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Punters give Johnson a 5.4% chance of being PM at next election – politicalbetting.com

SystemSystem Posts: 11,002
edited September 2022 in General
imagePunters give Johnson a 5.4% chance of being PM at next election – politicalbetting.com

One thing that Boris Johnson has made absolutely clear is that he has hopes of some future in British politics. He continues to be a contributor to big discussions in the Commons and will go on getting a lot of attention from the news media.

Read the full story here

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Comments

  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    Con leader not PM
  • IshmaelZ said:

    Con leader not PM

    Same thing at the next election
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830

    IshmaelZ said:

    Con leader not PM

    Same thing at the next election
    Con maj nailed on?
  • RogerRoger Posts: 18,891
    Corbyn's got more chance.....
  • IshmaelZ said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Con leader not PM

    Same thing at the next election
    Con maj nailed on?
    At it, not after it, is the bet I think
  • Great thread on “Tales from the Queue”

    https://twitter.com/robertrea/status/1570310245465083906
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830

    IshmaelZ said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Con leader not PM

    Same thing at the next election
    Con maj nailed on?
    At it, not after it, is the bet I think
    Ah
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 7,254

    IshmaelZ said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Con leader not PM

    Same thing at the next election
    Con maj nailed on?
    At it, not after it, is the bet I think
    Yep, my reading. Some corner cases where e.g. government failing, LT booted out but stays as PM as an election is called, but BJ is annointed to fight the election - Con leader, but not PM at that point. But that can only be a pp or two difference.

    I don't see value here (at least, not for the kind of money I'd be willing to risk to lay). I might lay this at shorter odds if LT is sinking and the markets get overexcited about BJ's second coming.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    The latest polls show Truss has not got much bounce at all relative to what the Tories were polling under Johnson.

    Now she has made some good moves on cost of living and acted like a stateswoman after the Queen's death.

    However the decision of Truss and Kwarteng to end the cap on bankers' bonuses at a time of cost of living crisis and with a big deficit is politically tin eared even if economically there is the argument it will attract talent to the City and boost revenues longer term. It might go down well in the City of London and Home counties but it will not help Truss at all to retain the redwall. It is a further sign her government will be a more economically libertarian one than Boris' was
  • Underrated IMHO. Johnson is an election winner and could easily come back if, as I predict, Truss becomes extremely unpopular. She is in the process of blowing up the electoral coalition Johnson assembled. Does Truss have the nous to make sure Johnson's political future is destroyed by the privileges investigation? I doubt it.
  • CookieCookie Posts: 11,183
    Just been watching the livestream of the Lying in Sate. As others have said, weirdly compelling.
    There is a much bigger range of ages than I had thought. Clearly many of these people would otherwise be at work.
    Some people bow, or curtsy, some cross themselves. Most do little more than pause and nod, almost imperceptibly. Even after having queues for miles and hours, the British are not a demonstrative bunch. I quite liked the man, about my age, dressed in a suit who just mouthed the words 'Thank you'.
    The monarchy wasn't a big thing for me. But I am pleased for these people that they have had an opportunity to express how big a thing it was for them.
    But how do they feel afterwards? The camera only shows very briefly the expressions on people as they leave, and it is difficult to read too much into facial expressions at moments like this anyway. Are they pleased they made the effort, I wonder?

    Also, if you ask Google about 'the queue', it knows what you mean. You don't have to add any explanation.
  • Simon_PeachSimon_Peach Posts: 403
    edited September 2022
    HYUFD said:

    The latest polls show Truss has not got much bounce at all relative to what the Tories were polling under Johnson.

    Now she has made some good moves on cost of living and acted like a stateswoman after the Queen's death.

    However the decision of Truss and Kwarteng to end the cap on bankers' bonuses at a time of cost of living crisis and with a big deficit is politically tin eared even if economically there is the argument it will attract talent to the City and boost revenues longer term. It might go down well in the City of London and Home counties but it will not help Truss at all to retain the redwall. It is a further sign her government will be a more economically libertarian one than Boris' was

    I’m fascinated as to what not acting like a stateswoman would have been…
  • CookieCookie Posts: 11,183

    Great thread on “Tales from the Queue”

    https://twitter.com/robertrea/status/1570310245465083906

    That is brilliant. Britain at its best. That is how we do communal experiences.
  • kyf_100kyf_100 Posts: 3,911

    Somehow I put my response to this thread header on the previous thread. Not sure how that happened, anyway ...

    Terrible, terrible bet on both sides of the equation.

    Anyone who backs Johnson to be PM at the next election is just throwing their money away. He won't be.

    Anyone who backs Johnson not to be PM two years from now, for just a 5% return, when inflation is running at 10% per annum is just devaluing their own money and giving a negative real interest loan to Smarkets traders.

    Buy some Bitcoin instead with it Barty, you know you want to.
  • Cookie said:

    Great thread on “Tales from the Queue”

    https://twitter.com/robertrea/status/1570310245465083906

    That is brilliant. Britain at its best. That is how we do communal experiences.
    I can feel my next novel coming on: Queuing with Strangers. Endless possibilities for plot lines before, during and after the queue, as strangers intersect and new friends (or enemies) are made. Hope nobody beats me to it.
  • Underrated IMHO. Johnson is an election winner and could easily come back if, as I predict, Truss becomes extremely unpopular. She is in the process of blowing up the electoral coalition Johnson assembled. Does Truss have the nous to make sure Johnson's political future is destroyed by the privileges investigation? I doubt it.

    Johnson was an election winner. He is now toxic and the primary reason behind the Labour poll leads we see now. The Tories have done their leader change this Parliament, there is no road left for them to travel other than to roll the dice with Liz and hope.
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415
    Cyclefree said:

    Brexit Britain latest:

    Kwasi Kwarteng, chancellor, is seeking to scrap Britain’s cap on bankers’ bonuses - introduced after the 2008 financial crash - in a controversial move to boost the City of London’s global competitiveness.

    Oh goody.

    We can add the Financial Crisis Horseman to join his mates - Plague, War and a Gas Famine.

    And just when the Chancellor has sacked the only senior Treasury civil servant who advised the government during the last financial crisis.
    Fair play to Truss government for being honest why they sacked the Treasury head - they told media they want to take things in a “different direction” - explaining theres been far too much fiscal conservatism (!) they want to abandon that approach for “a dash for growth”.

    Is there anyone in this cabinet who have read UKs political and economic history of the 1960s and 70s 🫣

    Is Case still there?
  • pingping Posts: 3,724
    edited September 2022
    I’m on Boris next Con leader at 16/1. I think he should be clear favourite, ~4/1 or so.

