"Is Sadiq Khan’s lead narrowing in London? Labour and Conservative sources both believe that the race to be London’s next mayor is closer than thought. BY STEPHEN BUSH
Sadiq Khan’s lead has narrowed in the final set of polls before election day, meaning the London Mayor may no longer avoid a second round run-off against his Conservative opponent Shaun Bailey. In a further blow, Khan’s staff and well-placed Tories both believe that the polls are underestimating the fall in the mayor’s support as a combination of complacency among voters and anxiety about Covid-19 hurts the Labour incumbent’s chances."
If Khan ends up in a runoff against Shaun Bailey - of all people - Labour will have had a very bad night even if they somehow squeak Hartlepool and second place at Holyrood.
Not much chance then of it being terrrrrrible night for the Conservatives....
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
"The many syllabled name of Jessie Joe Jacobs’ grandfather tumbles almost magically from her lips.
“Moses Majekodunmi,” she says, with a smile. “He ended up with a mayoral role in Nigeria after they got independence in 1960. He was a brilliant man by all accounts and had a political role at such a significant time – he went to America and met JFK.”
She only really became aware of her grandfather’s achievements in her teens, of how he started as a doctor but was appointed to run the west of Nigeria in a time of political crisis. She met him once, shortly before he died in 2012 at the age of 95, and it reinforced her desire to seek political change."
The Northern Echo has been acting as a PR agency for her since the campaign started. Whatever they write she has not been a good candidate. She has been quite unimpressive. Covid hasn’t helped but she contracted it late in the campaign and, fortunately, she seems to be over it. She’s typical modern labour. Former charity worker, currently heading up a food and drink quango and her election campaign and material has been based very much on the usual guff that ticks labour HQ’s box. Climate crisis, green new deal etc, etc. Policy platform by party lobbyists.
I feel quite sorry for her. She’s openly derided by some local labour grandees and she seems very personable. But she’s not mayor material.
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
"Is Sadiq Khan’s lead narrowing in London? Labour and Conservative sources both believe that the race to be London’s next mayor is closer than thought. BY STEPHEN BUSH
Sadiq Khan’s lead has narrowed in the final set of polls before election day, meaning the London Mayor may no longer avoid a second round run-off against his Conservative opponent Shaun Bailey. In a further blow, Khan’s staff and well-placed Tories both believe that the polls are underestimating the fall in the mayor’s support as a combination of complacency among voters and anxiety about Covid-19 hurts the Labour incumbent’s chances."
If Khan ends up in a runoff against Shaun Bailey - of all people - Labour will have had a very bad night even if they somehow squeak Hartlepool and second place at Holyrood.
Not much chance then of it being terrrrrrible night for the Conservatives....
At the moment, with these polls, there’s little chance of that anyway. It’s almost a free hit for them. Nobody expects them to win Scotland, or Wales, or London, and they seem likely to come second in all of them. The counties still seem fairly solidly Tory and although they might lose a couple of leafy southern districts, will people really wake up screaming, ‘Johnson must go, the Tories have lost overall control of Oxfordshire?’
Similarly in Hartlepool this is a seat they don’t hold. If they win, it’s a bonus. If they don’t, it’s hardly going to to be a resigning matter.
I suspect they will go backwards in terms of council seats, but not by a lot, and the rest will be a bit ‘meh.’
And if they don’t go backwards, win in Hartlepool, and exceed expectations in Wales, it will be portrayed as a good night for them.
The issue will be if the SNP get an outright majority, in which case the squabbling over a section 30 order will start.
Freewheeling Boris rolls into ‘Super Thursday’, while stumbling Starmer prepares to lick his wounds It's hard not to pity Sir Keir’s plight – Captain Hindsight if he attacks the Government, or a Tory collaborator if he supports it
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I have seen his original grave site, on St. Helena.
Tiny. And as remote as you can get on St. Helena.
Very jealous. I LOVE remote islands, the remoter the better.
What is it like on St Helena?! Is it moody?
Easter Island is incredibly spooky. Also the Solovetskys and St Kilda. All haunted in different ways
It is wonderfully craggy and sheer on the coast, with lots of big whales and dolphins. It still feels like 1820 in the main street. They clearly had a lot of surplus cannon. The jail holds perhaps two people.
Then you get to the inside of the island, and it feels like the Home Counties. From a Marple.
The Napoleon stuff is wonderful - his iconic coat and hat on a chaise longue at Longwood House feel as if it was just placed down moments ago. But the real treat is the house he first stayed at, Briar's Pavilion, by the heart-shaped waterfall. It was gifted as French territory. If they continue to play silly buggers over Jersey, we should annex it.
Gawd. Sounds great, I'd love to go
Have you done Pitcairn or Tristan?
I haven't, but I hear they are spectacularly strange. Easter Island is one of the few places in the world where I've nearly lost my shit because it's so spooky. People forget all moai - the statues - were hurled down in a great iconoclasm, as the civilisation collapsed - no one is sure why, possibly deforestation inducing climate change inducing horror
At the far east end of the island (where no one lives) you can stand on a high cliff and look out to sea and know there is no one looking back at you for thousands and thousands of miles. It is not a *nice* feeling. It is disquieting in the extreme. And the weird noises....
Tristan da Cunha I have been to. You can go all the way there - and have not much better than a 50:50 chance of landing, due to the only harbour being out of action if the winds are wrong. As you draw near, it looks like a James Bond baddies' pad - just a volcano. There is a strip of land that houses Edinburgh of the Seven Seas (the capital) a golf course that is mostly boulders and "the potato fields", where they build shacks and spend the summer, amidst, er their potatoes.
They have a shop with nothing much less than than two years out of its sell-by date.
And the people are a weird agglomeration of every nationality. It is as near to a pirate island as you can imagine.
From Tristan you can visit Nightingale Island and the gloriously named Inaccessible Island. but you have to have landed on Tristan first, to get permission. So you can spend weeks getting there and never set foot on any land.
You'd love it.
God, I really would
I visited the Solovestskys before plague, and there's an island there where Peter the Great built a chapel and lesbians were interred in a Gulag, but landing is REALLY hard, and generally impossible outside high summer
I never made it, but the main Solovetsky is intoxicating enough. And they do have a kind of airstrip
So Tristan you could sail for weeks.... and then never get ashore?!?! Mad
But, yes, tantalising. I might make an end-of-plague vow to myself. When all this shit is over I will go somewhere insane. Just to know that I am free, again
That sounds like a good option
I did a 5 week trip that took in Ushaia, Antarctica, South Georgia, Gough Island, Tristan da Cunha (with added Inaccessible Island), St. Helena, Ascension Island, Cape Verde. (I could have taken the option to fly back from Ascension, but as the Vulcan wasn't an option, I stayed on....)
That's a magnificent itinerary. Highlights?
Before we even set off on the boat, loved the Patagonia National Park. The journey out from Ushuaia through the Drake Passage - the Roaring Forties and Fifties - was glassy smooth. No 40 foot waves for us. So much for the weather! We laugh at your fearsome reputation! Until we actually got to Antarctica...
If you weren't on the bridge at 6.00 am to see the peaks of mountains, you didn't see anything of Antarctica. We we were a week later than anyone had done the trip before. The blizzards of the first winter storm of the year told us why. We couldn't land. We spent 48 hours in a poorly-charted bay, avoiding icebergs that don't half shift with a force 12 behind them. Minus 17, but with the wind-chill, minus 50. Sea water freezes on the vessel in those temperatures. And there were no other boats to come to our aid. The ship's captain, a Dutchman in his 70's, said they were the most difficult 2 days he had ever experienced in his career...
A highlight should have been going to an Adelie's penguin colony. We saw one, sat on an iceberg as it shot past the side of the boat. We watched a seal toboggan along another - until the seal stood up! A very rare sighting that far north of an Emperor penguin. Then the blizzard returned - and it too was lost.
We did eventually escape that bay and made a run to South Georgia. The first views of South Georgia were awe-inspiring, even more so as we had largely followed Shackleton's route from Elephant Island to Cape Disappointment (so named because Cook sailed round it thinking they had found Australia - only to see that same Cape again far too quickly on their journey....).
If you want weird atmosphere, South Georgia has it. Not so much in Grytviken, although the church amidst the detritus of whaling - including a ship with its harpoon still mounted at the front - has it. And there is Sir Ernest Shackleton's grave in the small cemetery, with dead whalers and an Argentinian submariner for company. But the spookier place is the old whaling station of Stromness, round the coast. Closed now because it is packed full of asbestos, you can still see the foreman's house where Shackleton and his men knocked on the door, having sailed then walked over a glacier to reach it. Apparently the bath he used to clean up (and shave off the beard that made him unrecognisable) is still in there.
The Foehn winds still rip down to the fjord, whilst beneath your ship lie a mountain of whale bones. It's not the ghosts of the whalers you feel there - it's the ghosts of the whales....
Very gloomy article from the Guardian about Labour expectations across the country
"Labour MPs across England contacted by the Guardian about the mood on the doorstep warned of “apathy” among voters. Some complained about Labour’s lack of concrete proposals to sell to a sceptical electorate. “There is zero policy,” said one frontbencher.
“People don’t really know what we stand for, so we’re having to fall back on the time-honoured tradition of anti-Tory sentiment,” complained another MP.
