It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Not this shite again. Osborne ended up borrowing more than Darling would have borrowed.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Not this shite again. Osborne ended up borrowing more than Darling would have borrowed.
He had also reversed large parts of the direction of policy by 2014-2015, and only then could the economy recover.
The truth about GB News is that it's still considerably more Woke than the average British voter. It's less Woke than Sky News, BBC News and Channel 4 News.
Depends what you mean by "Woke" which is becoming increasingly meaningless..
Given that 59% don't have a clue what it means, and 30% haven't even heard the term, it isn't easy to work out how Woke the average Briton is.
I have difficulty myself as I haven't heard a convincing and coherent definition.
Woke means being awakened to persistent systemic economical disadvantage in general, and to racism in particular.
Which is why Tories are "anti-Woke".
A very inadequate and misleading definition of how the word is used and understood.
On the contrary, that is precisely what it means and how I use it.
By all means give us the benefit of your version.
So your definition of 'Woke' suggests that anyone who is 'woke' is particularly awakened to the persistent economic disadvantage of white males from disadvantaged backgrounds in the UK?
An interesting definition, to be sure. The only slight snaglet is that it doesn't seem to bear the slightest relation to how the term is used in practice.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Okay just disagree with the IMF, CBI, BoE then. You know better.
It didn't work, it failed by its own measures. When did we achieve a surplus Philip?
The BoE didn't say what you think they said. A single former member of the BoE is quoted there as about this pandemic, not the past decade. So you're just betraying your own ignorance on the issue.
Debt to GDP increased every year from 2001 onwards. Thanks to austerity that increase was arrested and the ratio peaked in 2015.
From 2015 onwards the debt to GDP ratio did something it hadn't done since 2001. It was falling every single year.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Not this shite again. Osborne ended up borrowing more than Darling would have borrowed.
Osborne stole Darling's plans, then did the recovery begin. Prior to that the economy had fallen into a blackhole.
Austerity doesn't work. Only insane people stick by this idea it was successful.
Jesus what has happened, David Davis is talking a lot of sense!
Apart from talking himself from Eurospkiness into hardcore Brexitdom, DD has always talked a reasonable amount of Conservative sense. Free people, small (but just large enough) government with responsibility for the less fortunate. And probably with enough internal integrity to acknowledge, in the blue of the night, that this isn't exactly what he strove for all that time.
Final bit on aid from me because my wife and I are heading out for dinner and a drink in a bit - aid spending and aid programmes in the UK (and the wider west) are driven by liberal white colonial guilt. We give money to Africa because we think it helps atone for our sins in Africa. Maybe it does, I don't know. It doesn't, however, help actual people living there. That's not what our aid programmes are designed to do, they exist to advertise that signal that the UK is "doing it's bit" to help the world's poor regardless of the actual results.
We dole out money to charities and aid agencies who in turn put out press releases telling the world how wonderful the British or Danes or Americans are for giving money to Africa for some new widgets they're definitely going to buy.
I don't have any answers on how we should run aid programmes, all I know is what we're doing isn't working. We're just giving the heroin addict their next hit or booze to an alcoholic. It might make them feel good for a few minutes, or a day but the underlying issue remains unresolved and soon enough they'll be back begging for more so they can get their next fix.
You know, maybe we're doing it completely wrong. Maybe we run a competition for one country to be our sole recipient of foreign aid for the next five years. That country gets the equivalent of 0.5% of UK GDP for five successive years, and also gets a free trade agreement, and as much support as we can give. This wouldn't be charity led - it would be direct government support, with the goal of using five years to dramatically improve infrastructure at all levels - human, health, water, ports/airports, legal structures, education. etc.
In return, they have to adhere to basic principles such as the rule of law.
We'd be giving such large sums of money to a very poor country that it would be genuinely life changing.
Done right - we could do what was done to Germany post WW2, or Korea in the 1950s and 60s.
And countries would compete to prove that they could spend the money right, and that they could put the structures in place that would make us want to spend the money there.
What's the difference between foreign aid and colonialism? I know officially there's a difference, but I'm talking about unofficially.
Helen Pidd @helenpidd · 4h Of all the heartfelt messages on the @MarcusRashford memorial today, this is the one which got me most. “Thank you for all our dinners”. From Reggie aged 6.
If Rashford decides to take Johnson on over the £20 for UC in the autumn then it is just a question of how the PM waffles his way around the u-turn.
Not a chance is the PM taking the £20 away. 😂
Not a snowballs chance in hell.
In which case, why doesn't he lead from the front for once and announce the change of policy now?
Overton Window.
Keep the £20 as not officially given and you can "extend" or even confirm it in a few months time and people are happy.
Confirm the £20 as officially part of the UC baseline and that will be banked and people will start campaigning for another increase from there.
Except that it’s costing almost an EU membership’s worth of cash, three times the Overseas Aid cut. It’s not just for the unemployed, more than half the country is on UC.
Do you have a source on that?
And of course the EU membership and Overseas Aid cuts was money going overseas which really is dead money. Money in the UK has a multiplier effect so its much harder to measure.
6.0m is the correct number of households claiming UC.
Yes, you are correct that an amount of aid is spend with domestic companies.
According to your source it was only 3m people pre-pandemic, so if it returns to that level then it'd be ~£3bn per annum.
Interestingly in the chart "Average (mean) Universal Credit payment for in payment households, Great Britain, February 2017 to February 2021" there's little visible sign of the uplift. Actually average payments have risen by less in the past year than they have in prior years. That seems counter-intuitive.
I’ve just pulled this up now, and realised that my thinking was wrong. It’s past bedtime now, but I’ll do some more digging on UC stuff tomorrow.
It’s genuinely interesting, especially that it seems to be working an awful lot better than the old system of benefits would have done, in the face of pandemic levels of disruption to employment.
Turn2us calculator is an invaluable resource when it comes to UC. I suspect Foxy is on to something. It is now pulling in more of the in work low paid. Particularly the part time workers with childcare responsibility who will have been badly hit by schools being shut. And you are spot on. The old system wouldn't have coped. Particularly the "signing on" with mandatory interview bit.
That we had UC as a nation was a real blessing. People should be really grateful to George Osborne and Iain Duncan Smith for sorting out the infrastructure to that.
Now UC should be merged with Income Tax and National Insurance next.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Not this shite again. Osborne ended up borrowing more than Darling would have borrowed.
Labour underestimated how much they'd borrow every single year they were in office which is how they ended up increasing debt to GDP annually from 2001 onwards despite the UK growing and having no recession in that period. So where are you getting the figures of what Darling would have borrowed from?
Face coverings must be worn on London's transport network despite restrictions easing on Monday, London's mayor says.
England is to move to level zero of Covid restrictions on 19 July, but mandatory use of face coverings is to remain in place on Transport for London (TfL) services, unless exempt.
This includes the Tube, bus, tram, DLR, Overground and TfL Rail.
That's me not going to the office any time soon, then.
Doesn’t affect trains I don’t think, unless Overground or TfL Rail under the mayor’s control.
This is going to be a nightmare to enforce.
Get on SWR service, take mask off. Get off SWR service, put mask on.
The Government have made a complete mess of this, they should have just said masks continued to be compulsory on public transport.
So that someone in an empty train carriage in the middle of nowhere could be fined for not wearing one?
The government’s approach is correct, they’re not renewing the most pernicious legislation enacted since 1945. Guidance will replace law, and it will be between companies and their customers how they interact, as it should be in a liberal democracy.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
Genuinely for that, Osborne is an absolute genius. I can only respect the level of political calculation that he pursued with this strategy
Having very effectively squeezed all but minions and tawdry lickspittles out of the party, how can post-Johnson Conservatives regenerate?
By renouncing BoZo and all his works.
The Conservative and Unionist Party of the future will pledge to restore Foreign Aid.
And rejoin the EU single market...
A future Labour led government might rejoin the single market even with free movement and restore overseas aid to 0.7% of gnp, it won't happen under the Tories given most of their core vote are opposed to both those propositions.
The only way the Tories might eventually accept the above is if Labour do both and they have been in opposition for a decade or more and it then becomes part of the consensus
We (i.e. the Americans) should never have gone in there in the first place, and pulling out was always going to reveal the tragic mistakenness of that original decision. Staying longer isn’t going to improve the eventual outcome, however, so credit to Biden for biting the bullet that both Obama and Trump promised, but ducked.
No, there was very good reason for going there in the first place, although they screwed up the follow-up (especially by losing focus and diverting attention and resource to Iraq).
Still, whatever the history, and irrespective of whether they are right to leave, leaving in such a tearing hurry is a huge mistake.
Hurry? How many years have we been wasting the lives and limbs of our soldiers out there already?
Too many. But what they are doing now is literally abandoning bases overnight. It's completely irresponsible.
Would you keep British troops there after Biden pulled out?
I think Biden is being too rapid on this, but I can understand from a tactical PoV that dragging it out might not work either.
But once the Americans made the decision to pull out, being realistic the British had no choice but to do so too. This isn't a war we could after 20 years win unilaterally.
Oh, absolutely. This is Biden's cock-up, not ours (I believe we strongly argued against it). We have no choice but to abandon the Afghans to their miserable US-mandated fate.
And it will be miserable
They are already talking about how the more vile aspects of Sharia are planned again.
Jesus Christ, the Tory Party backed Labour's spending plans POUND FOR POUND.
So Philip, did you resign your membership of the Tory Party at the time when this happened, as the Tories would have equally "blown" all the money.
I bet I know what the answer is
No because it was a cynical temporary political spin to gain power, just as it was in 1997 when Brown pledged to match Tory plans.