    Not big stakes, and I’m not loading up more at the current price because his intentions aren’t clear and I dislike tying up too much money on long term markets, especially with a small, young company like smarkets and especially especially with inflation at 10%.
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 7,254

    Great thread on “Tales from the Queue”

    https://twitter.com/robertrea/status/1570310245465083906

    It is. This kind of thing happens anywhere you're trapped for a long time. I was in A&E for 7 hours a couple of weeks ago (was supposed to be a direct emergency admission, but the ward was full, so I and several others were dumped in the ED to wait).

    Two strangers became, I'm pretty sure, a couple (they certainly swapped numbers). I got chatting to an elderly Welsh guy who, it turned out, went to school with one of my former bosses (professor, now dead). There was a weird noise every few minutes for about half an hour, which turned out to be santiser dispenser hidden behind a lady sitting on a chair (she ended up with a coat covered down the back in hand sanitiser). We swapped tales of waits, then and in the past. We compared notes on the biscuits available.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,132
    edited September 2022
    FPT
    MattW said:

    Carnyx said:

    Nigelb said:

    HYUFD said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Ben Judah in UnHerd

    "Queen Elizabeth’s death marks the latest step away from divinely ordained monarchy, towards something else. No longer sacred, the European monarch would rather be a pilot, or a country gentleman interested in urban planning. Another step along the path we have travelled since the laying of hands on His Majesty to cure disease was suspended after Queen Anne. It is no longer possible to suspend disbelief. The magic — or rather the mindset — was gone. There have been tears for the Queen this week, but can we imagine the same for Prince William decades from now?"

    https://unherd.com/2022/09/divine-monarchy-is-finished/

    The monarch will always be divinely ordained, whatever liberal intellectuals may wish
    Alternatively, you will always believe in fairies, and the Tory party.
    There's also the slight problem that, *on the monarchy's own evidence*, it supports two different religions, or at least two very different varieties of non-RC Christianity, one north and the other south of the border. The English variety of Catholic episcopalianism, subordinating Church to State, is completely incompatible with Calvinist Presbyterianism. As indeed the history of the High Kirk of St Giles reminds us.
    That seems to me to be a bit of a theological distinction, in both senses. There are far too many nuances and shades of grey.

    There is no established church in Scotland, so I don't see how particular religious requirements can be placed on the monarch or the nation.

    Secondly, it gets more interesting elsewhere' King Charles is also head of state of Papua New Guinea, for example. And that is a *very* interesting place for religion.

    And the links between CofS and CofE pointed out above imo suggest that 'completely incompatible' is an overstatement.
    Sorry I was out - so replying now. I had also thought that the Church of Scotland (strictly designated) was disestablished but it's not, in the sense that it remains the official church of Scotland [edit] as far as the state is concerned. Ydoethur pointed that out in a very interesting post a day or two back. And KCIII was swearing to protect the Protestant C of S at his proclamation-wotsit a few days ago. I don't *think* he did that for the Niugini religions, did he?
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715
    edited September 2022
    Didn't the Conservative party do very badly when the seats which will be contested in 2023 were last contested? It follows that it's not likely to do very badly in 2023.
    Comparatively speaking of course. If it does lose many seats, then that suggests a wipe out at the next general election!

  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614

    Somehow I put my response to this thread header on the previous thread. Not sure how that happened, anyway ...

    Terrible, terrible bet on both sides of the equation.

    Anyone who backs Johnson to be PM at the next election is just throwing their money away. He won't be.

    Anyone who backs Johnson not to be PM two years from now, for just a 5% return, when inflation is running at 10% per annum is just devaluing their own money and giving a negative real interest loan to Smarkets traders.

    Yep, time value of money is an important consideration, now that we have inflation.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    ping said:

    I’m on Boris next Con leader at 16/1. I think he should be clear favourite, ~4/1 or so.

    Wouldn't touch him at 160/1
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 7,254
    kyf_100 said:

    Somehow I put my response to this thread header on the previous thread. Not sure how that happened, anyway ...

    Terrible, terrible bet on both sides of the equation.

    Anyone who backs Johnson to be PM at the next election is just throwing their money away. He won't be.

    Anyone who backs Johnson not to be PM two years from now, for just a 5% return, when inflation is running at 10% per annum is just devaluing their own money and giving a negative real interest loan to Smarkets traders.

    Buy some Bitcoin instead with it Barty, you know you want to.
    It is at least a much faster way of losing money!
  • DynamoDynamo Posts: 651

    Cyclefree said:

    Brexit Britain latest:

    Kwasi Kwarteng, chancellor, is seeking to scrap Britain’s cap on bankers’ bonuses - introduced after the 2008 financial crash - in a controversial move to boost the City of London’s global competitiveness.

    Oh goody.

    We can add the Financial Crisis Horseman to join his mates - Plague, War and a Gas Famine.

    And just when the Chancellor has sacked the only senior Treasury civil servant who advised the government during the last financial crisis.
    Fair play to Truss government for being honest why they sacked the Treasury head - they told media they want to take things in a “different direction” - explaining theres been far too much fiscal conservatism (!) they want to abandon that approach for “a dash for growth”.
    If a civil servant can't implement government policy when it changes, why was he hired?

  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415

    Underrated IMHO. Johnson is an election winner and could easily come back if, as I predict, Truss becomes extremely unpopular. She is in the process of blowing up the electoral coalition Johnson assembled. Does Truss have the nous to make sure Johnson's political future is destroyed by the privileges investigation? I doubt it.

    Johnson was an election winner. He is now toxic and the primary reason behind the Labour poll leads we see now. The Tories have done their leader change this Parliament, there is no road left for them to travel other than to roll the dice with Liz and hope.
    So toxic that if he had been in the run off in this Tory leadership election he would have won it.

    The Labour Party are loving the fact Boris is out of the way.
  • wooliedyedwooliedyed Posts: 6,827
    Morning
    Truss is going nowhere before the Coronation. The biggest world spectacle in decades, not a chance the Tories put it all at risk by infighting. After that we are in the home straight. Shes leader at the next election. This 'it will all go tits up because we have been saying it will' is no basis for betting or likelihood. Mays locals are, perhaps fortunately for her, against a dreadful 2019 set.
    No Boris (no cry).
    She gets to relaunch next week with whatever bells and whistles she planned, she gets to hobble conference season 'to show we are working hard' etc.
    Over to the electorate/poll respondants to judge
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415
    Dynamo said:

    Cyclefree said:

    Brexit Britain latest:

    Kwasi Kwarteng, chancellor, is seeking to scrap Britain’s cap on bankers’ bonuses - introduced after the 2008 financial crash - in a controversial move to boost the City of London’s global competitiveness.

    Oh goody.

    We can add the Financial Crisis Horseman to join his mates - Plague, War and a Gas Famine.