“The focus of getting people to vote Labour who did previously and don’t any more is the right one – but it’s the way they’ve done it,” said a leftwing backbencher. “They’ve approached it in a way which is a caricature of northern, working-class people: beer, fish and chips and flags.”
Several warned that the Green party were eating into Labour’s support in some areas, ...'
Seems a bit excessive to me - expectations management?
The left of centre space does appear more crowded than ever: LDs, Greens, Labour all fighting over a centre & left ground and in Wales throw in PC as well n- all sustained by social media. It may be nothing new (remember Euros 1989) but but it all makes Labour's job that bit harder
On the island people moan about the Tory council, which comparatively isn't a good one, tied to a series of fiascos - yet when it comes to election time there's an avalanche of opposing choices - not only Labour and the LibDems (much depleted nowadays) and a very active Green Party, we have three different rival networks of Independent candidates, in some wards standing against each other. A Tory hold looks a certainty, despite the minor irritation of a handful of ex-Tory ex-UKIP candidates who have formed their own new party.
A couple of the Independent leaders and the Greens were in the paper last week pleading with voters to work out who stands the best chance in each ward; if only they had identified more common purpose before nominations closed.
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I am not talking about Tory leaders some have been truly awful. Labours problem is that they haven't had anybody voters could visualise as PM material. The Tories have had duffers but Labour has been even worse with its leaders.... Quad erat demonstrandum.
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I am not talking about Tory leaders some have been truly awful. Labours problem is that they haven't had anybody voters could visualise as PM material. The Tories have had duffers but Labour has been even worse with its leaders.... Quad erat demonstrandum.
For most of the last decade nobody but Boris could visualise Boris as PM, but PM he is.
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I am not talking about Tory leaders some have been truly awful. Labours problem is that they haven't had anybody voters could visualise as PM material. The Tories have had duffers but Labour has been even worse with its leaders.... Quad erat demonstrandum.
For most of the last decade nobody but Boris could visualise Boris as PM, but PM he is.
"Is Sadiq Khan’s lead narrowing in London? Labour and Conservative sources both believe that the race to be London’s next mayor is closer than thought. BY STEPHEN BUSH
Sadiq Khan’s lead has narrowed in the final set of polls before election day, meaning the London Mayor may no longer avoid a second round run-off against his Conservative opponent Shaun Bailey. In a further blow, Khan’s staff and well-placed Tories both believe that the polls are underestimating the fall in the mayor’s support as a combination of complacency among voters and anxiety about Covid-19 hurts the Labour incumbent’s chances."
If Khan ends up in a runoff against Shaun Bailey - of all people - Labour will have had a very bad night even if they somehow squeak Hartlepool and second place at Holyrood.
Not much chance then of it being terrrrrrible night for the Conservatives....
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I am not talking about Tory leaders some have been truly awful. Labours problem is that they haven't had anybody voters could visualise as PM material. The Tories have had duffers but Labour has been even worse with its leaders.... Quad erat demonstrandum.
For most of the last decade nobody but Boris could visualise Boris as PM, but PM he is.
But who in Labour has that level of burning ambition? OK, SKS could sit in a Shadow Cabinet waiting his turn, as he turned a blind eye to the antisemitism erupting all around. But who is there that wants to forge a new coalition with voters to win a majority - and take the ferocious flak from his own side in doing so? Who has the rhino hide shown by Boris?
As for Labour I think they're in the wilderness. They need a Moses to lead them into the promised land and I'm afraid I don't think it's Sir Keir, decent though he is.
It will HAVE to be a northerner (or a Scot). Someone who can speak the language of the blue Labour voters. A genuine patriot.
But, frankly, much more of this kind of situation this morning with vaccine bounces, bashing the Froggies and all-English Champions League finals and Boris will have another landslide next time around. His undoing, eventually, will be his own character failings but he has been underestimated far too frequently.
Looking around Europe, the centre-left has more than just a missing messiah problem.
In the medium term the hope must be that some sort of successful Biden-ism becomes a successful export from the US. Although in the UK we'll probably find the government doing it already.
I’m prepared for the Labour catastrophe today. Starmer though should not be resigning, primarily because that will give the left a foothold again and they’ll do even worse.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I am not talking about Tory leaders some have been truly awful. Labours problem is that they haven't had anybody voters could visualise as PM material. The Tories have had duffers but Labour has been even worse with its leaders.... Quad erat demonstrandum.
For most of the last decade nobody but Boris could visualise Boris as PM, but PM he is.
Not at all true. He was often mooted about as a possible future Party Leader and PM. Has been for a long time. He was favourite off and on for years.
Although election days aren’t the same without an early morning delivery finishing about now.
Good morning everyone.
Agree, Mr B2; no organising the first tellers nowadays, either. It is bight and sunny here though; reminds me of two beautiful mornings in early May 1997; May 1st and 2nd! Ah, memories!
I have tellers out at my three polling stations and deliverers out delivering. Knocking up from midday.
I have a strong suspicion that Boris is about to be "lucky" again. No doubt those who insist on calling him Bozo or the clown will have their excuses ready once more.
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I am not talking about Tory leaders some have been truly awful. Labours problem is that they haven't had anybody voters could visualise as PM material. The Tories have had duffers but Labour has been even worse with its leaders.... Quad erat demonstrandum.
For most of the last decade nobody but Boris could visualise Boris as PM, but PM he is.
But who in Labour has that level of burning ambition? OK, SKS could sit in a Shadow Cabinet waiting his turn, as he turned a blind eye to the antisemitism erupting all around. But who is there that wants to forge a new coalition with voters to win a majority - and take the ferocious flak from his own side in doing so? Who has the rhino hide shown by Boris?
You don’t get the Born to Rule arrogance on the Labour benches. Ultimately that’s a good thing.
"The many syllabled name of Jessie Joe Jacobs’ grandfather tumbles almost magically from her lips.
“Moses Majekodunmi,” she says, with a smile. “He ended up with a mayoral role in Nigeria after they got independence in 1960. He was a brilliant man by all accounts and had a political role at such a significant time – he went to America and met JFK.”
She only really became aware of her grandfather’s achievements in her teens, of how he started as a doctor but was appointed to run the west of Nigeria in a time of political crisis. She met him once, shortly before he died in 2012 at the age of 95, and it reinforced her desire to seek political change."
The Northern Echo has been acting as a PR agency for her since the campaign started. Whatever they write she has not been a good candidate. She has been quite unimpressive. Covid hasn’t helped but she contracted it late in the campaign and, fortunately, she seems to be over it. She’s typical modern labour. Former charity worker, currently heading up a food and drink quango and her election campaign and material has been based very much on the usual guff that ticks labour HQ’s box. Climate crisis, green new deal etc, etc. Policy platform by party lobbyists.
I feel quite sorry for her. She’s openly derided by some local labour grandees and she seems very personable. But she’s not mayor material.
...Climate crisis, green new deal etc, etc. Policy platform by party lobbyists...
I have a strong suspicion that Boris is about to be "lucky" again. No doubt those who insist on calling him Bozo or the clown will have their excuses ready once more.
Actually the interesting thing will be if the polls that showed some kind of narrowing were completely off base or not. My suspicion is that they were.
As for Labour I think they're in the wilderness. They need a Moses to lead them into the promised land and I'm afraid I don't think it's Sir Keir, decent though he is.
It will HAVE to be a northerner (or a Scot). Someone who can speak the language of the blue Labour voters. A genuine patriot.
But, frankly, much more of this kind of situation this morning with vaccine bounces, bashing the Froggies and all-English Champions League finals and Boris will have another landslide next time around. His undoing, eventually, will be his own character failings but he has been underestimated far too frequently.
Looking around Europe, the centre-left has more than just a missing messiah problem.
In the medium term the hope must be that some sort of successful Biden-ism becomes a successful export from the US. Although in the UK we'll probably find the government doing it already.
What is Bidenism?
Biden got in by not being an orange buffoon who advised injecting bleach. The left in Europe aren't facing that, which is why Boris can adopt and adapt in a way the orange buffoon couldn't.
I have seen his original grave site, on St. Helena.
Tiny. And as remote as you can get on St. Helena.
Very jealous. I LOVE remote islands, the remoter the better.
What is it like on St Helena?! Is it moody?
Easter Island is incredibly spooky. Also the Solovetskys and St Kilda. All haunted in different ways
It is wonderfully craggy and sheer on the coast, with lots of big whales and dolphins. It still feels like 1820 in the main street. They clearly had a lot of surplus cannon. The jail holds perhaps two people.
Then you get to the inside of the island, and it feels like the Home Counties. From a Marple.
The Napoleon stuff is wonderful - his iconic coat and hat on a chaise longue at Longwood House feel as if it was just placed down moments ago. But the real treat is the house he first stayed at, Briar's Pavilion, by the heart-shaped waterfall. It was gifted as French territory. If they continue to play silly buggers over Jersey, we should annex it.
Gawd. Sounds great, I'd love to go
Have you done Pitcairn or Tristan?
I haven't, but I hear they are spectacularly strange. Easter Island is one of the few places in the world where I've nearly lost my shit because it's so spooky. People forget all moai - the statues - were hurled down in a great iconoclasm, as the civilisation collapsed - no one is sure why, possibly deforestation inducing climate change inducing horror
At the far east end of the island (where no one lives) you can stand on a high cliff and look out to sea and know there is no one looking back at you for thousands and thousands of miles. It is not a *nice* feeling. It is disquieting in the extreme. And the weird noises....
