politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Another man in his late ’70s puts his hat into the ring for WH

Theuniondivvie said:

CarlottaVance said:

ozymandias said:

RobD said:

ozymandias said:

nova said:

Floater said:

nova said:

BluerBlue said:

The "we're the fifth biggest economy so we can afford it" argument from the left is utterly ridiculous. We're one of the biggest economies in the world because of our liberalised, free-market economy, not because of socialism. If we adopted Labour's crazy far-left platform, we'd be on a rapid descent towards poverty as business, investment, and the "evil rich" fled the country as fast as they could...

Boring.

Britain is great - we should be able to afford the best pensions and a great health service.

If you want to stand up after a decade of austerity and say we still can't afford anything, please do, but the public seem to like a "yes we can" attitude

But you have to be realistic

The public is literately laughing at your policies

Don't believe me, that's coming from your own focus groups.

I personally don't have any policies. While I appreciate that something like free broadband may not have gone down well - genuine extra money for pensions and the NHS are going to be popular.

The Tories could have been generous and still undercut Labour massively, but
their caution may just give Labour a simple positive argument (and let's face it, they need something big to go their way).

These momentum trolls stay up late now don’t they.

PB Tories stay up later

Made of stronger stuff. 😉

Get up earlier too.....

Didn't he used to post here:

https://twitter.com/thomasknox/status/1198748966898278400?s=20

He'll be back once he's won his £1k bet on the date of Brexit.

Andy_JS said:

Wikipedia says the Tory candidate in Leeds North East and the Brexit candidate in Glenrothes have also been officially suspended, although of course they can't be removed from the ballot paper.

TheGreenMachine said:

Andy_JS said:

Wikipedia says the Tory candidate in Leeds North East and the Brexit candidate in Glenrothes have also been officially suspended, although of course they can't be removed from the ballot paper.

What have they sone?

SunnyJim said:

I am pretty sure they have barely scratched the surface with this list...

https://twitter.com/crustyq/status/1198736462176555014

Byronic said:

ozymandias said:

Byronic said:

matt said:

LostPassword said:

Byronic said:

I’ve recently spent some time with a large smattering of Americans, left and right.

They all agreed that the age of the candidates is a real issue. They all despaired of it, and wanted change. Reps and Dems.

If this is a widespread feeling someone like Buttigieg has an in-built advantage.

What happened to the generation born in the fifties and sixties, who should now be in their fifties and sixties?

All the oxygen is being sucked out of the room by the triumph of the gerontocracy. That age doesn’t mean anything other than living doesn’t stop them believing that they’re something special. They should just fuck off and die.

Yes, that was pretty much the attitude of the Americans I met. Fuck odd and die, coffin-dodgers. And some of these people were in their 70s

Hillary got a lot of stick just for this.

Mr Byronic - at the last election there was a user called SeanT who went hysterical at the Tory manifesto. I remember reading his comments avidly before I joined this site. Sadly he no longer contributes.

How do you feel about the manifesto?

I worry it lacks one or two retail offers. But I don’t instantly feel it’s calamitous.

Foxy said:

It is a blank manifesto, one where a pothole fund is one of the highlights. Apart from Brexit, there is nothing for Blue Labour towns.

The idea of a blank manifesto is that there is nothing to go back on afterwards. It is a pig in a poke manifesto, where the unpopular stuff comes afterwards.

This is an angry election, and not just on twitter. It depends in the end what people are most angry about, Brexit or austerity. That may well vary by region.

Black_Rook said:

SunnyJim said:

I am pretty sure they have barely scratched the surface with this list...

https://twitter.com/crustyq/status/1198736462176555014

As others have pointed out, Labour and the broader Left play this broken record all the time because it works. I've actually had the "Boris Johnson might sell the NHS to Donald Trump" panic stories repeated to me when discussing this election at work (admittedly by a colleague who has to take a lot of prescription medication and so might be argued, at least in theory, to have more reason to worry than most.) Said individual will almost certainly end up voting Lib Dem anyway, but it does worry and irritate me in equal measure: she's not a reflexive Labour tribal voter and she's certainly not stupid either, but the message is still working its dark magic nonetheless.

Needless to say, pointing out politely that these warnings have been trotted out at every election for forty years and yet the NHS remains conspicuously intact falls on deaf ears.

Fishing said:

Evidently Corbyn's followers don't grasp the difference between overall and per-capita wealth. China is the world's second largest economy, but nobody would say they can afford better health care than we can. We are about the 15th-20th richest economy per head in the world, so we can afford public services that are fairly average for industrialised countries.

Black_Rook said:

SunnyJim said:

I am pretty sure they have barely scratched the surface with this list...

https://twitter.com/crustyq/status/1198736462176555014

As others have pointed out, Labour and the broader Left play this broken record all the time because it works. I've actually had the "Boris Johnson might sell the NHS to Donald Trump" panic stories repeated to me when discussing this election at work (admittedly by a colleague who has to take a lot of prescription medication and so might be argued, at least in theory, to have more reason to worry than most.) Said individual will almost certainly end up voting Lib Dem anyway, but it does worry and irritate me in equal measure: she's not a reflexive Labour tribal voter and she's certainly not stupid either, but the message is still working its dark magic nonetheless.