    And just when the Chancellor has sacked the only senior Treasury civil servant who advised the government during the last financial crisis.
    Fair play to Truss government for being honest why they sacked the Treasury head - they told media they want to take things in a “different direction” - explaining theres been far too much fiscal conservatism (!) they want to abandon that approach for “a dash for growth”.
    If a civil servant can't implement government policy when it changes, why was he hired?

    Hired? Have you any idea how the UK works? How it built and ran an Empire through a department of just five thousand civil servants?

    It’s a reassurance to many of us in UK that no matter how silly and green at the edges our governments are, at least the experience of our Civil Service is still running the country.
  • pingping Posts: 3,724
    edited September 2022

    Underrated IMHO. Johnson is an election winner and could easily come back if, as I predict, Truss becomes extremely unpopular. She is in the process of blowing up the electoral coalition Johnson assembled. Does Truss have the nous to make sure Johnson's political future is destroyed by the privileges investigation? I doubt it.

    Johnson was an election winner. He is now toxic and the primary reason behind the Labour poll leads we see now. The Tories have done their leader change this Parliament, there is no road left for them to travel other than to roll the dice with Liz and hope.
    So toxic that if he had been in the run off in this Tory leadership election he would have won it.

    The Labour Party are loving the fact Boris is out of the way.
    Yep. Starmer and labour spent the last year or so bluffing. They fear Boris way more than Truss. Or Sunak.

    Kemi is an interesting one. Had the tories picked her, by the time of the election she could have neutralised her big negative (inexperience) and gone on to give labour a complete pounding, holding onto most of the red wall.

    Or she might have been shit. We’ll never find out.
  • Underrated IMHO. Johnson is an election winner and could easily come back if, as I predict, Truss becomes extremely unpopular. She is in the process of blowing up the electoral coalition Johnson assembled. Does Truss have the nous to make sure Johnson's political future is destroyed by the privileges investigation? I doubt it.

    Johnson was an election winner. He is now toxic and the primary reason behind the Labour poll leads we see now. The Tories have done their leader change this Parliament, there is no road left for them to travel other than to roll the dice with Liz and hope.
    So toxic that if he had been in the run off in this Tory leadership election he would have won it.

    That says a lot about the current state of the Tory Party
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 47,786
    edited September 2022
    FPT
    As one of the replies says, “He at least helpfully lists all the other countries that Germany would happily give up to Russian aggression…”
  • wooliedyedwooliedyed Posts: 6,827
    edited September 2022
    One factor we ought to take into account i think is this

    If X = the situation politically, socially, mentally etc until 6.30PM Thursday 8 Sept 2022 and
    Y = everything on hold for national mourning, extraordinary scenes of queues, tributes etc, outpourings of emotion and feeling, clear 'instant' changes of opinion over, for example, KC3

    We would be very foolish to assume after Y we return to X

    What is Z?
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    edited September 2022
    Carnyx said:

    FPT

    MattW said:

    Carnyx said:

    Nigelb said:

    HYUFD said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Ben Judah in UnHerd

    "Queen Elizabeth’s death marks the latest step away from divinely ordained monarchy, towards something else. No longer sacred, the European monarch would rather be a pilot, or a country gentleman interested in urban planning. Another step along the path we have travelled since the laying of hands on His Majesty to cure disease was suspended after Queen Anne. It is no longer possible to suspend disbelief. The magic — or rather the mindset — was gone. There have been tears for the Queen this week, but can we imagine the same for Prince William decades from now?"

    https://unherd.com/2022/09/divine-monarchy-is-finished/

    The monarch will always be divinely ordained, whatever liberal intellectuals may wish
    Alternatively, you will always believe in fairies, and the Tory party.
    There's also the slight problem that, *on the monarchy's own evidence*, it supports two different religions, or at least two very different varieties of non-RC Christianity, one north and the other south of the border. The English variety of Catholic episcopalianism, subordinating Church to State, is completely incompatible with Calvinist Presbyterianism. As indeed the history of the High Kirk of St Giles reminds us.
    That seems to me to be a bit of a theological distinction, in both senses. There are far too many nuances and shades of grey.

    There is no established church in Scotland, so I don't see how particular religious requirements can be placed on the monarch or the nation.

    Secondly, it gets more interesting elsewhere' King Charles is also head of state of Papua New Guinea, for example. And that is a *very* interesting place for religion.

    And the links between CofS and CofE pointed out above imo suggest that 'completely incompatible' is an overstatement.
    Sorry I was out - so replying now. I had also thought that the Church of Scotland (strictly designated) was disestablished but it's not, in the sense that it remains the official church of Scotland [edit] as far as the state is concerned. Ydoethur pointed that out in a very interesting post a day or two back. And KCIII was swearing to protect the Protestant C of S at his proclamation-wotsit a few days ago. I don't *think* he did that for the Niugini religions, did he?
    Indeed, the Scottish Episcopal Church is the Anglican church in Scotland even if the Queen is not its Supreme Governor unlike the C of E. However as you say the Church of Scotland is the official national church in Scotland and effectively the established church there.

  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,132
    edited September 2022
    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    FPT

    MattW said:

    Carnyx said:

    Nigelb said:

    HYUFD said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Ben Judah in UnHerd

    "Queen Elizabeth’s death marks the latest step away from divinely ordained monarchy, towards something else. No longer sacred, the European monarch would rather be a pilot, or a country gentleman interested in urban planning. Another step along the path we have travelled since the laying of hands on His Majesty to cure disease was suspended after Queen Anne. It is no longer possible to suspend disbelief. The magic — or rather the mindset — was gone. There have been tears for the Queen this week, but can we imagine the same for Prince William decades from now?"

    https://unherd.com/2022/09/divine-monarchy-is-finished/

    The monarch will always be divinely ordained, whatever liberal intellectuals may wish
    Alternatively, you will always believe in fairies, and the Tory party.
    There's also the slight problem that, *on the monarchy's own evidence*, it supports two different religions, or at least two very different varieties of non-RC Christianity, one north and the other south of the border. The English variety of Catholic episcopalianism, subordinating Church to State, is completely incompatible with Calvinist Presbyterianism. As indeed the history of the High Kirk of St Giles reminds us.
    That seems to me to be a bit of a theological distinction, in both senses. There are far too many nuances and shades of grey.

    There is no established church in Scotland, so I don't see how particular religious requirements can be placed on the monarch or the nation.

    Secondly, it gets more interesting elsewhere' King Charles is also head of state of Papua New Guinea, for example. And that is a *very* interesting place for religion.

    And the links between CofS and CofE pointed out above imo suggest that 'completely incompatible' is an overstatement.
    Sorry I was out - so replying now. I had also thought that the Church of Scotland (strictly designated) was disestablished but it's not, in the sense that it remains the official church of Scotland [edit] as far as the state is concerned. Ydoethur pointed that out in a very interesting post a day or two back. And KCIII was swearing to protect the Protestant C of S at his proclamation-wotsit a few days ago. I don't *think* he did that for the Niugini religions, did he?
    Indeed, the Scottish Episcopal is the Anglican church in Scotland even if the Queen is not its Supreme Governor unlike the C of E. However as you say the Church of Scotland is the official national church in Scotland and effectively the established church there.