The Tories would never have long-term spent what Brown did. But after losing elections three times in a row, you have to try to convince the public to let you back in.
Jesus Christ, the Tory Party backed Labour's spending plans POUND FOR POUND.
So Philip, did you resign your membership of the Tory Party at the time when this happened, as the Tories would have equally "blown" all the money.
I bet I know what the answer is
No because it was a cynical temporary political spin to gain power, just as it was in 1997 when Brown pledged to match Tory plans.
The Tories would never have spent what Brown did. But after losing elections three times in a row, you have to try to convince the public to let you back in.
So basically, the Tory Party are liars? I am not surprised but the sad thing is how you vote for them anyway
Final bit on aid from me because my wife and I are heading out for dinner and a drink in a bit - aid spending and aid programmes in the UK (and the wider west) are driven by liberal white colonial guilt. We give money to Africa because we think it helps atone for our sins in Africa. Maybe it does, I don't know. It doesn't, however, help actual people living there. That's not what our aid programmes are designed to do, they exist to advertise that signal that the UK is "doing it's bit" to help the world's poor regardless of the actual results.
We dole out money to charities and aid agencies who in turn put out press releases telling the world how wonderful the British or Danes or Americans are for giving money to Africa for some new widgets they're definitely going to buy.
I don't have any answers on how we should run aid programmes, all I know is what we're doing isn't working. We're just giving the heroin addict their next hit or booze to an alcoholic. It might make them feel good for a few minutes, or a day but the underlying issue remains unresolved and soon enough they'll be back begging for more so they can get their next fix.
You know, maybe we're doing it completely wrong. Maybe we run a competition for one country to be our sole recipient of foreign aid for the next five years. That country gets the equivalent of 0.5% of UK GDP for five successive years, and also gets a free trade agreement, and as much support as we can give. This wouldn't be charity led - it would be direct government support, with the goal of using five years to dramatically improve infrastructure at all levels - human, health, water, ports/airports, legal structures, education. etc.
In return, they have to adhere to basic principles such as the rule of law.
We'd be giving such large sums of money to a very poor country that it would be genuinely life changing.
Done right - we could do what was done to Germany post WW2, or Korea in the 1950s and 60s.
And countries would compete to prove that they could spend the money right, and that they could put the structures in place that would make us want to spend the money there.
What's the difference between foreign aid and colonialism? I know officially there's a difference, but I'm talking about unofficially.
Officially, and unofficially, they are two entirely separate things that only a moral and intellectual cretin would conflate.
The truth about GB News is that it's still considerably more Woke than the average British voter. It's less Woke than Sky News, BBC News and Channel 4 News.
Depends what you mean by "Woke" which is becoming increasingly meaningless..
Given that 59% don't have a clue what it means, and 30% haven't even heard the term, it isn't easy to work out how Woke the average Briton is.
I have difficulty myself as I haven't heard a convincing and coherent definition.
Woke means being awakened to persistent systemic economical disadvantage in general, and to racism in particular.
Which is why Tories are "anti-Woke".
A very inadequate and misleading definition of how the word is used and understood.
On the contrary, that is precisely what it means and how I use it.
By all means give us the benefit of your version.
So your definition of 'Woke' suggests that anyone who is 'woke' is particularly awakened to the persistent economic disadvantage of white males from disadvantaged backgrounds in the UK?
An interesting definition, to be sure. The only slight snaglet is that it doesn't seem to bear the slightest relation to how the term is used in practice.
Indeed. Which is why I am trying, and miserably failing, to get a succinct definition, or even any definition of the term from one of the many posters who use it perjoratively. So far only @Casino_Royale has, to his credit, had a go. But that was copying Wiki on the history of how it has been used. So what does it mean?
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2010 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, they only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
No you missed the point.
Austerity destroyed these seats. Then when BoJo promised to reverse it they all voted for him.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
This idea is preposterous nonsense left-wingers tell themselves to help themselves sleep at night, rather than admitting they're losing the arguments and people are voting Tory for other reasons.
If this was really true then considering the Tories had far more Council seats than Labour did were are the thousands of Council seats that have turned away from the Tories?
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
Except "The Council" is shorthand for Labour round here. Even when it is Tory.
Helen Pidd @helenpidd · 4h Of all the heartfelt messages on the @MarcusRashford memorial today, this is the one which got me most. “Thank you for all our dinners”. From Reggie aged 6.
If Rashford decides to take Johnson on over the £20 for UC in the autumn then it is just a question of how the PM waffles his way around the u-turn.
Not a chance is the PM taking the £20 away. 😂
Not a snowballs chance in hell.
In which case, why doesn't he lead from the front for once and announce the change of policy now?
Overton Window.
Keep the £20 as not officially given and you can "extend" or even confirm it in a few months time and people are happy.
Confirm the £20 as officially part of the UC baseline and that will be banked and people will start campaigning for another increase from there.
Except that it’s costing almost an EU membership’s worth of cash, three times the Overseas Aid cut. It’s not just for the unemployed, more than half the country is on UC.
Do you have a source on that?
And of course the EU membership and Overseas Aid cuts was money going overseas which really is dead money. Money in the UK has a multiplier effect so its much harder to measure.
6.0m is the correct number of households claiming UC.
Yes, you are correct that an amount of aid is spend with domestic companies.
According to your source it was only 3m people pre-pandemic, so if it returns to that level then it'd be ~£3bn per annum.
Interestingly in the chart "Average (mean) Universal Credit payment for in payment households, Great Britain, February 2017 to February 2021" there's little visible sign of the uplift. Actually average payments have risen by less in the past year than they have in prior years. That seems counter-intuitive.
I’ve just pulled this up now, and realised that my thinking was wrong. It’s past bedtime now, but I’ll do some more digging on UC stuff tomorrow.
It’s genuinely interesting, especially that it seems to be working an awful lot better than the old system of benefits would have done, in the face of pandemic levels of disruption to employment.
Turn2us calculator is an invaluable resource when it comes to UC. I suspect Foxy is on to something. It is now pulling in more of the in work low paid. Particularly the part time workers with childcare responsibility who will have been badly hit by schools being shut. And you are spot on. The old system wouldn't have coped. Particularly the "signing on" with mandatory interview bit.
Well of course UC had the equivalent of signing on, complete with interviews, but that was quickly dropped at the start of Covid (sensibly).
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Not this shite again. Osborne ended up borrowing more than Darling would have borrowed.
Osborne stole Darling's plans, then did the recovery begin. Prior to that the economy had fallen into a blackhole.
Austerity doesn't work. Only insane people stick by this idea it was successful.
I do love this argument. It's so staggeringly irrational.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
Genuinely for that, Osborne is an absolute genius. I can only respect the level of political calculation that he pursued with this strategy
Never assume skill when luck is an option.
If Osborne had been more incompetent during the recession then the Conservatives would have won a majority in 2010.
They then wouldn't have had the prize shit Clegg agreeing to triple lock pensions (thus boosting the Conservative vote) and tripling student tuition fees (thus crippling the LibDem vote).
And the icing on the cake was people referring to cuts as austerity and ignoring the extra spending the Conservatives were using to buy votes.
Final bit on aid from me because my wife and I are heading out for dinner and a drink in a bit - aid spending and aid programmes in the UK (and the wider west) are driven by liberal white colonial guilt. We give money to Africa because we think it helps atone for our sins in Africa. Maybe it does, I don't know. It doesn't, however, help actual people living there. That's not what our aid programmes are designed to do, they exist to advertise that signal that the UK is "doing it's bit" to help the world's poor regardless of the actual results.
We dole out money to charities and aid agencies who in turn put out press releases telling the world how wonderful the British or Danes or Americans are for giving money to Africa for some new widgets they're definitely going to buy.
I don't have any answers on how we should run aid programmes, all I know is what we're doing isn't working. We're just giving the heroin addict their next hit or booze to an alcoholic. It might make them feel good for a few minutes, or a day but the underlying issue remains unresolved and soon enough they'll be back begging for more so they can get their next fix.
You know, maybe we're doing it completely wrong. Maybe we run a competition for one country to be our sole recipient of foreign aid for the next five years. That country gets the equivalent of 0.5% of UK GDP for five successive years, and also gets a free trade agreement, and as much support as we can give. This wouldn't be charity led - it would be direct government support, with the goal of using five years to dramatically improve infrastructure at all levels - human, health, water, ports/airports, legal structures, education. etc.
In return, they have to adhere to basic principles such as the rule of law.
We'd be giving such large sums of money to a very poor country that it would be genuinely life changing.
Done right - we could do what was done to Germany post WW2, or Korea in the 1950s and 60s.
And countries would compete to prove that they could spend the money right, and that they could put the structures in place that would make us want to spend the money there.
What's the difference between foreign aid and colonialism? I know officially there's a difference, but I'm talking about unofficially.
Foreign Aid does have an element of "The White Man's Burden" hence Easterley using that as the title of his book on aid.
Aid is basically similar to the positive elements of 19th and 20th century colonialism, the mission hospitals, schools etc, the stamping out of suttee and the Thugs, the building of roads and irrigation systems.
It is colonialism shorn of racism and economic exploitation, and other reprehensible aspects.
Jesus Christ, the Tory Party backed Labour's spending plans POUND FOR POUND.
So Philip, did you resign your membership of the Tory Party at the time when this happened, as the Tories would have equally "blown" all the money.
I bet I know what the answer is
No because it was a cynical temporary political spin to gain power, just as it was in 1997 when Brown pledged to match Tory plans.
The Tories would never have spent what Brown did. But after losing elections three times in a row, you have to try to convince the public to let you back in.
So basically, the Tory Party are liars? I am not surprised but the sad thing is how you vote for them anyway
No its not a lie, its politics.