Needless to say, pointing out politely that these warnings have been trotted out at every election for forty years and yet the NHS remains conspicuously intact falls on deaf ears.

SouthamObserver said:

CarlottaVance said:

IFS take on the Conservative Manifesto:

"If the Labour and Liberal Democrat manifestos were notable for the scale of their ambitions the Conservative one is not. If a single Budget had contained all these tax and spending proposals we would have been calling it modest. As a blueprint for five years in government the lack of significant policy action is remarkable.

"In part that is because the chancellor announced some big spending rises back In September. Other than for health and schools, though, that was a one-off increase. Taken at face value today’s manifesto suggests that for most services, in terms of day-to-day spending, that’s it. Health and school spending will continue to rise. Give or take pennies, other public services, and working age benefits, will see the cuts to their day-to-day budgets of the last decade baked in."

"One notable omission is any plan for social care. In his first speech as prime minister Boris Johnson promised to 'fix the crisis in social care once and for all'. After two decades of dither by both parties in government it seems we are no further forward."

https://www.ifs.org.uk/election/2019/article/conservative-manifesto-an-initial-reaction-from-ifs-researchers

Yep, Corbyn Labour has given the Tories complete freedom to operate. There is no need to make any promises because no-one takes the Labour ones seriously. It does, though, also indicate a complete absence of ideas. Like Labour, the Tories continue to fail to engage with the 21st century. It is not sustainable.

Jonathan said:

SouthamObserver said:

CarlottaVance said:

IFS take on the Conservative Manifesto:

"If the Labour and Liberal Democrat manifestos were notable for the scale of their ambitions the Conservative one is not. If a single Budget had contained all these tax and spending proposals we would have been calling it modest. As a blueprint for five years in government the lack of significant policy action is remarkable.

"In part that is because the chancellor announced some big spending rises back In September. Other than for health and schools, though, that was a one-off increase. Taken at face value today’s manifesto suggests that for most services, in terms of day-to-day spending, that’s it. Health and school spending will continue to rise. Give or take pennies, other public services, and working age benefits, will see the cuts to their day-to-day budgets of the last decade baked in."

"One notable omission is any plan for social care. In his first speech as prime minister Boris Johnson promised to 'fix the crisis in social care once and for all'. After two decades of dither by both parties in government it seems we are no further forward."

https://www.ifs.org.uk/election/2019/article/conservative-manifesto-an-initial-reaction-from-ifs-researchers

Yep, Corbyn Labour has given the Tories complete freedom to operate. There is no need to make any promises because no-one takes the Labour ones seriously. It does, though, also indicate a complete absence of ideas. Like Labour, the Tories continue to fail to engage with the 21st century. It is not sustainable.

This is nothing to do with Corbyn.

The Tories are devoting the attention and resources of British state towards Brexit, the grand Daddy of ideological crusades that actively makes us worse off, reduces our influence and does nothing to solve the problems we face today.

Jonathan said:

SouthamObserver said:

CarlottaVance said:

IFS take on the Conservative Manifesto:

"If the Labour and Liberal Democrat manifestos were notable for the scale of their ambitions the Conservative one is not. If a single Budget had contained all these tax and spending proposals we would have been calling it modest. As a blueprint for five years in government the lack of significant policy action is remarkable.

"In part that is because the chancellor announced some big spending rises back In September. Other than for health and schools, though, that was a one-off increase. Taken at face value today’s manifesto suggests that for most services, in terms of day-to-day spending, that’s it. Health and school spending will continue to rise. Give or take pennies, other public services, and working age benefits, will see the cuts to their day-to-day budgets of the last decade baked in."

"One notable omission is any plan for social care. In his first speech as prime minister Boris Johnson promised to 'fix the crisis in social care once and for all'. After two decades of dither by both parties in government it seems we are no further forward."

https://www.ifs.org.uk/election/2019/article/conservative-manifesto-an-initial-reaction-from-ifs-researchers

Yep, Corbyn Labour has given the Tories complete freedom to operate. There is no need to make any promises because no-one takes the Labour ones seriously. It does, though, also indicate a complete absence of ideas. Like Labour, the Tories continue to fail to engage with the 21st century. It is not sustainable.

This is nothing to do with Corbyn.

The Tories are devoting the attention and resources of British state towards Brexit, the grand Daddy of ideological crusades that actively makes us worse off, reduces our influence and does nothing to solve the problems we face today.

numbertwelve said:

Jonathan said:

SouthamObserver said:

CarlottaVance said:

IFS take on the Conservative Manifesto:

"If the Labour and Liberal Democrat manifestos were notable for the scale of their ambitions the Conservative one is not. If a single Budget had contained all these tax and spending proposals we would have been calling it modest. As a blueprint for five years in government the lack of significant policy action

"One notable omission is any plan for social care. In his first speech as prime minister Boris Johnson promised to 'fix the crisis in social care once and for all'. After two decades of dither by both parties in government it seems we are no further forward."

https://www.ifs.org.uk/election/2019/article/conservative-manifesto-an-initial-reaction-from-ifs-researchers

Yep, Corbyn Labour has given the Tories complete freedom to operate. There is no need to make any promises because no-one takes the Labour ones seriously. It does, though, also indicate a complete absence of ideas. Like Labour, the Tories continue to fail to engage with the 21st century. It is not sustainable.

