostile" than it is.
(Of course, you also need to look not just at the number of posters, but the number of posts. @HYUFD has almost 80,000 posts, for example.)
I’ve got to say that bringing such cases against individuals seems pretty low to me as a general rule.
Doesn’t it depend somewhat on whether he was acting within his own competence* and/or with the approval of the appropriate manager?
My understanding is that SPADs are technically employed by the MP in question, and if that is so, there would seem to be a reasonable case that he acted without authority and therefore is personally liable for any breaches.
*I know Cummings is totally incompetent. That isn’t what I meant!
Simplistically speaking, employees will be liable for their own acts if such acts are done in contravention of the Equality Act 2010 and the course of their employment or with the authority of a principal. Beyond that I can’t really comment save to say that tactically it’s what I would have done if I were acting for her - although sometimes it can backfire as you’re making it personal and personal grudges tend to be less likely to settle.
Certainly Cummings will never, ever settle. It would mean at least a tacit acceptance that he did something wrong.
Yes - that thought occurred to me after I posted. Could be a tactical mistake then - unless the strategy is to get him on the witness stand and embarrass the shit out of the govt.
Having done a little further research, it appears that under her contract she was employed by the PM directly. But after she was sacked, the rules were changed so that Cummings was made line manager for all SPADs.
The parallels with the rewriting of quarantine rules are all too uncomfortably obvious.
There is something very, very wrong with a government that feels the need to protect somebody as out of control as this.
You could understand for somebody with extraordinary talent - but for Cummings?
Sonia Khan is apparently being backed by the FDA in her case against Cummings / the Cabinet Office. The FDA chooses its cases carefully and rarely backs losers. Looking back over the incident, it appears that she was unceremoniously sacked by Cummings, without following any normal procedures, for allegedly having the temerity to exchange messages with a former advisor to Philip Hammond. Sajid Javid was apparently most unhappy with the sacking and the absence of natural justice. Malcolm Tucker would have been very proud of Dom (provided the expletives used in the sacking were of similar quality). Interesting that it's being brought as a sex discrimination case, though. Less interesting that it's not until December.
His demeanour would suggest Cummings is an equal opportunities bully and oaf.
Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.
That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters
That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.
The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.
You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?
You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.
Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.
It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents
Nixon - Criminal Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east. Trump - doing ok so far.
So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.
There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
Or the Nuremburg judges?
I don't think WW2 was illegal.
They held it to be so. Counts 1 and 2 were ‘conspiring to commit crimes against peace’ and ‘waging aggressive war.’
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
A lot more of them would have had the chance, had they been resident in the country at the time.
The sensible Torues voted remain but accepted the result when it went the other way. Move on.
On the other side how many PBers voted Remain in 2016 and Labour in 2019?
Anyway in reply to my comment earlier there clearly are some Leave voting conservative Conservatives on this site but it seems to be just a few.
Considering people regularly call this a conservative site there doesn't seem to be an abundance of Leave voting conservative Conservatives.
My view - for which I have no hard evidence - is that the commentators are a lot less partisan and particularly a lot less conservative than it was the start, but the reputation it had built up over the first 6/7 years still lingers.
Quite a number of reasons for that, including deaths, retirements, changes of view, bannings which tend to affect the hard right disproportionately because they get carried away fastest. But I think also the political upheaval has weakened the hold of the conservatives on their supporters, the likes of TSE and Morris Dancer (or me for that matter) while Labour were already pretty well at rock bottom so those that stayed are not going anywhere (Rochdale Pioneers being a notable exception).
I could be totally wrong, but that’s my impression.
I think we also tend to skim over the posts of those we agree with, and fixate on those we disagree with.
This results in us seeing the site as being much more "hostile" than it is.
(Of course, you also need to look not just at the number of posters, but the number of posts. @HYUFD has almost 80,000 posts, for example.)
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
I respectively disagree with you entirely.
