Sunak sees a colossal drop in his favourability ratings – politicalbetting.com

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/skynews/status/1511669445877551104

BoJo goes woke

Farooq said:

TOPPING said:

Farooq said:

TOPPING said:

Farooq said:

IshmaelZ said:

Daveyboy1961 said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Jonathan said:

JosiasJessop said:

Jonathan said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

JosiasJessop said:

OldKingCole said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

MarqueeMark said:

"Britain deserves better than this Conservative cost of living crisis."

Does suggest "Britain deserves a Labour cost of living crisis."

Utter lack of alternative ways to deal with it.

You've not watched the video, then? It is a clunky slogan though.

Morning, everybody. By no means as cold today.

The slogan strips down to 'Britain deserves better', though, and that could be quite potent.

Because one can't say, surely, and certainly from this side of the fence, that Bad Dog's government shows us in a good light.

Did Blair's government show us in a good light? So much ephemeral image fluff to strains of 'things can only get better', followed by a disastrous war and an economic crisis within ten years. Such a wasted opportunity.

The only major crisis Blair had to deal with was 9/11. Johnson, in just a handful of years, has had Covid and Ukraine to deal with. IMV (and I know you'll disagree): he hasn't done too badly on either, and very well in some respects.

Blair did not really have to deal with 9/11, and his response was probably counter-productive. Similarly, Boris has not really had to deal with the Ukrainian invasion in any real sense. We've followed the American lead on sanctions, and continued military cooperation that began under his predecessors. Afghanistan, well, least said, soonest mended. Covid and Brexit were the main crises Boris faced and is facing.

"Similarly, Boris has not really had to deal with the Ukrainian invasion in any real sense."

Wow. That seems rather disconnected with reality. Boris has been one of the strongest allies with Ukraine so far (as, to be fair, have the government since 2014/5).

Note how Russia seems keen to put the UK first amongst their enemies? That's why.

Russia thought Boris was their friend, that’s why.

Otherwise it’s mostly been posturing. Which, along with clinging to his job, is the only thing the clown is good at.

Yes, he thought the PM of the country that was actively training the military of the country he had attacked - and wanted to attack again - was a friend.

FFS. I know some people hate Boris, but sometimes hatred can lead to a certain amount of irrationality...

"Otherwise it’s mostly been posturing."

Again, this seems rather an odd comment. It's been far from posturing, given the limits of what we can actually do. Compare, say, to Germany or France...

The extent of Johnson's (and his party's) entanglement with Russian wealth is a slow burn story that will likely be running when the immediate military crisis is over. The Russians will have thought all that time grooming him might have been worth something; another misjudgement since the only reaction that would save his skin, at least in the short term, was to go over the top in the other direction.

Training the Ukranians was a decision taken by the Coalition, which I doubt the clown was even aware of until it came to matter.

Oh, come on. You are being ridiculous. Operation Orbital was extended in 2019 and expanded in 2020, well before this war. The idea Johnson knew nothing of it is a little ridiculous.

No it isn't. You forget, I've spent time with him both in public and private. His lack of awareness as to where he is, what he's supposed to be doing and the history and background to anything is closer to zero than in anyone I've ever met.

And you seem a rather impartial observer. Compare, say, with Nick's interactions with him, which seemed a lot fairer and nearer to the real Johnson (fnarr, fnarr).

(Jesus. People's irrational hatred of Johnson is turning me, someone who was criticising him before most on here, and who has never voted for him, into a defended of him!)

If it were just me, you might have a point.

But I invite you to review what a whole stack of people who've interacted with Johnson - professionally and personally - have said, from his schooldays onwards, and to notice his lack of friends and allies.

The only people who rate him are those who don't know him.

Yes, someone who lacks friends and allies managed to get himself elected to a number of positions, and became PM. He did that through lacking friends and allies, obviously ...

Many people in the 2000s were saying how friendly Blair and Brown were, yet we saw that was a lie even before Brown got power.

Again, I stress I don't think Johnson is a good PM. But neither do I think he's the venal, nasty and lazy one his haters on here make him out to be. He's a flawed individual, but then so was Thatcher, Major, Blair, Brown, Cameron, and May.

Boris is singularly unsuited to this moment. We need someone able to deal with reality rather than spin lies.

Well, it's a real shame that Labour gave us the option of voting for an anti-Semite who called this war wrong.

If having Boris as PM is bad, then Labour need to accept some blame for putting up a far worse candidate at GE 2019.

I mean, just look at the wrongheadedness of StW's statement on Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Signed by Jeremy.
https://www.stopwar.org.uk/article/list-of-signatories-stop-the-war-statement-on-the-crisis-over-ukraine/

Do you honestly think Corbyn, someone too spineless to say whether he's had the Covid vaccine, and who is utterly wrong on the Ukrainian war - would have handled the two crises better?

Gold plated whataboutery. If you voted for Boris you take the lions share for this nonsense. It was perfectly possible not to vote for either. My late father in law, a lifelong Tory, cast his last vote for the Lib Dems because he didn’t trust Boris.

Voting for neither was just washing your hands of the unpalatable decision between two inadequate candidates and leaving it to others.

Absolute horseshit. You don't get to push the blame onto those of us who actively opposed both.

I'm sorry if you don't like the reality that there was a choice at the last general election of exactly two possible Prime Ministers.

That's odd, I seem to remember more parties standing nationally than just those two.
Perhaps you mean just those with a realistic chance of winning? In which case you're still wrong, the Conservatives were very obviously going to win it.

So there was a choice of ONE, and I said no. And I was right.

No, I meant those with a possible chance of winning, which is why I used the word possible...

As for where I put the blame? Primarily on to the Labour MPs who didn't understand their leadership election format and gave Corbyn the nominations in the first place.

I don't blame anyone for washing their hands of the choice, but to pretend you "opposed both" is risible.

If everyone had done what I'd done, we'd not have either Boris or Corbyn as PM. It's actually that simple.

You're starting to resemble that Northern Irish joke, when new kid moves into the street and the other kids ask is he's a Protestant or a Catholic. "Neither, I'm a Muslim," he replies. And after a long pause, the other kids ask "yeah, but are you a Protestant Muslim or a Catholic Muslim?"

Ask yourself this, if someone didn't want either Boris or Corbyn as PM, what the hell else COULD they do other than vote for a third party?

They could wash their hands of the choice and vote for a third party, but that would be delegating the choice to other voters.

Since (like everyone else who posts here) you are more informed than the average voter and (like the vast majority of people who post here) you are more intelligent than the average voter, delegating the choice to the average voter seems to me to be a strange thing for you to have done.

Can you actually stop trying to gaslight me, please?

I know what I voted for, which was emphatically "neither of them". That was a considered, deliberate choice and it starts and ends there. My choice wasn't "delegated" to anyone else, I made it myself. What appears on another person's ballot paper is THEIR choice, not mine.

I totally agree. Blaming someone for not voting for either of the 2 main party leaders is tantamount to gaslighting, basically forcing every to vote Starmer/Johnson etc. The last time I looked i didn't live in either Holborn or Uxbridge, therefore I couldn't vote for them anyway. I voted for one of the people on my ballot paper. Sadly the winner was that wet fish "Simon Hart", who I never voted for anyway. Don't blame me for electing him or any other tory!

No it isn't. Gaslighting has a specific meaning which is not the meaning you think it has.

He's certainly trying to gaslight me in the sense that he's trying to tell me what I know to be factually true is actually not, and that a part of that factual truth is my own intentions when I did the thing that I did. There are two strands here: what I did, and what I meant by doing that. What I did was to vote for the Lib Dems. Blandly, simply, uncontroversially that was a vote against all the other parties.
What I intended from that was that (amongst other things) my voice would be registered as saying I this country would be run by people other than Boris and Corbyn. Obviously that was a forlorn hope, clearly there was only going to be one winner, but I didn't feel that I should silence my own voice just because I was in a minority.

Anyone who says that I was not opposed to Boris and Corbyn is therefore gaslighting me, telling me things that I know to be true (and that I know better than anybody else on this whole earth) are false.

It would be the same as sending HMRC a cheque for £100 to register your desire that we should all be taxed more.

Well, no. I'd write to my MP to register that opinion. At least they have the power to do that. HMRC don't set tax rates.

Exactly. That's why I used the analogy. It would be making a personal gesture while ignoring the reality of how taxes are raised and the likelihood of any change as a result (probably similarly to writing to your MP about it, that said).

You voted LD because you didn't want either Johnson or Corbyn to win but the reality is that one of them would win because the LDs would not.

It is the "none of the above" fallacy. None of the above means one of the above for certain.

But that's other people's choice, not mine.
I didn't vote Lib Dem thinking "maybe we will win!" You have to separate out what you think will happen (Boris winning was certain) versus what you want to happen. You vote for what you want to happen. There's no "fallacy" in expressing your political views at the ballot box.

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

IshmaelZ said:

Daveyboy1961 said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Jonathan said:

JosiasJessop said:

Jonathan said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

JosiasJessop said:

OldKingCole said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

MarqueeMark said:

"Britain deserves better than this Conservative cost of living crisis."

Does suggest "Britain deserves a Labour cost of living crisis."

Utter lack of alternative ways to deal with it.

You've not watched the video, then? It is a clunky slogan though.

Morning, everybody. By no means as cold today.

The slogan strips down to 'Britain deserves better', though, and that could be quite potent.

Because one can't say, surely, and certainly from this side of the fence, that Bad Dog's government shows us in a good light.

Did Blair's government show us in a good light? So much ephemeral image fluff to strains of 'things can only get better', followed by a disastrous war and an economic crisis within ten years. Such a wasted opportunity.

The only major crisis Blair had to deal with was 9/11. Johnson, in just a handful of years, has had Covid and Ukraine to deal with. IMV (and I know you'll disagree): he hasn't done too badly on either, and very well in some respects.

Blair did not really have to deal with 9/11, and his response was probably counter-productive. Similarly, Boris has not really had to deal with the Ukrainian invasion in any real sense. We've followed the American lead on sanctions, and continued military cooperation that began under his predecessors. Afghanistan, well, least said, soonest mended. Covid and Brexit were the main crises Boris faced and is facing.

"Similarly, Boris has not really had to deal with the Ukrainian invasion in any real sense."