    To be even more specific, the SEC is not the Anglican Church = C of E in Scotland , but a member of the Anglican network. Not the same thing, not least because they are independently derived from different dioceses/groups of dioceses of the Roman Cahtolic Church (though in the case of the SEC via the Church of Scotland proper, most of which became and remained Presbyterian).
  • paulyork64paulyork64 Posts: 2,461
    edited September 2022
    On a previous thread there was discussion of a correlation between being a royalist and being superstitious. I wasn't until an image of HMQ appeared in my granddaughter's wallpaper.

    https://ibb.co/7VP0Sgm
  • WhisperingOracleWhisperingOracle Posts: 8,480
    edited September 2022
    FPT, I quite like this :

    "Tory politicians have backed a campaign which has been launched to give the late Queen the title of 'Elizabeth the Faithful' because 'the Great' is rather common and has been used by despots and conquerors."

  • kyf_100kyf_100 Posts: 3,911
    edited September 2022
    Selebian said:

    kyf_100 said:

    Somehow I put my response to this thread header on the previous thread. Not sure how that happened, anyway ...

    Terrible, terrible bet on both sides of the equation.

    Anyone who backs Johnson to be PM at the next election is just throwing their money away. He won't be.

    Anyone who backs Johnson not to be PM two years from now, for just a 5% return, when inflation is running at 10% per annum is just devaluing their own money and giving a negative real interest loan to Smarkets traders.

    Buy some Bitcoin instead with it Barty, you know you want to.
    It is at least a much faster way of losing money!
    The coin I bought for $300 is still doing well...
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614
    HYUFD said:

    The latest polls show Truss has not got much bounce at all relative to what the Tories were polling under Johnson.

    Now she has made some good moves on cost of living and acted like a stateswoman after the Queen's death.

    However the decision of Truss and Kwarteng to end the cap on bankers' bonuses at a time of cost of living crisis and with a big deficit is politically tin eared even if economically there is the argument it will attract talent to the City and boost revenues longer term. It might go down well in the City of London and Home counties but it will not help Truss at all to retain the redwall. It is a further sign her government will be a more economically libertarian one than Boris' was

    Taking more tax revenue from the City, and less tax revenue from the income of ordinary people, should go down a storm in the Red Wall. RW voters are not obsessed by the politics of envy, they just want their own taxes to come down.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,273

    Underrated IMHO. Johnson is an election winner and could easily come back if, as I predict, Truss becomes extremely unpopular. She is in the process of blowing up the electoral coalition Johnson assembled. Does Truss have the nous to make sure Johnson's political future is destroyed by the privileges investigation? I doubt it.

    Johnson was an election winner. He is now toxic and the primary reason behind the Labour poll leads we see now. The Tories have done their leader change this Parliament, there is no road left for them to travel other than to roll the dice with Liz and hope.
    So toxic that if he had been in the run off in this Tory leadership election he would have won it.

    The Labour Party are loving the fact Boris is out of the way.
    Toxic with the general population; not toxic with the rather unrepresentative Tory membership.

    If you cannot see the difference there you might as well give up.
  • DynamoDynamo Posts: 651

    Morning
    Truss is going nowhere before the Coronation. The biggest world spectacle in decades, not a chance the Tories put it all at risk by infighting. After that we are in the home straight. Shes leader at the next election.

    You write as if it's a certainty there's going to be a coronation, and in addition that if there is then billions around the world will eagerly lap it up. Have you examined the assumptions?

    In 1953 the prime ministerial declaration that "You've never had it so good" may have lain a few years in the future, but by that year there was already a general atmosphere of progress in the country, and also there was the spread of TV (which personally I wouldn't call progress of any kind, but many others would).

    This time, what is there? What will they do? Give every child in the country a bag of sweets with a picture of the "king and queen consort" on the front, the cost to be added to their "student loan" when they reach 18?

    There could easily be prolonged widespread power cuts this winter, and rampant inflation not just of domestic energy, and who knows what will happen in the war? What are the chances of another lockdown? Or of an "overwhelming" of the NHS?

    For that matter, who can be sure that the mentally and emotionally retarded gullible syphilitic idiot of a "God-sent" bully on the throne will still have his a*se on it in a few months' time?

    Has Harry agreed not to bring his book out? :-)
  • FPT, I quite like this :

    "Tory politicians have backed a campaign which has been launched to give the late Queen the title of 'Elizabeth the Faithful' because 'the Great' is rather common and has been used by despots and conquerors."

    No danger of it being applied to the present incumbent, either ante or post mortem.
  • Somehow I put my response to this thread header on the previous thread. Not sure how that happened, anyway ...

    Terrible, terrible bet on both sides of the equation.

    Anyone who backs Johnson to be PM at the next election is just throwing their money away. He won't be.

    Anyone who backs Johnson not to be PM two years from now, for just a 5% return, when inflation is running at 10% per annum is just devaluing their own money and giving a negative real interest loan to Smarkets traders.

    Aren't those trading bets, though? So people aren't sitting on them for two years - they are reasoning that his price will drift before then as attention turns elsewhere, as he potentially runs into trouble on ethics investigations, possibly even calling it a day as MP etc.

    I'm not sure it's a good trade even then, and your inflation point is not an unreasonable one. But people aren't in reality waiting for a small return in 2024 but much sooner.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    FPT

    MattW said:

    Carnyx said:

    Nigelb said:

    HYUFD said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Ben Judah in UnHerd

    "Queen Elizabeth’s death marks the latest step away from divinely ordained monarchy, towards something else. No longer sacred, the European monarch would rather be a pilot, or a country gentleman interested in urban planning. Another step along the path we have travelled since the laying of hands on His Majesty to cure disease was suspended after Queen Anne. It is no longer possible to suspend disbelief. The magic — or rather the mindset — was gone. There have been tears for the Queen this week, but can we imagine the same for Prince William decades from now?"

    https://unherd.com/2022/09/divine-monarchy-is-finished/

    The monarch will always be divinely ordained, whatever liberal intellectuals may wish
    Alternatively, you will always believe in fairies, and the Tory party.
    There's also the slight problem that, *on the monarchy's own evidence*, it supports two different religions, or at least two very different varieties of non-RC Christianity, one north and the other south of the border. The English variety of Catholic episcopalianism, subordinating Church to State, is completely incompatible with Calvinist Presbyterianism. As indeed the history of the High Kirk of St Giles reminds us.
    That seems to me to be a bit of a theological distinction, in both senses. There are far too many nuances and shades of grey.