We’re going to be on “WTO terms” very soon. At that point, there will be no single market v WTO debate. Either everything is fine, and we’ll stay on WTO indefinitely as there will be little appetite to change, or everything is not fine, and suddenly nobody will admit to supporting them.
The question is do the Brexiteers go quiet or do they start wanting trade wars with the EU when they realise WTO is still not their promised paradise? I think the latter.
If he had been talking to Diane Abbott I would have listened. I can get my fill of right wing middle aged white dudes on PB.
How do you know what types of people post on here? (Unless you've been to one of the PB meet-ups).
Political opinion is easy to ascertain, people often drop hints about ages, and indeed their gender, while demographics suggests that most will be white.
For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
I notice this notion that Labour (and others) are apparently going to put us back in the Single Market.
I don't think so - I've not heard Starmer express that view and since the SM would mean Freedom of Movement and the return of EU regulatory control, I don't see Labour following that (the LDs might).
Once Transition has ended and we leave (whether to WTO rules or some agree trade policy), Labour will have the option of either accepting the status quo or seeking to further re-negotiate our relationship with the EU whether it's through some form of EEA membership or Canada +++ or some variant.
Given the issues with which Britain will be confronted in the next 18-24 months (second Covid-19 wave notwithstanding), isn't it more likely matters European will be relegated to the margins and more "domestic" issues be of greater prominence.
One issue which may bother Conservatives - defence cuts. If Sunak can't raise taxes how does he seek to close the deficit ? Spending cuts might be one way but the NHS is sacrosanct so perhaps defence may be in the sights.
Would the Conservatives accept defence cuts before tax rises?
Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.
That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters
That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.
The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.
You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?
You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.
Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.
It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents
Nixon - Criminal Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east. Trump - doing ok so far.
So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.
There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
Or the Nuremburg judges?
I don't think WW2 was illegal.
They held it to be so. Counts 1 and 2 were ‘conspiring to commit crimes against peace’ and ‘waging aggressive war.’
Well I didn't know that, I thought those trials were focused on war crimes during the war, rather than the legality of the conflict itself.
Nope. One of the reasons why Nuremberg set an important precedent is that it clarified the waging of war could be held as a crime. War crimes had been tried before Nuremberg - Leipzig in 1921 springs to mind - but I think it was the first time members of a government that had started a war were held criminally responsible for it.
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
I respectively disagree with you entirely.
We’re going to be on “WTO terms” very soon. At that point, there will be no single market v WTO debate. Either everything is fine, and we’ll stay on WTO indefinitely as there will be little appetite to change, or everything is not fine, and suddenly nobody will admit to supporting them.
If you believe WTO terms Brexit will lead to a booming Britain and even Starmer's Labour supporting it that is quite a statement.
Even if it does not work out and Starmer becomes PM and takes us back into the single market Leavers and hard Brexiteers now so dominate the Tories it will take at least 2 or 3 general elections for the Tories to elect a pro single market leader again
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
I'm not a conservative Conservative, I'm a liberal Conservative.
I'm not sure if any of those six would identify as a conservative Conservative.
I'm definitely more socially conservative than most people realise. Personal liberty, but not liberty to impose onto others. Collective responsibility and personal responsibility are important.
For example, I don't think TfL getting involved with pride and asking their employees to support it is fair or should be allowed. Employees can and should support it as private citizens, TfL shouldn't be making employees wear rainbow lanyards or paving roads with rainbows etc... I couldn't give a fuck about whether someone is gay or not but pride is a blatantly political event and companies/agencies forcing political views onto their employees and the public is simply wrong.
It's also something I've probably shifted to the right on in the last few years, I'm much less accepting of companies and agencies supporting liberal political causes publicly and have chosen not to use services of a few who have come out on favour of one side or the other, same as I have stopped supporting companies who came out against equal marriage.
I am quite socially conservative too. I believe in marriage as the cornerstone of life, and adultery a shameful betrayal. That the nation would be a better place if more were religious, and Christian in particular. I believe in the work ethic, at study and employment, that sound money and finances are the cornerstone of prosperity at both household and national level. Etc etc.