Wow. That seems rather disconnected with reality. Boris has been one of the strongest allies with Ukraine so far (as, to be fair, have the government since 2014/5).

Note how Russia seems keen to put the UK first amongst their enemies? That's why.

Russia thought Boris was their friend, that’s why.

Otherwise it’s mostly been posturing. Which, along with clinging to his job, is the only thing the clown is good at.

Yes, he thought the PM of the country that was actively training the military of the country he had attacked - and wanted to attack again - was a friend.

FFS. I know some people hate Boris, but sometimes hatred can lead to a certain amount of irrationality...

"Otherwise it’s mostly been posturing."

Again, this seems rather an odd comment. It's been far from posturing, given the limits of what we can actually do. Compare, say, to Germany or France...

The extent of Johnson's (and his party's) entanglement with Russian wealth is a slow burn story that will likely be running when the immediate military crisis is over. The Russians will have thought all that time grooming him might have been worth something; another misjudgement since the only reaction that would save his skin, at least in the short term, was to go over the top in the other direction.

Training the Ukranians was a decision taken by the Coalition, which I doubt the clown was even aware of until it came to matter.

Oh, come on. You are being ridiculous. Operation Orbital was extended in 2019 and expanded in 2020, well before this war. The idea Johnson knew nothing of it is a little ridiculous.

No it isn't. You forget, I've spent time with him both in public and private. His lack of awareness as to where he is, what he's supposed to be doing and the history and background to anything is closer to zero than in anyone I've ever met.

And you seem a rather impartial observer. Compare, say, with Nick's interactions with him, which seemed a lot fairer and nearer to the real Johnson (fnarr, fnarr).

(Jesus. People's irrational hatred of Johnson is turning me, someone who was criticising him before most on here, and who has never voted for him, into a defended of him!)

If it were just me, you might have a point.

But I invite you to review what a whole stack of people who've interacted with Johnson - professionally and personally - have said, from his schooldays onwards, and to notice his lack of friends and allies.

The only people who rate him are those who don't know him.

Yes, someone who lacks friends and allies managed to get himself elected to a number of positions, and became PM. He did that through lacking friends and allies, obviously ...

Many people in the 2000s were saying how friendly Blair and Brown were, yet we saw that was a lie even before Brown got power.

Again, I stress I don't think Johnson is a good PM. But neither do I think he's the venal, nasty and lazy one his haters on here make him out to be. He's a flawed individual, but then so was Thatcher, Major, Blair, Brown, Cameron, and May.

Boris is singularly unsuited to this moment. We need someone able to deal with reality rather than spin lies.

Well, it's a real shame that Labour gave us the option of voting for an anti-Semite who called this war wrong.

If having Boris as PM is bad, then Labour need to accept some blame for putting up a far worse candidate at GE 2019.

I mean, just look at the wrongheadedness of StW's statement on Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Signed by Jeremy.
https://www.stopwar.org.uk/article/list-of-signatories-stop-the-war-statement-on-the-crisis-over-ukraine/

Do you honestly think Corbyn, someone too spineless to say whether he's had the Covid vaccine, and who is utterly wrong on the Ukrainian war - would have handled the two crises better?

Gold plated whataboutery. If you voted for Boris you take the lions share for this nonsense. It was perfectly possible not to vote for either. My late father in law, a lifelong Tory, cast his last vote for the Lib Dems because he didn’t trust Boris.

Voting for neither was just washing your hands of the unpalatable decision between two inadequate candidates and leaving it to others.

Absolute horseshit. You don't get to push the blame onto those of us who actively opposed both.

I'm sorry if you don't like the reality that there was a choice at the last general election of exactly two possible Prime Ministers.

That's odd, I seem to remember more parties standing nationally than just those two.
Perhaps you mean just those with a realistic chance of winning? In which case you're still wrong, the Conservatives were very obviously going to win it.

So there was a choice of ONE, and I said no. And I was right.

No, I meant those with a possible chance of winning, which is why I used the word possible...

As for where I put the blame? Primarily on to the Labour MPs who didn't understand their leadership election format and gave Corbyn the nominations in the first place.

I don't blame anyone for washing their hands of the choice, but to pretend you "opposed both" is risible.

If everyone had done what I'd done, we'd not have either Boris or Corbyn as PM. It's actually that simple.

You're starting to resemble that Northern Irish joke, when new kid moves into the street and the other kids ask is he's a Protestant or a Catholic. "Neither, I'm a Muslim," he replies. And after a long pause, the other kids ask "yeah, but are you a Protestant Muslim or a Catholic Muslim?"

Ask yourself this, if someone didn't want either Boris or Corbyn as PM, what the hell else COULD they do other than vote for a third party?

They could wash their hands of the choice and vote for a third party, but that would be delegating the choice to other voters.

Since (like everyone else who posts here) you are more informed than the average voter and (like the vast majority of people who post here) you are more intelligent than the average voter, delegating the choice to the average voter seems to me to be a strange thing for you to have done.

Can you actually stop trying to gaslight me, please?

I know what I voted for, which was emphatically "neither of them". That was a considered, deliberate choice and it starts and ends there. My choice wasn't "delegated" to anyone else, I made it myself. What appears on another person's ballot paper is THEIR choice, not mine.

I totally agree. Blaming someone for not voting for either of the 2 main party leaders is tantamount to gaslighting, basically forcing every to vote Starmer/Johnson etc. The last time I looked i didn't live in either Holborn or Uxbridge, therefore I couldn't vote for them anyway. I voted for one of the people on my ballot paper. Sadly the winner was that wet fish "Simon Hart", who I never voted for anyway. Don't blame me for electing him or any other tory!

No it isn't. Gaslighting has a specific meaning which is not the meaning you think it has.

He's certainly trying to gaslight me in the sense that he's trying to tell me what I know to be factually true is actually not, and that a part of that factual truth is my own intentions when I did the thing that I did. There are two strands here: what I did, and what I meant by doing that. What I did was to vote for the Lib Dems. Blandly, simply, uncontroversially that was a vote against all the other parties.
What I intended from that was that (amongst other things) my voice would be registered as saying I this country would be run by people other than Boris and Corbyn. Obviously that was a forlorn hope, clearly there was only going to be one winner, but I didn't feel that I should silence my own voice just because I was in a minority.

Anyone who says that I was not opposed to Boris and Corbyn is therefore gaslighting me, telling me things that I know to be true (and that I know better than anybody else on this whole earth) are false.

I'm not querying your intentions - I'm just pointing out the effect of your actions.

If by "effect" you mean the fact Boris is PM... I'd heap all the blame/praise for that onto Conservative voters. I don't get to share in any of the glory or regret that comes from that outcome.

RobD said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/skynews/status/1511669445877551104

BoJo goes woke

There are many things children can't do on their own volition, so we as a society must think they aren't capable of making all decisions themselves.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/skynews/status/1511669445877551104

BoJo goes woke

Farooq said:

The more I think about this, the more I think Applicant has got this completely backwards.

You have two choices in casting your vote. You either (1) just choose the closest to what you believe in irrespective of what everyone else is doing. Or you (2) choose your vote based on who you think has a realistic chance of winning (perhaps locally perhaps nationally) and then choose the least worst option.

In the last election I did (1). Yet Applicant is trying to tell me I somehow "delegated" my choice to others. It's exactly the opposite. I chose my own choice ignoring the fact that it wouldn't win (locally or nationally).
If you do (2), then you are delegating your range of choices to others.

@Applicant, you're just wrong, sorry.

Applicant said:

LostPassword said:

Farooq said:

TOPPING said:

Farooq said:

TOPPING said:

Farooq said:

IshmaelZ said:

Daveyboy1961 said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Jonathan said:

JosiasJessop said:

Jonathan said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

JosiasJessop said:

OldKingCole said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

MarqueeMark said:

"Britain deserves better than this Conservative cost of living crisis."

Does suggest "Britain deserves a Labour cost of living crisis."

Utter lack of alternative ways to deal with it.

You've not watched the video, then? It is a clunky slogan though.

Morning, everybody. By no means as cold today.

The slogan strips down to 'Britain deserves better', though, and that could be quite potent.

Because one can't say, surely, and certainly from this side of the fence, that Bad Dog's government shows us in a good light.

Did Blair's government show us in a good light? So much ephemeral image fluff to strains of 'things can only get better', followed by a disastrous war and an economic crisis within ten years. Such a wasted opportunity.

The only major crisis Blair had to deal with was 9/11. Johnson, in just a handful of years, has had Covid and Ukraine to deal with. IMV (and I know you'll disagree): he hasn't done too badly on either, and very well in some respects.

Blair did not really have to deal with 9/11, and his response was probably counter-productive. Similarly, Boris has not really had to deal with the Ukrainian invasion in any real sense. We've followed the American lead on sanctions, and continued military cooperation that began under his predecessors. Afghanistan, well, least said, soonest mended. Covid and Brexit were the main crises Boris faced and is facing.

"Similarly, Boris has not really had to deal with the Ukrainian invasion in any real sense."

Wow. That seems rather disconnected with reality. Boris has been one of the strongest allies with Ukraine so far (as, to be fair, have the government since 2014/5).

Note how Russia seems keen to put the UK first amongst their enemies? That's why.

Russia thought Boris was their friend, that’s why.

Otherwise it’s mostly been posturing. Which, along with clinging to his job, is the only thing the clown is good at.

Yes, he thought the PM of the country that was actively training the military of the country he had attacked - and wanted to attack again - was a friend.

FFS. I know some people hate Boris, but sometimes hatred can lead to a certain amount of irrationality...

"Otherwise it’s mostly been posturing."

Again, this seems rather an odd comment. It's been far from posturing, given the limits of what we can actually do. Compare, say, to Germany or France...

The extent of Johnson's (and his party's) entanglement with Russian wealth is a slow burn story that will likely be running when the immediate military crisis is over. The Russians will have thought all that time grooming him might have been worth something; another misjudgement since the only reaction that would save his skin, at least in the short term, was to go over the top in the other direction.

Training the Ukranians was a decision taken by the Coalition, which I doubt the clown was even aware of until it came to matter.

Oh, come on. You are being ridiculous. Operation Orbital was extended in 2019 and expanded in 2020, well before this war. The idea Johnson knew nothing of it is a little ridiculous.