The commitment Brown made in 1997 and the commitment Cameron made in ~2007 mirroring it was for a temporary match in spending. Which is actually not that meaningful since the reality is that most spending continues from year to year and it takes time for decisions to change things anyway.
Long-term the divergence goes in different ways, even if you have a temporary two year spending match.
It seems hardly anyone wants to talk about the fact that most of the social media comments came from abroad, probably generated by bots. Why not? It ought to be the main news of the day IMO.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
It seems hardly anyone wants to talk about the fact that most of the social media comments came from abroad, probably generated by bots. Why not? It ought to be the main news of the day IMO.
Final bit on aid from me because my wife and I are heading out for dinner and a drink in a bit - aid spending and aid programmes in the UK (and the wider west) are driven by liberal white colonial guilt. We give money to Africa because we think it helps atone for our sins in Africa. Maybe it does, I don't know. It doesn't, however, help actual people living there. That's not what our aid programmes are designed to do, they exist to advertise that signal that the UK is "doing it's bit" to help the world's poor regardless of the actual results.
We dole out money to charities and aid agencies who in turn put out press releases telling the world how wonderful the British or Danes or Americans are for giving money to Africa for some new widgets they're definitely going to buy.
I don't have any answers on how we should run aid programmes, all I know is what we're doing isn't working. We're just giving the heroin addict their next hit or booze to an alcoholic. It might make them feel good for a few minutes, or a day but the underlying issue remains unresolved and soon enough they'll be back begging for more so they can get their next fix.
You know, maybe we're doing it completely wrong. Maybe we run a competition for one country to be our sole recipient of foreign aid for the next five years. That country gets the equivalent of 0.5% of UK GDP for five successive years, and also gets a free trade agreement, and as much support as we can give. This wouldn't be charity led - it would be direct government support, with the goal of using five years to dramatically improve infrastructure at all levels - human, health, water, ports/airports, legal structures, education. etc.
In return, they have to adhere to basic principles such as the rule of law.
We'd be giving such large sums of money to a very poor country that it would be genuinely life changing.
Done right - we could do what was done to Germany post WW2, or Korea in the 1950s and 60s.
And countries would compete to prove that they could spend the money right, and that they could put the structures in place that would make us want to spend the money there.
What's the difference between foreign aid and colonialism? I know officially there's a difference, but I'm talking about unofficially.
With foreign aid middle class leftists from the first world tell third world countries what to do.
With colonialism middle class rightists from the first world tell third world countries what to do.
It seems hardly anyone wants to talk about the fact that most of the social media comments came from abroad, probably generated by bots. Why not? It ought to be the main news of the day IMO.
I believe that's true and it's a concern. But you're presumably not denying there were plenty from racists in the UK too?
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2010 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, they only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
No you missed the point.
Austerity destroyed these seats. Then when BoJo promised to reverse it they all voted for him.
How long have you spent in the Red Wall?
I do. Austerity hasn't destroyed these seats.
Barratt Homes, Help To Buy, economic growth etc have built up these seats not knocked them down.
These seats aren't worse off than 2010, they're better off with more home owners than they were in 2010.
The Tories have been rewarded because their policies have worked, not Labour punished because the Tories policies have failed.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2010 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, they only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
No you missed the point.
Austerity destroyed these seats. Then when BoJo promised to reverse it they all voted for him.
Which is why the new austerity will be inflicted on the Labour held cities and Labour voting young rather than the pensioners in declining towns.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Not this shite again. Osborne ended up borrowing more than Darling would have borrowed.
This is what I love! The left can't decide whether to criticise Osborne for too much 'austerity' [stupid word] or too little.
Of course there's a good reason for that. His macro-economic judgement was, as I've pointed out in the past, near-perfect. No wonder the opposition can't decide whether it was too austere or not austere enough.
It seems hardly anyone wants to talk about the fact that most of the social media comments came from abroad, probably generated by bots. Why not? It ought to be the main news of the day IMO.
Did foreign bots deface that mural in Manchester? Or boo the knee at football matches?
From the Guardian story on the football, they make it sound like it wasn't just some random drunk fans trying their luck, it was pre-arranged on social media.
Indeed. Appalling crowd management at Wembley is going to be a nail in the coffin of any bid for a World Cup.
It's sweet that you still think that actual practical considerations of being able to host the tournament play any part at all in the decision process these days.
Good to see Rent-a-Gob impartial former BBC employee anti-government leftie Gavin Esler, taking money from Abu Dhabi to write an opinion piece calling England fans racist.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Not this shite again. Osborne ended up borrowing more than Darling would have borrowed.
This is what I love! The left can't decide whether to criticise Osborne for too much 'austerity' [stupid word] or too little.
Of course there's a good reason for that. His macro-economic judgement was, as I've pointed out in the past, near-perfect. No wonder the opposition can't decide whether it was too austere or not austere enough.
Who on the left is saying Osborne did too little austerity? Nobody is.
Austerity of any kind is too much, it doesn't work. I've been consistent on that for years.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
Helen Pidd @helenpidd · 4h Of all the heartfelt messages on the @MarcusRashford memorial today, this is the one which got me most. “Thank you for all our dinners”. From Reggie aged 6.
If Rashford decides to take Johnson on over the £20 for UC in the autumn then it is just a question of how the PM waffles his way around the u-turn.
Not a chance is the PM taking the £20 away. 😂
Not a snowballs chance in hell.
In which case, why doesn't he lead from the front for once and announce the change of policy now?
Overton Window.
Keep the £20 as not officially given and you can "extend" or even confirm it in a few months time and people are happy.
Confirm the £20 as officially part of the UC baseline and that will be banked and people will start campaigning for another increase from there.
Except that it’s costing almost an EU membership’s worth of cash, three times the Overseas Aid cut. It’s not just for the unemployed, more than half the country is on UC.
Do you have a source on that?
And of course the EU membership and Overseas Aid cuts was money going overseas which really is dead money. Money in the UK has a multiplier effect so its much harder to measure.
6.0m is the correct number of households claiming UC.
Yes, you are correct that an amount of aid is spend with domestic companies.
According to your source it was only 3m people pre-pandemic, so if it returns to that level then it'd be ~£3bn per annum.
Interestingly in the chart "Average (mean) Universal Credit payment for in payment households, Great Britain, February 2017 to February 2021" there's little visible sign of the uplift. Actually average payments have risen by less in the past year than they have in prior years. That seems counter-intuitive.
I’ve just pulled this up now, and realised that my thinking was wrong. It’s past bedtime now, but I’ll do some more digging on UC stuff tomorrow.
It’s genuinely interesting, especially that it seems to be working an awful lot better than the old system of benefits would have done, in the face of pandemic levels of disruption to employment.
Turn2us calculator is an invaluable resource when it comes to UC. I suspect Foxy is on to something. It is now pulling in more of the in work low paid. Particularly the part time workers with childcare responsibility who will have been badly hit by schools being shut. And you are spot on. The old system wouldn't have coped. Particularly the "signing on" with mandatory interview bit.
Well of course UC had the equivalent of signing on, complete with interviews, but that was quickly dropped at the start of Covid (sensibly).
Yes, but. The facility to do it Online was already there. And many were using it in fairness. At least they were round here.
One thing that would be great to analyse when they do is comparing seat swings from 2010 to 2019 with demographic and especially home ownership changes from 2010 to 2021.
People act like the Red Wall is some deprived shit-hole desperate for government spending to help people get out of their miserable existance. Reality couldn't be further from the truth.
It seems hardly anyone wants to talk about the fact that most of the social media comments came from abroad, probably generated by bots. Why not? It ought to be the main news of the day IMO.
Did foreign bots deface that mural in Manchester? Or boo the knee at football matches?
Racism doesn't exist, just explain it away is what the Tory Party and its fans do now. Imagine if this was Labour, no alternative view or option there, just racism. Appalling.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2010 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, they only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
No you missed the point.
Austerity destroyed these seats. Then when BoJo promised to reverse it they all voted for him.
How long have you spent in the Red Wall?
I do. Austerity hasn't destroyed these seats.
Barratt Homes, Help To Buy, economic growth etc have built up these seats not knocked them down.
These seats aren't worse off than 2010, they're better off with more home owners than they were in 2010.
The Tories have been rewarded because their policies have worked, not Labour punished because the Tories policies have failed.
A number of years thank you Philip.
Austerity absolutely has destroyed those seats, the destruction of council services, including mental health, ending of homeless support.
Final bit on aid from me because my wife and I are heading out for dinner and a drink in a bit - aid spending and aid programmes in the UK (and the wider west) are driven by liberal white colonial guilt. We give money to Africa because we think it helps atone for our sins in Africa. Maybe it does, I don't know. It doesn't, however, help actual people living there. That's not what our aid programmes are designed to do, they exist to advertise that signal that the UK is "doing it's bit" to help the world's poor regardless of the actual results.
We dole out money to charities and aid agencies who in turn put out press releases telling the world how wonderful the British or Danes or Americans are for giving money to Africa for some new widgets they're definitely going to buy.
I don't have any answers on how we should run aid programmes, all I know is what we're doing isn't working. We're just giving the heroin addict their next hit or booze to an alcoholic. It might make them feel good for a few minutes, or a day but the underlying issue remains unresolved and soon enough they'll be back begging for more so they can get their next fix.
You know, maybe we're doing it completely wrong. Maybe we run a competition for one country to be our sole recipient of foreign aid for the next five years. That country gets the equivalent of 0.5% of UK GDP for five successive years, and also gets a free trade agreement, and as much support as we can give. This wouldn't be charity led - it would be direct government support, with the goal of using five years to dramatically improve infrastructure at all levels - human, health, water, ports/airports, legal structures, education. etc.