I cannot see myself voting for the Conservative party again though.
Things don’t stack up neatly. You have to pick the party that is the best approximation of your views.
I could not be described as conservative in any way. Some of the most conservative people I know are on the left of the Labour Party.
Or you can do what I did as (in @kinabalu’s words) a highly partisan raging centrist, and abstain.
I hate the term centrist. Whereas the left and right define themselves relative to someone else, centrists define themselves relative to two others.
Prefer social democrat or progressive if you have to.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Sean Fear. And didn’t Max (not a party member since last week) also voted leave? And GIN too? And of course Casino!!
Yes, I campaigned and voted for Leave and and then Boris at the GE. To say that I'm some kind of liberal or globalist is misrepresentation of my position.
Sorry I should have more clearly separated the points, but am I right you weren't much of a fan of Cummings or Boris before?
I distinctly remember in the run up to the Tory leadership election when there was so much vitriol on this site against Boris (much of it from PB Tories) making the comment that they were afraid he would win the next GE.
My point is the reaction of people on this site simply isn't going to be representative of the wider public.
Wasn't a huge Boris fan because I thought he was too lazy to be PM and that he doesn't usually surround himself with good enough people to be an effective leader. I think both of those have come to pass, I still went out and campaigned for him in the cold winter months though.
I've generally been a fan of Cummings both as a political operator and as someone who seemed to understand the issues. One of the major reasons I decided to campaign for Boris rather than sit it out (and I almost did) was because of Cummings being part of the package, it seemed like he would ensure that the party would stay grounded and concentrate on the things that really matter to voters.
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
I respectively disagree with you entirely.
We’re going to be on “WTO terms” very soon. At that point, there will be no single market v WTO debate. Either everything is fine, and we’ll stay on WTO indefinitely as there will be little appetite to change, or everything is not fine, and suddenly nobody will admit to supporting them.
If you believe WTO terms Brexit will lead to a booming Britain and even Starmer's Labour supporting it that is quite a statement.
Even if it does not work out and Starmer becomes PM and takes us back into the single market Leavers and hard Brexiteers now so dominate the Tories it will take at least 2 or 3 general elections for the Tories to elect a pro single market leader again
I have no idea what you’re trying to say here.
If we go to “WTO terms” and life continues pretty much as normal, Labour are not going to be clambering to rock the boat for the sake of it. We’ll stay on “WTO terms”.
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
That's a little optimistic, HYUFD.
There's a pub in Tewkesbury called The Ancient Grudge. It is named not after the Civil War, as I once thought, but the decisive battle of the War of the Roses.
Takes a while for people to get over these things. I imagine in centuries to come avid geeks will re-enact the blog wars fought on this site, dressing up as Remoaners and Leavers to do so.
I can envisage you as one of their favorite characters, HYUFD. Be proud!
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
Yebbut I voted Labour in 2015
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
Oh and I voted Labour in 1997, LibDem in 2001 and 2005
You seem to lack a firm ideology by which you process reality and live your life.
I didn’t vote for Labour in 2019. I voted for Cat McKinnell who happened to be the Labour candidate.
This might come as a bit of a shock to you, but that's generally viewed as voting Labour.
Your vote and why you vote is entirely personal. Others can go hang.
It is perfectly valid to vote for an individual you respect regardless of the party label.
For sure, and personal votes do exist. But they are ultimately a Labour MP who will be expected to do as they are told.
Likewise Conservative MPs. Think of those who were frogmarched out of the party by Johnson and Cummings late last year. The current crop won't make the same error.
Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.
That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters
That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.
The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.
You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?
You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.
Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.
It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents
Nixon - Criminal Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east. Trump - doing ok so far.
So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.
There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
Or the Nuremburg judges?
I don't think WW2 was illegal.
I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
That's a little optimistic, HYUFD.
There's a pub in Tewkesbury called The Ancient Grudge. It is named not after the Civil War, as I once thought, but the decisive battle of the War of the Roses.