Tristan da Cunha I have been to. You can go all the way there - and have not much better than a 50:50 chance of landing, due to the only harbour being out of action if the winds are wrong. As you draw near, it looks like a James Bond baddies' pad - just a volcano. There is a strip of land that houses Edinburgh of the Seven Seas (the capital) a golf course that is mostly boulders and "the potato fields", where they build shacks and spend the summer, amidst, er their potatoes.
They have a shop with nothing much less than than two years out of its sell-by date.
And the people are a weird agglomeration of every nationality. It is as near to a pirate island as you can imagine.
From Tristan you can visit Nightingale Island and the gloriously named Inaccessible Island. but you have to have landed on Tristan first, to get permission. So you can spend weeks getting there and never set foot on any land.
You'd love it.
God, I really would
I visited the Solovestskys before plague, and there's an island there where Peter the Great built a chapel and lesbians were interred in a Gulag, but landing is REALLY hard, and generally impossible outside high summer
I never made it, but the main Solovetsky is intoxicating enough. And they do have a kind of airstrip
So Tristan you could sail for weeks.... and then never get ashore?!?! Mad
But, yes, tantalising. I might make an end-of-plague vow to myself. When all this shit is over I will go somewhere insane. Just to know that I am free, again
That sounds like a good option
I did a 5 week trip that took in Ushaia, Antarctica, South Georgia, Gough Island, Tristan da Cunha (with added Inaccessible Island), St. Helena, Ascension Island, Cape Verde. (I could have taken the option to fly back from Ascension, but as the Vulcan wasn't an option, I stayed on....)
That's a magnificent itinerary. Highlights?
Before we even set off on the boat, loved the Patagonia National Park. The journey out from Ushuaia through the Drake Passage - the Roaring Forties and Fifties - was glassy smooth. No 40 foot waves for us. So much for the weather! We laugh at your fearsome reputation! Until we actually got to Antarctica...
If you weren't on the bridge at 6.00 am to see the peaks of mountains, you didn't see anything of Antarctica. We we were a week later than anyone had done the trip before. The blizzards of the first winter storm of the year told us why. We couldn't land. We spent 48 hours in a poorly-charted bay, avoiding icebergs that don't half shift with a force 12 behind them. Minus 17, but with the wind-chill, minus 50. Sea water freezes on the vessel in those temperatures. And there were no other boats to come to our aid. The ship's captain, a Dutchman in his 70's, said they were the most difficult 2 days he had ever experienced in his career...
A highlight should have been going to an Adelie's penguin colony. We saw one, sat on an iceberg as it shot past the side of the boat. We watched a seal toboggan along another - until the seal stood up! A very rare sighting that far north of an Emperor penguin. Then the blizzard returned - and it too was lost.
We did eventually escape that bay and made a run to South Georgia. The first views of South Georgia were awe-inspiring, even more so as we had largely followed Shackleton's route from Elephant Island to Cape Disappointment (so named because Cook sailed round it thinking they had found Australia - only to see that same Cape again far too quickly on their journey....).
If you want weird atmosphere, South Georgia has it. Not so much in Grytviken, although the church amidst the detritus of whaling - including a ship with its harpoon still mounted at the front - has it. And there is Sir Ernest Shackleton's grave in the small cemetery, with dead whalers and an Argentinian submariner for company. But the spookier place is the old whaling station of Stromness, round the coast. Closed now because it is packed full of asbestos, you can still see the foreman's house where Shackleton and his men knocked on the door, having sailed then walked over a glacier to reach it. Apparently the bath he used to clean up (and shave off the beard that made him unrecognisable) is still in there.
The Foehn winds still rip down to the fjord, whilst beneath your ship lie a mountain of whale bones. It's not the ghosts of the whalers you feel there - it's the ghosts of the whales....
You describe my wife and my Antarctic voyage in 2009 when we followed the footsteps of Shackleton as you did but our crossing of Drake passage was one of high seas and storm force winds but once at Antarctica it was clear blue skies all the way with 5 separate zodiac landings and we were transfixed by the beauty of it all and the penguin colonies, whales and wild life
South Georgia is exactly as you describe with Shackleton's grave but we could not land at Stromness as we were hit by an katabatic wind which was quite some experience
We continued to the Falklands and then to Buenos Aires from here we returned to Heathrow
There is no doubt that a trip of this nature is an extraordinary experience and should not be missed if the opportunity arises
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I am not talking about Tory leaders some have been truly awful. Labours problem is that they haven't had anybody voters could visualise as PM material. The Tories have had duffers but Labour has been even worse with its leaders.... Quad erat demonstrandum.
For most of the last decade nobody but Boris could visualise Boris as PM, but PM he is.
But who in Labour has that level of burning ambition? OK, SKS could sit in a Shadow Cabinet waiting his turn, as he turned a blind eye to the antisemitism erupting all around. But who is there that wants to forge a new coalition with voters to win a majority - and take the ferocious flak from his own side in doing so? Who has the rhino hide shown by Boris?
You don’t get the Born to Rule arrogance on the Labour benches. Ultimately that’s a good thing.
Its no effing good if it keeps you in permanent opposition. SKS is as boring as Ralph Mellish.
As for Labour I think they're in the wilderness. They need a Moses to lead them into the promised land and I'm afraid I don't think it's Sir Keir, decent though he is.
It will HAVE to be a northerner (or a Scot). Someone who can speak the language of the blue Labour voters. A genuine patriot.
But, frankly, much more of this kind of situation this morning with vaccine bounces, bashing the Froggies and all-English Champions League finals and Boris will have another landslide next time around. His undoing, eventually, will be his own character failings but he has been underestimated far too frequently.
Looking around Europe, the centre-left has more than just a missing messiah problem.
In the medium term the hope must be that some sort of successful Biden-ism becomes a successful export from the US. Although in the UK we'll probably find the government doing it already.
What is Bidenism?
Biden got in by not being an orange buffoon who advised injecting bleach. The left in Europe aren't facing that, which is why Boris can adopt and adapt in a way the orange buffoon couldn't.
There is something in the idea Biden won because he was not Trump. He didn’t offend anyone.
I’m not saying BoJo is Trump, I think the point I would make is that Labour’s best chance of a victory with Starmer is that the election is about “not Johnson”. Starmer was made for that.
We are not there yet. And we may never be - but I don’t think certain comparisons to the U.S. are wrong
Although election days aren’t the same without an early morning delivery finishing about now.
Good morning everyone.
Agree, Mr B2; no organising the first tellers nowadays, either. It is bight and sunny here though; reminds me of two beautiful mornings in early May 1997; May 1st and 2nd! Ah, memories!
I have tellers out at my three polling stations and deliverers out delivering. Knocking up from midday.
EDIT: Us cockroaches don't give up easily!
You should be out there leading from the front! Not sitting indoors with a cup of tea browsing PB
I have a strong suspicion that Boris is about to be "lucky" again. No doubt those who insist on calling him Bozo or the clown will have their excuses ready once more.
I don't think it is down to luck. Johnson is a natural campaigner, and because of his complete lack of moral compass is a shameless liar, willing to promise whatever voters want. Aided by an opposition split into multiple parties, with no real alternative vision or inspiring leaders he is nailed on to win.
He is still an appalling PM. Campaigning skill and governing well seem to have zero correlation.
I have a strong suspicion that Boris is about to be "lucky" again. No doubt those who insist on calling him Bozo or the clown will have their excuses ready once more.
I don't think it is down to luck. Johnson is a natural campaigner, and because of his complete lack of moral compass is a shameless liar, willing to promise whatever voters want. Aided by an opposition split into multiple parties, with no real alternative vision or inspiring leaders he is nailed on to win.
He is still an appalling PM. Campaigning skill and governing well seem to have zero correlation.
Hence why you were convinced that you were going to run out of PPE early last year and ... didn't?
Or hence why we got the vaccine rollout before any other major nation in the world?
If this is governing badly, I'm curious what governing well looks like?
I have a strong suspicion that Boris is about to be "lucky" again. No doubt those who insist on calling him Bozo or the clown will have their excuses ready once more.
I don't think it is down to luck. Johnson is a natural campaigner, and because of his complete lack of moral compass is a shameless liar, willing to promise whatever voters want. Aided by an opposition split into multiple parties, with no real alternative vision or inspiring leaders he is nailed on to win.
He is still an appalling PM. Campaigning skill and governing well seem to have zero correlation.
Indeed. Its a major flaw in this democracy nonsense altogether. We are overly susceptible to facile liars. Definitely the worst possible system. Apart from all the others of course.
As for Labour I think they're in the wilderness. They need a Moses to lead them into the promised land and I'm afraid I don't think it's Sir Keir, decent though he is.
It will HAVE to be a northerner (or a Scot). Someone who can speak the language of the blue Labour voters. A genuine patriot.
But, frankly, much more of this kind of situation this morning with vaccine bounces, bashing the Froggies and all-English Champions League finals and Boris will have another landslide next time around. His undoing, eventually, will be his own character failings but he has been underestimated far too frequently.
Looking around Europe, the centre-left has more than just a missing messiah problem.