In return, they have to adhere to basic principles such as the rule of law.
We'd be giving such large sums of money to a very poor country that it would be genuinely life changing.
Done right - we could do what was done to Germany post WW2, or Korea in the 1950s and 60s.
And countries would compete to prove that they could spend the money right, and that they could put the structures in place that would make us want to spend the money there.
What's the difference between foreign aid and colonialism? I know officially there's a difference, but I'm talking about unofficially.
With foreign aid middle class leftists from the first world tell third world countries what to do.
With colonialism middle class rightists from the first world tell third world countries what to do.
And appoint themselves Governor. Replete with a uniform, palace and army.
Gareth Southgate himself has said most of the comments came from abroad, not from the UK.
I would be interested to know the analysis behind this claim and if they do actually have any handle on how much of it were bots.
Obviously a VPN can be used to make you appear as from overseas, but equally you can use it to make it appear like you are in the UK (when you are located overseas or in the UK).
I fear the anlysis might be rather too simplistic to actually really know.... especially without the social media companies help and careful analysis by technically minded people.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2010 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, they only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
No you missed the point.
Austerity destroyed these seats. Then when BoJo promised to reverse it they all voted for him.
So it was big spending they voted for, whether from Ed Miliband, Corbyn or BoJo, they never voted for austerity from Cameron, Osborne, Clegg and May
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2010 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, they only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
No you missed the point.
Austerity destroyed these seats. Then when BoJo promised to reverse it they all voted for him.
How long have you spent in the Red Wall?
I do. Austerity hasn't destroyed these seats.
Barratt Homes, Help To Buy, economic growth etc have built up these seats not knocked them down.
These seats aren't worse off than 2010, they're better off with more home owners than they were in 2010.
The Tories have been rewarded because their policies have worked, not Labour punished because the Tories policies have failed.
A number of years thank you Philip.
Austerity absolutely has destroyed those seats, the destruction of council services, including mental health, ending of homeless support.
You know nothing and it shows.
Complete bollocks.
What percentage of 2019 Tory Red Wall voters do you think were voting Tory because they were distraught at cuts to mental health or homeless support? 🤔
As opposed to voting Tory because they agreed with Tory policies and possibly now owned their own home?
Am looking forward to the formation of the Giant Man Babies of PB dance troop - We put the rot in erotic and take the ok out of Woke, oiled up and unmasked!
Helen Pidd @helenpidd · 4h Of all the heartfelt messages on the @MarcusRashford memorial today, this is the one which got me most. “Thank you for all our dinners”. From Reggie aged 6.
If Rashford decides to take Johnson on over the £20 for UC in the autumn then it is just a question of how the PM waffles his way around the u-turn.
Not a chance is the PM taking the £20 away. 😂
Not a snowballs chance in hell.
In which case, why doesn't he lead from the front for once and announce the change of policy now?
Overton Window.
Keep the £20 as not officially given and you can "extend" or even confirm it in a few months time and people are happy.
Confirm the £20 as officially part of the UC baseline and that will be banked and people will start campaigning for another increase from there.
Except that it’s costing almost an EU membership’s worth of cash, three times the Overseas Aid cut. It’s not just for the unemployed, more than half the country is on UC.
Do you have a source on that?
And of course the EU membership and Overseas Aid cuts was money going overseas which really is dead money. Money in the UK has a multiplier effect so its much harder to measure.
6.0m is the correct number of households claiming UC.
Yes, you are correct that an amount of aid is spend with domestic companies.
According to your source it was only 3m people pre-pandemic, so if it returns to that level then it'd be ~£3bn per annum.
Interestingly in the chart "Average (mean) Universal Credit payment for in payment households, Great Britain, February 2017 to February 2021" there's little visible sign of the uplift. Actually average payments have risen by less in the past year than they have in prior years. That seems counter-intuitive.
I’ve just pulled this up now, and realised that my thinking was wrong. It’s past bedtime now, but I’ll do some more digging on UC stuff tomorrow.
It’s genuinely interesting, especially that it seems to be working an awful lot better than the old system of benefits would have done, in the face of pandemic levels of disruption to employment.
Turn2us calculator is an invaluable resource when it comes to UC. I suspect Foxy is on to something. It is now pulling in more of the in work low paid. Particularly the part time workers with childcare responsibility who will have been badly hit by schools being shut. And you are spot on. The old system wouldn't have coped. Particularly the "signing on" with mandatory interview bit.
Well of course UC had the equivalent of signing on, complete with interviews, but that was quickly dropped at the start of Covid (sensibly).
Yes, but. The facility to do it Online was already there. And many were using it in fairness. At least they were round here.
Well, everybody I helped claim UC for the first time pre-covid had to attend an initial interview 15-20 miles away in Yeovil or Poole. Which was tricky for some many with no transport.
Does this actually matter, given the clear photo evidence of actual racist behaviour from fans physically present at the match? It's only the scale of the problem that's in dispute, not its existence.
It seems hardly anyone wants to talk about the fact that most of the social media comments came from abroad, probably generated by bots. Why not? It ought to be the main news of the day IMO.
Ever heard of a VPN?
You do realise the authorities can track down people who use VPNs right? It might be fine to get away with if you’re just using a dodgy foreign TV stream but if you’ve actually committed a serious crime of note they can work out if you’re in the UK or not.
It isn’t surprising to anyone most of these offences take place outside the UK - usually gambling is involved and those abroad don’t expect repercussions because those they are sending hate to are thousands of miles away (see the Neil Maupay case).
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2010 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, they only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
No you missed the point.
Austerity destroyed these seats. Then when BoJo promised to reverse it they all voted for him.
How long have you spent in the Red Wall?
I do. Austerity hasn't destroyed these seats.
Barratt Homes, Help To Buy, economic growth etc have built up these seats not knocked them down.
These seats aren't worse off than 2010, they're better off with more home owners than they were in 2010.
The Tories have been rewarded because their policies have worked, not Labour punished because the Tories policies have failed.
A number of years thank you Philip.
Austerity absolutely has destroyed those seats, the destruction of council services, including mental health, ending of homeless support.
You know nothing and it shows.
Complete bollocks.
What percentage of 2019 Tory Red Wall voters do you think were voting Tory because they were distraught at cuts to mental health or homeless support? 🤔
As opposed to voting Tory because they agreed with Tory policies and possibly now owned their own home?
Who are you to tell people what they can and can't vote for? I know a number who saw their communities being destroyed and thought many years of neglect and being forgotten about meant they had to vote Tory.
I gave you examples of things austerity destroyed. Here are more: hospitals, council services like bin collections, road works, libraries, community centres. These things matter to people.
I happen to think they were mistaken in that, the cuts and destruction being brought about by Tory austerity but it was Labour's fault for putting up a piss poor candidate and not being able to articulate that.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Not this shite again. Osborne ended up borrowing more than Darling would have borrowed.
This is what I love! The left can't decide whether to criticise Osborne for too much 'austerity' [stupid word] or too little.
Of course there's a good reason for that. His macro-economic judgement was, as I've pointed out in the past, near-perfect. No wonder the opposition can't decide whether it was too austere or not austere enough.
Who on the left is saying Osborne did too little austerity? Nobody is.
Austerity of any kind is too much, it doesn't work. I've been consistent on that for years.
We're told he borrowed too much.
To be fair, your criticism was a slightly different, equally hilarious, variant of the criticism - that he 'stole' Darling's plans. That wouldn't be much of a criticism in any circumstances, but it's particularly funny in this case, because there were no Darling plans. Brown, in a characteristically cynical move, didn't allow the Treasury to carry out the usual spending review before the 2010 election. So there were no plans. We'll never know what Darling was going to cut. He didn't know himself.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2010 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, they only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
No you missed the point.
Austerity destroyed these seats. Then when BoJo promised to reverse it they all voted for him.
How long have you spent in the Red Wall?
I do. Austerity hasn't destroyed these seats.
Barratt Homes, Help To Buy, economic growth etc have built up these seats not knocked them down.
These seats aren't worse off than 2010, they're better off with more home owners than they were in 2010.
The Tories have been rewarded because their policies have worked, not Labour punished because the Tories policies have failed.
True of some places not of others. Red Wall is another term without a definition.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
It was funny and apposite, and although people may want it to have been racist so bad they can taste it, it just wasn't. And he didn't look much of an England ace taking that penalty.
It seems hardly anyone wants to talk about the fact that most of the social media comments came from abroad, probably generated by bots. Why not? It ought to be the main news of the day IMO.
Ever heard of a VPN?
You do realise the authorities can track down people who use VPNs right? It might be fine to get away with if you’re just using a dodgy foreign TV stream but if you’ve actually committed a serious crime of note they can work out if you’re in the UK or not.
It isn’t surprising to anyone most of these offences take place outside the UK - usually gambling is involved and those abroad don’t expect repercussions because those they are sending hate to are thousands of miles away (see the Neil Maupay case).
They can't very easily. They can ask the VPN company to provide logs but if they don't keep logs - as many don't - they can't be tracked down. One of the key selling points is anonymity.
And several VPNs employ their own protocols now which are essentially uncrackable - it's one of the reasons they want to ban encryption.
The truth about GB News is that it's still considerably more Woke than the average British voter. It's less Woke than Sky News, BBC News and Channel 4 News.
Depends what you mean by "Woke" which is becoming increasingly meaningless..
Given that 59% don't have a clue what it means, and 30% haven't even heard the term, it isn't easy to work out how Woke the average Briton is.
I have difficulty myself as I haven't heard a convincing and coherent definition.