Takes a while for people to get over these things. I imagine in centuries to come avid geeks will re-enact the blog wars fought on this site, dressing up as Remoaners and Leavers to do so.
I can envisage you as one of their favorite characters, HYUFD. Be proud!
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
I respectively disagree with you entirely.
We’re going to be on “WTO terms” very soon. At that point, there will be no single market v WTO debate. Either everything is fine, and we’ll stay on WTO indefinitely as there will be little appetite to change, or everything is not fine, and suddenly nobody will admit to supporting them.
If you believe WTO terms Brexit will lead to a booming Britain and even Starmer's Labour supporting it that is quite a statement.
Even if it does not work out and Starmer becomes PM and takes us back into the single market Leavers and hard Brexiteers now so dominate the Tories it will take at least 2 or 3 general elections for the Tories to elect a pro single market leader again
I suppose its possible that Johnson & Sunak will use COVID as cover for some radical free market low tax reforms 'to get the economy going'
Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.
That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters
That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.
The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.
You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?
You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.
Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.
It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents
Nixon - Criminal Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east. Trump - doing ok so far.
So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.
There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
Or the Nuremburg judges?
I don't think WW2 was illegal.
I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
Or the annexation of Bohemia and Moravia, in defiance of treaties signed seven months previously.
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
That's a little optimistic, HYUFD.
There's a pub in Tewkesbury called The Ancient Grudge. It is named not after the Civil War, as I once thought, but the decisive battle of the War of the Roses.
Takes a while for people to get over these things. I imagine in centuries to come avid geeks will re-enact the blog wars fought on this site, dressing up as Remoaners and Leavers to do so.
I can envisage you as one of their favorite characters, HYUFD. Be proud!
There’s an ongoing beef between the Guelphs and Ghibellines round here. You have to be careful not to wear anything that might indicate your support for the Pope or the Holy Roman Emperor. There’s gang signs and everything
Anyway in reply to my comment earlier there clearly are some Leave voting conservative Conservatives on this site but it seems to be just a few.
Considering people regularly call this a conservative site there doesn't seem to be an abundance of Leave voting conservative Conservatives.
My view - for which I have no hard evidence - is that the commentators are a lot less partisan and particularly a lot less conservative than it was the start, but the reputation it had built up over the first 6/7 years still lingers.
Quite a number of reasons for that, including deaths, retirements, changes of view, bannings which tend to affect the hard right disproportionately because they get carried away fastest. But I think also the political upheaval has weakened the hold of the conservatives on their supporters, the likes of TSE and Morris Dancer (or me for that matter) while Labour were already pretty well at rock bottom so those that stayed are not going anywhere (Rochdale Pioneers being a notable exception).
I could be totally wrong, but that’s my impression.
I think we also tend to skim over the posts of those we agree with, and fixate on those we disagree with.
This results in us seeing the site as being much more "hostile" than it is.
(Of course, you also need to look not just at the number of posters, but the number of posts. @HYUFD has almost 80,000 posts, for example.)
And every one of them is sheer quality.
I note you don’t say what sort of quality
‘Sheer’ - as robust as a pair of laddered 5 denier stockings ?
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
Yebbut I voted Labour in 2015
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
Oh and I voted Labour in 1997, LibDem in 2001 and 2005
You seem to lack a firm ideology by which you process reality and live your life.
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
I respectively disagree with you entirely.
We’re going to be on “WTO terms” very soon. At that point, there will be no single market v WTO debate. Either everything is fine, and we’ll stay on WTO indefinitely as there will be little appetite to change, or everything is not fine, and suddenly nobody will admit to supporting them.
If you believe WTO terms Brexit will lead to a booming Britain and even Starmer's Labour supporting it that is quite a statement.
Even if it does not work out and Starmer becomes PM and takes us back into the single market Leavers and hard Brexiteers now so dominate the Tories it will take at least 2 or 3 general elections for the Tories to elect a pro single market leader again
I suppose its possible that Johnson & Sunak will use COVID as cover for some radical free market low tax reforms 'to get the economy going'
Possible, but unlikely.