In the medium term the hope must be that some sort of successful Biden-ism becomes a successful export from the US. Although in the UK we'll probably find the government doing it already.
What is Bidenism?
Biden got in by not being an orange buffoon who advised injecting bleach. The left in Europe aren't facing that, which is why Boris can adopt and adapt in a way the orange buffoon couldn't.
We don't yet know. But it may emerge, like Thatcherism, which wasn't on view in 1979
As for Labour I think they're in the wilderness. They need a Moses to lead them into the promised land and I'm afraid I don't think it's Sir Keir, decent though he is.
It will HAVE to be a northerner (or a Scot). Someone who can speak the language of the blue Labour voters. A genuine patriot.
But, frankly, much more of this kind of situation this morning with vaccine bounces, bashing the Froggies and all-English Champions League finals and Boris will have another landslide next time around. His undoing, eventually, will be his own character failings but he has been underestimated far too frequently.
Looking around Europe, the centre-left has more than just a missing messiah problem.
In the medium term the hope must be that some sort of successful Biden-ism becomes a successful export from the US. Although in the UK we'll probably find the government doing it already.
What is Bidenism?
Biden got in by not being an orange buffoon who advised injecting bleach. The left in Europe aren't facing that, which is why Boris can adopt and adapt in a way the orange buffoon couldn't.
There is something in the idea Biden won because he was not Trump. He didn’t offend anyone.
I’m not saying BoJo is Trump, I think the point I would make is that Labour’s best chance of a victory with Starmer is that the election is about “not Johnson”. Starmer was made for that.
We are not there yet. And we may never be - but I don’t think certain comparisons to the U.S. are wrong
But that's the problem. There is a rather simplistic assumption that governments lose elections so you need to be inoffensive, which perhaps can be the case, but it's extremely rare. It's like turning up at a Tennis match with no return serve and just waiting for your opponent to double fault themselves out.
Blair and Cameron gave ideas about what they were for. Some of it was mushy sure, but I don't see any of that from Starmer yet.
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I am not talking about Tory leaders some have been truly awful. Labours problem is that they haven't had anybody voters could visualise as PM material. The Tories have had duffers but Labour has been even worse with its leaders.... Quad erat demonstrandum.
For most of the last decade nobody but Boris could visualise Boris as PM, but PM he is.
But who in Labour has that level of burning ambition? OK, SKS could sit in a Shadow Cabinet waiting his turn, as he turned a blind eye to the antisemitism erupting all around. But who is there that wants to forge a new coalition with voters to win a majority - and take the ferocious flak from his own side in doing so? Who has the rhino hide shown by Boris?
Pah, this is Labours chance to ditch Starmer and then the nation can have Jezza back
I’m prepared for the Labour catastrophe today. Starmer though should not be resigning, primarily because that will give the left a foothold again and they’ll do even worse.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
Starmer may not resign but he needs to own this completely if it is as bad as labour fears it will be.
I’ll say what I have said before. The shadow cabinet are poor. Dodds was, I thought, an inspired pick and she has been hopeless. Kate Green has given a free ride to the incompetent Gavin Williamson. Her two main contributions seem to have been about ‘decolonialising the curriculum’ and removing ‘Empire’ from the title of awards. Neither of which are pressing matters of the day however worthy. I watched Jonathan Reynolds on BBC Breakfast yesterday and he seemed a beaten man. I’d not heard of him as a shadow cabinet member before. Starmers team make Corbyn team seem like winners.
I have a strong suspicion that Boris is about to be "lucky" again. No doubt those who insist on calling him Bozo or the clown will have their excuses ready once more.
I don't think it is down to luck. Johnson is a natural campaigner, and because of his complete lack of moral compass is a shameless liar, willing to promise whatever voters want. Aided by an opposition split into multiple parties, with no real alternative vision or inspiring leaders he is nailed on to win.
He is still an appalling PM. Campaigning skill and governing well seem to have zero correlation.
Indeed. Its a major flaw in this democracy nonsense altogether. We are overly susceptible to facile liars. Definitely the worst possible system. Apart from all the others of course.
Of course, in Scotland you have a wider choice of populists who ignore inconvenient truths...
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I am not talking about Tory leaders some have been truly awful. Labours problem is that they haven't had anybody voters could visualise as PM material. The Tories have had duffers but Labour has been even worse with its leaders.... Quad erat demonstrandum.
For most of the last decade nobody but Boris could visualise Boris as PM, but PM he is.
But who in Labour has that level of burning ambition? OK, SKS could sit in a Shadow Cabinet waiting his turn, as he turned a blind eye to the antisemitism erupting all around. But who is there that wants to forge a new coalition with voters to win a majority - and take the ferocious flak from his own side in doing so? Who has the rhino hide shown by Boris?
You don’t get the Born to Rule arrogance on the Labour benches. Ultimately that’s a good thing.
My son who is 17 gets his first vote today. I am in the wrong town this morning and the Ls will be voting en masse later this evening fighting our way through the thicket of SNP signs to do the right thing. Hope the snow is off by then.
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I am not talking about Tory leaders some have been truly awful. Labours problem is that they haven't had anybody voters could visualise as PM material. The Tories have had duffers but Labour has been even worse with its leaders.... Quad erat demonstrandum.
For most of the last decade nobody but Boris could visualise Boris as PM, but PM he is.
But who in Labour has that level of burning ambition? OK, SKS could sit in a Shadow Cabinet waiting his turn, as he turned a blind eye to the antisemitism erupting all around. But who is there that wants to forge a new coalition with voters to win a majority - and take the ferocious flak from his own side in doing so? Who has the rhino hide shown by Boris?
You don’t get the Born to Rule arrogance on the Labour benches. Ultimately that’s a good thing.
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I am not talking about Tory leaders some have been truly awful. Labours problem is that they haven't had anybody voters could visualise as PM material. The Tories have had duffers but Labour has been even worse with its leaders.... Quad erat demonstrandum.
For most of the last decade nobody but Boris could visualise Boris as PM, but PM he is.
But who in Labour has that level of burning ambition? OK, SKS could sit in a Shadow Cabinet waiting his turn, as he turned a blind eye to the antisemitism erupting all around. But who is there that wants to forge a new coalition with voters to win a majority - and take the ferocious flak from his own side in doing so? Who has the rhino hide shown by Boris?
You don’t get the Born to Rule arrogance on the Labour benches. Ultimately that’s a good thing.
Its no effing good if it keeps you in permanent opposition. SKS is as boring as Ralph Mellish.
I can understand the hostility to Corbyn because of his peculiar views on what constitutes a friend or a foe. That seems fair enough to me, but the argument constructed by team Johnson that Starmer is a bad man because he is dull, makes no sense.
So given the choice we have a dour forensic lawyer or a flamboyant and edgy bon viveur. An edgy bon viveur who apart from his colourful home life has made some hilariously charismatic interjections along the way, like claiming Mrs Ratcliffe worked for Reuters, and quoting colonial Kipling poetry in the colonies.
Hmmm, but for a full house, does he juggle and do card tricks?
Google's chief executive has sent an email to employees encouraging them to return to work in the office for at least three days a week as lockdowns ease.
I can see this becoming the new norm.
85% plus of our employees indicate they want a maximum of 3 days in office a week post covid.
Also government advise remains to WAH if you can - we will not be back until late June at earliest
A majority in our department want to return to the office 'as late as possible'.
This came as a bit of a surprise to our boss.
Ultimately, 2-3 or 3-2 will be the new normal for most of us. 1-4 or 0-5 for me.
Half eleven would suit me fine. And home at 2. With an hour for lunch, natch.
In all seriousness I'd much rather work 11-7 than 9-5.
2 till 10. I've always been a night owl. I only stop yawning at half nine at night.
I'd rather do a 7-4. Which is easy consulting for a company two time zones ahead.
Not today though. Sertraline withdrawal has kicked in - seem to sleep a looooong time, have quality sleep according to my tracker thing and yet wake up tired and achy. And I get jabbed tomorrow - going to be a fun weekend...!
As for Labour I think they're in the wilderness. They need a Moses to lead them into the promised land and I'm afraid I don't think it's Sir Keir, decent though he is.
It will HAVE to be a northerner (or a Scot). Someone who can speak the language of the blue Labour voters. A genuine patriot.
But, frankly, much more of this kind of situation this morning with vaccine bounces, bashing the Froggies and all-English Champions League finals and Boris will have another landslide next time around. His undoing, eventually, will be his own character failings but he has been underestimated far too frequently.
Looking around Europe, the centre-left has more than just a missing messiah problem.
In the medium term the hope must be that some sort of successful Biden-ism becomes a successful export from the US. Although in the UK we'll probably find the government doing it already.
What is Bidenism?
Biden got in by not being an orange buffoon who advised injecting bleach. The left in Europe aren't facing that, which is why Boris can adopt and adapt in a way the orange buffoon couldn't.
There is something in the idea Biden won because he was not Trump. He didn’t offend anyone.
I’m not saying BoJo is Trump, I think the point I would make is that Labour’s best chance of a victory with Starmer is that the election is about “not Johnson”. Starmer was made for that.
We are not there yet. And we may never be - but I don’t think certain comparisons to the U.S. are wrong
But that's the problem. There is a rather simplistic assumption that governments lose elections so you need to be inoffensive, which perhaps can be the case, but it's extremely rare. It's like turning up at a Tennis match with no return serve and just waiting for your opponent to double fault themselves out.