    There is no established church in Scotland, so I don't see how particular religious requirements can be placed on the monarch or the nation.

    Secondly, it gets more interesting elsewhere' King Charles is also head of state of Papua New Guinea, for example. And that is a *very* interesting place for religion.

    And the links between CofS and CofE pointed out above imo suggest that 'completely incompatible' is an overstatement.
    Sorry I was out - so replying now. I had also thought that the Church of Scotland (strictly designated) was disestablished but it's not, in the sense that it remains the official church of Scotland [edit] as far as the state is concerned. Ydoethur pointed that out in a very interesting post a day or two back. And KCIII was swearing to protect the Protestant C of S at his proclamation-wotsit a few days ago. I don't *think* he did that for the Niugini religions, did he?
    Indeed, the Scottish Episcopal is the Anglican church in Scotland even if the Queen is not its Supreme Governor unlike the C of E. However as you say the Church of Scotland is the official national church in Scotland and effectively the established church there.

    To be even more specific, the SEC is not the Anglican Church = C of E in Scotland , but a member of the Anglican network. Not the same thing, not least because they are independently derived from different dioceses/groups of dioceses of the Roman Cahtolic Church (though in the case of the SEC via the Church of Scotland proper, most of which became and remained Presbyterian).
    The SEC is the Anglican church and a member of the Anglican communion. Same as the Church in Wales and the Church of Ireland, all who have the Archbishop of Canterbury as their ceremonial head even if they do not share the King as their Supreme Governor with the Church of England.

    Pre Reformation both England and Scotland were majority Roman Catholic. The Scottish Episcopal Church actually started as early as 1582 just over 20 years after the Church of Scotland was founded to preserve bishops
  • kjhkjh Posts: 10,458
    I see Theresa Coffey has got her priorities right. Telling NHS staff to stop using the Oxford Comma. Glad she is doing no 1 on the priority list.

    And why stop using it? Some sort of Grammar Hitler stuff regardless that the removal of the use of it can cause utter confusion. After all it is not as though clarity is important in the NHS.

    What is wrong with her?
  • My prediction is that Truss will turn out to be a lot better than many of us gave her credit for. Boris Johnson is a busted flush. He is yesterday's Clown; someone who achieved a great election victory against a ridiculously weedy opponent and managed very little else of note. His deranged supporters might want him back, but they will hopefully diminish in time, and before long it will be difficult to find anyone to admit they supported him.
  • TOPPING said:

    Cookie said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    ping said:

    Wow.

    Analyst on R5L’s wake up to money - tracking a basket of essential goods says price difference between Morrissons and Aldi is now 40%. Explained by Morrisons having to service a gigantic debt.

    Shop at Aldi, people.

    Good morning

    I heard that report as well and it is astonishing that Morrisons apparently have a 7 billion debt

    Shop anywhere but Morrisons would be the message

    5live also discussed Kwarteng's proposal to abolish city bonuses and it really does make you wonder if the conservative party have lost all it's instincts to govern

    It may be the right thing from a business sense, but the optics are shocking and hands yet another gift to labour

    It is the right thing from city workers sense. It is a bad thing for shareholders and really bad for government and taxpayers who will eventually have to fund another bailout with years of austerity.
    I'm curious about this idea that bankers bonuses caused the subprime mortgage crisis.

    I am even more curious about the idea that there will ever be another bank bailout.
    Extreme bankers bonuses create incentives for bankers to gamble with the banks money. If they win, fantastic, if they lose its not their money and as long as you can talk the talk and know some of the right people, it is still easy to get another job.

    That culture feeds through to the banks to gamble, notionally with their money, but knowing they have a government funded back stop as they are too big to fail.

    Take away the controls and regulation and sooner or later we shall be back to bail outs.
    Well, it's too bad the Labour government didn't do something about it then...
    Of course. Not sure why you think that is relevant when they have not been in power for a long time and it is the current governments policies that will matter.
    Well, the view of Labour supporters on the GFC is "it started in America".
    That's not the view of Labour supporters, it is a statement of fact.
    The global [key word, there] financial crisis started in America.
    Britain was very poorly placed to weather it because Gordon Brown had spent the previous 6 years [after an admirable initial period of restraint] pissing money up the wall, spending more than he raked in even during times of relative financial health.
    Personally I couldn't give a fig how big bankers' bonuses are. I don't care at all about the optics, I care about the gap between what we spend and what we earn. That should be the #1 issue for a chancellor of the exchequer to worry about. If this measure narrows that gap (and I am at best agnostic about whether it will) it should be welcomed.
    Britain was hit badly because we have a large globally exposed financial sector and one of our biggest banks was in the midst of an ill-advised over-leveraged buying spree at the top of the market. Running a structural deficit of 4% of GDP in 2007 compared to a G7 average of 3% is unlikely to have been a significant factor in explaining why we were hit worse than others, no matter how much people want it to be Gordon Brown's fault.
    Running a structural deficit of 4% during pre-crash times is utterly catastrophic as when the crash inevitably comes and you inevitably need countercyclical spending to go with it, then you have nowhere to go.

    The fact that some other countries were nearly as bad as the UK doesn't justify or excuse what Brown did.
    But it is hard to blame Brown's fiscal policy for us being hit *much worse than others* when Brown's fiscal policy was *pretty much the same as others'*. That was the point I was responding to.
    Also worth noting that our debt to GDP ratio in 2007 was 41% (down from 43% in 1997) compared to a G7 average of 81%. So we had plenty of space to run countercyclical fiscal policy, certainly compared to other countries, and indeed the increase in our debt to GDP ratio between 2007 and 2010 (33pp) was almost identical to the G7 average (32pp), suggesting that we were indeed able to run a countercyclical fiscal policy just like other economies.
    Except it wasn't the same as others, it was via your own figures worse than others. And of course its worth noting that the G7 average includes the UK so the G7 average was itself getting dragged down by Brown's terrible performance.

    Debt to GDP isn't the relevant figure, the deficit is, although its worth noting via your own figures again in the span of three years Brown nearly doubled our debt-to-GDP figure whereas G7 nations debt-to-GDP increased by much less than half.
    Gordon Brown's peak debt to GDP being around 3% iirc which was on a par with preceding Conservative governments. It was not significant and did not cause or exacerbate the GFC.

    Also, aiui Team Truss has determined, as Cheney said of Reagan, that deficits don't matter and that George Osborne's austerity was a mistake that hobbled Britain's economy.
    Except....this was a time of unprecedented receipts. The housing market was going bananas, profits were high, and it was a time where debt to GDP didn't need to be as high given the circumstances in the economy. Simply, we were spending too much. I don't think anyone disputes that, no matter what they think the answer (austerity/non-austerity) should have been.
    Yes, there is a good deal in that. But as it happened, the GFC came along and rendered it all moot. Then Osborne came along and flatlined the nascent recovery inherited from Labour, and here we are.
    The GFC didn't just "come along and render it moot", the GFC was a crash that the Government should have been preparing for as it was overdue. Crashes happen, and the GFC was a classic crash, not some exogenous and unforeseeable shock.