I think Boris will relish the recovery planning. He’s a fiscally wet bread and circuses social democrat, and will love splashing the cash on public spending and (possibly) tax cuts. He won’t care much about the deficit.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
I'm not a conservative Conservative, I'm a liberal Conservative.
I'm not sure if any of those six would identify as a conservative Conservative.
I'm definitely more socially conservative than most people realise. Personal liberty, but not liberty to impose onto others. Collective responsibility and personal responsibility are important.
For example, I don't think TfL getting involved with pride and asking their employees to support it is fair or should be allowed. Employees can and should support it as private citizens, TfL shouldn't be making employees wear rainbow lanyards or paving roads with rainbows etc... I couldn't give a fuck about whether someone is gay or not but pride is a blatantly political event and companies/agencies forcing political views onto their employees and the public is simply wrong.
It's also something I've probably shifted to the right on in the last few years, I'm much less accepting of companies and agencies supporting liberal political causes publicly and have chosen not to use services of a few who have come out on favour of one side or the other, same as I have stopped supporting companies who came out against equal marriage.
I am quite socially conservative too. I believe in marriage as the cornerstone of life, and adultery a shameful betrayal. That the nation would be a better place if more were religious, and Christian in particular. I believe in the work ethic, at study and employment, that sound money and finances are the cornerstone of prosperity at both household and national level. Etc etc.
I cannot see myself voting for the Conservative party again though.
Things don’t stack up neatly. You have to pick the party that is the best approximation of your views.
I could not be described as conservative in any way. Some of the most conservative people I know are on the left of the Labour Party.
Or you can do what I did as (in @kinabalu’s words) a highly partisan raging centrist, and abstain.
I hate the term centrist. Whereas the left and right define themselves relative to someone else, centrists define themselves relative to two others.
Prefer social democrat or progressive if you have to.
Voter sentiment about President Donald Trump’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic reached a new nadir as reports emerged that the United States had surpassed 100,000 deaths attributed to COVID-19.
Forty-one percent of registered voters approve of Trump’s management of the public health crisis while 53 percent disapprove, according to a May 29-June 1 poll, his worst marks since Morning Consult began tracking public opinion on the pandemic in February. The survey polled 1,989 registered voters and has a margin of error of 2 percentage points.
A poll organised by a newspaper desperate to keep a (non) story going......
The story is over.
But for those who think that has had absolutely no impact, look at this board.
There are a number of posters - loyal Conservative voters and in some case long-term members - who are absolutely livid. Not livid about the press, or the government's media strategy, but that there was not even an apology.
No offence but this place is one of the least representative places on planet earth.
You make my point.
This board contains more tribal people than the population as a whole. And there are still a bunch of people - like myself or @MaxPB or @Big_G_NorthWales or @DavidL - who think Dominic Cummings behaved poorly.
I didn't ask for a resignation. I just asked for an acknowledgement that the rules had been broken, and that he was sorry about that.
There are millions of people who made enormous sacrifices to follow government guidelines. Some, like @GideonWise looked after kids in small flats while having CV-19. Others couldn't see loved ones on their death beds.
Some of those people, who chose to obey the rules at great personal cost, are angry.
And I find it staggering that anyone would doubt that there are people who are justifiably angry that the protagonist can't even be bothered to apologise.
Actually I was thinking far more that the Tories on this board tend to be a lot more towards the liberal end rather than conservative. If I remember correctly all the people you mention couldn't countenance Boris (or Cummings for that matter) even before he became leader, and he's mostly a liberal tory.
Of course, the story has had some impact. Major and long-lasting? I doubt it.
Indeed very few conservative Conservatives on this site. I can't think of a single Leave voting conservative Conservative on this site.
Charles, Mortimer, Alanbrooke, Casino, BluestBlue, even Sunil to name just six all voted Leave in 2016 and Tory in 2019.