Blair and Cameron gave ideas about what they were for. Some of it was mushy sure, but I don't see any of that from Starmer yet.
I do think part of it is that Starmer has, correctly imo, identified that if he generates a popular policy that Boris Johnson will steal it. It doesn't matter how 'left' or 'right' a policy is, Boris doesn't care about that, if it's popular then he's having it!
I saw HMS Severn go past my window yesterday morning. How is it going to switch the lights back on?
Jersey's backup power supply will switch the lights back on...
I really don't understand French Govt Ministers' utter dedication to being posturing twats.
Anyhoo the Minister for Silly Talks seems to have backed down from making like Vladimir Putin wrt Georgia.
Plays well in “Le Daily Mail?”
Nah this is win win territory
Struggling french president turns Monsieur macho and stuffs it to les rosbifs in run up to election Tub thumping PM socks it to the frogs on election day
If Labour do badly tomorrow everyone's going to blame Keir Starmer. But I think they'd probably be doing even worse with anyone else. He's the best choice available at the moment.
Labour should have done what the Conservatives did back in 2005, taken a chance and elected a fresh new Labour Leader as the Conservatives did when they elected Cameron. Like the Conservatives back then, Labour had the same luxury of time to embed and build up support for a new leader before another GE. But unfortunately, they elected the Conservative equivalent of David Davis instead, and Keir Starmer was already carrying so much baggage due to his high profile role in Corbyn's dysfunctional shadow Cabinet on the issue of Brexit during the chaotic couple of years after Theresa May lost her majority. As it stands now, Labour are probable going to have to have another Leadership election before the next GE. I also fully expect the Conservatives to be on their fouth Leader/PM by the time the next GE is called.
It's just not going to be a Boris Johnson vs Keir Starmer fight at the next GE, it will come down to which party picks the right leadership successor along with how the public judge the Conservatives guidence of the country through the post pandemic economic recovery and the timing of the contests.
Who remembers the early days of that 2005 Conservative leadership contest when David Davis was the nailed on favourite to win while Cameron was regarded as an also ran among far bigger political beasts? The culmination of that Leadership contest whereby the various candidates had to address Conference with a speech should have become a template for future leadership contests in political parties, yet it didn't and the Labour party are still no where near regaining power eleven years after they lost the 2010 GE because they keep making the same mistake of choosing a Labour leader that will appeal to the membership rather than one that will appeal to the voters outside the Labour party and who are vital to them getting elected. That is why the public turned off during the last three Labour leadership contests, they were not invited to the debate so were not interested in the outcome. But that Conservative leadership contest in 2005 did the opposite, it got the public interested, and then the Conservative party ditched the favourite and went for the candidate the public showed some interest in, the rest is history.
Two problems with your thesis. Starmer polls or at least polled well. Labour is in a very, very different position to the Conservatives in 2005. Cameron would not have been elected if, say, John Redwood or Norman Tebbitt had been leader for 5 years.
The time for a detailed discussion about all this starts at 10pm. But for now, good luck to all those standing.
Since 1979 apart from John Smith, how many decent Labour leaders have there been? My answer would be zero, Blair being discounted because of IRAQ... and the millions of deaths that have happened as a result.
Tory doesn’t like Labour leaders shock.
No... its a serious question.. none of them apart from Smith would you think was a leader of standing that you could envisage as PM.. and I am voting Ĺib Dem today.
Smith, Blair, Brown, Milliband and certainly Starmer could be PM. Corbyn, whilst unlikely IMO as PM, got 40% of the vote in 2017 which is more than most and deserves respect.
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
I am not talking about Tory leaders some have been truly awful. Labours problem is that they haven't had anybody voters could visualise as PM material. The Tories have had duffers but Labour has been even worse with its leaders.... Quad erat demonstrandum.
For most of the last decade nobody but Boris could visualise Boris as PM, but PM he is.
But who in Labour has that level of burning ambition? OK, SKS could sit in a Shadow Cabinet waiting his turn, as he turned a blind eye to the antisemitism erupting all around. But who is there that wants to forge a new coalition with voters to win a majority - and take the ferocious flak from his own side in doing so? Who has the rhino hide shown by Boris?
You don’t get the Born to Rule arrogance on the Labour benches. Ultimately that’s a good thing.
You clearly didn't read the linked article about Jessie whassername upthread
I’m prepared for the Labour catastrophe today. Starmer though should not be resigning, primarily because that will give the left a foothold again and they’ll do even worse.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
I’m prepared for the Labour catastrophe today. Starmer though should not be resigning, primarily because that will give the left a foothold again and they’ll do even worse.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
You make it sound so easy…
I wonder if he has thought about a cones hotline ?
They’ve probably got Trident submarines in the Channel, now.
According to shipfinder, there's a stack of french fishing boats in Jersey bay, with the odd one arriving to join the party. HMS Tamar and Severn are patrolling some miles out. It looks like Guernsey has sent a harbour vessel out to keep an eye on things. For some reason, the Trident subs don't show on the App.
I saw HMS Severn go past my window yesterday morning. How is it going to switch the lights back on?
Jersey's backup power supply will switch the lights back on...
I really don't understand French Govt Ministers' utter dedication to being posturing twats.
Anyhoo the Minister for Silly Talks seems to have backed down from making like Vladimir Putin wrt Georgia.
Plays well in “Le Daily Mail?”
Nah this is win win territory
Struggling french president turns Monsieur macho and stuffs it to les rosbifs in run up to election Tub thumping PM socks it to the frogs on election day
Both sides want to play
How exactly did Macron "stuff" us? A threat to cut off the power not acted upon, a flotilla of trawlers that turns tail after making some sort of a gesture. A really crap EU deal that doesn't seem to suit us or the French. Surely he has just demonstrated his own ineffectiveness.
I saw HMS Severn go past my window yesterday morning. How is it going to switch the lights back on?
Jersey's backup power supply will switch the lights back on...
I really don't understand French Govt Ministers' utter dedication to being posturing twats.
Anyhoo the Minister for Silly Talks seems to have backed down from making like Vladimir Putin wrt Georgia.
Plays well in “Le Daily Mail?”
Nah this is win win territory
Struggling french president turns Monsieur macho and stuffs it to les rosbifs in run up to election Tub thumping PM socks it to the frogs on election day
Both sides want to play
How exactly did Macron "stuff" us? A threat to cut off the power not acted upon, a flotilla of trawlers that turns tail after making some sort of a gesture. A really crap EU deal that doesn't seem to suit us or the French. Surely he has just demonstrated his own ineffectiveness.
Macron has been a great disappointment. He was the future, once.
Indeed. She is Jessie Joe Jacobs of the Jessie Joe Jacobs party. She released a 5 minute promo video which was one of the worst poilitical films I have ever seen. It included: Jessie doing her makeup Jessie leaving her house and leaving the front door wide open Jessie knocking on doors, not getting answered and walking away again Jessie solemnly telling us how she had led local regional and national change Jessie telling us that the area had gone to the dogs under the Tories with the opening shot of this hysterical rant a big England flag flying on Eston nab Jessie hysterically ranting about how terrible everything is and why its all the evil Tories fault All intercut with shots of Jessie doing that godawful Patel smirk whilst standing heorically on headlands or outside the closed steelworks.
When she gets demolished today, she will move onto her next project. We don't know what it is yet but I can guarantee that she will always have been passionate about it and will use 403 photos of her pulling that same fucking Patel smirk to illustrate the point.
EDIT - her "IS THIS THE UK'S FIRST FEMALE METRO MAYOR?" newspaper is just as bad. So many shots of JJJJJJJ heroically pulling the same pose in front of everything I wondered if this was the Freemans catalogue and not a crap political leaflet. Who puts "Will I Win?" on their front page FFS.
I’m prepared for the Labour catastrophe today. Starmer though should not be resigning, primarily because that will give the left a foothold again and they’ll do even worse.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
You make it sound so easy…
I wonder if he has thought about a cones hotline ?
For someone who has for the last thirty years travelled the length of England and Wales for work, and suffered the inconvenience of miles of contraflow with no work going on. Starmer's (he does remind me somewhat of 1992 election winner John Major) much pilloried cones hotline, way back in the 1990s wasn't as daft as it sounded.
I have a strong suspicion that Boris is about to be "lucky" again. No doubt those who insist on calling him Bozo or the clown will have their excuses ready once more.
I don't think it is down to luck. Johnson is a natural campaigner, and because of his complete lack of moral compass is a shameless liar, willing to promise whatever voters want. Aided by an opposition split into multiple parties, with no real alternative vision or inspiring leaders he is nailed on to win.
He is still an appalling PM. Campaigning skill and governing well seem to have zero correlation.
Hence why you were convinced that you were going to run out of PPE early last year and ... didn't?
Or hence why we got the vaccine rollout before any other major nation in the world?
If this is governing badly, I'm curious what governing well looks like?
Well, 70 508 excess deaths is clearly better than 117 049 excess deaths, if the countries are basically the same size. That's France vs. UK. 38 606 excess deaths in a larger country (Germany) is clearly better still. Denmark is currently on negative excess deaths.
To be fair, there are a bunch of countries that have done worse than the UK.