    And you repeat the myth that Osborne flatlined the recovery. Don't you realise the UK in the 2010s grew faster than the Eurozone did, both in nominal terms and in per capita terms. "Despite Brexit" supposedly harming the UK during that decade.

    If Brexit and Osborne "flatlined" or harmed the UK, then how come the UK grew faster than the Eurozone or the rest of the EU? Just how much faster than them would we have grown in your eyes were it not for Osborne or Brexit, and why?
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    Sandpit said:

    HYUFD said:

    The latest polls show Truss has not got much bounce at all relative to what the Tories were polling under Johnson.

    Now she has made some good moves on cost of living and acted like a stateswoman after the Queen's death.

    However the decision of Truss and Kwarteng to end the cap on bankers' bonuses at a time of cost of living crisis and with a big deficit is politically tin eared even if economically there is the argument it will attract talent to the City and boost revenues longer term. It might go down well in the City of London and Home counties but it will not help Truss at all to retain the redwall. It is a further sign her government will be a more economically libertarian one than Boris' was

    Taking more tax revenue from the City, and less tax revenue from the income of ordinary people, should go down a storm in the Red Wall. RW voters are not obsessed by the politics of envy, they just want their own taxes to come down.
    We will see if it actually leads to big tax cuts for redwall voters and more revenue overall for the Treasury. If not Truss will be in trouble
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830

    FPT, I quite like this :

    "Tory politicians have backed a campaign which has been launched to give the late Queen the title of 'Elizabeth the Faithful' because 'the Great' is rather common and has been used by despots and conquerors."

    Eeeuw. I don't think that sort of epithet is formally conferred is it? She can't have the Great after QEI. Faithful raises questions about Porchester.

    Just leave it.
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 60,001
    edited September 2022
    I expect a 5% chance is about right but I just do not see Johnson returning

    This is a very good article on Sky news site and I am posting a link to it but for those who blame the UK's woes on Brexit this is far more nuanced and credible

    Sam Tombs, Chief UK Economist at economic research consultancy Pantheon Macroeconomics, says this is evidence of a small Brexit impact.

    Mr Tombs also said that "the UK's relatively high inflation rate largely is a consequence of government policies to date."

    "The government has helped households cope with higher energy prices by giving them grants - which don't reduce consumer prices - rather than directly controlling energy prices as many other governments in Europe have done."

    "This will change from October, now the government has put in place the £2,500 price cap, so I doubt Britain will be an outlier next year."

    Mr McWilliams agreed that the Brexit impact is likely small.

    "Immigration post-Brexit has been roughly the same as it was before, although the mix is different. If you look at the things that have gone up in price it doesn't follow that Brexit is the issue - Brexit doesn't affect energy prices or the price of wheat.

    "There could be a bit of an effect, but it's hard to see good evidence for it and it's not the most obvious factor."

    https://news.sky.com/story/cost-of-living-are-prices-in-the-uk-rising-faster-than-other-countries-12696483
  • WhisperingOracleWhisperingOracle Posts: 8,480
    edited September 2022
    kjh said:

    I see Theresa Coffey has got her priorities right. Telling NHS staff to stop using the Oxford Comma. Glad she is doing no 1 on the priority list.

    And why stop using it? Some sort of Grammar Hitler stuff regardless that the removal of the use of it can cause utter confusion. After all it is not as though clarity is important in the NHS.

    What is wrong with her?

    Sadly her record in government is appalling. Still no sign of the DWP report and investigation into the uselessness of welfare sanctions, which she repressed because it didn't fit her narrative.
  • FPT, I quite like this :

    "Tory politicians have backed a campaign which has been launched to give the late Queen the title of 'Elizabeth the Faithful' because 'the Great' is rather common and has been used by despots and conquerors."

    Quite nice, but my immediate thought was that Philip would therefore be Philip (the alleged) Unfaithful
  • Selebian said:

    Great thread on “Tales from the Queue”

    https://twitter.com/robertrea/status/1570310245465083906

    It is. This kind of thing happens anywhere you're trapped for a long time. I was in A&E for 7 hours a couple of weeks ago (was supposed to be a direct emergency admission, but the ward was full, so I and several others were dumped in the ED to wait).

    Two strangers became, I'm pretty sure, a couple (they certainly swapped numbers). I got chatting to an elderly Welsh guy who, it turned out, went to school with one of my former bosses (professor, now dead). There was a weird noise every few minutes for about half an hour, which turned out to be santiser dispenser hidden behind a lady sitting on a chair (she ended up with a coat covered down the back in hand sanitiser). We swapped tales of waits, then and in the past. We compared notes on the biscuits available.
    Wait, they give you free biscuits in the queue?
  • paulyork64paulyork64 Posts: 2,461

    FPT, I quite like this :

    "Tory politicians have backed a campaign which has been launched to give the late Queen the title of 'Elizabeth the Faithful' because 'the Great' is rather common and has been used by despots and conquerors."

    I think until the day I die she will always just be The Queen, because I won't see another one.
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 35,765

    FPT, I quite like this :

    "Tory politicians have backed a campaign which has been launched to give the late Queen the title of 'Elizabeth the Faithful' because 'the Great' is rather common and has been used by despots and conquerors."

    No danger of it being applied to the present incumbent, either ante or post mortem.
    Maybe Charles The Scourge of God.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    Dynamo said:

    Morning
    Truss is going nowhere before the Coronation. The biggest world spectacle in decades, not a chance the Tories put it all at risk by infighting. After that we are in the home straight. Shes leader at the next election.

    You write as if it's a certainty there's going to be a coronation, and in addition that if there is then billions around the world will eagerly lap it up. Have you examined the assumptions?

    In 1953 the prime ministerial declaration that "You've never had it so good" may have lain a few years in the future, but by that year there was already a general atmosphere of progress in the country, and also there was the spread of TV (which personally I wouldn't call progress of any kind, but many others would).

    This time, what is there? What will they do? Give every child in the country a bag of sweets with a picture of the "king and queen consort" on the front, the cost to be added to their "student loan" when they reach 18?

    There could easily be prolonged widespread power cuts this winter, and rampant inflation not just of domestic energy, and who knows what will happen in the war? What are the chances of another lockdown? Or of an "overwhelming" of the NHS?

    For that matter, who can be sure that the mentally and emotionally retarded gullible syphilitic idiot of a "God-sent" bully on the throne will still have his a*se on it in a few months' time?