As did you
Yebbut I voted Labour in 2015
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
Oh and I voted Labour in 1997, LibDem in 2001 and 2005
You seem to lack a firm ideology by which you process reality and live your life.
I have voted (in reverse chronological order by GE) LD, LD LD, Con, Green, Lab, Lab, Lab, Alliance, SDP.
When the situation changes, I change. Indeed floating voters like myself and Sunil are the keys to electoral success. No party wins on soley their core vote.
Doesn't count for this argument as was pre Brexit. Sedgefield, Mansfield and Bishop Auckland and Bolsover voted Labour in 2015, Richmond Park, Enfield Southgate and Canterbury and Warwick and Leamington voted Tory
For how long, in your view, will Brexit or how someone voted in the 2016 Referendum, define our politics and political discourse?
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
For a decade at least, maybe two, not just whether you supported Leave or Remain but whether you back returning to the single market or WTO terms has defined our politics since 2016 and will do so for at least another 2 or 3 general elections until settled one way or the other
That's a little optimistic, HYUFD.
There's a pub in Tewkesbury called The Ancient Grudge. It is named not after the Civil War, as I once thought, but the decisive battle of the War of the Roses.
Takes a while for people to get over these things. I imagine in centuries to come avid geeks will re-enact the blog wars fought on this site, dressing up as Remoaners and Leavers to do so.
I can envisage you as one of their favorite characters, HYUFD. Be proud!
Is this relevant to anything? Cummings is clearly unpopular (no surprise) but I can't see it has any bearing whatsoever on the next general election.
That will be fought almost exclusively on what's left of the economy and a berk driving to a castle will be forgotten by 99% of voters
That might be true, however the focus will be on the berk driving the country.
Correct, I read that some on here think Boris won't be around for long, hard to disagree.
The next few years are going to be painful, I can't think of anybody that I would like to see in charge - do you have any suggestions?
It is to the Tory party’s shame that Hunt was always the better choice.
Not in the circumstances. Hunt was a far worse choice.
You really think Hunt would have got a better (from our perspective) deal like Boris got?
You really think Hunt would have got an 80 seat majority.
Hunt isn't bad, certainly better than May but the time was not right for Hunt. And if Hunt had been elected then you'd have been saying how bad he is.
That is where you extreme right wing (and some less extreme) fanbois of Johnson get it so wrong. So many of !
No we were led by a fucking idiot with zero leadership skills and the result was she threw away Cameron's majority.
Here we go again. Obsession with winning elections without the thought as to what to do with the winnings. TMay was quite poor, but trust me, as someone who has spent most of my adult career assessing leadership capability, she has much more leadership ability than Johnson. I would not put Johnson in executive leadership of a Parish Council! If I had to order leadership ability, by observable objective measure of all the PMs in my recollection (I can just about remember Wilson), Thatcher would clearly be top and Johnson would be in very poor last place with TMay and Brown tied on quite a few more points above him.
Every PM is the worst Prime Minister ever, when they are in office.
It's way too early to judge what Johnson is like.
That's also true for Republican presidents in the United States.
Lets check the most recent Republican Presidents
Nixon - Criminal Reagan - Promoted criminal members of the Nixon administration, engaged in illegal central American wars Bush Snr - Covered up Reagan's crimes Bush Jr - Gave positions to all of dad's mates who helped with the cover up of Reagan's crimes, engaged in devastating destabilisation of the world with disastrous. murderous invasion of the middle east. Trump - doing ok so far.
So with the exception of Trump you are spot on.
There is no such thing as an illegal war, the president has the power to deploy military force for 60 days without Congressional approval and indefinitely with it.
There may be military actions taken without UN approval but only Bush Snr in the 1990 Gulf War and Obama in Libya in 2011 of recent US presidents got that UN approval
Have you told Tony Blair there is no such thing as an illegal war? He will be relieved to hear so.
Or the Nuremburg judges?