Going by the percentages, there are places like Bulgaria, Colombia, Russia. If your argument is that Johnson's Britain is great because it's done better than that, you're welcome. Italy and the US are slightly worse than the UK (but there's not much in it)- that seems to be what happens when you have leading politicians who are TV personalities with dodgy attitudes to women and foreigners.
Great vaccine rollout, yes. Thank goodness, because the UK botched everything else.
I saw HMS Severn go past my window yesterday morning. How is it going to switch the lights back on?
Jersey's backup power supply will switch the lights back on...
I really don't understand French Govt Ministers' utter dedication to being posturing twats.
Anyhoo the Minister for Silly Talks seems to have backed down from making like Vladimir Putin wrt Georgia.
Plays well in “Le Daily Mail?”
Nah this is win win territory
Struggling french president turns Monsieur macho and stuffs it to les rosbifs in run up to election Tub thumping PM socks it to the frogs on election day
Both sides want to play
How exactly did Macron "stuff" us? A threat to cut off the power not acted upon, a flotilla of trawlers that turns tail after making some sort of a gesture. A really crap EU deal that doesn't seem to suit us or the French. Surely he has just demonstrated his own ineffectiveness.
He has no more stuffed us than Boris has become Admiral Thomas Cochrane, it's just all posturing for the press and elections.
I’m prepared for the Labour catastrophe today. Starmer though should not be resigning, primarily because that will give the left a foothold again and they’ll do even worse.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
You make it sound so easy…
I wonder if he has thought about a cones hotline ?
For someone who has for the last thirty years travelled the length of England and Wales for work, and suffered the inconvenience of miles of contraflow with no work going on. Starmer's (he does remind me somewhat of 1992 election winner John Major) much pilloried cones hotline, way back in the 1990s wasn't as daft as it sounded.
SeanT or whatever he is called these days has been calling for someone to attend to lifestyle issues as a “sure fire election winner”.
It’s not that Keir doesn’t have policies. It’s not even clear what his philosophy is.
At present I’d far rather have Keir than the corrupt clown, but if he hasn’t got anything he wants to say then he needs to “get off the pot”.
Sadiq won’t be getting either of my votes today, either.
Starmer is working within serious constraints. It may not look it, but arguably he is doing a heroic job. If he moves on policy, someone somewhere shouts betrayal. Anyway more anon after polls close.
Mr. Romford, worth noting we have significantly higher population density than France, and that we appear to be counting perhaps excessively (I remember reading we're the only country in the world with a seriously mismatched excess deaths and COVID deaths tallies).
That said, there has been some serious incompetence over international borders, care homes, and the nonsense at Christmas.
I saw HMS Severn go past my window yesterday morning. How is it going to switch the lights back on?
Jersey's backup power supply will switch the lights back on...
I really don't understand French Govt Ministers' utter dedication to being posturing twats.
Anyhoo the Minister for Silly Talks seems to have backed down from making like Vladimir Putin wrt Georgia.
Plays well in “Le Daily Mail?”
Nah this is win win territory
Struggling french president turns Monsieur macho and stuffs it to les rosbifs in run up to election Tub thumping PM socks it to the frogs on election day
Both sides want to play
How exactly did Macron "stuff" us? A threat to cut off the power not acted upon, a flotilla of trawlers that turns tail after making some sort of a gesture. A really crap EU deal that doesn't seem to suit us or the French. Surely he has just demonstrated his own ineffectiveness.
A successful military victory against mainland Europe, would of course confirm Johnson as Churchillian. Indeed he would surpass Churchill, we could from hereon refer to Churchill as Johnsonian.
I’m prepared for the Labour catastrophe today. Starmer though should not be resigning, primarily because that will give the left a foothold again and they’ll do even worse.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
You make it sound so easy…
I wonder if he has thought about a cones hotline ?
For someone who has for the last thirty years travelled the length of England and Wales for work, and suffered the inconvenience of miles of contraflow with no work going on. Starmer's (he does remind me somewhat of 1992 election winner John Major) much pilloried cones hotline, way back in the 1990s wasn't as daft as it sounded.
Basically it was “let us know if you see miles of road coned off with no one doing any work”. Quite practical I would have thought.
I’m prepared for the Labour catastrophe today. Starmer though should not be resigning, primarily because that will give the left a foothold again and they’ll do even worse.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
You make it sound so easy…
I wonder if he has thought about a cones hotline ?
For someone who has for the last thirty years travelled the length of England and Wales for work, and suffered the inconvenience of miles of contraflow with no work going on. Starmer's (he does remind me somewhat of 1992 election winner John Major) much pilloried cones hotline, way back in the 1990s wasn't as daft as it sounded.
Great , SKS should make it policy.
The upside is that despite being as grey as Major, when he's gone well probably find out his daily life was drugs and S&M with Little Mix. Really he should declare it now, it would at least give him a chance with the electorate
I’m prepared for the Labour catastrophe today. Starmer though should not be resigning, primarily because that will give the left a foothold again and they’ll do even worse.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
You make it sound so easy…
I wonder if he has thought about a cones hotline ?
For someone who has for the last thirty years travelled the length of England and Wales for work, and suffered the inconvenience of miles of contraflow with no work going on. Starmer's (he does remind me somewhat of 1992 election winner John Major) much pilloried cones hotline, way back in the 1990s wasn't as daft as it sounded.
Well if we're dropping the "woke shit" and the "class shit" and the "Europe shit" we do need some new shit.
I have a strong suspicion that Boris is about to be "lucky" again. No doubt those who insist on calling him Bozo or the clown will have their excuses ready once more.
I don't think it is down to luck. Johnson is a natural campaigner, and because of his complete lack of moral compass is a shameless liar, willing to promise whatever voters want. Aided by an opposition split into multiple parties, with no real alternative vision or inspiring leaders he is nailed on to win.
He is still an appalling PM. Campaigning skill and governing well seem to have zero correlation.
Hence why you were convinced that you were going to run out of PPE early last year and ... didn't?
Or hence why we got the vaccine rollout before any other major nation in the world?
If this is governing badly, I'm curious what governing well looks like?
Well, 70 508 excess deaths is clearly better than 117 049 excess deaths, if the countries are basically the same size. That's France vs. UK. 38 606 excess deaths in a larger country (Germany) is clearly better still. Denmark is currently on negative excess deaths.
To be fair, there are a bunch of countries that have done worse than the UK.
Going by the percentages, there are places like Bulgaria, Colombia, Russia. If your argument is that Johnson's Britain is great because it's done better than that, you're welcome. Italy and the US are slightly worse than the UK (but there's not much in it)- that seems to be what happens when you have leading politicians who are TV personalities with dodgy attitudes to women and foreigners.
Great vaccine rollout, yes. Thank goodness, because the UK botched everything else.
Its sweet that Countries death figures are still believed
I'm hearing rumours now that if Labour lose the Hartlepool by-election and the Tees Valley and West Midlands mayoral elections the Tribune Group of MPs are ready to call for a vote of no confidence in Keir Starmer"
It’s not that Keir doesn’t have policies. It’s not even clear what his philosophy is.
At present I’d far rather have Keir than the corrupt clown, but if he hasn’t got anything he wants to say then he needs to “get off the pot”.
Sadiq won’t be getting either of my votes today, either.
Starmer is working within serious constraints. It may not look it, but arguably he is doing a heroic job. If he moves on policy, someone somewhere shouts betrayal. Anyway more anon after polls close.
I don’t remember any early policy from Cameron.
However; I do remember he published a kind of philosophical manifesto in the Times which read well and positioned him as not just another Tory.
He then followed it up with some PR stunts, which were gauche but succeeded in reinforcing his positioning.
I know it’s been hard with coronavirus but I would have expected Keir to activate some kind of comms campaign from 1 April.
I'm hearing rumours now that if Labour lose the Hartlepool by-election and the Tees Valley and West Midlands mayoral elections the Tribune Group of MPs are ready to call for a vote of no confidence in Keir Starmer"
I'm hearing rumours now that if Labour lose the Hartlepool by-election and the Tees Valley and West Midlands mayoral elections the Tribune Group of MPs are ready to call for a vote of no confidence in Keir Starmer"
I’m prepared for the Labour catastrophe today. Starmer though should not be resigning, primarily because that will give the left a foothold again and they’ll do even worse.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
You make it sound so easy…
I wonder if he has thought about a cones hotline ?
For someone who has for the last thirty years travelled the length of England and Wales for work, and suffered the inconvenience of miles of contraflow with no work going on. Starmer's (he does remind me somewhat of 1992 election winner John Major) much pilloried cones hotline, way back in the 1990s wasn't as daft as it sounded.
SeanT or whatever he is called these days has been calling for someone to attend to lifestyle issues as a “sure fire election winner”.
It’s not that Keir doesn’t have policies. It’s not even clear what his philosophy is.
At present I’d far rather have Keir than the corrupt clown, but if he hasn’t got anything he wants to say then he needs to “get off the pot”.
Sadiq won’t be getting either of my votes today, either.
Starmer is working within serious constraints. It may not look it, but arguably he is doing a heroic job. If he moves on policy, someone somewhere shouts betrayal. Anyway more anon after polls close.
I don’t remember any early policy from Cameron.
However; I do remember he published a kind of philosophical manifesto in the Times which read well and positioned him as not just another Tory.