Woke means being awakened to persistent systemic economical disadvantage in general, and to racism in particular.
Which is why Tories are "anti-Woke".
A very inadequate and misleading definition of how the word is used and understood.
On the contrary, that is precisely what it means and how I use it.
By all means give us the benefit of your version.
18 months ago I had only come across one person in real life who used the term as a positive, so assumed it was a term that started out as a positive but had been subsumed by its negative counter reaction. It seems to have made a bit of a comeback.
Wiki:
"Amid its increasing adoption beyond its African American origins, the term "woke" gained broader connotations. Rather than being applied solely to racial issues, it was increasingly used as a catch-all term to describe those left-wing ideologies, often centred on the identity politics of minority groups and informed by academic movements like critical race theory, which identified themselves as being devoted to "social justice". This included BLM but also related forms of anti-racism as well as campaigns on women's and LGBT issues. The terms "woke capitalism" and "woke washing" were coined to describe companies who signalled their support for such causes. By 2020, parts of the political right in several Western countries were using the term "woke", often in an ironic way, to describe various leftist movements and ideologies they disagreed with. In turn, some left-wing activists came to consider it an offensive term used to denigrate those campaigning against discrimination."
In short, "woke" got culturally appropriated by white lefties, who then turned it into something completely different, with some assistance from the right.
"cultural appropriation" is a much more bollocks concept than "woke" could ever dream of being, given that it is pretty much the defining human activity. It's especially lol when universities go on about it because what subject ever taught in any university outside ancient Athens (where there weren't any) is not 99% appropriated from elsewhere?
Yes, I completely agree. The fact that "woke" types tend to spout bollocks about it being something you can "appropriate" is a big part of why the right looks down on "woke".
But what does "woke" mean?
I don't think it really matter anymore; it's how it's used that matters. People on the right use it to mean divisive identity politicking from the left. Those on the left claim it just means being in favour of social justice. As usual, both sides are talking past each other rather than to each other and we are all the worse off for it.
Part of the problem is that it is now completely impossible to have any kind of sensible conversation about sensitive issues without being decried as a bigot. There is thus no incentive to engage at all.
The truth about GB News is that it's still considerably more Woke than the average British voter. It's less Woke than Sky News, BBC News and Channel 4 News.
Depends what you mean by "Woke" which is becoming increasingly meaningless..
Given that 59% don't have a clue what it means, and 30% haven't even heard the term, it isn't easy to work out how Woke the average Briton is.
I have difficulty myself as I haven't heard a convincing and coherent definition.
Woke means being awakened to persistent systemic economical disadvantage in general, and to racism in particular.
Which is why Tories are "anti-Woke".
A very inadequate and misleading definition of how the word is used and understood.
On the contrary, that is precisely what it means and how I use it.
By all means give us the benefit of your version.
18 months ago I had only come across one person in real life who used the term as a positive, so assumed it was a term that started out as a positive but had been subsumed by its negative counter reaction. It seems to have made a bit of a comeback.
Wiki:
"Amid its increasing adoption beyond its African American origins, the term "woke" gained broader connotations. Rather than being applied solely to racial issues, it was increasingly used as a catch-all term to describe those left-wing ideologies, often centred on the identity politics of minority groups and informed by academic movements like critical race theory, which identified themselves as being devoted to "social justice". This included BLM but also related forms of anti-racism as well as campaigns on women's and LGBT issues. The terms "woke capitalism" and "woke washing" were coined to describe companies who signalled their support for such causes. By 2020, parts of the political right in several Western countries were using the term "woke", often in an ironic way, to describe various leftist movements and ideologies they disagreed with. In turn, some left-wing activists came to consider it an offensive term used to denigrate those campaigning against discrimination."
In short, "woke" got culturally appropriated by white lefties, who then turned it into something completely different, with some assistance from the right.
"cultural appropriation" is a much more bollocks concept than "woke" could ever dream of being, given that it is pretty much the defining human activity. It's especially lol when universities go on about it because what subject ever taught in any university outside ancient Athens (where there weren't any) is not 99% appropriated from elsewhere?
Yes, I completely agree. The fact that "woke" types tend to spout bollocks about it being something you can "appropriate" is a big part of why the right looks down on "woke".
But what does "woke" mean?
I don't think it really matter anymore; it's how it's used that matters. People on the right use it to mean divisive identity politicking from the left. Those on the left claim it just means being in favour of social justice. As usual, both sides are talking past each other rather than to each other and we are all the worse off for it.
Part of the problem is that it is now completely impossible to have any kind of sensible conversation about sensitive issues without being decried as a bigot. There is thus no incentive to engage at all.
Helen Pidd @helenpidd · 4h Of all the heartfelt messages on the @MarcusRashford memorial today, this is the one which got me most. “Thank you for all our dinners”. From Reggie aged 6.
If Rashford decides to take Johnson on over the £20 for UC in the autumn then it is just a question of how the PM waffles his way around the u-turn.
Not a chance is the PM taking the £20 away. 😂
Not a snowballs chance in hell.
In which case, why doesn't he lead from the front for once and announce the change of policy now?
Overton Window.
Keep the £20 as not officially given and you can "extend" or even confirm it in a few months time and people are happy.
Confirm the £20 as officially part of the UC baseline and that will be banked and people will start campaigning for another increase from there.
Except that it’s costing almost an EU membership’s worth of cash, three times the Overseas Aid cut. It’s not just for the unemployed, more than half the country is on UC.
Do you have a source on that?
And of course the EU membership and Overseas Aid cuts was money going overseas which really is dead money. Money in the UK has a multiplier effect so its much harder to measure.
6.0m is the correct number of households claiming UC.
Yes, you are correct that an amount of aid is spend with domestic companies.
According to your source it was only 3m people pre-pandemic, so if it returns to that level then it'd be ~£3bn per annum.
Interestingly in the chart "Average (mean) Universal Credit payment for in payment households, Great Britain, February 2017 to February 2021" there's little visible sign of the uplift. Actually average payments have risen by less in the past year than they have in prior years. That seems counter-intuitive.
I’ve just pulled this up now, and realised that my thinking was wrong. It’s past bedtime now, but I’ll do some more digging on UC stuff tomorrow.
It’s genuinely interesting, especially that it seems to be working an awful lot better than the old system of benefits would have done, in the face of pandemic levels of disruption to employment.
Turn2us calculator is an invaluable resource when it comes to UC. I suspect Foxy is on to something. It is now pulling in more of the in work low paid. Particularly the part time workers with childcare responsibility who will have been badly hit by schools being shut. And you are spot on. The old system wouldn't have coped. Particularly the "signing on" with mandatory interview bit.
Well of course UC had the equivalent of signing on, complete with interviews, but that was quickly dropped at the start of Covid (sensibly).
Yes, but. The facility to do it Online was already there. And many were using it in fairness. At least they were round here.
Well, everybody I helped claim UC for the first time pre-covid had to attend an initial interview 15-20 miles away in Yeovil or Poole. Which was tricky for some many with no transport.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2010 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, they only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
No you missed the point.
Austerity destroyed these seats. Then when BoJo promised to reverse it they all voted for him.
How long have you spent in the Red Wall?
I do. Austerity hasn't destroyed these seats.
Barratt Homes, Help To Buy, economic growth etc have built up these seats not knocked them down.
These seats aren't worse off than 2010, they're better off with more home owners than they were in 2010.
The Tories have been rewarded because their policies have worked, not Labour punished because the Tories policies have failed.
A number of years thank you Philip.
Austerity absolutely has destroyed those seats, the destruction of council services, including mental health, ending of homeless support.
You know nothing and it shows.
Complete bollocks.
What percentage of 2019 Tory Red Wall voters do you think were voting Tory because they were distraught at cuts to mental health or homeless support? 🤔
As opposed to voting Tory because they agreed with Tory policies and possibly now owned their own home?
Who are you to tell people what they can and can't vote for? I know a number who saw their communities being destroyed and thought many years of neglect and being forgotten about meant they had to vote Tory.
I gave you examples of things austerity destroyed. Here are more: hospitals, council services like bin collections, road works, libraries, community centres. These things matter to people.
I happen to think they were mistaken in that, the cuts and destruction being brought about by Tory austerity but it was Labour's fault for putting up a piss poor candidate and not being able to articulate that.
That suits your agenda because you're in denial. There's no evidence for that whatsoever.
Across England the Tories as they went into Downing Street had thousands more Councillors than Labour did. So if people were turning against their Councillors because of austerity, why haven't the Tories been a major net loser of seats? Considering they had more to lose than Labour did?
What evidence as opposed to anecdotes do you have that Red Wall voters voted Tory because they were distraught at "cuts and destruction" as opposed to being happy at Tory policies?
Why have no other seats been distraught at cuts and destruction? 🤔
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
It seems hardly anyone wants to talk about the fact that most of the social media comments came from abroad, probably generated by bots. Why not? It ought to be the main news of the day IMO.
Ever heard of a VPN?
You do realise the authorities can track down people who use VPNs right? It might be fine to get away with if you’re just using a dodgy foreign TV stream but if you’ve actually committed a serious crime of note they can work out if you’re in the UK or not.
It isn’t surprising to anyone most of these offences take place outside the UK - usually gambling is involved and those abroad don’t expect repercussions because those they are sending hate to are thousands of miles away (see the Neil Maupay case).
They can't very easily. They can ask the VPN company to provide logs but if they don't keep logs - as many don't - they can't be tracked down. One of the key selling points is anonymity.
And several VPNs employ their own protocols now which are essentially uncrackable - it's one of the reasons they want to ban encryption.