This is nothing to do with Corbyn.

The Tories are devoting the attention and resources of British state towards Brexit, the grand Daddy of ideological crusades that actively makes us worse off, reduces our influence and does nothing to solve the problems we face today.

And Corbyn wouldn’t be doing this considering he’ll be spending 6 months renegotiating the deal and holding another referendum?

bigjohnowls said:

Black_Rook said:

SunnyJim said:

I am pretty sure they have barely scratched the surface with this list...

https://twitter.com/crustyq/status/1198736462176555014

As others have pointed out, Labour and the broader Left play this broken record all the time because it works. I've actually had the "Boris Johnson might sell the NHS to Donald Trump" panic stories repeated to me when discussing this election at work (admittedly by a colleague who has to take a lot of prescription medication and so might be argued, at least in theory, to have more reason to worry than most.) Said individual will almost certainly end up voting Lib Dem anyway, but it does worry and irritate me in equal measure: she's not a reflexive Labour tribal voter and she's certainly not stupid either, but the message is still working its dark magic nonetheless.

Needless to say, pointing out politely that these warnings have been trotted out at every election for forty years and yet the NHS remains conspicuously intact falls on deaf ears.

Intact!

Worst stats on record.

numbertwelve said:

SouthamObserver said:

CarlottaVance said:

IFS take on the Conservative Manifesto:

"If the Labour and Liberal Democrat manifestos were notable for the scale of their ambitions the Conservative one is not. If a single Budget had contained all these tax and spending proposals we would have been calling it modest. As a blueprint for five years in government the lack of significant policy action is remarkable.

"In part that is because the chancellor announced some big spending rises back In September. Other than for health and schools, though, that was a one-off increase. Taken at face value today’s manifesto suggests that for most services, in terms of day-to-day spending, that’s it. Health and school spending will continue to rise. Give or take pennies, other public services, and working age benefits, will see the cuts to their day-to-day budgets of the last decade baked in."

"One notable omission is any plan for social care. In his first speech as prime minister Boris Johnson promised to 'fix the crisis in social care once and for all'. After two decades of dither by both parties in government it seems we are no further forward."

https://www.ifs.org.uk/election/2019/article/conservative-manifesto-an-initial-reaction-from-ifs-researchers

Yep, Corbyn Labour has given the Tories complete freedom to operate. There is no need to make any promises because no-one takes the Labour ones seriously. It does, though, also indicate a complete absence of ideas. Like Labour, the Tories continue to fail to engage with the 21st century. It is not sustainable.

The question in 2 weeks time is how many people have thought to themselves “McDonnell is doing something for me, I’ll vote Labour” and how many think Labours spending pledges are overbaked and reckless.

At any other time, if Brexit wasn’t an issue, I’d say Labour might actually put in a respectable result (unfairly, because the spending plans are ridiculous, but people like freebies). But I do think Brexit will override a lot this time around.

I think labour have done enough to avoid a heavy defeat, though. I think we’re still in slim Tory majority territory.

camel said:

Andy_JS said:

AramintaMoonbeamQC said:

Dodgy candidate watch:

https://www.hackneycitizen.co.uk/2019/11/24/hackney-north-lib-dem-candidate-dropped-clearly-offensive-tweets/

How many have we had now?

The ones I know of, in addition to this one, are the Tory candidate in Aberdeen North and the LD candidate in Birmingham Hodge Hill.

“Some of my old tweets contain language I’m not proud of, but mostly they’re just the product of someone who talks a lot of shit"

How to sell yourself to the public as their representative in parliament.

DavidL said:

There are aspirations to spend more on infrastructure too but this clearly depends on the outcome of the HS2 review (although Boris has made it clear what his views are) and whether the Courts can once again stop Heathrow expansion.

Alistair said:

The most amazing think about HK is that I have been assured that noisy public street protests with public disorder are the sure fire way to turn people against you.

Weird.

MarqueeMark said:

bigjohnowls said:

Black_Rook said:

SunnyJim said:

I am pretty sure they have barely scratched the surface with this list...

https://twitter.com/crustyq/status/1198736462176555014

As others have pointed out, Labour and the broader Left play this broken record all the time because it works. I've actually had the "Boris Johnson might sell the NHS to Donald Trump" panic stories repeated to me when discussing this election at work (admittedly by a colleague who has to take a lot of prescription medication and so might be argued, at least in theory, to have more reason to worry than most.) Said individual will almost certainly end up voting Lib Dem anyway, but it does worry and irritate me in equal measure: she's not a reflexive Labour tribal voter and she's certainly not stupid either, but the message is still working its dark magic nonetheless.

Needless to say, pointing out politely that these warnings have been trotted out at every election for forty years and yet the NHS remains conspicuously intact falls on deaf ears.

Intact!

Worst stats on record.

Remind us, how much extra provision did Labour make in the NHS for the extra three million who came over from the EU?

But that would that have been a politically embarrasing admission - so let's not make any provision for these 3,000,000 who aren't actually coming because we assessed there's be 30,000. We'll let the Tories pick up the mess and then shout loudly at subsequent elections about its "worst stats on records".