No it isn't. You forget, I've spent time with him both in public and private. His lack of awareness as to where he is, what he's supposed to be doing and the history and background to anything is closer to zero than in anyone I've ever met.

And you seem a rather impartial observer. Compare, say, with Nick's interactions with him, which seemed a lot fairer and nearer to the real Johnson (fnarr, fnarr).

(Jesus. People's irrational hatred of Johnson is turning me, someone who was criticising him before most on here, and who has never voted for him, into a defended of him!)

If it were just me, you might have a point.

But I invite you to review what a whole stack of people who've interacted with Johnson - professionally and personally - have said, from his schooldays onwards, and to notice his lack of friends and allies.

The only people who rate him are those who don't know him.

Yes, someone who lacks friends and allies managed to get himself elected to a number of positions, and became PM. He did that through lacking friends and allies, obviously ...

Many people in the 2000s were saying how friendly Blair and Brown were, yet we saw that was a lie even before Brown got power.

Again, I stress I don't think Johnson is a good PM. But neither do I think he's the venal, nasty and lazy one his haters on here make him out to be. He's a flawed individual, but then so was Thatcher, Major, Blair, Brown, Cameron, and May.

Boris is singularly unsuited to this moment. We need someone able to deal with reality rather than spin lies.

Well, it's a real shame that Labour gave us the option of voting for an anti-Semite who called this war wrong.

If having Boris as PM is bad, then Labour need to accept some blame for putting up a far worse candidate at GE 2019.

I mean, just look at the wrongheadedness of StW's statement on Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Signed by Jeremy.
https://www.stopwar.org.uk/article/list-of-signatories-stop-the-war-statement-on-the-crisis-over-ukraine/

Do you honestly think Corbyn, someone too spineless to say whether he's had the Covid vaccine, and who is utterly wrong on the Ukrainian war - would have handled the two crises better?

Gold plated whataboutery. If you voted for Boris you take the lions share for this nonsense. It was perfectly possible not to vote for either. My late father in law, a lifelong Tory, cast his last vote for the Lib Dems because he didn’t trust Boris.

Voting for neither was just washing your hands of the unpalatable decision between two inadequate candidates and leaving it to others.

Absolute horseshit. You don't get to push the blame onto those of us who actively opposed both.

I'm sorry if you don't like the reality that there was a choice at the last general election of exactly two possible Prime Ministers.

That's odd, I seem to remember more parties standing nationally than just those two.
Perhaps you mean just those with a realistic chance of winning? In which case you're still wrong, the Conservatives were very obviously going to win it.

So there was a choice of ONE, and I said no. And I was right.

No, I meant those with a possible chance of winning, which is why I used the word possible...

As for where I put the blame? Primarily on to the Labour MPs who didn't understand their leadership election format and gave Corbyn the nominations in the first place.

I don't blame anyone for washing their hands of the choice, but to pretend you "opposed both" is risible.

If everyone had done what I'd done, we'd not have either Boris or Corbyn as PM. It's actually that simple.

You're starting to resemble that Northern Irish joke, when new kid moves into the street and the other kids ask is he's a Protestant or a Catholic. "Neither, I'm a Muslim," he replies. And after a long pause, the other kids ask "yeah, but are you a Protestant Muslim or a Catholic Muslim?"

Ask yourself this, if someone didn't want either Boris or Corbyn as PM, what the hell else COULD they do other than vote for a third party?

They could wash their hands of the choice and vote for a third party, but that would be delegating the choice to other voters.

Since (like everyone else who posts here) you are more informed than the average voter and (like the vast majority of people who post here) you are more intelligent than the average voter, delegating the choice to the average voter seems to me to be a strange thing for you to have done.

Can you actually stop trying to gaslight me, please?

I know what I voted for, which was emphatically "neither of them". That was a considered, deliberate choice and it starts and ends there. My choice wasn't "delegated" to anyone else, I made it myself. What appears on another person's ballot paper is THEIR choice, not mine.

I totally agree. Blaming someone for not voting for either of the 2 main party leaders is tantamount to gaslighting, basically forcing every to vote Starmer/Johnson etc. The last time I looked i didn't live in either Holborn or Uxbridge, therefore I couldn't vote for them anyway. I voted for one of the people on my ballot paper. Sadly the winner was that wet fish "Simon Hart", who I never voted for anyway. Don't blame me for electing him or any other tory!

No it isn't. Gaslighting has a specific meaning which is not the meaning you think it has.

He's certainly trying to gaslight me in the sense that he's trying to tell me what I know to be factually true is actually not, and that a part of that factual truth is my own intentions when I did the thing that I did. There are two strands here: what I did, and what I meant by doing that. What I did was to vote for the Lib Dems. Blandly, simply, uncontroversially that was a vote against all the other parties.
What I intended from that was that (amongst other things) my voice would be registered as saying I this country would be run by people other than Boris and Corbyn. Obviously that was a forlorn hope, clearly there was only going to be one winner, but I didn't feel that I should silence my own voice just because I was in a minority.

Anyone who says that I was not opposed to Boris and Corbyn is therefore gaslighting me, telling me things that I know to be true (and that I know better than anybody else on this whole earth) are false.

It would be the same as sending HMRC a cheque for £100 to register your desire that we should all be taxed more.

Well, no. I'd write to my MP to register that opinion. At least they have the power to do that. HMRC don't set tax rates.

Exactly. That's why I used the analogy. It would be making a personal gesture while ignoring the reality of how taxes are raised and the likelihood of any change as a result (probably similarly to writing to your MP about it, that said).

You voted LD because you didn't want either Johnson or Corbyn to win but the reality is that one of them would win because the LDs would not.

It is the "none of the above" fallacy. None of the above means one of the above for certain.

But that's other people's choice, not mine.
I didn't vote Lib Dem thinking "maybe we will win!" You have to separate out what you think will happen (Boris winning was certain) versus what you want to happen. You vote for what you want to happen. There's no "fallacy" in expressing your political views at the ballot box.

The encouragement to guess how other people will vote before deciding how to vote is one of the worst defects of FPTP, and it stifles a broad public debate on politics

Not exclusive to FPTP. See, for example, the French presidential election in progress at the moment.

Benpointer said:

Holy f*ck! Just got my email from British Gas.

Our electricity costs are going to be £3,943 this year. Last year on a fixed deal we were paying £1,345.

That's a 293% increase with more to come in October! 😬

I can help but laugh that we're being charged 28.455p a unit and being paid 5.57p for the units we export from our PV panels.

LostPassword said:

Applicant said:

LostPassword said:

Farooq said:

TOPPING said:

Farooq said:

TOPPING said:

Farooq said:

IshmaelZ said:

Daveyboy1961 said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Jonathan said:

JosiasJessop said:

Jonathan said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

JosiasJessop said:

OldKingCole said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

MarqueeMark said:

"Britain deserves better than this Conservative cost of living crisis."

Does suggest "Britain deserves a Labour cost of living crisis."

Utter lack of alternative ways to deal with it.

You've not watched the video, then? It is a clunky slogan though.

Morning, everybody. By no means as cold today.

The slogan strips down to 'Britain deserves better', though, and that could be quite potent.

Because one can't say, surely, and certainly from this side of the fence, that Bad Dog's government shows us in a good light.

Did Blair's government show us in a good light? So much ephemeral image fluff to strains of 'things can only get better', followed by a disastrous war and an economic crisis within ten years. Such a wasted opportunity.

The only major crisis Blair had to deal with was 9/11. Johnson, in just a handful of years, has had Covid and Ukraine to deal with. IMV (and I know you'll disagree): he hasn't done too badly on either, and very well in some respects.

Blair did not really have to deal with 9/11, and his response was probably counter-productive. Similarly, Boris has not really had to deal with the Ukrainian invasion in any real sense. We've followed the American lead on sanctions, and continued military cooperation that began under his predecessors. Afghanistan, well, least said, soonest mended. Covid and Brexit were the main crises Boris faced and is facing.

"Similarly, Boris has not really had to deal with the Ukrainian invasion in any real sense."

Wow. That seems rather disconnected with reality. Boris has been one of the strongest allies with Ukraine so far (as, to be fair, have the government since 2014/5).

Note how Russia seems keen to put the UK first amongst their enemies? That's why.

Russia thought Boris was their friend, that’s why.

Otherwise it’s mostly been posturing. Which, along with clinging to his job, is the only thing the clown is good at.

Yes, he thought the PM of the country that was actively training the military of the country he had attacked - and wanted to attack again - was a friend.

FFS. I know some people hate Boris, but sometimes hatred can lead to a certain amount of irrationality...

"Otherwise it’s mostly been posturing."

Again, this seems rather an odd comment. It's been far from posturing, given the limits of what we can actually do. Compare, say, to Germany or France...

The extent of Johnson's (and his party's) entanglement with Russian wealth is a slow burn story that will likely be running when the immediate military crisis is over. The Russians will have thought all that time grooming him might have been worth something; another misjudgement since the only reaction that would save his skin, at least in the short term, was to go over the top in the other direction.

Training the Ukranians was a decision taken by the Coalition, which I doubt the clown was even aware of until it came to matter.

Oh, come on. You are being ridiculous. Operation Orbital was extended in 2019 and expanded in 2020, well before this war. The idea Johnson knew nothing of it is a little ridiculous.

No it isn't. You forget, I've spent time with him both in public and private. His lack of awareness as to where he is, what he's supposed to be doing and the history and background to anything is closer to zero than in anyone I've ever met.

And you seem a rather impartial observer. Compare, say, with Nick's interactions with him, which seemed a lot fairer and nearer to the real Johnson (fnarr, fnarr).

(Jesus. People's irrational hatred of Johnson is turning me, someone who was criticising him before most on here, and who has never voted for him, into a defended of him!)

If it were just me, you might have a point.

But I invite you to review what a whole stack of people who've interacted with Johnson - professionally and personally - have said, from his schooldays onwards, and to notice his lack of friends and allies.

The only people who rate him are those who don't know him.

Yes, someone who lacks friends and allies managed to get himself elected to a number of positions, and became PM. He did that through lacking friends and allies, obviously ...

Many people in the 2000s were saying how friendly Blair and Brown were, yet we saw that was a lie even before Brown got power.