    Has Harry agreed not to bring his book out? :-)
    How you do go on, Dynie. Chill.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,132
    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    FPT

    MattW said:

    Carnyx said:

    Nigelb said:

    HYUFD said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Ben Judah in UnHerd

    "Queen Elizabeth’s death marks the latest step away from divinely ordained monarchy, towards something else. No longer sacred, the European monarch would rather be a pilot, or a country gentleman interested in urban planning. Another step along the path we have travelled since the laying of hands on His Majesty to cure disease was suspended after Queen Anne. It is no longer possible to suspend disbelief. The magic — or rather the mindset — was gone. There have been tears for the Queen this week, but can we imagine the same for Prince William decades from now?"

    https://unherd.com/2022/09/divine-monarchy-is-finished/

    The monarch will always be divinely ordained, whatever liberal intellectuals may wish
    Alternatively, you will always believe in fairies, and the Tory party.
    There's also the slight problem that, *on the monarchy's own evidence*, it supports two different religions, or at least two very different varieties of non-RC Christianity, one north and the other south of the border. The English variety of Catholic episcopalianism, subordinating Church to State, is completely incompatible with Calvinist Presbyterianism. As indeed the history of the High Kirk of St Giles reminds us.
    That seems to me to be a bit of a theological distinction, in both senses. There are far too many nuances and shades of grey.

    There is no established church in Scotland, so I don't see how particular religious requirements can be placed on the monarch or the nation.

    Secondly, it gets more interesting elsewhere' King Charles is also head of state of Papua New Guinea, for example. And that is a *very* interesting place for religion.

    And the links between CofS and CofE pointed out above imo suggest that 'completely incompatible' is an overstatement.
    Sorry I was out - so replying now. I had also thought that the Church of Scotland (strictly designated) was disestablished but it's not, in the sense that it remains the official church of Scotland [edit] as far as the state is concerned. Ydoethur pointed that out in a very interesting post a day or two back. And KCIII was swearing to protect the Protestant C of S at his proclamation-wotsit a few days ago. I don't *think* he did that for the Niugini religions, did he?
    Indeed, the Scottish Episcopal is the Anglican church in Scotland even if the Queen is not its Supreme Governor unlike the C of E. However as you say the Church of Scotland is the official national church in Scotland and effectively the established church there.

    To be even more specific, the SEC is not the Anglican Church = C of E in Scotland , but a member of the Anglican network. Not the same thing, not least because they are independently derived from different dioceses/groups of dioceses of the Roman Cahtolic Church (though in the case of the SEC via the Church of Scotland proper, most of which became and remained Presbyterian).
    The SEC is the Anglican church and a member of the Anglican communion. Same as the Church in Wales and the Church of Ireland, all who have the Archbishop of Canterbury as their ceremonial head even if they do not share the King as their Supreme Governor with the Church of England.

    Pre Reformation both England and Scotland were majority Roman Catholic. The Scottish Episcopal Church actually started as early as 1582 just over 20 years after the Church of Scotland was founded to preserve bishops
    "the Anglican church" - no, it isn't. That's the C of E if you are using those words. The SEC is quite different. It was never Anglican except in the sense that it joined the Anglican communion in recent years.

    The two churches have different Reformations, different histories, different Williamite settlements.
  • HYUFD said:

    Sandpit said:

    HYUFD said:

    The latest polls show Truss has not got much bounce at all relative to what the Tories were polling under Johnson.

    Now she has made some good moves on cost of living and acted like a stateswoman after the Queen's death.

    However the decision of Truss and Kwarteng to end the cap on bankers' bonuses at a time of cost of living crisis and with a big deficit is politically tin eared even if economically there is the argument it will attract talent to the City and boost revenues longer term. It might go down well in the City of London and Home counties but it will not help Truss at all to retain the redwall. It is a further sign her government will be a more economically libertarian one than Boris' was

    Taking more tax revenue from the City, and less tax revenue from the income of ordinary people, should go down a storm in the Red Wall. RW voters are not obsessed by the politics of envy, they just want their own taxes to come down.
    We will see if it actually leads to big tax cuts for redwall voters and more revenue overall for the Treasury. If not Truss will be in trouble
    I really find your comments at times strange to say the least

    Truss has just 2 years to become electable back to government and if you think the red wall voters will see any change in that timeframe then you at not thinking it through

    It may well be the right thing to do, but the optics are dreadful
  • DynamoDynamo Posts: 651
    Carnyx said:
    "Steve Owens, an astronomer and science communicator at the Glasgow Science Centre, said (...) 'The one last night might have been the size of a golf ball or maybe a cricket ball, maybe bigger than that'."

    No way was that object as small as a cricket ball.
  • kjh said:

    I see Theresa Coffey has got her priorities right. Telling NHS staff to stop using the Oxford Comma. Glad she is doing no 1 on the priority list.

    And why stop using it? Some sort of Grammar Hitler stuff regardless that the removal of the use of it can cause utter confusion. After all it is not as though clarity is important in the NHS.

    What is wrong with her?

    Sadly her record in government is appalling. Still no sign of the DWP report and investigation into the uselessness of welfare sanctions, which she repressed because it didn't fit her narrative.
    The combination of looking like the side of a sturdily built cottage and 'sounding' quite sensible regardless of whatever illiberal guff she's spouting has given Coffey an entirely undeserved reputation for competence.
  • My prediction is that Truss will turn out to be a lot better than many of us gave her credit for. Boris Johnson is a busted flush. He is yesterday's Clown; someone who achieved a great election victory against a ridiculously weedy opponent and managed very little else of note. His deranged supporters might want him back, but they will hopefully diminish in time, and before long it will be difficult to find anyone to admit they supported him.

    There will always be one won't there @HYUFD
  • HYUFD said:

    Sandpit said:

    HYUFD said:

    The latest polls show Truss has not got much bounce at all relative to what the Tories were polling under Johnson.

    Now she has made some good moves on cost of living and acted like a stateswoman after the Queen's death.

    However the decision of Truss and Kwarteng to end the cap on bankers' bonuses at a time of cost of living crisis and with a big deficit is politically tin eared even if economically there is the argument it will attract talent to the City and boost revenues longer term. It might go down well in the City of London and Home counties but it will not help Truss at all to retain the redwall. It is a further sign her government will be a more economically libertarian one than Boris' was

    Taking more tax revenue from the City, and less tax revenue from the income of ordinary people, should go down a storm in the Red Wall. RW voters are not obsessed by the politics of envy, they just want their own taxes to come down.
    We will see if it actually leads to big tax cuts for redwall voters and more revenue overall for the Treasury. If not Truss will be in trouble
    I really find your comments at times strange to say the least

    Truss has just 2 years to become electable back to government and if you think the red wall voters will see any change in that timeframe then you at not thinking it through

    It may well be the right thing to do, but the optics are dreadful
    Optics be damned, the right thing to do is good governance and should be done.