Well, piss off with that. Your lot dropped a Manchester (530k) and a Birmingham (1.3m) and a Cardiff (350k) and a Glasgow (600k) and a Derby (250k) into the system and said "you don't need any more health care for those new cities - carry on as you are".

You have lost any moral right to bitch about the state of the NHS after what Labour did.

Foxy said:

SunnyJim said:

CarlottaVance said:

IFS take on the Conservative Manifesto:

I sensed on twitter yesterday a real frustration on the left that there was so little to criticize in the manifesto.

Other than it being pretty boring...which it is.

Thank god.

It is a blank manifesto, one where a pothole fund is one of the highlights. Apart from Brexit, there is nothing for Blue Labour towns.

The idea of a blank manifesto is that there is nothing to go back on afterwards. It is a pig in a poke manifesto, where the unpopular stuff comes afterwards.

This is an angry election, and not just on twitter. It depends in the end what people are most angry about, Brexit or austerity. That may well vary by region.

MarqueeMark said:

bigjohnowls said:

Black_Rook said:

SunnyJim said:

I am pretty sure they have barely scratched the surface with this list...

https://twitter.com/crustyq/status/1198736462176555014

As others have pointed out, Labour and the broader Left play this broken record all the time because it works. I've actually had the "Boris Johnson might sell the NHS to Donald Trump" panic stories repeated to me when discussing this election at work (admittedly by a colleague who has to take a lot of prescription medication and so might be argued, at least in theory, to have more reason to worry than most.) Said individual will almost certainly end up voting Lib Dem anyway, but it does worry and irritate me in equal measure: she's not a reflexive Labour tribal voter and she's certainly not stupid either, but the message is still working its dark magic nonetheless.

Needless to say, pointing out politely that these warnings have been trotted out at every election for forty years and yet the NHS remains conspicuously intact falls on deaf ears.

Intact!

Worst stats on record.

Remind us, how much extra provision did Labour make in the NHS for the extra three million who came over from the EU?

But that would that have been a politically embarrasing admission - so let's not make any provision for these 3,000,000 who aren't actually coming because we assessed there's be 30,000. We'll let the Tories pick up the mess and then shout loudly at subsequent elections about its "worst stats on records".

Well, piss off with that. Your lot dropped a Manchester (530k) and a Birmingham (1.3m) and a Cardiff (350k) and a Glasgow (600k) and a Derby (250k) into the system and said "you don't need any more health care for those new cities - carry on as you are".

You have lost any moral right to bitch about the state of the NHS after what Labour did.

MarqueeMark said:

rkrkrk said:

MarqueeMark said:

Remind us, how much extra provision did Labour make in the NHS for the extra three million who came over from the EU?

But that would that have been a politically embarrasing admission - so let's not make any provision for these 3,000,000 who aren't actually coming because we assessed there's be 30,000. We'll let the Tories pick up the mess and then shout loudly at subsequent elections about its "worst stats on records".

Well, piss off with that. Your lot dropped a Manchester (530k) and a Birmingham (1.3m) and a Cardiff (350k) and a Glasgow (600k) and a Derby (250k) into the system and said "you don't need any more health care for those new cities - carry on as you are".

You have lost any moral right to bitch about the state of the NHS after what Labour did.

Labour significantly increased funding for the NHS per capita over their period in government.

On their old numbers. Forgettting 3m had arrived.

Oh, and they also caused us to have to suffer 10+ years of austerity in the process.

Jonathan said:

TOPPING said:

Jonathan said:

SouthamObserver said:

CarlottaVance said:

IFS take on the Conservative Manifesto:

"If the Labour and Liberal Democrat manifestos were notable for the scale of their ambitions the Conservative one is not. If a single Budget had contained all these tax and spending proposals we would have been calling it modest. As a blueprint for five years in government the lack of significant policy action is remarkable.

"In part that is because the chancellor announced some big spending rises back In September. Other than for health and schools, though, that was a one-off increase. Taken at face value today’s manifesto suggests that for most services, in terms of day-to-day spending, that’s it. Health and school spending will continue to rise. Give or take pennies, other public services, and working age benefits, will see the cuts to their day-to-day budgets of the last decade baked in."

"One notable omission is any plan for social care. In his first speech as prime minister Boris Johnson promised to 'fix the crisis in social care once and for all'. After two decades of dither by both parties in government it seems we are no further forward."

https://www.ifs.org.uk/election/2019/article/conservative-manifesto-an-initial-reaction-from-ifs-researchers

Yep, Corbyn Labour has given the Tories complete freedom to operate. There is no need to make any promises because no-one takes the Labour ones seriously. It does, though, also indicate a complete absence of ideas. Like Labour, the Tories continue to fail to engage with the 21st century. It is not sustainable.

This is nothing to do with Corbyn.

The Tories are devoting the attention and resources of British state towards Brexit, the grand Daddy of ideological crusades that actively makes us worse off, reduces our influence and does nothing to solve the problems we face today.

Which, irritatingly to you and me as it was, the British public nevertheless voted for.

There was never a mandate for Brexit at all costs.