Hmm yes and no.....there are a number of ways people can and have been tracked down even with no log VPNs, but it is limited to things like terrorism, via GCHQ, or really top tier pirate community groups.
Its too time consuming and resource heavy to do to track down somebody streaming the odd episode of dragon and tits.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
It was funny and apposite, and although people may want it to have been racist so bad they can taste it, it just wasn't. And he didn't look much of an England ace taking that penalty.
The penalty run up was shocking and Rashford was probably our worst player throughout the tournament despite limited minutes. He does not deserve the abuse though as he obviously wasn’t deliberately trying to stink up the games like so many England players before him, and worth remembering he did score in the shootout in 2018. Football wise he has gone backwards but maybe the shoulder operation will help.
I do wonder how involved in the political campaigning he is (I know he employs a Manchester based PR firm to do all his social media), but it might just be a coincidence that his rise off the pitch has coincided with his fall from grace on it. Obviously non football fans and Man Utd/England fans might have conflicting opinions on which is more important!
Personally I hope he can bounce back and get to the levels he once showed as he was a very useful player for England around the 2018/19 Nations League campaign.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
The truth about GB News is that it's still considerably more Woke than the average British voter. It's less Woke than Sky News, BBC News and Channel 4 News.
Depends what you mean by "Woke" which is becoming increasingly meaningless..
Given that 59% don't have a clue what it means, and 30% haven't even heard the term, it isn't easy to work out how Woke the average Briton is.
I have difficulty myself as I haven't heard a convincing and coherent definition.
Woke means being awakened to persistent systemic economical disadvantage in general, and to racism in particular.
Which is why Tories are "anti-Woke".
A very inadequate and misleading definition of how the word is used and understood.
On the contrary, that is precisely what it means and how I use it.
By all means give us the benefit of your version.
18 months ago I had only come across one person in real life who used the term as a positive, so assumed it was a term that started out as a positive but had been subsumed by its negative counter reaction. It seems to have made a bit of a comeback.
Wiki:
"Amid its increasing adoption beyond its African American origins, the term "woke" gained broader connotations. Rather than being applied solely to racial issues, it was increasingly used as a catch-all term to describe those left-wing ideologies, often centred on the identity politics of minority groups and informed by academic movements like critical race theory, which identified themselves as being devoted to "social justice". This included BLM but also related forms of anti-racism as well as campaigns on women's and LGBT issues. The terms "woke capitalism" and "woke washing" were coined to describe companies who signalled their support for such causes. By 2020, parts of the political right in several Western countries were using the term "woke", often in an ironic way, to describe various leftist movements and ideologies they disagreed with. In turn, some left-wing activists came to consider it an offensive term used to denigrate those campaigning against discrimination."
In short, "woke" got culturally appropriated by white lefties, who then turned it into something completely different, with some assistance from the right.
"cultural appropriation" is a much more bollocks concept than "woke" could ever dream of being, given that it is pretty much the defining human activity. It's especially lol when universities go on about it because what subject ever taught in any university outside ancient Athens (where there weren't any) is not 99% appropriated from elsewhere?
Yes, I completely agree. The fact that "woke" types tend to spout bollocks about it being something you can "appropriate" is a big part of why the right looks down on "woke".
But what does "woke" mean?
I don't think it really matter anymore; it's how it's used that matters. People on the right use it to mean divisive identity politicking from the left. Those on the left claim it just means being in favour of social justice. As usual, both sides are talking past each other rather than to each other and we are all the worse off for it.
Part of the problem is that it is now completely impossible to have any kind of sensible conversation about sensitive issues without being decried as a bigot. There is thus no incentive to engage at all.
Indeed. It’s a depressing thread and a rather pointless one, rather like the pathetic ‘culture war’ itself, indulged in by a bunch of divisive fools on both flanks.
The truth about GB News is that it's still considerably more Woke than the average British voter. It's less Woke than Sky News, BBC News and Channel 4 News.
Depends what you mean by "Woke" which is becoming increasingly meaningless..
Given that 59% don't have a clue what it means, and 30% haven't even heard the term, it isn't easy to work out how Woke the average Briton is.
I have difficulty myself as I haven't heard a convincing and coherent definition.
Woke means being awakened to persistent systemic economical disadvantage in general, and to racism in particular.
Which is why Tories are "anti-Woke".
A very inadequate and misleading definition of how the word is used and understood.
On the contrary, that is precisely what it means and how I use it.
By all means give us the benefit of your version.
18 months ago I had only come across one person in real life who used the term as a positive, so assumed it was a term that started out as a positive but had been subsumed by its negative counter reaction. It seems to have made a bit of a comeback.
Wiki:
"Amid its increasing adoption beyond its African American origins, the term "woke" gained broader connotations. Rather than being applied solely to racial issues, it was increasingly used as a catch-all term to describe those left-wing ideologies, often centred on the identity politics of minority groups and informed by academic movements like critical race theory, which identified themselves as being devoted to "social justice". This included BLM but also related forms of anti-racism as well as campaigns on women's and LGBT issues. The terms "woke capitalism" and "woke washing" were coined to describe companies who signalled their support for such causes. By 2020, parts of the political right in several Western countries were using the term "woke", often in an ironic way, to describe various leftist movements and ideologies they disagreed with. In turn, some left-wing activists came to consider it an offensive term used to denigrate those campaigning against discrimination."
In short, "woke" got culturally appropriated by white lefties, who then turned it into something completely different, with some assistance from the right.
"cultural appropriation" is a much more bollocks concept than "woke" could ever dream of being, given that it is pretty much the defining human activity. It's especially lol when universities go on about it because what subject ever taught in any university outside ancient Athens (where there weren't any) is not 99% appropriated from elsewhere?
Yes, I completely agree. The fact that "woke" types tend to spout bollocks about it being something you can "appropriate" is a big part of why the right looks down on "woke".
But what does "woke" mean?
I don't think it really matter anymore; it's how it's used that matters. People on the right use it to mean divisive identity politicking from the left. Those on the left claim it just means being in favour of social justice. As usual, both sides are talking past each other rather than to each other and we are all the worse off for it.
Part of the problem is that it is now completely impossible to have any kind of sensible conversation about sensitive issues without being decried as a bigot. There is thus no incentive to engage at all.
Which is true. But use of woke is the precise equivalent of being decried as a bigot. As you say, there is no incentive to engage.
It seems hardly anyone wants to talk about the fact that most of the social media comments came from abroad, probably generated by bots. Why not? It ought to be the main news of the day IMO.
Ever heard of a VPN?
You do realise the authorities can track down people who use VPNs right? It might be fine to get away with if you’re just using a dodgy foreign TV stream but if you’ve actually committed a serious crime of note they can work out if you’re in the UK or not.
It isn’t surprising to anyone most of these offences take place outside the UK - usually gambling is involved and those abroad don’t expect repercussions because those they are sending hate to are thousands of miles away (see the Neil Maupay case).
They can't very easily. They can ask the VPN company to provide logs but if they don't keep logs - as many don't - they can't be tracked down. One of the key selling points is anonymity.
And several VPNs employ their own protocols now which are essentially uncrackable - it's one of the reasons they want to ban encryption.
Hmm yes and no.....there are a number of ways people can and have been tracked down even with no log VPNs, but it is limited to things like terrorism, via GCHQ, or really top tier pirate community groups.
Its too time consuming and resource heavy to do to track down somebody streaming the odd episode of dragon and tits.
Yeah, you’ve got to be on a government’s “Top 10 Wanted” list, for even basic security practices to be undone sufficiently to be able to identify you.
If you’re Julian Assange, or just hacked an oil pipeline’s SCADA system, then be very afraid.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
I do like the idea that 'red-wall' voters switched from Labour to the Tories because they hated Tory austerity.
They switched to get Brexit done and because they disliked Corbyn. Boris' cake for all promise was to reassure them it was safe to do so
They didn't just switch because of Brexit or Corbyn. The Red Wall has been trending for a decade and it matches changes in economics, demographics, home ownership levels etc
The whole point of the terminology Red Wall is it is seats that demographically should be Tory but were voting Labour historically. Cameron and Osborne were chipping away at the Red Wall for years before Brexit and Corbyn and eventually its reached a tipping point.
Now that the tipping point has been reached, it will be naive to think they'll just tip back post-Brexit and post-Corbyn. Because Brexit and Corbyn were not the only issues.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2010 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, they only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
No you missed the point.
Austerity destroyed these seats. Then when BoJo promised to reverse it they all voted for him.
How long have you spent in the Red Wall?
I do. Austerity hasn't destroyed these seats.
Barratt Homes, Help To Buy, economic growth etc have built up these seats not knocked them down.
These seats aren't worse off than 2010, they're better off with more home owners than they were in 2010.
The Tories have been rewarded because their policies have worked, not Labour punished because the Tories policies have failed.
A number of years thank you Philip.
Austerity absolutely has destroyed those seats, the destruction of council services, including mental health, ending of homeless support.
You know nothing and it shows.
mental health, ending of homeless support
Why don't you mention food banks, zero hour contracts and bedroom taxes ?
Let me explain that these things don't apply to the 80%.
What's more having someone from London jabber away about such things might not impress northerners.
Well he would say that wouldn't he? Just as the drink industry is kept afloat by alcoholics and betting by gambling addicts, so Ingerland football support is built on a bedrock of 17 pints of faaaacking lager monkey grunters. Ingerland would prefer not to admit this.
And as others have pointed out he has no way of knowing unless GCHQ has dropped everything else, including surveilling Russia and China, and rushed to his aid.
I do like the idea that 'red-wall' voters switched from Labour to the Tories because they hated Tory austerity.