Again, I stress I don't think Johnson is a good PM. But neither do I think he's the venal, nasty and lazy one his haters on here make him out to be. He's a flawed individual, but then so was Thatcher, Major, Blair, Brown, Cameron, and May.

Boris is singularly unsuited to this moment. We need someone able to deal with reality rather than spin lies.

Well, it's a real shame that Labour gave us the option of voting for an anti-Semite who called this war wrong.

If having Boris as PM is bad, then Labour need to accept some blame for putting up a far worse candidate at GE 2019.

I mean, just look at the wrongheadedness of StW's statement on Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Signed by Jeremy.
https://www.stopwar.org.uk/article/list-of-signatories-stop-the-war-statement-on-the-crisis-over-ukraine/

Do you honestly think Corbyn, someone too spineless to say whether he's had the Covid vaccine, and who is utterly wrong on the Ukrainian war - would have handled the two crises better?

Gold plated whataboutery. If you voted for Boris you take the lions share for this nonsense. It was perfectly possible not to vote for either. My late father in law, a lifelong Tory, cast his last vote for the Lib Dems because he didn’t trust Boris.

Voting for neither was just washing your hands of the unpalatable decision between two inadequate candidates and leaving it to others.

Absolute horseshit. You don't get to push the blame onto those of us who actively opposed both.

I'm sorry if you don't like the reality that there was a choice at the last general election of exactly two possible Prime Ministers.

That's odd, I seem to remember more parties standing nationally than just those two.
Perhaps you mean just those with a realistic chance of winning? In which case you're still wrong, the Conservatives were very obviously going to win it.

So there was a choice of ONE, and I said no. And I was right.

No, I meant those with a possible chance of winning, which is why I used the word possible...

As for where I put the blame? Primarily on to the Labour MPs who didn't understand their leadership election format and gave Corbyn the nominations in the first place.

I don't blame anyone for washing their hands of the choice, but to pretend you "opposed both" is risible.

If everyone had done what I'd done, we'd not have either Boris or Corbyn as PM. It's actually that simple.

You're starting to resemble that Northern Irish joke, when new kid moves into the street and the other kids ask is he's a Protestant or a Catholic. "Neither, I'm a Muslim," he replies. And after a long pause, the other kids ask "yeah, but are you a Protestant Muslim or a Catholic Muslim?"

Ask yourself this, if someone didn't want either Boris or Corbyn as PM, what the hell else COULD they do other than vote for a third party?

They could wash their hands of the choice and vote for a third party, but that would be delegating the choice to other voters.

Since (like everyone else who posts here) you are more informed than the average voter and (like the vast majority of people who post here) you are more intelligent than the average voter, delegating the choice to the average voter seems to me to be a strange thing for you to have done.

Can you actually stop trying to gaslight me, please?

I know what I voted for, which was emphatically "neither of them". That was a considered, deliberate choice and it starts and ends there. My choice wasn't "delegated" to anyone else, I made it myself. What appears on another person's ballot paper is THEIR choice, not mine.

I totally agree. Blaming someone for not voting for either of the 2 main party leaders is tantamount to gaslighting, basically forcing every to vote Starmer/Johnson etc. The last time I looked i didn't live in either Holborn or Uxbridge, therefore I couldn't vote for them anyway. I voted for one of the people on my ballot paper. Sadly the winner was that wet fish "Simon Hart", who I never voted for anyway. Don't blame me for electing him or any other tory!

No it isn't. Gaslighting has a specific meaning which is not the meaning you think it has.

He's certainly trying to gaslight me in the sense that he's trying to tell me what I know to be factually true is actually not, and that a part of that factual truth is my own intentions when I did the thing that I did. There are two strands here: what I did, and what I meant by doing that. What I did was to vote for the Lib Dems. Blandly, simply, uncontroversially that was a vote against all the other parties.
What I intended from that was that (amongst other things) my voice would be registered as saying I this country would be run by people other than Boris and Corbyn. Obviously that was a forlorn hope, clearly there was only going to be one winner, but I didn't feel that I should silence my own voice just because I was in a minority.

Anyone who says that I was not opposed to Boris and Corbyn is therefore gaslighting me, telling me things that I know to be true (and that I know better than anybody else on this whole earth) are false.

It would be the same as sending HMRC a cheque for £100 to register your desire that we should all be taxed more.

Well, no. I'd write to my MP to register that opinion. At least they have the power to do that. HMRC don't set tax rates.

Exactly. That's why I used the analogy. It would be making a personal gesture while ignoring the reality of how taxes are raised and the likelihood of any change as a result (probably similarly to writing to your MP about it, that said).

You voted LD because you didn't want either Johnson or Corbyn to win but the reality is that one of them would win because the LDs would not.

It is the "none of the above" fallacy. None of the above means one of the above for certain.

But that's other people's choice, not mine.
I didn't vote Lib Dem thinking "maybe we will win!" You have to separate out what you think will happen (Boris winning was certain) versus what you want to happen. You vote for what you want to happen. There's no "fallacy" in expressing your political views at the ballot box.

The encouragement to guess how other people will vote before deciding how to vote is one of the worst defects of FPTP, and it stifles a broad public debate on politics

Not exclusive to FPTP. See, for example, the French presidential election in progress at the moment.

Since I didn't suggest the French electoral system as a replacement that is irrelevant.

Heathener said:

Goodbye Dishi Rishi.

Meanwhile I've finally been seen by a doctor. Broken rib confirmed but they were checking for a lung complication which appears not to be present.

I'm back and have just seen this on Sky News:

Six hospitals tell public to avoid A&E amid 12-hour waits
Six hospitals have issued a joint warning for people to stay away from emergency departments except for in "genuine, life-threatening situations".

The announcement was made after a surge in attendances left some patients waiting for up to 12 hours.

Nigelb said:

Applicant said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/skynews/status/1511669445877551104

BoJo goes woke

If you quoted what he said, it would have given the game away as it's the antithesis of woke:

"There are complexities and sensitivities when you move from the area of sexuality to the question of gender", says PM Boris Johnson, adding "I don't think it's reasonable" for children to "take decisions on their gender" without a parent's involvement.

What does any of that have to do with conversion therapy ?

The plain message of the government's decision to legislate in one case and not the other is that it's unacceptable for one, and acceptable for the other.

HYUFD said:

BartholomewRoberts said:

NerysHughes said:

BartholomewRoberts said:

NerysHughes said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Big_G_NorthWales said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Big_G_NorthWales said:

Endillion said:

As I recall, it was widely held on here that Sunak had to move for the top job before March, because by April, the tax rises, rise in energy prices and general inflation hitting would make him very unpopular and hence much worse placed to challenge.

Well done, everyone.

It didn't have to be that way but he totally misjudged the budget and is justifiably paying the price

You were one of his biggest cheerleaders, ROFL

Just as you cheered on Corbyn, but I have admitted he has disappointed me and I have attacked his budget since it was announced

You do not get to play judge when you would have imposed Corbyn on us

Yes but you're trying to pretend that you saw this coming, when you didn't.

You were saying literally a month ago how "Rishi must take over now".

You do not get to play judge when you would have imposed Rishi on us.

What would you have have done differently to RS over the past 2 years?

He has had to deal with the biggest Government spending scheme since WW2 in order to preserve companies and peoples jobs. It was incredible how quickly the schemes were set up, they were run very efficiently and they worked. It was an amazing achievement and the Country remains at full employment.

Now he is looking to recover a tiny percentage of that money he is apparently the worst chancellor ever,

What utter nonsense!!

What would I have done differently? Not increase National Insurance.

Furthermore if there's room for tax cuts (planned for Income Tax) then that should go 100% into reversing the NI hike, not being gifted to those who don't pay NI.

Sunak isn't the worst Chancellor in history, that accolade still belongs to one Gordon Brown, but Sunak has stolen his clothes and is wearing them. NI is raised because its 2p in tax rises but the media says 1p, Brown knew that and Sunak is copying him.

I may have tipped him at 250/1 but I don't want a poundshop Gordon Brown in Downing Street.

So how would you pay for Social Care or would you just keep avoiding the problem?

No avoidance necessary. I don't think its right for the taxpayers to provide for other people's inheritances. If people spend their savings on Care at the end of their life, then that's what they've saved for - a rainy day.

Which is exactly what Theresa May proposed in 2017. Everyone would get to keep £100,000 in assets but all of their assets over £100k would be liable for social care costs, whether residential or domestic.

The public loved the plan so much she lost her majority. Boris ensured it was dumped by the 2019 general election and got a majority of 80

BartholomewRoberts said:

Nigelb said:

Applicant said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/skynews/status/1511669445877551104

BoJo goes woke

If you quoted what he said, it would have given the game away as it's the antithesis of woke:

"There are complexities and sensitivities when you move from the area of sexuality to the question of gender", says PM Boris Johnson, adding "I don't think it's reasonable" for children to "take decisions on their gender" without a parent's involvement.

What does any of that have to do with conversion therapy ?

The plain message of the government's decision to legislate in one case and not the other is that it's unacceptable for one, and acceptable for the other.

Of course it is.

Are you suggesting that transgendered people should be banned from converting to their desired sex? Or are you viewing conversion as the other way around perhaps? In which case should people who are not transgendered but think they might be, be denied therapy?

Sexuality and gender are completely different things. No reason at all to say the same solution must work for both.

Nigelb said:

BartholomewRoberts said:

Nigelb said:

Applicant said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/skynews/status/1511669445877551104

BoJo goes woke

If you quoted what he said, it would have given the game away as it's the antithesis of woke:

"There are complexities and sensitivities when you move from the area of sexuality to the question of gender", says PM Boris Johnson, adding "I don't think it's reasonable" for children to "take decisions on their gender" without a parent's involvement.

What does any of that have to do with conversion therapy ?

The plain message of the government's decision to legislate in one case and not the other is that it's unacceptable for one, and acceptable for the other.

Of course it is.

Are you suggesting that transgendered people should be banned from converting to their desired sex? Or are you viewing conversion as the other way around perhaps? In which case should people who are not transgendered but think they might be, be denied therapy?

Sexuality and gender are completely different things. No reason at all to say the same solution must work for both.

The legislation is about banning coercion, not therapy.