Jonathan said:

TOPPING said:

Jonathan said:

SouthamObserver said:

CarlottaVance said:

IFS take on the Conservative Manifesto:

"If the Labour and Liberal Democrat manifestos were notable for the scale of their ambitions the Conservative one is not. If a single Budget had contained all these tax and spending proposals we would have been calling it modest. As a blueprint for five years in government the lack of significant policy action is remarkable.

"In part that is because the chancellor announced some big spending rises back In September. Other than for health and schools, though, that was a one-off increase. Taken at face value today’s manifesto suggests that for most services, in terms of day-to-day spending, that’s it. Health and school spending will continue to rise. Give or take pennies, other public services, and working age benefits, will see the cuts to their day-to-day budgets of the last decade baked in."

"One notable omission is any plan for social care. In his first speech as prime minister Boris Johnson promised to 'fix the crisis in social care once and for all'. After two decades of dither by both parties in government it seems we are no further forward."

https://www.ifs.org.uk/election/2019/article/conservative-manifesto-an-initial-reaction-from-ifs-researchers

Yep, Corbyn Labour has given the Tories complete freedom to operate. There is no need to make any promises because no-one takes the Labour ones seriously. It does, though, also indicate a complete absence of ideas. Like Labour, the Tories continue to fail to engage with the 21st century. It is not sustainable.

This is nothing to do with Corbyn.

The Tories are devoting the attention and resources of British state towards Brexit, the grand Daddy of ideological crusades that actively makes us worse off, reduces our influence and does nothing to solve the problems we face today.

Which, irritatingly to you and me as it was, the British public nevertheless voted for.

There was never a mandate for Brexit at all costs.

rkrkrk said:

MarqueeMark said:

rkrkrk said:

MarqueeMark said:

Remind us, how much extra provision did Labour make in the NHS for the extra three million who came over from the EU?

But that would that have been a politically embarrasing admission - so let's not make any provision for these 3,000,000 who aren't actually coming because we assessed there's be 30,000. We'll let the Tories pick up the mess and then shout loudly at subsequent elections about its "worst stats on records".

Well, piss off with that. Your lot dropped a Manchester (530k) and a Birmingham (1.3m) and a Cardiff (350k) and a Glasgow (600k) and a Derby (250k) into the system and said "you don't need any more health care for those new cities - carry on as you are".

You have lost any moral right to bitch about the state of the NHS after what Labour did.

Labour significantly increased funding for the NHS per capita over their period in government.

On their old numbers. Forgettting 3m had arrived.

Oh, and they also caused us to have to suffer 10+ years of austerity in the process.

Labour increased it per capita by something like 60%. So you need to find around 35m immigrants to be right.

Foxy said:

MarqueeMark said:

bigjohnowls said:

Black_Rook said:

SunnyJim said:

I am pretty sure they have barely scratched the surface with this list...

https://twitter.com/crustyq/status/1198736462176555014

As others have pointed out, Labour and the broader Left play this broken record all the time because it works. I've actually had the "Boris Johnson might sell the NHS to Donald Trump" panic stories repeated to me when discussing this election at work (admittedly by a colleague who has to take a lot of prescription medication and so might be argued, at least in theory, to have more reason to worry than most.) Said individual will almost certainly end up voting Lib Dem anyway, but it does worry and irritate me in equal measure: she's not a reflexive Labour tribal voter and she's certainly not stupid either, but the message is still working its dark magic nonetheless.

Needless to say, pointing out politely that these warnings have been trotted out at every election for forty years and yet the NHS remains conspicuously intact falls on deaf ears.

Intact!

Worst stats on record.

Remind us, how much extra provision did Labour make in the NHS for the extra three million who came over from the EU?

But that would that have been a politically embarrasing admission - so let's not make any provision for these 3,000,000 who aren't actually coming because we assessed there's be 30,000. We'll let the Tories pick up the mess and then shout loudly at subsequent elections about its "worst stats on records".

Well, piss off with that. Your lot dropped a Manchester (530k) and a Birmingham (1.3m) and a Cardiff (350k) and a Glasgow (600k) and a Derby (250k) into the system and said "you don't need any more health care for those new cities - carry on as you are".

You have lost any moral right to bitch about the state of the NHS after what Labour did.

Not sure where you get your 3 million number from, but EU migrants are overwhelmingly healthy young adults. Apart from obstetric services they are light users of the NHS. The heavy users are the over 65s and even more so the over 80's, who are overwhelmingly Brits or migrants from half a century ago.

OldKingCole said:

Didn't a lot of the European migrants actually work in and around the NHS. Seem to frequently.. once upon a time anyway ..... encounter European doctors, dentists, pharmacists, nurses etc.
When I worked in GP services we used to reckon that while a young (under 40 or so) man would have a couple of prescriptions a month, a young woman perhaps 4 an over 65 of either sex would have ten. (Mrs C and I are on about 4 each doing quite well!)

DavidL said:

Personally I am almost relieved that the Tory manifesto is so boring. For a time it looked as if Boris was going to try competing with the Labour spending splurge. It was a competition that he could never win and simply risked his own credibility.