I don't think WW2 was illegal.
I think it fair to describe the invasion of Poland as illegal...
I agree - though it was no more illegal than the invasion of Iraq by Bush and Blair in 2003. Both were more guilty of the Count1 and Count2 Nuremburg indictments than any of the Nazis put on trial - with the possible exception of Ribbentrop.
They are advocating using the armed forces against their own countrymen. That's astonishing.
I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.
I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.
MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.
Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.
The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.
We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
If he had been talking to Diane Abbott I would have listened. I can get my fill of right wing middle aged white dudes on PB.
How do you know what types of people post on here? (Unless you've been to one of the PB meet-ups).
Political opinion is easy to ascertain, people often drop hints about ages, and indeed their gender, while demographics suggests that most will be white.
The typical PBer is 50+, Oxbridge educated, flies business class, enjoys fine wine, dislikes pineapple on pizza, almost certainly has an income in the upper quintile and, judging from the similarities between some posters, may or may not be the writer of several of popular thrillers.
Comments
We'll see when excess deaths are analysed, but I'd expect Brazil has already matched our 60k, and is heading towards an end number many times greater.
I cannot see myself voting for the Conservative party again though.
I distinctly remember in the run up to the Tory leadership election when there was so much vitriol on this site against Boris (much of it from PB Tories) making the comment that they were afraid he would win the next GE.
My point is the reaction of people on this site simply isn't going to be representative of the wider public.
https://twitter.com/sheeraf/status/1267496012207149056
The parallels with the rewriting of quarantine rules are all too uncomfortably obvious.
There is something very, very wrong with a government that feels the need to protect somebody as out of control as this.
You could understand for somebody with extraordinary talent - but for Cummings?
Ah, my coat...
We have left - once we exit Transition, there will no longer be "leavers" and "remainers". There may be "rejoiners" and that's a valid position to take albeit some clarity as to the terms on which we would rejoin would also be helpful.
It's moot anyway as no one wants a repeat of the angst of 2016.
Things don’t stack up neatly. You have to pick the party that is the best approximation of your views.
I could not be described as conservative in any way. Some of the most conservative people I know are on the left of the Labour Party.
Considering people regularly call this a conservative site there doesn't seem to be an abundance of Leave voting conservative Conservatives.
https://twitter.com/Politics_Polls/status/1267483117666869250?s=20
https://twitter.com/Politics_Polls/status/1267521162399158273?s=20
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1267468295504039936?s=20
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1267470092977266688?s=20
Prefer social democrat or progressive if you have to.
Quite a number of reasons for that, including deaths, retirements, changes of view, bannings which tend to affect the hard right disproportionately because they get carried away fastest. But I think also the political upheaval has weakened the hold of the conservatives on their supporters, the likes of TSE and Morris Dancer (or me for that matter) while Labour were already pretty well at rock bottom so those that stayed are not going anywhere (Rochdale Pioneers being a notable exception).
I could be totally wrong, but that’s my impression.
I prefer centrist. I do not belong on either left or right, but borrow whichever ideas make sense from either.
That, incidentally, is why I was a pretty unabashed supporter of the Conservatives ten years ago and yet am totally estranged from them now.
It is perfectly valid to vote for an individual you respect regardless of the party label.
Btw I came across as a bit feisty. I am just a bit tired of our politics being defined by those on the extreme.
But I could not bring myself to vote for a party led by Corbyn.
I don’t think he stood anywhere last year. Labour put up more or less a token candidate in Cannock.
Bring back the boring centrists please, I've had enough of the nutters.
We’re going to be on “WTO terms” very soon. At that point, there will be no single market v WTO debate. Either everything is fine, and we’ll stay on WTO indefinitely as there will be little appetite to change, or everything is not fine, and suddenly nobody will admit to supporting them.
This results in us seeing the site as being much more "hostile" than it is.