In the government's own words:
https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/banning-conversion-therapy/banning-conversion-therapy
...I want to reassure those who may have concerns about the impact of this ban on clinicians’ independence as well as on freedom of speech. People’s personal freedoms are key to the health and functioning of a democratic society, such as freedom of choice, freedom of speech and belief, and are central to my proposals. It is also vitally important that no person is forced or coerced into conversion therapy, and that young people are supported in exploring their identity without being encouraged towards one particular path. This is especially the case for those who are under 18 and where this might result in an irreversible decision. These proposals therefore do not alter the existing clinical regulatory framework or the independence of regulated clinicians working within their professional obligations.

The proposed protections are universal: an attempt to change a person from being attracted to the same-sex to being attracted to the opposite-sex, or from not being transgender to being transgender, will be treated in the same way as the reverse scenario. They therefore protect everyone....

Until they decided otherwise.
The message is, as I say, clear.

FrancisUrquhart said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/06/we-own-channel-4-sell-off-isnt-a-done-deal-armando-iannucci

The thing that is always striking from these defence pieces about BBC / CH4, is a) it is all historic, 30-40 years ago it did x and b) they acknowledge the elephant in the room, but never provide any suggestion about what to do about it.

Film4 spends £30m a year on new productions, Netflix spends £1bn a year and 10,000 people work on their productions in the UK. Sky are committing billions to UK production, with a massive project at Elstree . What Film4 spends in a year on total film budget, Netflix spends on 3 episodes of one of their blue chip shows.

I am all ears for suggestions. But no change isn't going to work. We see constantly now, the best talent goes to Netflix, Amazon. Its a bit like remembering when Wimbledon FC used to match up against the best in the Premier League, plucky upstarts on shoe string budget, and saying they can do it again....but now you either need billions and / or incredibly innovative owners like at Brentford.

CorrectHorseBattery said:

Hope you are doing a bit better @HYUFD

bondegezou said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/06/we-own-channel-4-sell-off-isnt-a-done-deal-armando-iannucci

The thing that is always striking from these defence pieces about BBC / CH4, is a) it is all historic, 30-40 years ago it did x and b) they acknowledge the elephant in the room, but never provide any suggestion about what to do about it.

Film4 spends £30m a year on new productions, Netflix spends £1bn a year and 10,000 people work on their productions in the UK. Sky are committing billions to UK production, with a massive project at Elstree . What Film4 spends in a year on total film budget, Netflix spends on 3 episodes of one of their blue chip shows.

I am all ears for suggestions. But no change isn't going to work. We see constantly now, the best talent goes to Netflix, Amazon. Its a bit like remembering when Wimbledon FC used to match up against the best in the Premier League, plucky upstarts on shoe string budget, and saying they can do it again....but now you either need billions and / or incredibly innovative owners like at Brentford.

Netflix has never made a profit. Channel 4 is financially self-sustaining.

Nigelb said:

BartholomewRoberts said:

Nigelb said:

Applicant said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/skynews/status/1511669445877551104

BoJo goes woke

If you quoted what he said, it would have given the game away as it's the antithesis of woke:

"There are complexities and sensitivities when you move from the area of sexuality to the question of gender", says PM Boris Johnson, adding "I don't think it's reasonable" for children to "take decisions on their gender" without a parent's involvement.

What does any of that have to do with conversion therapy ?

The plain message of the government's decision to legislate in one case and not the other is that it's unacceptable for one, and acceptable for the other.

Of course it is.

Are you suggesting that transgendered people should be banned from converting to their desired sex? Or are you viewing conversion as the other way around perhaps? In which case should people who are not transgendered but think they might be, be denied therapy?

Sexuality and gender are completely different things. No reason at all to say the same solution must work for both.

The legislation is about banning coercion, not therapy.

In the government's own words:
https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/banning-conversion-therapy/banning-conversion-therapy
...I want to reassure those who may have concerns about the impact of this ban on clinicians’ independence as well as on freedom of speech. People’s personal freedoms are key to the health and functioning of a democratic society, such as freedom of choice, freedom of speech and belief, and are central to my proposals. It is also vitally important that no person is forced or coerced into conversion therapy, and that young people are supported in exploring their identity without being encouraged towards one particular path. This is especially the case for those who are under 18 and where this might result in an irreversible decision. These proposals therefore do not alter the existing clinical regulatory framework or the independence of regulated clinicians working within their professional obligations.

The proposed protections are universal: an attempt to change a person from being attracted to the same-sex to being attracted to the opposite-sex, or from not being transgender to being transgender, will be treated in the same way as the reverse scenario. They therefore protect everyone....

Until they decided otherwise.
The message is, as I say, clear.

bondegezou said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/06/we-own-channel-4-sell-off-isnt-a-done-deal-armando-iannucci

The thing that is always striking from these defence pieces about BBC / CH4, is a) it is all historic, 30-40 years ago it did x and b) they acknowledge the elephant in the room, but never provide any suggestion about what to do about it.

Film4 spends £30m a year on new productions, Netflix spends £1bn a year and 10,000 people work on their productions in the UK. Sky are committing billions to UK production, with a massive project at Elstree . What Film4 spends in a year on total film budget, Netflix spends on 3 episodes of one of their blue chip shows.

I am all ears for suggestions. But no change isn't going to work. We see constantly now, the best talent goes to Netflix, Amazon. Its a bit like remembering when Wimbledon FC used to match up against the best in the Premier League, plucky upstarts on shoe string budget, and saying they can do it again....but now you either need billions and / or incredibly innovative owners like at Brentford.

Netflix has never made a profit. Channel 4 is financially self-sustaining.

glw said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/06/we-own-channel-4-sell-off-isnt-a-done-deal-armando-iannucci

The thing that is always striking from these defence pieces about BBC / CH4, is a) it is all historic, 30-40 years ago it did x and b) they acknowledge the elephant in the room, but never provide any suggestion about what to do about it.

Film4 spends £30m a year on new productions, Netflix spends £1bn a year and 10,000 people work on their productions in the UK. Sky are committing billions to UK production, with a massive project at Elstree . What Film4 spends in a year on total film budget, Netflix spends on 3 episodes of one of their blue chip shows.

I am all ears for suggestions. But no change isn't going to work. We see constantly now, the best talent goes to Netflix, Amazon. Its a bit like remembering when Wimbledon FC used to match up against the best in the Premier League, plucky upstarts on shoe string budget, and saying they can do it again....but now you either need billions and / or incredibly innovative owners like at Brentford.

No change is simply a slower death. If the likes of the BBC and Channel 4 haven't already figured out that broadcast TV is going the way of the dodo there will be no saving them. They should be demanding change, not clinging on to the past.

bondegezou said:

glw said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/06/we-own-channel-4-sell-off-isnt-a-done-deal-armando-iannucci

The thing that is always striking from these defence pieces about BBC / CH4, is a) it is all historic, 30-40 years ago it did x and b) they acknowledge the elephant in the room, but never provide any suggestion about what to do about it.

Film4 spends £30m a year on new productions, Netflix spends £1bn a year and 10,000 people work on their productions in the UK. Sky are committing billions to UK production, with a massive project at Elstree . What Film4 spends in a year on total film budget, Netflix spends on 3 episodes of one of their blue chip shows.

I am all ears for suggestions. But no change isn't going to work. We see constantly now, the best talent goes to Netflix, Amazon. Its a bit like remembering when Wimbledon FC used to match up against the best in the Premier League, plucky upstarts on shoe string budget, and saying they can do it again....but now you either need billions and / or incredibly innovative owners like at Brentford.

No change is simply a slower death. If the likes of the BBC and Channel 4 haven't already figured out that broadcast TV is going the way of the dodo there will be no saving them. They should be demanding change, not clinging on to the past.

TV is going through a period of huge change. What does any enterprise need to weather and indeed thrive in a period of such change? They need a stable foundation, a secure financial footing, which allows them to innovate and evolve in response. Now is the worst time to start tinkering with those foundations.

This is like the Government deciding to re-organise Public Health England in the middle of a pandemic, which diverted everyone's energies from fighting the pandemic to working out what the re-organisation meant and having to set up new systems for the successor bodies.

We talk about Global Britain and then the Conservative Government seeks to (unconservatively) meddle with our country's success stories.

RobD said:

bondegezou said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/06/we-own-channel-4-sell-off-isnt-a-done-deal-armando-iannucci

The thing that is always striking from these defence pieces about BBC / CH4, is a) it is all historic, 30-40 years ago it did x and b) they acknowledge the elephant in the room, but never provide any suggestion about what to do about it.

Film4 spends £30m a year on new productions, Netflix spends £1bn a year and 10,000 people work on their productions in the UK. Sky are committing billions to UK production, with a massive project at Elstree . What Film4 spends in a year on total film budget, Netflix spends on 3 episodes of one of their blue chip shows.

I am all ears for suggestions. But no change isn't going to work. We see constantly now, the best talent goes to Netflix, Amazon. Its a bit like remembering when Wimbledon FC used to match up against the best in the Premier League, plucky upstarts on shoe string budget, and saying they can do it again....but now you either need billions and / or incredibly innovative owners like at Brentford.

Netflix has never made a profit. Channel 4 is financially self-sustaining.

Are you sure? The net income reported was in the billions last year.

Selebian said:

Nigelb said:

BartholomewRoberts said:

Nigelb said:

Applicant said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/skynews/status/1511669445877551104

BoJo goes woke

If you quoted what he said, it would have given the game away as it's the antithesis of woke:

"There are complexities and sensitivities when you move from the area of sexuality to the question of gender", says PM Boris Johnson, adding "I don't think it's reasonable" for children to "take decisions on their gender" without a parent's involvement.

What does any of that have to do with conversion therapy ?

The plain message of the government's decision to legislate in one case and not the other is that it's unacceptable for one, and acceptable for the other.

Of course it is.

Are you suggesting that transgendered people should be banned from converting to their desired sex? Or are you viewing conversion as the other way around perhaps? In which case should people who are not transgendered but think they might be, be denied therapy?

Sexuality and gender are completely different things. No reason at all to say the same solution must work for both.

The legislation is about banning coercion, not therapy.