What we have now are specific spending promises on health, on education and on the police with considerable caution on everything else. There are aspirations to spend more on infrastructure too but this clearly depends on the outcome of the HS2 review (although Boris has made it clear what his views are) and whether the Courts can once again stop Heathrow expansion.

It is a pity that there is not a clearer vision of what sort of UK the Tories want to see once Brexit is done and dusted but in reality Brexit will continue to dominate for some time yet. So we will go into the transition of Boris's deal but a lot of energy will be absorbed in negotiating a FTA and regulatory equivalence for the end of that period. We will need to decide our new immigration policy, we need to decide what aspects of agriculture we want to subsidise outside the CAP, we need to achieve the roll over of various EU trade deals to the UK, there is in fact plenty to do.

Cyclefree said:

Some idiot Lib Dem woman doing her level best on the Today programme to lose my vote with flannel over China and rubbish about gender recognition.

At this rate I am going to have spoil my ballot.

Have the Tories come up with an answer to the WASPI nonsense yet? I gave them a good answer yesterday. Surely one of their researchers reads this site?

MarqueeMark said:

In 1950, the NHS spent an estimated £460 million.

By 2020 it will spend over 340 times as much – around £158.4 billion. The original spending is now a decimal point.

The Tories have been in power 43 of those 70 years. They've had to come into power after the mess of the 70's and the the crippling mess of the Blair-Brown-Darling years, to fix an economy that Labour has broken each time it has had power.

So that we can now afford an NHS spend that is 340 times what it was.

I'm proud of my party's side of that record.

TOPPING said:

Jonathan said:

TOPPING said:

Jonathan said:

SouthamObserver said:

CarlottaVance said:

IFS take on the Conservative Manifesto:

"If the Labour and Liberal Democrat manifestos were notable for the scale of their ambitions the Conservative one is not. If a single Budget had contained all these tax and spending proposals we would have been calling it modest. As a blueprint for five years in government the lack of significant policy action is remarkable.

"In part that is because the chancellor announced some big spending rises back In September. Other than for health and schools, though, that was a one-off increase. Taken at face value today’s manifesto suggests that for most services, in terms of day-to-day spending, that’s it. Health and school spending will continue to rise. Give or take pennies, other public services, and working age benefits, will see the cuts to their day-to-day budgets of the last decade baked in."

"One notable omission is any plan for social care. In his first speech as prime minister Boris Johnson promised to 'fix the crisis in social care once and for all'. After two decades of dither by both parties in government it seems we are no further forward."

https://www.ifs.org.uk/election/2019/article/conservative-manifesto-an-initial-reaction-from-ifs-researchers

Yep, Corbyn Labour has given the Tories complete freedom to operate. There is no need to make any promises because no-one takes the Labour ones seriously. It does, though, also indicate a complete absence of ideas. Like Labour, the Tories continue to fail to engage with the 21st century. It is not sustainable.

This is nothing to do with Corbyn.

The Tories are devoting the attention and resources of British state towards Brexit, the grand Daddy of ideological crusades that actively makes us worse off, reduces our influence and does nothing to solve the problems we face today.

Which, irritatingly to you and me as it was, the British public nevertheless voted for.

There was never a mandate for Brexit at all costs.

Yes there was. Any Brexit would fulfill the requirement.

Foxy said:

MarqueeMark said:

bigjohnowls said:

Black_Rook said:

SunnyJim said:

I am pretty sure they have barely scratched the surface with this list...

https://twitter.com/crustyq/status/1198736462176555014

As others have pointed out, Labour and the broader Left play this broken record all the time because it works. I've actually had the "Boris Johnson might sell the NHS to Donald Trump" panic stories repeated to me when discussing this election at work (admittedly by a colleague who has to take a lot of prescription medication and so might be argued, at least in theory, to have more reason to worry than most.) Said individual will almost certainly end up voting Lib Dem anyway, but it does worry and irritate me in equal measure: she's not a reflexive Labour tribal voter and she's certainly not stupid either, but the message is still working its dark magic nonetheless.

Needless to say, pointing out politely that these warnings have been trotted out at every election for forty years and yet the NHS remains conspicuously intact falls on deaf ears.

Intact!

Worst stats on record.

Remind us, how much extra provision did Labour make in the NHS for the extra three million who came over from the EU?

But that would that have been a politically embarrasing admission - so let's not make any provision for these 3,000,000 who aren't actually coming because we assessed there's be 30,000. We'll let the Tories pick up the mess and then shout loudly at subsequent elections about its "worst stats on records".

Well, piss off with that. Your lot dropped a Manchester (530k) and a Birmingham (1.3m) and a Cardiff (350k) and a Glasgow (600k) and a Derby (250k) into the system and said "you don't need any more health care for those new cities - carry on as you are".

You have lost any moral right to bitch about the state of the NHS after what Labour did.

Not sure where you get your 3 million number from, but EU migrants are overwhelmingly healthy young adults. Apart from obstetric services they are light users of the NHS. The heavy users are the over 65s and even more so the over 80's, who are overwhelmingly Brits or migrants from half a century ago.

A_View_From_Cumbria5 said:

Cyclefree said:

Some idiot Lib Dem woman doing her level best on the Today programme to lose my vote with flannel over China and rubbish about gender recognition.