He then followed it up with some PR stunts, which were gauche but succeeded in reinforcing his positioning.
I know it’s been hard with coronavirus but I would have expected Keir to activate some kind of comms campaign from 1 April.
He is in a very, very different and far weaker position than Cameron.
I’m prepared for the Labour catastrophe today. Starmer though should not be resigning, primarily because that will give the left a foothold again and they’ll do even worse.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
You make it sound so easy…
I wonder if he has thought about a cones hotline ?
For someone who has for the last thirty years travelled the length of England and Wales for work, and suffered the inconvenience of miles of contraflow with no work going on. Starmer's (he does remind me somewhat of 1992 election winner John Major) much pilloried cones hotline, way back in the 1990s wasn't as daft as it sounded.
Basically it was “let us know if you see miles of road coned off with no one doing any work”. Quite practical I would have thought.
But I felt very satisfied ranting down the Motorola car phone (didn't need to be hands-free in those days either) at some minion bean counter. Excellent job creation too, I would have thought. OK so Starmer's cones hotline wasn't a success.
P.S. After Johnson, I'd have Major back in a heartbeat.
It’s not that Keir doesn’t have policies. It’s not even clear what his philosophy is.
At present I’d far rather have Keir than the corrupt clown, but if he hasn’t got anything he wants to say then he needs to “get off the pot”.
Sadiq won’t be getting either of my votes today, either.
Starmer is working within serious constraints. It may not look it, but arguably he is doing a heroic job. If he moves on policy, someone somewhere shouts betrayal. Anyway more anon after polls close.
I don’t remember any early policy from Cameron.
However; I do remember he published a kind of philosophical manifesto in the Times which read well and positioned him as not just another Tory.
He then followed it up with some PR stunts, which were gauche but succeeded in reinforcing his positioning.
I know it’s been hard with coronavirus but I would have expected Keir to activate some kind of comms campaign from 1 April.
IDStarmer has a philosophical manifesto too - "I am not Jeremy Corbyn".
What do you mean that isn't enough? Bloody moaning Tories...
Google's chief executive has sent an email to employees encouraging them to return to work in the office for at least three days a week as lockdowns ease.
I can see this becoming the new norm.
85% plus of our employees indicate they want a maximum of 3 days in office a week post covid.
Also government advise remains to WAH if you can - we will not be back until late June at earliest
A majority in our department want to return to the office 'as late as possible'.
This came as a bit of a surprise to our boss.
Ultimately, 2-3 or 3-2 will be the new normal for most of us. 1-4 or 0-5 for me.
Half eleven would suit me fine. And home at 2. With an hour for lunch, natch.
In all seriousness I'd much rather work 11-7 than 9-5.
2 till 10. I've always been a night owl. I only stop yawning at half nine at night.
I'd rather do a 7-4. Which is easy consulting for a company two time zones ahead.
Not today though. Sertraline withdrawal has kicked in - seem to sleep a looooong time, have quality sleep according to my tracker thing and yet wake up tired and achy. And I get jabbed tomorrow - going to be a fun weekend...!
Hope it goes well with the sertraline withdrawal. Presumably positive news that you are taking this step?
I just drove straight back home from nursery drop-off totally forgetting about the fact it's polling day today, I normally go at 8am, and there are no signs anywhere.
I’m prepared for the Labour catastrophe today. Starmer though should not be resigning, primarily because that will give the left a foothold again and they’ll do even worse.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
You make it sound so easy…
I wonder if he has thought about a cones hotline ?
For someone who has for the last thirty years travelled the length of England and Wales for work, and suffered the inconvenience of miles of contraflow with no work going on. Starmer's (he does remind me somewhat of 1992 election winner John Major) much pilloried cones hotline, way back in the 1990s wasn't as daft as it sounded.
SeanT or whatever he is called these days has been calling for someone to attend to lifestyle issues as a “sure fire election winner”.
Anyway, it’d be a cone app these days.
It's still accessible, under a new name, via 0300 123 5000
Mr. Romford, worth noting we have significantly higher population density than France, and that we appear to be counting perhaps excessively (I remember reading we're the only country in the world with a seriously mismatched excess deaths and COVID deaths tallies).
That said, there has been some serious incompetence over international borders, care homes, and the nonsense at Christmas.
True, though the density argument is tricky- what matters is the density of the inhabited bits. Spain, for example is densely populated cities and masses of empty in between. Paris is denser than London, because you don't have the same sort of metroland suburbia.
And the FT source is the nearest we have to gold-standard excess deaths at the moment, rather than attributing deaths to a cause. That flatters everyone a bit, because it credits the flu deaths that didn't happen this year as a positive- presumably that's why Denmark have ended the crisis ahead of the game.
The UK botched a lot of its Covid response- heck, that's why the government was beginning to fall behind in the polls in December. Vaccines are a feather in their cap, but it's not made the overall response more than meh.
I have a strong suspicion that Boris is about to be "lucky" again. No doubt those who insist on calling him Bozo or the clown will have their excuses ready once more.
I don't think it is down to luck. Johnson is a natural campaigner, and because of his complete lack of moral compass is a shameless liar, willing to promise whatever voters want. Aided by an opposition split into multiple parties, with no real alternative vision or inspiring leaders he is nailed on to win.
He is still an appalling PM. Campaigning skill and governing well seem to have zero correlation.
Hence why you were convinced that you were going to run out of PPE early last year and ... didn't?
Or hence why we got the vaccine rollout before any other major nation in the world?
If this is governing badly, I'm curious what governing well looks like?
Well, 70 508 excess deaths is clearly better than 117 049 excess deaths, if the countries are basically the same size. That's France vs. UK. 38 606 excess deaths in a larger country (Germany) is clearly better still. Denmark is currently on negative excess deaths.
To be fair, there are a bunch of countries that have done worse than the UK.
Going by the percentages, there are places like Bulgaria, Colombia, Russia. If your argument is that Johnson's Britain is great because it's done better than that, you're welcome. Italy and the US are slightly worse than the UK (but there's not much in it)- that seems to be what happens when you have leading politicians who are TV personalities with dodgy attitudes to women and foreigners.
Great vaccine rollout, yes. Thank goodness, because the UK botched everything else.
Its sweet that Countries death figures are still believed
Excess deaths is a statistic not as easily manipulated as others.
I saw HMS Severn go past my window yesterday morning. How is it going to switch the lights back on?
Jersey's backup power supply will switch the lights back on...
I really don't understand French Govt Ministers' utter dedication to being posturing twats.
Anyhoo the Minister for Silly Talks seems to have backed down from making like Vladimir Putin wrt Georgia.
Plays well in “Le Daily Mail?”
Nah this is win win territory
Struggling french president turns Monsieur macho and stuffs it to les rosbifs in run up to election Tub thumping PM socks it to the frogs on election day
Both sides want to play
How exactly did Macron "stuff" us? A threat to cut off the power not acted upon, a flotilla of trawlers that turns tail after making some sort of a gesture. A really crap EU deal that doesn't seem to suit us or the French. Surely he has just demonstrated his own ineffectiveness.
He has no more stuffed us than Boris has become Admiral Thomas Cochrane, it's just all posturing for the press and elections.
Has anyone considered that Macron and Boris (who text each other regularly, and clearly admire each other on some level) have partly orchestrated the drama?
Macron gets electoral benefit by standing up to Les Rosbifs over fish. Boris gets fantastic headlines on election day by sending in the navy.
Nothing happens. Both men stay in office and are fêted as heroes.
It’s not that Keir doesn’t have policies. It’s not even clear what his philosophy is.
At present I’d far rather have Keir than the corrupt clown, but if he hasn’t got anything he wants to say then he needs to “get off the pot”.
Sadiq won’t be getting either of my votes today, either.
Starmer is working within serious constraints. It may not look it, but arguably he is doing a heroic job. If he moves on policy, someone somewhere shouts betrayal. Anyway more anon after polls close.
We saw that on here the other day. At some point the party needs to move on from fighting over the comb.
Comments
I feel quite sorry for her. She’s openly derided by some local labour grandees and she seems very personable. But she’s not mayor material.
Similarly in Hartlepool this is a seat they don’t hold. If they win, it’s a bonus. If they don’t, it’s hardly going to to be a resigning matter.
I suspect they will go backwards in terms of council seats, but not by a lot, and the rest will be a bit ‘meh.’
And if they don’t go backwards, win in Hartlepool, and exceed expectations in Wales, it will be portrayed as a good night for them.
The issue will be if the SNP get an outright majority, in which case the squabbling over a section 30 order will start.
Freewheeling Boris rolls into ‘Super Thursday’, while stumbling Starmer prepares to lick his wounds
It's hard not to pity Sir Keir’s plight – Captain Hindsight if he attacks the Government, or a Tory collaborator if he supports it
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/05/ever-showman-boris-tries-fails-rein-bullishness-ahead-super/ (£££ but it's the headline that counts)
Milliband much like Hague became leader too young, but like Hague has since developed gravitas.
There is not much difference in quality with Tory leaders in the past 20 years.