In the government's own words:
https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/banning-conversion-therapy/banning-conversion-therapy
...I want to reassure those who may have concerns about the impact of this ban on clinicians’ independence as well as on freedom of speech. People’s personal freedoms are key to the health and functioning of a democratic society, such as freedom of choice, freedom of speech and belief, and are central to my proposals. It is also vitally important that no person is forced or coerced into conversion therapy, and that young people are supported in exploring their identity without being encouraged towards one particular path. This is especially the case for those who are under 18 and where this might result in an irreversible decision. These proposals therefore do not alter the existing clinical regulatory framework or the independence of regulated clinicians working within their professional obligations.

The proposed protections are universal: an attempt to change a person from being attracted to the same-sex to being attracted to the opposite-sex, or from not being transgender to being transgender, will be treated in the same way as the reverse scenario. They therefore protect everyone....

Until they decided otherwise.
The message is, as I say, clear.

I've liked, as I agree. But there is a degree of subtlety when it comes to transgender issues simply in the need for careful wording to avoid unintended consequences. Young person attends gender identity clinic claiming to want to change gender. Clinician suspects there are other issues at play (e.g. mental health, depression, risk that gender is being latched on to as a problem/solution) and pushes for e.g. mental health service referral. Does that fall under the legislation? It shouldn't and I don't think there was ever an intention that it should, but it could be a bit of a grey area.

One can make a similar argument re heterosexual/homosexual too, of course, but most homosexual young people are not going to be visiting doctors asking for treatment and so unlikely to be referred to a mental health service through that route. The example situation for children with transgender issues is not uncommon, indeed I have a recollection (may be incorrect) that CAMHS referral is even required before gender clinic referral in some areas (Wales?)

I still think conversion therapy should be banned, but the law would need to be drafted carefully, which should of course be perfectly possible.

glw said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/06/we-own-channel-4-sell-off-isnt-a-done-deal-armando-iannucci

The thing that is always striking from these defence pieces about BBC / CH4, is a) it is all historic, 30-40 years ago it did x and b) they acknowledge the elephant in the room, but never provide any suggestion about what to do about it.

Film4 spends £30m a year on new productions, Netflix spends £1bn a year and 10,000 people work on their productions in the UK. Sky are committing billions to UK production, with a massive project at Elstree . What Film4 spends in a year on total film budget, Netflix spends on 3 episodes of one of their blue chip shows.

I am all ears for suggestions. But no change isn't going to work. We see constantly now, the best talent goes to Netflix, Amazon. Its a bit like remembering when Wimbledon FC used to match up against the best in the Premier League, plucky upstarts on shoe string budget, and saying they can do it again....but now you either need billions and / or incredibly innovative owners like at Brentford.

No change is simply a slower death. If the likes of the BBC and Channel 4 haven't already figured out that broadcast TV is going the way of the dodo there will be no saving them. They should be demanding change, not clinging on to the past.

FrancisUrquhart said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/06/we-own-channel-4-sell-off-isnt-a-done-deal-armando-iannucci

The thing that is always striking from these defence pieces about BBC / CH4, is a) it is all historic, 30-40 years ago it did x and b) they acknowledge the elephant in the room, but never provide any suggestion about what to do about it.

Film4 spends £30m a year on new productions, Netflix spends £1bn a year and 10,000 people work on their productions in the UK. Sky are committing billions to UK production, with a massive project at Elstree . What Film4 spends in a year on total film budget, Netflix spends on 3 episodes of one of their blue chip shows.

I am all ears for suggestions. But no change isn't going to work. We see constantly now, the best talent goes to Netflix, Amazon. Its a bit like remembering when Wimbledon FC used to match up against the best in the Premier League, plucky upstarts on shoe string budget, and saying they can do it again....but now you either need billions and / or incredibly innovative owners like at Brentford.

Applicant said:

LostPassword said:

Farooq said:

TOPPING said:

Farooq said:

TOPPING said:

Farooq said:

IshmaelZ said:

Daveyboy1961 said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Farooq said:

Applicant said:

Jonathan said:

JosiasJessop said:

Jonathan said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

IanB2 said:

JosiasJessop said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

JosiasJessop said:

OldKingCole said:

DecrepiterJohnL said:

MarqueeMark said:

"Britain deserves better than this Conservative cost of living crisis."

Does suggest "Britain deserves a Labour cost of living crisis."

Utter lack of alternative ways to deal with it.

You've not watched the video, then? It is a clunky slogan though.

Morning, everybody. By no means as cold today.

The slogan strips down to 'Britain deserves better', though, and that could be quite potent.

Because one can't say, surely, and certainly from this side of the fence, that Bad Dog's government shows us in a good light.

Did Blair's government show us in a good light? So much ephemeral image fluff to strains of 'things can only get better', followed by a disastrous war and an economic crisis within ten years. Such a wasted opportunity.

The only major crisis Blair had to deal with was 9/11. Johnson, in just a handful of years, has had Covid and Ukraine to deal with. IMV (and I know you'll disagree): he hasn't done too badly on either, and very well in some respects.

Blair did not really have to deal with 9/11, and his response was probably counter-productive. Similarly, Boris has not really had to deal with the Ukrainian invasion in any real sense. We've followed the American lead on sanctions, and continued military cooperation that began under his predecessors. Afghanistan, well, least said, soonest mended. Covid and Brexit were the main crises Boris faced and is facing.

"Similarly, Boris has not really had to deal with the Ukrainian invasion in any real sense."

Wow. That seems rather disconnected with reality. Boris has been one of the strongest allies with Ukraine so far (as, to be fair, have the government since 2014/5).

Note how Russia seems keen to put the UK first amongst their enemies? That's why.

Russia thought Boris was their friend, that’s why.

Otherwise it’s mostly been posturing. Which, along with clinging to his job, is the only thing the clown is good at.

Yes, he thought the PM of the country that was actively training the military of the country he had attacked - and wanted to attack again - was a friend.

FFS. I know some people hate Boris, but sometimes hatred can lead to a certain amount of irrationality...

"Otherwise it’s mostly been posturing."

Again, this seems rather an odd comment. It's been far from posturing, given the limits of what we can actually do. Compare, say, to Germany or France...

The extent of Johnson's (and his party's) entanglement with Russian wealth is a slow burn story that will likely be running when the immediate military crisis is over. The Russians will have thought all that time grooming him might have been worth something; another misjudgement since the only reaction that would save his skin, at least in the short term, was to go over the top in the other direction.

Training the Ukranians was a decision taken by the Coalition, which I doubt the clown was even aware of until it came to matter.

Oh, come on. You are being ridiculous. Operation Orbital was extended in 2019 and expanded in 2020, well before this war. The idea Johnson knew nothing of it is a little ridiculous.

No it isn't. You forget, I've spent time with him both in public and private. His lack of awareness as to where he is, what he's supposed to be doing and the history and background to anything is closer to zero than in anyone I've ever met.

And you seem a rather impartial observer. Compare, say, with Nick's interactions with him, which seemed a lot fairer and nearer to the real Johnson (fnarr, fnarr).

(Jesus. People's irrational hatred of Johnson is turning me, someone who was criticising him before most on here, and who has never voted for him, into a defended of him!)

If it were just me, you might have a point.

But I invite you to review what a whole stack of people who've interacted with Johnson - professionally and personally - have said, from his schooldays onwards, and to notice his lack of friends and allies.

The only people who rate him are those who don't know him.

Yes, someone who lacks friends and allies managed to get himself elected to a number of positions, and became PM. He did that through lacking friends and allies, obviously ...

Many people in the 2000s were saying how friendly Blair and Brown were, yet we saw that was a lie even before Brown got power.

Again, I stress I don't think Johnson is a good PM. But neither do I think he's the venal, nasty and lazy one his haters on here make him out to be. He's a flawed individual, but then so was Thatcher, Major, Blair, Brown, Cameron, and May.

Boris is singularly unsuited to this moment. We need someone able to deal with reality rather than spin lies.

Well, it's a real shame that Labour gave us the option of voting for an anti-Semite who called this war wrong.

If having Boris as PM is bad, then Labour need to accept some blame for putting up a far worse candidate at GE 2019.

I mean, just look at the wrongheadedness of StW's statement on Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Signed by Jeremy.
https://www.stopwar.org.uk/article/list-of-signatories-stop-the-war-statement-on-the-crisis-over-ukraine/

Do you honestly think Corbyn, someone too spineless to say whether he's had the Covid vaccine, and who is utterly wrong on the Ukrainian war - would have handled the two crises better?

Gold plated whataboutery. If you voted for Boris you take the lions share for this nonsense. It was perfectly possible not to vote for either. My late father in law, a lifelong Tory, cast his last vote for the Lib Dems because he didn’t trust Boris.

Voting for neither was just washing your hands of the unpalatable decision between two inadequate candidates and leaving it to others.

Absolute horseshit. You don't get to push the blame onto those of us who actively opposed both.

I'm sorry if you don't like the reality that there was a choice at the last general election of exactly two possible Prime Ministers.

That's odd, I seem to remember more parties standing nationally than just those two.
Perhaps you mean just those with a realistic chance of winning? In which case you're still wrong, the Conservatives were very obviously going to win it.

So there was a choice of ONE, and I said no. And I was right.

No, I meant those with a possible chance of winning, which is why I used the word possible...

As for where I put the blame? Primarily on to the Labour MPs who didn't understand their leadership election format and gave Corbyn the nominations in the first place.

I don't blame anyone for washing their hands of the choice, but to pretend you "opposed both" is risible.

If everyone had done what I'd done, we'd not have either Boris or Corbyn as PM. It's actually that simple.

You're starting to resemble that Northern Irish joke, when new kid moves into the street and the other kids ask is he's a Protestant or a Catholic. "Neither, I'm a Muslim," he replies. And after a long pause, the other kids ask "yeah, but are you a Protestant Muslim or a Catholic Muslim?"

Ask yourself this, if someone didn't want either Boris or Corbyn as PM, what the hell else COULD they do other than vote for a third party?

They could wash their hands of the choice and vote for a third party, but that would be delegating the choice to other voters.

Since (like everyone else who posts here) you are more informed than the average voter and (like the vast majority of people who post here) you are more intelligent than the average voter, delegating the choice to the average voter seems to me to be a strange thing for you to have done.

Can you actually stop trying to gaslight me, please?

I know what I voted for, which was emphatically "neither of them". That was a considered, deliberate choice and it starts and ends there. My choice wasn't "delegated" to anyone else, I made it myself. What appears on another person's ballot paper is THEIR choice, not mine.