They switched to get Brexit done and because they disliked Corbyn. Boris' cake for all promise was to reassure them it was safe to do so
They didn't just switch because of Brexit or Corbyn. The Red Wall has been trending for a decade and it matches changes in economics, demographics, home ownership levels etc
The whole point of the terminology Red Wall is it is seats that demographically should be Tory but were voting Labour historically. Cameron and Osborne were chipping away at the Red Wall for years before Brexit and Corbyn and eventually its reached a tipping point.
Now that the tipping point has been reached, it will be naive to think they'll just tip back post-Brexit and post-Corbyn. Because Brexit and Corbyn were not the only issues.
Now that I like. "Seats that demographically should be Tory but were Labour historically." A definition. But, the "demographically should be Tory" needs a "now" after it. Many of the old mining seats have fallen because the Tories have hoovered up the votes of the old in recent years. And the seats skew heavily old. They traditionally voted Labour because of their political demography which suited Labour then. And now vote Tory because of their political demography which now suits the Tories. It isn't because of some Damascene conversion to the ramblings of Ayn Rand.
I’m sure the PM would have been fine meeting the 25 players who weren’t Tyrone Mings. Truth is a reception with the players after losing the final looks incredibly smalltime, and I’m sure the players would only want to go when the trophy was lifted (hopefully in 18 months) when they can meet Rishi Sunak!
The Rugby World Cup losing finalists of 2019 didn’t visit Number 10 to my knowledge but the ODI cricketers did the same year when they won.
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
Well he would say that wouldn't he? Just as the drink industry is kept afloat by alcoholics and betting by gambling addicts, so Ingerland football support is built on a bedrock of 17 pints of faaaacking lager monkey grunters. Ingerland would prefer not to admit this.
And as others have pointed out he has no way of knowing unless GCHQ has dropped everything else, including surveilling Russia and China, and rushed to his aid.
It is definitely true there were bots fanning the flames. I saw it on twitter some very dodgy accounts with the classic russian tactic...they were posting video such as two black guys beating up an italian fan, while other dodgy accounts posting a white guy getting into it with a black guy....then an italian fan starting on an england fan.
I was however rather surprised however when they suddenly said 70% came from abroad....and arguing over what percent of what seems to miss the point.
It seems hardly anyone wants to talk about the fact that most of the social media comments came from abroad, probably generated by bots. Why not? It ought to be the main news of the day IMO.
Ever heard of a VPN?
You do realise the authorities can track down people who use VPNs right? It might be fine to get away with if you’re just using a dodgy foreign TV stream but if you’ve actually committed a serious crime of note they can work out if you’re in the UK or not.
It isn’t surprising to anyone most of these offences take place outside the UK - usually gambling is involved and those abroad don’t expect repercussions because those they are sending hate to are thousands of miles away (see the Neil Maupay case).
They can't very easily. They can ask the VPN company to provide logs but if they don't keep logs - as many don't - they can't be tracked down. One of the key selling points is anonymity.
And several VPNs employ their own protocols now which are essentially uncrackable - it's one of the reasons they want to ban encryption.
Hmm yes and no.....there are a number of ways people can and have been tracked down even with no log VPNs, but it is limited to things like terrorism, via GCHQ, or really top tier pirate community groups.
Its too time consuming and resource heavy to do to track down somebody streaming the odd episode of dragon and tits.
Yeah, you’ve got to be on a government’s “Top 10 Wanted” list, for even basic security practices to be undone sufficiently to be able to identify you.
If you’re Julian Assange, or just hacked an oil pipeline’s SCADA system, then be very afraid.
Talking of Assange, what's the latest news? Is he still in jail in this country
Well he would say that wouldn't he? Just as the drink industry is kept afloat by alcoholics and betting by gambling addicts, so Ingerland football support is built on a bedrock of 17 pints of faaaacking lager monkey grunters. Ingerland would prefer not to admit this.
And as others have pointed out he has no way of knowing unless GCHQ has dropped everything else, including surveilling Russia and China, and rushed to his aid.
Can’t have been the English, everyone I watched the final with down the pub was too fucked to stand by the end let along compose a tweet.
Given 47% of English voters voted Tory in 2019 a bit rude of English players to refuse to meet the Tory PM about half of the voters of the country they are supposed to represent on the football pitch voted for
It's great that after warning about this for years, the mainstream has finally conceded that the Tory economic programme was a complete and utter disaster.
The difference is that austerity was necessary in 2010 because Gordon Brown had blown all the money and was running a structural deficit.
Prior to the pandemic the 2018/19 deficit was considerably lower than the 2007/08 deficit, so the structural deficit coming out now should be much lower too.
The Tories fixed the roof that Brown trashed.
Why don't you watch the clip. The economist there said austerity was a disaster.
It was not necessary. It was never necessary. It did not work.
Austerity was not a disaster and it did work.
It was necessary, we had no choice, its the necessary result of Brown pissing away so much money.
And its worth noting that from 2010-2019 pre-pandemic as well as the Tories closing away Brown's structural deficit they inherited, Britain actually grew faster not slower than our EU neighbours. Despite Tories "flatlining" growth according to spin from lefties, despite "Tory austerity", despite the 2016 Brexit vote, despite the uncertainty supposedly associated with Brexit suppressing growth.
Despite all that, actually Britain was faster growing over the entire Tory decade.
Austerity is the reason the Tories won the Red Wall seats (labour was blamed for the cuts) and it's why Teesside is now Blue but Wearside and south Tyneside is still Labour
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
The opposite, Labour held the Red Wall in 2015 and 2017 when Cameron and Osborne and May and Hammond were pursuing austerity, the Tories only won it in 2019 when Boris was promising cake for all as well as to get Brexit done
Hi there! Have you given a groveling apology for your Rashford tweet yet, à la Elphicke?
I also see most of the comments in that Mail article support Elphicke and said she did not need to apologise.
All I said was I will accept Rashford's penalty taking ability may not have been affected by his campaigning which is as far as I will go
Maybe if you had concentrated on your day job, you would have actually won that seat on EFDC back in May!
I won the town council seat and in the EFDC seat got the highest Tory voteshare in a LD held seat for 5 years
You still got trounced by the LD candidate!
A somewhat unkind and unsporting comment Sunil.
But surely not as unkind or unsporting as HYUFD's comment about Rashford?
Pro tip HYUFD: If you want to win next time try and think what you can do to win over voters from the LDs.
Trying to attract 47% of Tory voters to vote for you and telling everyone else not to vote for you won't win.
Top issue with them is opposing development on the green belt, something you adamantly support, had I gone down your route I would have seen a swing to the LDs not the other way in May
Given 47% of English voters voted Tory a bit rude of English players to refuse to meet the Tory PM about half of the voters of the country they are supposed to represent on the football pitch voted for
Well he would say that wouldn't he? Just as the drink industry is kept afloat by alcoholics and betting by gambling addicts, so Ingerland football support is built on a bedrock of 17 pints of faaaacking lager monkey grunters. Ingerland would prefer not to admit this.
And as others have pointed out he has no way of knowing unless GCHQ has dropped everything else, including surveilling Russia and China, and rushed to his aid.
It is definitely true there were bots fanning the flames. I saw it on twitter some very dodgy accounts with the classic russian tactic...they were posting video such as two black guys beating up an italian fan, while other dodgy accounts posting a white guy getting into it with a black guy....then an italian fan starting on an england fan.
I was however rather surprised however when they suddenly said 70% came from abroad....and arguing over what percent of what seems to miss the point.
There’s no way of knowing yet for last Sunday’s abuse but the 70% came from an in depth Premier League study earlier this year so it seems likely to be something similar. The question is 70% of what I suppose? Hopefully a fairly small number, it’s just a shame social media gives these people the oxygen.
Given 47% of English voters voted Tory a bit rude of English players to refuse to meet the Tory PM about half of the voters of the country they are supposed to represent on the football pitch voted for
I do like the idea that 'red-wall' voters switched from Labour to the Tories because they hated Tory austerity.
They switched to get Brexit done and because they disliked Corbyn. Boris' cake for all promise was to reassure them it was safe to do so
They didn't just switch because of Brexit or Corbyn. The Red Wall has been trending for a decade and it matches changes in economics, demographics, home ownership levels etc
The whole point of the terminology Red Wall is it is seats that demographically should be Tory but were voting Labour historically. Cameron and Osborne were chipping away at the Red Wall for years before Brexit and Corbyn and eventually its reached a tipping point.
Now that the tipping point has been reached, it will be naive to think they'll just tip back post-Brexit and post-Corbyn. Because Brexit and Corbyn were not the only issues.
Now that I like. "Seats that demographically should be Tory but were Labour historically." A definition. But, the "demographically should be Tory" needs a "now" after it. Many of the old mining seats have fallen because the Tories have hoovered up the votes of the old in recent years. And the seats skew heavily old. They traditionally voted Labour because of their political demography which suited Labour then. And now vote Tory because of their political demography which now suits the Tories. It isn't because of some Damascene conversion to the ramblings of Ayn Rand.
The Tories aren't just the party of Ayn Rand of course, as much as I might admire her thoughts personally.
And its not just the elderly voting Tory in these seats either. The stereotypical example is some eg like an electrician who now owns their own home, has two cars and is basically content with their lives. They're now voting Tory and its not because they're distraught at the Council cutting services.
I do like the idea that 'red-wall' voters switched from Labour to the Tories because they hated Tory austerity.
They switched to get Brexit done and because they disliked Corbyn. Boris' cake for all promise was to reassure them it was safe to do so
They didn't just switch because of Brexit or Corbyn. The Red Wall has been trending for a decade and it matches changes in economics, demographics, home ownership levels etc
The whole point of the terminology Red Wall is it is seats that demographically should be Tory but were voting Labour historically. Cameron and Osborne were chipping away at the Red Wall for years before Brexit and Corbyn and eventually its reached a tipping point.