(Of course, you also need to look not just at the number of posters, but the number of posts. @HYUFD has almost 80,000 posts, for example.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_trials#The_trial
I don't think so - I've not heard Starmer express that view and since the SM would mean Freedom of Movement and the return of EU regulatory control, I don't see Labour following that (the LDs might).
Once Transition has ended and we leave (whether to WTO rules or some agree trade policy), Labour will have the option of either accepting the status quo or seeking to further re-negotiate our relationship with the EU whether it's through some form of EEA membership or Canada +++ or some variant.
Given the issues with which Britain will be confronted in the next 18-24 months (second Covid-19 wave notwithstanding), isn't it more likely matters European will be relegated to the margins and more "domestic" issues be of greater prominence.
One issue which may bother Conservatives - defence cuts. If Sunak can't raise taxes how does he seek to close the deficit ? Spending cuts might be one way but the NHS is sacrosanct so perhaps defence may be in the sights.
Would the Conservatives accept defence cuts before tax rises?
Even if it does not work out and Starmer becomes PM and takes us back into the single market Leavers and hard Brexiteers now so dominate the Tories it will take at least 2 or 3 general elections for the Tories to elect a pro single market leader again
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1267522468400562183
I've generally been a fan of Cummings both as a political operator and as someone who seemed to understand the issues. One of the major reasons I decided to campaign for Boris rather than sit it out (and I almost did) was because of Cummings being part of the package, it seemed like he would ensure that the party would stay grounded and concentrate on the things that really matter to voters.
Sadly, that hasn't gone to plan.
We have an investment programme to save the economy.
They have a massive deficit that will bankrupt us all.
If we go to “WTO terms” and life continues pretty much as normal, Labour are not going to be clambering to rock the boat for the sake of it. We’ll stay on “WTO terms”.
There's a pub in Tewkesbury called The Ancient Grudge. It is named not after the Civil War, as I once thought, but the decisive battle of the War of the Roses.
Takes a while for people to get over these things. I imagine in centuries to come avid geeks will re-enact the blog wars fought on this site, dressing up as Remoaners and Leavers to do so.
I can envisage you as one of their favorite characters, HYUFD. Be proud!
Possible, but unlikely.
Forty-one percent of registered voters approve of Trump’s management of the public health crisis while 53 percent disapprove, according to a May 29-June 1 poll, his worst marks since Morning Consult began tracking public opinion on the pandemic in February. The survey polled 1,989 registered voters and has a margin of error of 2 percentage points.
https://morningconsult.com/2020/06/01/trump-pandemic-response-polling-low/
Tricky for Biden, this. Very tricky.
Needs the black vote en bloc, doesn't want to scare the horses in the suburbs.
When the situation changes, I change. Indeed floating voters like myself and Sunil are the keys to electoral success. No party wins on soley their core vote.
I remember the outrage when Polish troops shot Solidarity strikers in 1981 - when the point comes when a Government feels it has to turn its own troops on its own people a line has been crossed.
I've only seen bits of America - the chasm between wealth and poverty is frightening. I found San Francisco intimidating with pan handlers on every corner. It's different in Vegas - the poor and the dispossessed are usually out of sight but if you look Downtown in the early morning you'll see them.
MY experience of the restaurants is this - the servers (waiters/waitresses) are often white, very polite and eager to please. If you spend $120 on dinner they'll expect a $20 tip so make sure you've done well at the tables.
Then you have the people who set the tables and clear way the plates - generally hispanic. They move fast, avoid eye contact - their place in the hierarchy is clear.
The guests in the hotels come from all over the world but the weekend visitors are more often from the culturally conservative states. One evening Mrs Stodge and I had returned from dinner and got into the lift when this man rushed in and started lighting up his cigar in the lift.
We must have looked appalled - he was not exactly confrontational but perplexed until he heard my British accent at which point he became apologetic and said he understood "you do things different over there". That's America - I don't pretend to understand it, I don't think anyone does - the Americans included.
https://twitter.com/SunPolitics/status/1267539175399731201
https://twitter.com/BarackObama/status/1267534333067382784