I totally agree. Blaming someone for not voting for either of the 2 main party leaders is tantamount to gaslighting, basically forcing every to vote Starmer/Johnson etc. The last time I looked i didn't live in either Holborn or Uxbridge, therefore I couldn't vote for them anyway. I voted for one of the people on my ballot paper. Sadly the winner was that wet fish "Simon Hart", who I never voted for anyway. Don't blame me for electing him or any other tory!

No it isn't. Gaslighting has a specific meaning which is not the meaning you think it has.

He's certainly trying to gaslight me in the sense that he's trying to tell me what I know to be factually true is actually not, and that a part of that factual truth is my own intentions when I did the thing that I did. There are two strands here: what I did, and what I meant by doing that. What I did was to vote for the Lib Dems. Blandly, simply, uncontroversially that was a vote against all the other parties.
What I intended from that was that (amongst other things) my voice would be registered as saying I this country would be run by people other than Boris and Corbyn. Obviously that was a forlorn hope, clearly there was only going to be one winner, but I didn't feel that I should silence my own voice just because I was in a minority.

Anyone who says that I was not opposed to Boris and Corbyn is therefore gaslighting me, telling me things that I know to be true (and that I know better than anybody else on this whole earth) are false.

It would be the same as sending HMRC a cheque for £100 to register your desire that we should all be taxed more.

Well, no. I'd write to my MP to register that opinion. At least they have the power to do that. HMRC don't set tax rates.

Exactly. That's why I used the analogy. It would be making a personal gesture while ignoring the reality of how taxes are raised and the likelihood of any change as a result (probably similarly to writing to your MP about it, that said).

You voted LD because you didn't want either Johnson or Corbyn to win but the reality is that one of them would win because the LDs would not.

It is the "none of the above" fallacy. None of the above means one of the above for certain.

But that's other people's choice, not mine.
I didn't vote Lib Dem thinking "maybe we will win!" You have to separate out what you think will happen (Boris winning was certain) versus what you want to happen. You vote for what you want to happen. There's no "fallacy" in expressing your political views at the ballot box.

The encouragement to guess how other people will vote before deciding how to vote is one of the worst defects of FPTP, and it stifles a broad public debate on politics

Not exclusive to FPTP. See, for example, the French presidential election in progress at the moment.

Andy_Cooke said:

I see the discussion has turned to the joys of FPTP.

- If you don't vote for one of the Big Two, your vote is "wasted" [1] and others will choose for you.
- If you do vote for one of the Big Two, you cement the binary choice and if the Big Two see fit to present a choice of Corbyn or Johnson, well, that's just what you should expect.

Then we spend four or five years complaining about how crap the political leadership of the country is, and how bad were the choices given us, and we go around the cycle again.

[1] Spoiler - if the candidate you voted for wins by more than one vote, or loses, your vote was "wasted" anyway. Had you not turned up, the result would have been the same. You may as well have voted for who you preferred.

MarqueeMark said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/06/we-own-channel-4-sell-off-isnt-a-done-deal-armando-iannucci

The thing that is always striking from these defence pieces about BBC / CH4, is a) it is all historic, 30-40 years ago it did x and b) they acknowledge the elephant in the room, but never provide any suggestion about what to do about it.

Film4 spends £30m a year on new productions, Netflix spends £1bn a year and 10,000 people work on their productions in the UK. Sky are committing billions to UK production, with a massive project at Elstree . What Film4 spends in a year on total film budget, Netflix spends on 3 episodes of one of their blue chip shows.

I am all ears for suggestions. But no change isn't going to work. We see constantly now, the best talent goes to Netflix, Amazon. Its a bit like remembering when Wimbledon FC used to match up against the best in the Premier League, plucky upstarts on shoe string budget, and saying they can do it again....but now you either need billions and / or incredibly innovative owners like at Brentford.

The existing studios in the UK have been bought/block-booked by Netflix, Disney, Amazon. It is very, very difficult to get studio time in the UK because of this. A new large studio is being built outside Reading. Everyone went "Phew!" - then Disney booked the first three years. The old Hammer studios at Bray are having a massive makeover, there are new studios going up at Winnersh, Reading and various other places. It is an incredibly buoyant time - although finding staff is the next big issue.

Stereodog said:

glw said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/06/we-own-channel-4-sell-off-isnt-a-done-deal-armando-iannucci

The thing that is always striking from these defence pieces about BBC / CH4, is a) it is all historic, 30-40 years ago it did x and b) they acknowledge the elephant in the room, but never provide any suggestion about what to do about it.

Film4 spends £30m a year on new productions, Netflix spends £1bn a year and 10,000 people work on their productions in the UK. Sky are committing billions to UK production, with a massive project at Elstree . What Film4 spends in a year on total film budget, Netflix spends on 3 episodes of one of their blue chip shows.

I am all ears for suggestions. But no change isn't going to work. We see constantly now, the best talent goes to Netflix, Amazon. Its a bit like remembering when Wimbledon FC used to match up against the best in the Premier League, plucky upstarts on shoe string budget, and saying they can do it again....but now you either need billions and / or incredibly innovative owners like at Brentford.

No change is simply a slower death. If the likes of the BBC and Channel 4 haven't already figured out that broadcast TV is going the way of the dodo there will be no saving them. They should be demanding change, not clinging on to the past.

Proponents of this sale are imagining problems that don't exist.

Channel 4 makes a profit unlike certain major streaming services.

It's created or owns a lot of critically acclaimed and popular programmes such as 'Its a Sin', 'Derry Girls ', 'GBBO', 'Taskmaster'. This doesn't suggest an organisation that is creatively or financially moribund.

Do we really want every single media service to have the same corporate model? In my opinion we're going to have a massive streaming crash soon as there's too many out there to be sustainable. Soon people are going to realise how much they're paying to get the content they want.

FrancisUrquhart said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Have we discussed Matt Le Tissier proving he's an utter cockwomble?

He has gone absolutely total David Icke the past few years. No idea if he always been a bit like that or too much YouTube / Twitter. It can't have been too many knocks to the head when playing, as I don't think he ever headed the ball did he?

Selebian said:

Nigelb said:

BartholomewRoberts said:

Nigelb said:

Applicant said:

CorrectHorseBattery said:

https://twitter.com/skynews/status/1511669445877551104

BoJo goes woke

If you quoted what he said, it would have given the game away as it's the antithesis of woke:

"There are complexities and sensitivities when you move from the area of sexuality to the question of gender", says PM Boris Johnson, adding "I don't think it's reasonable" for children to "take decisions on their gender" without a parent's involvement.

What does any of that have to do with conversion therapy ?

The plain message of the government's decision to legislate in one case and not the other is that it's unacceptable for one, and acceptable for the other.

Of course it is.

Are you suggesting that transgendered people should be banned from converting to their desired sex? Or are you viewing conversion as the other way around perhaps? In which case should people who are not transgendered but think they might be, be denied therapy?

Sexuality and gender are completely different things. No reason at all to say the same solution must work for both.

The legislation is about banning coercion, not therapy.

In the government's own words:
https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/banning-conversion-therapy/banning-conversion-therapy
...I want to reassure those who may have concerns about the impact of this ban on clinicians’ independence as well as on freedom of speech. People’s personal freedoms are key to the health and functioning of a democratic society, such as freedom of choice, freedom of speech and belief, and are central to my proposals. It is also vitally important that no person is forced or coerced into conversion therapy, and that young people are supported in exploring their identity without being encouraged towards one particular path. This is especially the case for those who are under 18 and where this might result in an irreversible decision. These proposals therefore do not alter the existing clinical regulatory framework or the independence of regulated clinicians working within their professional obligations.

The proposed protections are universal: an attempt to change a person from being attracted to the same-sex to being attracted to the opposite-sex, or from not being transgender to being transgender, will be treated in the same way as the reverse scenario. They therefore protect everyone....

Until they decided otherwise.
The message is, as I say, clear.

I've liked, as I agree. But there is a degree of subtlety when it comes to transgender issues simply in the need for careful wording to avoid unintended consequences. Young person attends gender identity clinic claiming to want to change gender. Clinician suspects there are other issues at play (e.g. mental health, depression, risk that gender is being latched on to as a problem/solution) and pushes for e.g. mental health service referral. Does that fall under the legislation? It shouldn't and I don't think there was ever an intention that it should, but it could be a bit of a grey area.

One can make a similar argument re heterosexual/homosexual too, of course, but most homosexual young people are not going to be visiting doctors asking for treatment and so unlikely to be referred to a mental health service through that route. The example situation for children with transgender issues is not uncommon, indeed I have a recollection (may be incorrect) that CAMHS referral is even required before gender clinic referral in some areas (Wales?)

I still think conversion therapy should be banned, but the law would need to be drafted carefully, which should of course be perfectly possible.

bondegezou said:

RobD said:

bondegezou said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/06/we-own-channel-4-sell-off-isnt-a-done-deal-armando-iannucci

The thing that is always striking from these defence pieces about BBC / CH4, is a) it is all historic, 30-40 years ago it did x and b) they acknowledge the elephant in the room, but never provide any suggestion about what to do about it.

Film4 spends £30m a year on new productions, Netflix spends £1bn a year and 10,000 people work on their productions in the UK. Sky are committing billions to UK production, with a massive project at Elstree . What Film4 spends in a year on total film budget, Netflix spends on 3 episodes of one of their blue chip shows.

I am all ears for suggestions. But no change isn't going to work. We see constantly now, the best talent goes to Netflix, Amazon. Its a bit like remembering when Wimbledon FC used to match up against the best in the Premier League, plucky upstarts on shoe string budget, and saying they can do it again....but now you either need billions and / or incredibly innovative owners like at Brentford.

Netflix has never made a profit. Channel 4 is financially self-sustaining.

Are you sure? The net income reported was in the billions last year.

I'm sorry: they briefly had positive cash flow in 2020 when COVID stopped production and thus production costs. See https://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2022/01/27/netflix-is-still-overvalued-by-at-least-114-billion/

FrancisUrquhart said:

bondegezou said:

glw said:

bondegezou said:

TV is going through a period of huge change. What does any enterprise need to weather and indeed thrive in a period of such change? They need a stable foundation, a secure financial footing, which allows them to innovate and evolve in response. Now is the worst time to start tinkering with those foundations.