Now that the tipping point has been reached, it will be naive to think they'll just tip back post-Brexit and post-Corbyn. Because Brexit and Corbyn were not the only issues.
If that was the case the seats would have gone Tory in 2017 which was only 2 years before 2019 after all.
Yes increased home ownership made them marginal Labour seats rather than safe Labour seats but it was the desire to get Brexit done as well as defeat Corbyn which was pivotal in turning so many Tory in 2019
Comments
An interesting definition, to be sure. The only slight snaglet is that it doesn't seem to bear the slightest relation to how the term is used in practice.
Debt to GDP increased every year from 2001 onwards. Thanks to austerity that increase was arrested and the ratio peaked in 2015.
From 2015 onwards the debt to GDP ratio did something it hadn't done since 2001. It was falling every single year.
Austerity doesn't work. Only insane people stick by this idea it was successful.
Now UC should be merged with Income Tax and National Insurance next.
Now locally the council is Tory, our MP is Tory and the government is Tory. If Sunak imposes austerity the Tories will take all the blame
So Philip, did you resign your membership of the Tory Party at the time when this happened, as the Tories would have equally "blown" all the money.
I bet I know what the answer is
The government’s approach is correct, they’re not renewing the most pernicious legislation enacted since 1945. Guidance will replace law, and it will be between companies and their customers how they interact, as it should be in a liberal democracy.
The only way the Tories might eventually accept the above is if Labour do both and they have been in opposition for a decade or more and it then becomes part of the consensus
They are already talking about how the more vile aspects of Sharia are planned again.
The Tories would never have long-term spent what Brown did. But after losing elections three times in a row, you have to try to convince the public to let you back in.
So far only @Casino_Royale has, to his credit, had a go.
But that was copying Wiki on the history of how it has been used.
So what does it mean?
Austerity destroyed these seats. Then when BoJo promised to reverse it they all voted for him.
- New cases: 3,652
- Average: 2,199 (+378)
- In hospital: 2,460 (+115)
- In ICU: 781 (+93)
- New deaths: 29
If this was really true then considering the Tories had far more Council seats than Labour did were are the thousands of Council seats that have turned away from the Tories?
Even when it is Tory.
If Osborne had been more incompetent during the recession then the Conservatives would have won a majority in 2010.
They then wouldn't have had the prize shit Clegg agreeing to triple lock pensions (thus boosting the Conservative vote) and tripling student tuition fees (thus crippling the LibDem vote).
And the icing on the cake was people referring to cuts as austerity and ignoring the extra spending the Conservatives were using to buy votes.
Aid is basically similar to the positive elements of 19th and 20th century colonialism, the mission hospitals, schools etc, the stamping out of suttee and the Thugs, the building of roads and irrigation systems.
It is colonialism shorn of racism and economic exploitation, and other reprehensible aspects.
The commitment Brown made in 1997 and the commitment Cameron made in ~2007 mirroring it was for a temporary match in spending. Which is actually not that meaningful since the reality is that most spending continues from year to year and it takes time for decisions to change things anyway.
Long-term the divergence goes in different ways, even if you have a temporary two year spending match.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9779813/Tory-MP-Natalie-Elphicke-forced-groveling-climbdown-attack-England-ace-Marcus-Rashford.html
With colonialism middle class rightists from the first world tell third world countries what to do.
I do. Austerity hasn't destroyed these seats.
Barratt Homes, Help To Buy, economic growth etc have built up these seats not knocked them down.
These seats aren't worse off than 2010, they're better off with more home owners than they were in 2010.
The Tories have been rewarded because their policies have worked, not Labour punished because the Tories policies have failed.
Of course there's a good reason for that. His macro-economic judgement was, as I've pointed out in the past, near-perfect. No wonder the opposition can't decide whether it was too austere or not austere enough.
impartial former BBC employeeanti-government leftie Gavin Esler, taking money from Abu Dhabi to write an opinion piece calling England fans racist.https://mobile.twitter.com/NationalComment/status/1414507702861148165
Austerity of any kind is too much, it doesn't work. I've been consistent on that for years.
https://www.otbsports.com/sport/southgate-condemns-racist-abuse-lot-come-from-abroad-1224425
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1317126424587833344?s=20
I also see most of the comments in that Mail article support Elphicke and said she did not need to apologise.
All I said was I will accept Rashford's penalty taking ability may not have been affected by his campaigning which is as far as I will go
One thing that would be great to analyse when they do is comparing seat swings from 2010 to 2019 with demographic and especially home ownership changes from 2010 to 2021.
People act like the Red Wall is some deprived shit-hole desperate for government spending to help people get out of their miserable existance. Reality couldn't be further from the truth.
Austerity absolutely has destroyed those seats, the destruction of council services, including mental health, ending of homeless support.
You know nothing and it shows.
Obviously a VPN can be used to make you appear as from overseas, but equally you can use it to make it appear like you are in the UK (when you are located overseas or in the UK).
I fear the anlysis might be rather too simplistic to actually really know.... especially without the social media companies help and careful analysis by technically minded people.
What percentage of 2019 Tory Red Wall voters do you think were voting Tory because they were distraught at cuts to mental health or homeless support? 🤔
As opposed to voting Tory because they agreed with Tory policies and possibly now owned their own home?
It isn’t surprising to anyone most of these offences take place outside the UK - usually gambling is involved and those abroad don’t expect repercussions because those they are sending hate to are thousands of miles away (see the Neil Maupay case).
I gave you examples of things austerity destroyed. Here are more: hospitals, council services like bin collections, road works, libraries, community centres. These things matter to people.
I happen to think they were mistaken in that, the cuts and destruction being brought about by Tory austerity but it was Labour's fault for putting up a piss poor candidate and not being able to articulate that.
To be fair, your criticism was a slightly different, equally hilarious, variant of the criticism - that he 'stole' Darling's plans. That wouldn't be much of a criticism in any circumstances, but it's particularly funny in this case, because there were no Darling plans. Brown, in a characteristically cynical move, didn't allow the Treasury to carry out the usual spending review before the 2010 election. So there were no plans. We'll never know what Darling was going to cut. He didn't know himself.
Red Wall is another term without a definition.
And several VPNs employ their own protocols now which are essentially uncrackable - it's one of the reasons they want to ban encryption.
Part of the problem is that it is now completely impossible to have any kind of sensible conversation about sensitive issues without being decried as a bigot. There is thus no incentive to engage at all.
Across England the Tories as they went into Downing Street had thousands more Councillors than Labour did. So if people were turning against their Councillors because of austerity, why haven't the Tories been a major net loser of seats? Considering they had more to lose than Labour did?
What evidence as opposed to anecdotes do you have that Red Wall voters voted Tory because they were distraught at "cuts and destruction" as opposed to being happy at Tory policies?
Why have no other seats been distraught at cuts and destruction? 🤔
Its too time consuming and resource heavy to do to track down somebody streaming the odd episode of dragon and tits.
I do wonder how involved in the political campaigning he is (I know he employs a Manchester based PR firm to do all his social media), but it might just be a coincidence that his rise off the pitch has coincided with his fall from grace on it. Obviously non football fans and Man Utd/England fans might have conflicting opinions on which is more important!
Personally I hope he can bounce back and get to the levels he once showed as he was a very useful player for England around the 2018/19 Nations League campaign.
As you say, there is no incentive to engage.
If you’re Julian Assange, or just hacked an oil pipeline’s SCADA system, then be very afraid.
The whole point of the terminology Red Wall is it is seats that demographically should be Tory but were voting Labour historically. Cameron and Osborne were chipping away at the Red Wall for years before Brexit and Corbyn and eventually its reached a tipping point.
Now that the tipping point has been reached, it will be naive to think they'll just tip back post-Brexit and post-Corbyn. Because Brexit and Corbyn were not the only issues.
Trying to attract 47% of Tory voters to vote for you and telling everyone else not to vote for you won't win.
Why don't you mention food banks, zero hour contracts and bedroom taxes ?
Let me explain that these things don't apply to the 80%.
What's more having someone from London jabber away about such things might not impress northerners.
https://skwawkbox.org/2021/07/13/breaking-england-teams-downing-st-reception-was-cancelled-because-players-refused-to-meet-johnson/
And as others have pointed out he has no way of knowing unless GCHQ has dropped everything else, including surveilling Russia and China, and rushed to his aid.
But, the "demographically should be Tory" needs a "now" after it.
Many of the old mining seats have fallen because the Tories have hoovered up the votes of the old in recent years. And the seats skew heavily old.
They traditionally voted Labour because of their political demography which suited Labour then.
And now vote Tory because of their political demography which now suits the Tories.
It isn't because of some Damascene conversion to the ramblings of Ayn Rand.
The Rugby World Cup losing finalists of 2019 didn’t visit Number 10 to my knowledge but the ODI cricketers did the same year when they won.
"Italy win, it all went wrong then when Rashford spent all his time campaigning against the government rather than practicing his penalties"
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/3477625/#Comment_3477625
I was however rather surprised however when they suddenly said 70% came from abroad....and arguing over what percent of what seems to miss the point.
And its not just the elderly voting Tory in these seats either. The stereotypical example is some eg like an electrician who now owns their own home, has two cars and is basically content with their lives. They're now voting Tory and its not because they're distraught at the Council cutting services.
Yes increased home ownership made them marginal Labour seats rather than safe Labour seats but it was the desire to get Brexit done as well as defeat Corbyn which was pivotal in turning so many Tory in 2019