At this rate I am going to have spoil my ballot.

Have the Tories come up with an answer to the WASPI nonsense yet? I gave them a good answer yesterday. Surely one of their researchers reads this site?

Nicki Morgan seemed to give a fairly shrewd answer on BBC Breakfast Time. She agreed that any injustice must be remedied. The Labour plan was unaffordable ...

MarqueeMark said:

Gallowgate said:

Obviously @MarqueeMark lives in Devon, an area that has experienced very little EU or non EU immigration but pretends to know everything about its effects on northern towns.

Yeah, because I haven't knocked on any doors of nice Polish and Hungarian people who have settled down here, but cannot vote in this election.

Your view of EU immigration is what, I should look to some recreation of the Warsaw Ghetto in Boston?

Gallowgate said:

Philip_Thompson said:

Gallowgate said:

MarqueeMark said:

In 1950, the NHS spent an estimated £460 million.

By 2020 it will spend over 340 times as much – around £158.4 billion. The original spending is now a decimal point.

The Tories have been in power 43 of those 70 years. They've had to come into power after the mess of the 70's and the the crippling mess of the Blair-Brown-Darling years, to fix an economy that Labour has broken each time it has had power.

So that we can now afford an NHS spend that is 340 times what it was.

I'm proud of my party's side of that record.

You’re proud that based on almost every metric the NHS is in a much worse state now than it was in 2010?

You must have incredibly low standards.

The country was bankrupt in 2010. We've managed to get rid of Brown's deficit while protecting NHS budgets - if we'd not done that it would be in a much, much, much worse state.

The country was not bankrupt. What an incredibly laughable statement.

IanB2 said:

DavidL said:

Personally I am almost relieved that the Tory manifesto is so boring. For a time it looked as if Boris was going to try competing with the Labour spending splurge. It was a competition that he could never win and simply risked his own credibility.

What we have now are specific spending promises on health, on education and on the police with considerable caution on everything else. There are aspirations to spend more on infrastructure too but this clearly depends on the outcome of the HS2 review (although Boris has made it clear what his views are) and whether the Courts can once again stop Heathrow expansion.

It is a pity that there is not a clearer vision of what sort of UK the Tories want to see once Brexit is done and dusted but in reality Brexit will continue to dominate for some time yet. So we will go into the transition of Boris's deal but a lot of energy will be absorbed in negotiating a FTA and regulatory equivalence for the end of that period. We will need to decide our new immigration policy, we need to decide what aspects of agriculture we want to subsidise outside the CAP, we need to achieve the roll over of various EU trade deals to the UK, there is in fact plenty to do.

An admission that oven-ready getting Brexit done is a con trick.

Philip_Thompson said:

IanB2 said:

DavidL said:

Personally I am almost relieved that the Tory manifesto is so boring. For a time it looked as if Boris was going to try competing with the Labour spending splurge. It was a competition that he could never win and simply risked his own credibility.

What we have now are specific spending promises on health, on education and on the police with considerable caution on everything else. There are aspirations to spend more on infrastructure too but this clearly depends on the outcome of the HS2 review (although Boris has made it clear what his views are) and whether the Courts can once again stop Heathrow expansion.

It is a pity that there is not a clearer vision of what sort of UK the Tories want to see once Brexit is done and dusted but in reality Brexit will continue to dominate for some time yet. So we will go into the transition of Boris's deal but a lot of energy will be absorbed in negotiating a FTA and regulatory equivalence for the end of that period. We will need to decide our new immigration policy, we need to decide what aspects of agriculture we want to subsidise outside the CAP, we need to achieve the roll over of various EU trade deals to the UK, there is in fact plenty to do.

An admission that oven-ready getting Brexit done is a con trick.

Brexit will be done on or before 31/1.

We will be negotiating a FTA post-Brexit but that's not Brexit that is after Brexit. Countries negotiate Free Trade Agreements all the time without being in the EU. Deciding our agriculture, immigration, and trade policies isn't dragging on Brexit it is post-Brexit . . . it is part of being a normal independent sovereign country once more.

This is the sort of stuff we will do forever which we weren't doing in the EU. Because we will have control back and if you don't like the decisions made you can change them at the next election.

Alistair said:

MarqueeMark said:

The Tories have been in power 43 of those 70 years. They've had to come into power after the mess of the 70's

The Tories were in power for half the seventies.

MarqueeMark said:

In 1950, the NHS spent an estimated £460 million.

By 2020 it will spend over 340 times as much – around £158.4 billion. The original spending is now a decimal point.

The Tories have been in power 43 of those 70 years. They've had to come into power after the mess of the 70's and the the crippling mess of the Blair-Brown-Darling years, to fix an economy that Labour has broken each time it has had power.

So that we can now afford an NHS spend that is 340 times what it was.

I'm proud of my party's side of that record.

Philip_Thompson said:

Gallowgate said:

Philip_Thompson said:

IanB2 said:

DavidL said:

Personally I am almost relieved that the Tory manifesto is so boring. For a time it looked as if Boris was going to try competing with the Labour spending splurge. It was a competition that he could never win and simply risked his own credibility.