If you weren't on the bridge at 6.00 am to see the peaks of mountains, you didn't see anything of Antarctica. We we were a week later than anyone had done the trip before. The blizzards of the first winter storm of the year told us why. We couldn't land. We spent 48 hours in a poorly-charted bay, avoiding icebergs that don't half shift with a force 12 behind them. Minus 17, but with the wind-chill, minus 50. Sea water freezes on the vessel in those temperatures. And there were no other boats to come to our aid. The ship's captain, a Dutchman in his 70's, said they were the most difficult 2 days he had ever experienced in his career...
A highlight should have been going to an Adelie's penguin colony. We saw one, sat on an iceberg as it shot past the side of the boat. We watched a seal toboggan along another - until the seal stood up! A very rare sighting that far north of an Emperor penguin. Then the blizzard returned - and it too was lost.
We did eventually escape that bay and made a run to South Georgia. The first views of South Georgia were awe-inspiring, even more so as we had largely followed Shackleton's route from Elephant Island to Cape Disappointment (so named because Cook sailed round it thinking they had found Australia - only to see that same Cape again far too quickly on their journey....).
If you want weird atmosphere, South Georgia has it. Not so much in Grytviken, although the church amidst the detritus of whaling - including a ship with its harpoon still mounted at the front - has it. And there is Sir Ernest Shackleton's grave in the small cemetery, with dead whalers and an Argentinian submariner for company. But the spookier place is the old whaling station of Stromness, round the coast. Closed now because it is packed full of asbestos, you can still see the foreman's house where Shackleton and his men knocked on the door, having sailed then walked over a glacier to reach it. Apparently the bath he used to clean up (and shave off the beard that made him unrecognisable) is still in there.
The Foehn winds still rip down to the fjord, whilst beneath your ship lie a mountain of whale bones. It's not the ghosts of the whalers you feel there - it's the ghosts of the whales....
A couple of the Independent leaders and the Greens were in the paper last week pleading with voters to work out who stands the best chance in each ward; if only they had identified more common purpose before nominations closed.
The flotilla is now heading back to France after making its point.
And, whatever your view, they’ve achieved it with a mass of international coverage.
What happens next is the interesting bit.
https://twitter.com/garyburgessci/status/1390189028897660929?s=21
In the medium term the hope must be that some sort of successful Biden-ism becomes a successful export from the US. Although in the UK we'll probably find the government doing it already.
The priority for him now must be reshuffling the Shadow Cabinet and developing some big, bold, simple ideas.
EDIT: Us cockroaches don't give up easily!
You didn't say she was a Bozo Tory?
Biden got in by not being an orange buffoon who advised injecting bleach. The left in Europe aren't facing that, which is why Boris can adopt and adapt in a way the orange buffoon couldn't.
South Georgia is exactly as you describe with Shackleton's grave but we could not land at Stromness as we were hit by an katabatic wind which was quite some experience
We continued to the Falklands and then to Buenos Aires from here we returned to Heathrow
There is no doubt that a trip of this nature is an extraordinary experience and should not be missed if the opportunity arises
I’m not saying BoJo is Trump, I think the point I would make is that Labour’s best chance of a victory with Starmer is that the election is about “not Johnson”. Starmer was made for that.
We are not there yet. And we may never be - but I don’t think certain comparisons to the U.S. are wrong
Hats off to @Leon
He is still an appalling PM. Campaigning skill and governing well seem to have zero correlation.
Or hence why we got the vaccine rollout before any other major nation in the world?
If this is governing badly, I'm curious what governing well looks like?
Blair and Cameron gave ideas about what they were for. Some of it was mushy sure, but I don't see any of that from Starmer yet.
So were Napoleon III, and Juan Peron.
Crooked clowns can be popular.
I’ll say what I have said before. The shadow cabinet are poor. Dodds was, I thought, an inspired pick and she has been hopeless. Kate Green has given a free ride to the incompetent Gavin Williamson. Her two main contributions seem to have been about ‘decolonialising the curriculum’ and removing ‘Empire’ from the title of awards. Neither of which are pressing matters of the day however worthy. I watched Jonathan Reynolds on BBC Breakfast yesterday and he seemed a beaten man. I’d not heard of him as a shadow cabinet member before. Starmers team make Corbyn team seem like winners.
I really don't understand French Govt Ministers' utter dedication to being posturing twats.
Anyhoo the Minister for Silly Talks seems to have backed down from making like Vladimir Putin wrt Georgia.
So given the choice we have a dour forensic lawyer or a flamboyant and edgy bon viveur. An edgy bon viveur who apart from his colourful home life has made some hilariously charismatic interjections along the way, like claiming Mrs Ratcliffe worked for Reuters, and quoting colonial Kipling poetry in the colonies.
Hmmm, but for a full house, does he juggle and do card tricks?
Not today though. Sertraline withdrawal has kicked in - seem to sleep a looooong time, have quality sleep according to my tracker thing and yet wake up tired and achy. And I get jabbed tomorrow - going to be a fun weekend...!
Struggling french president turns Monsieur macho and stuffs it to les rosbifs in run up to election
Tub thumping PM socks it to the frogs on election day
Both sides want to play
My theory is that they don't have an Express so the Ministers need to create their own
He was the future, once.
Mikasa is quite interesting - it was saved by a US businessman originally from Barrow, and in Barrow there exists Mikasa Street.
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mikasa+St,+Walney,+Barrow-in-Furness/@54.102636,-3.2477664,162m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x487ca9193e7800d7:0x25c7eea1d7bc7588!8m2!3d54.1026558!4d-3.2473215
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_battleship_Mikasa
Jessie doing her makeup
Jessie leaving her house and leaving the front door wide open
Jessie knocking on doors, not getting answered and walking away again
Jessie solemnly telling us how she had led local regional and national change
Jessie telling us that the area had gone to the dogs under the Tories with the opening shot of this hysterical rant a big England flag flying on Eston nab
Jessie hysterically ranting about how terrible everything is and why its all the evil Tories fault
All intercut with shots of Jessie doing that godawful Patel smirk whilst standing heorically on headlands or outside the closed steelworks.
When she gets demolished today, she will move onto her next project. We don't know what it is yet but I can guarantee that she will always have been passionate about it and will use 403 photos of her pulling that same fucking Patel smirk to illustrate the point.
EDIT - her "IS THIS THE UK'S FIRST FEMALE METRO MAYOR?" newspaper is just as bad. So many shots of JJJJJJJ heroically pulling the same pose in front of everything I wondered if this was the Freemans catalogue and not a crap political leaflet. Who puts "Will I Win?" on their front page FFS.
It’s not even clear what his philosophy is.
At present I’d far rather have Keir than the corrupt clown, but if he hasn’t got anything he wants to say then he needs to “get off the pot”.
Sadiq won’t be getting either of my votes today, either.
38 606 excess deaths in a larger country (Germany) is clearly better still.
Denmark is currently on negative excess deaths.
https://www.ft.com/content/a2901ce8-5eb7-4633-b89c-cbdf5b386938
To be fair, there are a bunch of countries that have done worse than the UK.
Going by the percentages, there are places like Bulgaria, Colombia, Russia. If your argument is that Johnson's Britain is great because it's done better than that, you're welcome. Italy and the US are slightly worse than the UK (but there's not much in it)- that seems to be what happens when you have leading politicians who are TV personalities with dodgy attitudes to women and foreigners.
Great vaccine rollout, yes. Thank goodness, because the UK botched everything else.
Anyway, it’d be a cone app these days.
Mr. Romford, worth noting we have significantly higher population density than France, and that we appear to be counting perhaps excessively (I remember reading we're the only country in the world with a seriously mismatched excess deaths and COVID deaths tallies).
That said, there has been some serious incompetence over international borders, care homes, and the nonsense at Christmas.
Scramble the Navy!
The upside is that despite being as grey as Major, when he's gone well probably find out his daily life was drugs and S&M with Little Mix. Really he should declare it now, it would at least give him a chance with the electorate
@LabourAccel
I'm hearing rumours now that if Labour lose the Hartlepool by-election and the Tees Valley and West Midlands mayoral elections the Tribune Group of MPs are ready to call for a vote of no confidence in Keir Starmer"
https://twitter.com/LabourAccel/status/1390206010959216641
However; I do remember he published a kind of philosophical manifesto in the Times which read well and positioned him as not just another Tory.
He then followed it up with some PR stunts, which were gauche but succeeded in reinforcing his positioning.
I know it’s been hard with coronavirus but I would have expected Keir to activate some kind of comms campaign from 1 April.
Like the Graeae, with one shared eye.
P.S. After Johnson, I'd have Major back in a heartbeat.
What do you mean that isn't enough? Bloody moaning Tories...
I just drove straight back home from nursery drop-off totally forgetting about the fact it's polling day today, I normally go at 8am, and there are no signs anywhere.
I will have to go later today now.
And the FT source is the nearest we have to gold-standard excess deaths at the moment, rather than attributing deaths to a cause. That flatters everyone a bit, because it credits the flu deaths that didn't happen this year as a positive- presumably that's why Denmark have ended the crisis ahead of the game.
The UK botched a lot of its Covid response- heck, that's why the government was beginning to fall behind in the polls in December. Vaccines are a feather in their cap, but it's not made the overall response more than meh.
Macron gets electoral benefit by standing up to Les Rosbifs over fish. Boris gets fantastic headlines on election day by sending in the navy.
Nothing happens. Both men stay in office and are fêted as heroes.
They then chuckle to each other after.