They don't have "a stable foundation, a secure financial footing, which allows them to innovate and evolve in response." They have a pittance to spend when compared to their new competitors. I've mentioned it before but Amazon are spending roughly as much on the first season of their Lord of the Rings series as the BBC spends on drama in an entire year. British broadcasters have never faced such well funded competition before, and unlike in the past those mostly US competitors can access the UK market directly.

https://www.nme.com/news/tv/uk-viewers-watched-three-times-more-bbc-than-netflix-in-2021-3150727

So, Netflix and other streamers have massively bigger budgets, but way more watch the BBC. Looks to me like the BBC is a model of efficiency we should be celebrating then!

Except a) nobody actually fully knows for certain Netflix viewership as they never release it and b) there is an absolutely huge demographic split. Oldies continue to watch linear tv, but middle aged and younger people don't.

NickPalmer said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

bondegezou said:

glw said:

bondegezou said:

TV is going through a period of huge change. What does any enterprise need to weather and indeed thrive in a period of such change? They need a stable foundation, a secure financial footing, which allows them to innovate and evolve in response. Now is the worst time to start tinkering with those foundations.

They don't have "a stable foundation, a secure financial footing, which allows them to innovate and evolve in response." They have a pittance to spend when compared to their new competitors. I've mentioned it before but Amazon are spending roughly as much on the first season of their Lord of the Rings series as the BBC spends on drama in an entire year. British broadcasters have never faced such well funded competition before, and unlike in the past those mostly US competitors can access the UK market directly.

https://www.nme.com/news/tv/uk-viewers-watched-three-times-more-bbc-than-netflix-in-2021-3150727

So, Netflix and other streamers have massively bigger budgets, but way more watch the BBC. Looks to me like the BBC is a model of efficiency we should be celebrating then!

Except a) nobody actually fully knows for certain Netflix viewership as they never release it and b) there is an absolutely huge demographic split. Oldies continue to watch linear tv, but middle aged and younger people don't.

Not entirely correct, according to the BARB figures I posted a couple of days ago. Apparently linear TV plus iplayer is watched for between 1 hour/day (youngsters) to 6 hours per day (oldies). I suspect that includes a lot of "having it on in the background", but soaps and the 6 o'clock news continue to dominate.

TheScreamingEagles said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Have we discussed Matt Le Tissier proving he's an utter cockwomble?

He has gone absolutely total David Icke the past few years. No idea if he always been a bit like that or too much YouTube / Twitter. It can't have been too many knocks to the head when playing, as I don't think he ever headed the ball did he?

It's so sad to see.

We saw on it here, once someone gets hooked to the conspiracy theories via Facebook/Twitter/YouTube they believe any old bollocks.

BartholomewRoberts said:

bondegezou said:

glw said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/06/we-own-channel-4-sell-off-isnt-a-done-deal-armando-iannucci

The thing that is always striking from these defence pieces about BBC / CH4, is a) it is all historic, 30-40 years ago it did x and b) they acknowledge the elephant in the room, but never provide any suggestion about what to do about it.

Film4 spends £30m a year on new productions, Netflix spends £1bn a year and 10,000 people work on their productions in the UK. Sky are committing billions to UK production, with a massive project at Elstree . What Film4 spends in a year on total film budget, Netflix spends on 3 episodes of one of their blue chip shows.

I am all ears for suggestions. But no change isn't going to work. We see constantly now, the best talent goes to Netflix, Amazon. Its a bit like remembering when Wimbledon FC used to match up against the best in the Premier League, plucky upstarts on shoe string budget, and saying they can do it again....but now you either need billions and / or incredibly innovative owners like at Brentford.

No change is simply a slower death. If the likes of the BBC and Channel 4 haven't already figured out that broadcast TV is going the way of the dodo there will be no saving them. They should be demanding change, not clinging on to the past.

TV is going through a period of huge change. What does any enterprise need to weather and indeed thrive in a period of such change? They need a stable foundation, a secure financial footing, which allows them to innovate and evolve in response. Now is the worst time to start tinkering with those foundations.

This is like the Government deciding to re-organise Public Health England in the middle of a pandemic, which diverted everyone's energies from fighting the pandemic to working out what the re-organisation meant and having to set up new systems for the successor bodies.

We talk about Global Britain and then the Conservative Government seeks to (unconservatively) meddle with our country's success stories.

"a stable foundation" - well that rules out linear broadcasting models then.
"a secure financial footing" - well that rules out the licence fee then, which people reasonably object to and are increasingly and rightly refusing to pay.

Glad we're agreed. What they need is to evolve and develop their own funding models secure for the future, not be decrepit and tied to the past.

If the entities instead try to cling to the past they don't deserve to survive the change and they should be allowed to wither and die.

FrancisUrquhart said:

bondegezou said:

glw said:

bondegezou said:

TV is going through a period of huge change. What does any enterprise need to weather and indeed thrive in a period of such change? They need a stable foundation, a secure financial footing, which allows them to innovate and evolve in response. Now is the worst time to start tinkering with those foundations.

They don't have "a stable foundation, a secure financial footing, which allows them to innovate and evolve in response." They have a pittance to spend when compared to their new competitors. I've mentioned it before but Amazon are spending roughly as much on the first season of their Lord of the Rings series as the BBC spends on drama in an entire year. British broadcasters have never faced such well funded competition before, and unlike in the past those mostly US competitors can access the UK market directly.

https://www.nme.com/news/tv/uk-viewers-watched-three-times-more-bbc-than-netflix-in-2021-3150727

So, Netflix and other streamers have massively bigger budgets, but way more watch the BBC. Looks to me like the BBC is a model of efficiency we should be celebrating then!

Except a) nobody actually fully knows for certain Netflix viewership as they never release it and b) there is an absolutely huge demographic split. Oldies continue to watch linear tv, but middle aged and younger people don't at anywhere near the same amount.

Media is having the same revolution as the globalisation of every other industry over the past 20-30 years, and many seem to want to try and repeat the mistake of those industries holding onto this yes but we are the best mantra, no need to change.

FrancisUrquhart said:

NickPalmer said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

bondegezou said:

glw said:

bondegezou said:

TV is going through a period of huge change. What does any enterprise need to weather and indeed thrive in a period of such change? They need a stable foundation, a secure financial footing, which allows them to innovate and evolve in response. Now is the worst time to start tinkering with those foundations.

They don't have "a stable foundation, a secure financial footing, which allows them to innovate and evolve in response." They have a pittance to spend when compared to their new competitors. I've mentioned it before but Amazon are spending roughly as much on the first season of their Lord of the Rings series as the BBC spends on drama in an entire year. British broadcasters have never faced such well funded competition before, and unlike in the past those mostly US competitors can access the UK market directly.

https://www.nme.com/news/tv/uk-viewers-watched-three-times-more-bbc-than-netflix-in-2021-3150727

So, Netflix and other streamers have massively bigger budgets, but way more watch the BBC. Looks to me like the BBC is a model of efficiency we should be celebrating then!

Except a) nobody actually fully knows for certain Netflix viewership as they never release it and b) there is an absolutely huge demographic split. Oldies continue to watch linear tv, but middle aged and younger people don't.

Not entirely correct, according to the BARB figures I posted a couple of days ago. Apparently linear TV plus iplayer is watched for between 1 hour/day (youngsters) to 6 hours per day (oldies). I suspect that includes a lot of "having it on in the background", but soaps and the 6 o'clock news continue to dominate.

I slightly adjusted my comment. But a) I am a bit dubious of that methodology e.g. 6hrs on average for oldies seem nonsense and b) the trend if your friend.....the trend is going one way, away from linear tv and fast.

The question isn't what is the state of play now, its whats the state of play in 5 years. 5G is coming, that means streaming anywhere that has it will become trivial. In the car, on the train, out in the countryside....

glw said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

bondegezou said:

glw said:

bondegezou said:

TV is going through a period of huge change. What does any enterprise need to weather and indeed thrive in a period of such change? They need a stable foundation, a secure financial footing, which allows them to innovate and evolve in response. Now is the worst time to start tinkering with those foundations.

They don't have "a stable foundation, a secure financial footing, which allows them to innovate and evolve in response." They have a pittance to spend when compared to their new competitors. I've mentioned it before but Amazon are spending roughly as much on the first season of their Lord of the Rings series as the BBC spends on drama in an entire year. British broadcasters have never faced such well funded competition before, and unlike in the past those mostly US competitors can access the UK market directly.

https://www.nme.com/news/tv/uk-viewers-watched-three-times-more-bbc-than-netflix-in-2021-3150727

So, Netflix and other streamers have massively bigger budgets, but way more watch the BBC. Looks to me like the BBC is a model of efficiency we should be celebrating then!

Except a) nobody actually fully knows for certain Netflix viewership as they never release it and b) there is an absolutely huge demographic split. Oldies continue to watch linear tv, but middle aged and younger people don't at anywhere near the same amount.

Media is having the same revolution as the globalisation of every other industry over the past 20-30 years, and many seem to want to try and repeat the mistake of those industries holding onto this yes but we are the best mantra, no need to change.

Young adults already watch more subscription streaming TV (like Netflix) than ALL broadcast TV and broadcaster streaming (like iPlayer) combined. When you add stuff like YouTube to the mix it's not even close, the ratio is nearer 2:1 already. So traditional broadcasters keep doing the same thing, there can't possibly be a huge problem developing before your eyes.

Benpointer said:

Holy f*ck! Just got my email from British Gas.

Our electricity costs are going to be £3,943 this year. Last year on a fixed deal we were paying £1,345.

That's a 293% increase with more to come in October! 😬

I can help but laugh that we're being charged 28.455p a unit and being paid 5.57p for the units we export from our PV panels.

glw said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

Absolutely, YouTube and Twitch have enormous viewership, and the production quality just increases every year. The big channels they have basically just cut out the middle men gatekeepers.

I think a big problem with this debate is that if you are predominantly a broadcast TV viewer, and in particular the main free-to-air channels, you probably aren't aware of just how much things have changed. I don't watch much TV of any sort at all, but I also see how different TV viewing is amongst my family to they way it was when I was a kid. There's no sitting down after school to watch the BBC for 90 minutes before dinner with a glass of orange squash. It's more like Roblox on the laptop and YouTube on the phone at the same time.