What we have now are specific spending promises on health, on education and on the police with considerable caution on everything else. There are aspirations to spend more on infrastructure too but this clearly depends on the outcome of the HS2 review (although Boris has made it clear what his views are) and whether the Courts can once again stop Heathrow expansion.

It is a pity that there is not a clearer vision of what sort of UK the Tories want to see once Brexit is done and dusted but in reality Brexit will continue to dominate for some time yet. So we will go into the transition of Boris's deal but a lot of energy will be absorbed in negotiating a FTA and regulatory equivalence for the end of that period. We will need to decide our new immigration policy, we need to decide what aspects of agriculture we want to subsidise outside the CAP, we need to achieve the roll over of various EU trade deals to the UK, there is in fact plenty to do.

An admission that oven-ready getting Brexit done is a con trick.

Brexit will be done on or before 31/1.

We will be negotiating a FTA post-Brexit but that's not Brexit that is after Brexit. Countries negotiate Free Trade Agreements all the time without being in the EU. Deciding our agriculture, immigration, and trade policies isn't dragging on Brexit it is post-Brexit . . . it is part of being a normal independent sovereign country once more.

This is the sort of stuff we will do forever which we weren't doing in the EU. Because we will have control back and if you don't like the decisions made you can change them at the next election.

Literally irrelevant. None of that will solve the problems in your fetishized ‘northern towns’.

Did you see what I replied to? It was completely relevant to what I replied to, I didn't reply to a comment about 'northern towns'.

I live in a Northern town myself so I don't need you to tell me about the North thank you.

DecrepiterJohnL said:

MarqueeMark said:

In 1950, the NHS spent an estimated £460 million.

By 2020 it will spend over 340 times as much – around £158.4 billion. The original spending is now a decimal point.

The Tories have been in power 43 of those 70 years. They've had to come into power after the mess of the 70's and the the crippling mess of the Blair-Brown-Darling years, to fix an economy that Labour has broken each time it has had power.

So that we can now afford an NHS spend that is 340 times what it was.

I'm proud of my party's side of that record.

Labour did not break the economy. Even the Thatcher government blamed the 1970s malaise on the Barber boom and oil price shock rather than Labour. As for the 2000s, the global financial crisis was global, and was not caused by Labour.

Philip_Thompson said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Are you really going to sit here and tell me we'd have had no recession or deficit with them in power? Come on.

Quite the opposite. I'm not saying we never had recessions, but recessions happen. We coped with recessions because we were taking action to reduce debt-to-GDP prior to the recession hitting in the past. Unfortunately due to Brown's hubris in thinking he'd ended boom and bust he screwed up completely.

We had a recession under the prior Tory government.

The prior recession was Q3 1990 - Q3 1991. But every single year from 1984 to 1990 the debt-to-GDP ratio fell.

1984 43.53
1985 43.4
1986 41.76
1987 39.14
1988 34.98
1989 29.26
1990 26.64

Debt to GDP was slashed over the 80s so when the recession hit countercyclical spending could kick in.

Brown hubristically assumed that he "ended boom and bust" and increased spending every year.
2002 30.05
2003 31.26
2004 32.52
2005 35.6
2006 36.67
2007 37.25

After 16 years of economic growth Brown hubristically increased the deficit and increased debt annually so when the inevitable recession hit we were screwed.

IanB2 said:

Foxy said:

MarqueeMark said:

bigjohnowls said:

Black_Rook said:

SunnyJim said:

I am pretty sure they have barely scratched the surface with this list...

https://twitter.com/crustyq/status/1198736462176555014

As others have pointed out, Labour and the broader Left play this broken record all the time because it works. I've actually had the "Boris Johnson might sell the NHS to Donald Trump" panic stories repeated to me when discussing this election at work (admittedly by a colleague who has to take a lot of prescription medication and so might be argued, at least in theory, to have more reason to worry than most.) Said individual will almost certainly end up voting Lib Dem anyway, but it does worry and irritate me in equal measure: she's not a reflexive Labour tribal voter and she's certainly not stupid either, but the message is still working its dark magic nonetheless.

Needless to say, pointing out politely that these warnings have been trotted out at every election for forty years and yet the NHS remains conspicuously intact falls on deaf ears.

Intact!

Worst stats on record.

Remind us, how much extra provision did Labour make in the NHS for the extra three million who came over from the EU?

But that would that have been a politically embarrasing admission - so let's not make any provision for these 3,000,000 who aren't actually coming because we assessed there's be 30,000. We'll let the Tories pick up the mess and then shout loudly at subsequent elections about its "worst stats on records".

Well, piss off with that. Your lot dropped a Manchester (530k) and a Birmingham (1.3m) and a Cardiff (350k) and a Glasgow (600k) and a Derby (250k) into the system and said "you don't need any more health care for those new cities - carry on as you are".

You have lost any moral right to bitch about the state of the NHS after what Labour did.

Not sure where you get your 3 million number from, but EU migrants are overwhelmingly healthy young adults. Apart from obstetric services they are light users of the NHS. The heavy users are the over 65s and even more so the over 80's, who are overwhelmingly Brits or migrants from half a century ago.

I recall but cannot remember a statistic that a high proportion of NHS expenditure is incurred during people’s last year of life.