    Certain people will hate the Tories and think they are on the side of bankers/business etc no matter what they do.

    Certain people will like the Tories and be ultra loyal to them no matter what they do.

    Most people just want good governance. Stop worrying whether every single thing is good or bad optics, and start thinking about what is actually good for the country. Making some unpopular decisions, if they are the right thing to do, is not the end of the world or a bad thing for any responsible government to be doing.
  • My prediction is that Truss will turn out to be a lot better than many of us gave her credit for. Boris Johnson is a busted flush. He is yesterday's Clown; someone who achieved a great election victory against a ridiculously weedy opponent and managed very little else of note. His deranged supporters might want him back, but they will hopefully diminish in time, and before long it will be difficult to find anyone to admit they supported him.

    There will always be one won't there @HYUFD
    I do wonder whether even he has fallen out of love with "Boris" as he always affectionately referred to him.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,733
    Cyclefree said:

    Can I just say that, from a professional perspective, Truss deciding to allow the City to do all the bad stuff from years ago which led to so many frauds and disasters, is absolutely wonderful news. Superb.

    I and the colleagues I have trained will be inundated with work. That drama series I'm writing will go on and on and on.... A trickle-down of wealth to Cyclefree and friends. What could be better than that!

    Become a financial investigator, folks. You'll never be out of work.

    Shame that everyone else will be.

    Do you need an apprentice who is an ex-teacher with a nose for bullshit and the ability to understand totally impenetrable documents?

    If so, let me know...
  • TOPPING said:

    Cookie said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    ping said:

    Wow.

    Analyst on R5L’s wake up to money - tracking a basket of essential goods says price difference between Morrissons and Aldi is now 40%. Explained by Morrisons having to service a gigantic debt.

    Shop at Aldi, people.

    Good morning

    I heard that report as well and it is astonishing that Morrisons apparently have a 7 billion debt

    Shop anywhere but Morrisons would be the message

    5live also discussed Kwarteng's proposal to abolish city bonuses and it really does make you wonder if the conservative party have lost all it's instincts to govern

    It may be the right thing from a business sense, but the optics are shocking and hands yet another gift to labour

    It is the right thing from city workers sense. It is a bad thing for shareholders and really bad for government and taxpayers who will eventually have to fund another bailout with years of austerity.
    I'm curious about this idea that bankers bonuses caused the subprime mortgage crisis.

    I am even more curious about the idea that there will ever be another bank bailout.
    Extreme bankers bonuses create incentives for bankers to gamble with the banks money. If they win, fantastic, if they lose its not their money and as long as you can talk the talk and know some of the right people, it is still easy to get another job.

    That culture feeds through to the banks to gamble, notionally with their money, but knowing they have a government funded back stop as they are too big to fail.

    Take away the controls and regulation and sooner or later we shall be back to bail outs.
    Well, it's too bad the Labour government didn't do something about it then...
    Of course. Not sure why you think that is relevant when they have not been in power for a long time and it is the current governments policies that will matter.
    Well, the view of Labour supporters on the GFC is "it started in America".
    That's not the view of Labour supporters, it is a statement of fact.
    The global [key word, there] financial crisis started in America.
    Britain was very poorly placed to weather it because Gordon Brown had spent the previous 6 years [after an admirable initial period of restraint] pissing money up the wall, spending more than he raked in even during times of relative financial health.
    Personally I couldn't give a fig how big bankers' bonuses are. I don't care at all about the optics, I care about the gap between what we spend and what we earn. That should be the #1 issue for a chancellor of the exchequer to worry about. If this measure narrows that gap (and I am at best agnostic about whether it will) it should be welcomed.
    Britain was hit badly because we have a large globally exposed financial sector and one of our biggest banks was in the midst of an ill-advised over-leveraged buying spree at the top of the market. Running a structural deficit of 4% of GDP in 2007 compared to a G7 average of 3% is unlikely to have been a significant factor in explaining why we were hit worse than others, no matter how much people want it to be Gordon Brown's fault.
    Running a structural deficit of 4% during pre-crash times is utterly catastrophic as when the crash inevitably comes and you inevitably need countercyclical spending to go with it, then you have nowhere to go.

    The fact that some other countries were nearly as bad as the UK doesn't justify or excuse what Brown did.
    But it is hard to blame Brown's fiscal policy for us being hit *much worse than others* when Brown's fiscal policy was *pretty much the same as others'*. That was the point I was responding to.
    Also worth noting that our debt to GDP ratio in 2007 was 41% (down from 43% in 1997) compared to a G7 average of 81%. So we had plenty of space to run countercyclical fiscal policy, certainly compared to other countries, and indeed the increase in our debt to GDP ratio between 2007 and 2010 (33pp) was almost identical to the G7 average (32pp), suggesting that we were indeed able to run a countercyclical fiscal policy just like other economies.
    Except it wasn't the same as others, it was via your own figures worse than others. And of course its worth noting that the G7 average includes the UK so the G7 average was itself getting dragged down by Brown's terrible performance.

    Debt to GDP isn't the relevant figure, the deficit is, although its worth noting via your own figures again in the span of three years Brown nearly doubled our debt-to-GDP figure whereas G7 nations debt-to-GDP increased by much less than half.
    Gordon Brown's peak debt to GDP being around 3% iirc which was on a par with preceding Conservative governments. It was not significant and did not cause or exacerbate the GFC.

    Also, aiui Team Truss has determined, as Cheney said of Reagan, that deficits don't matter and that George Osborne's austerity was a mistake that hobbled Britain's economy.
    Except....this was a time of unprecedented receipts. The housing market was going bananas, profits were high, and it was a time where debt to GDP didn't need to be as high given the circumstances in the economy. Simply, we were spending too much. I don't think anyone disputes that, no matter what they think the answer (austerity/non-austerity) should have been.
    Yes, there is a good deal in that. But as it happened, the GFC came along and rendered it all moot. Then Osborne came along and flatlined the nascent recovery inherited from Labour, and here we are.
    The GFC didn't just "come along and render it moot", the GFC was a crash that the Government should have been preparing for as it was overdue. Crashes happen, and the GFC was a classic crash, not some exogenous and unforeseeable shock.

    And you repeat the myth that Osborne flatlined the recovery. Don't you realise the UK in the 2010s grew faster than the Eurozone did, both in nominal terms and in per capita terms. "Despite Brexit" supposedly harming the UK during that decade.

    If Brexit and Osborne "flatlined" or harmed the UK, then how come the UK grew faster than the Eurozone or the rest of the EU? Just how much faster than them would we have grown in your eyes were it not for Osborne or Brexit, and why?
    Osborne's austerity was a mistake as even the current vintage of Tories now acknowledge. The problem is that they have pivoted to pro-growth fiscal policies at precisely the wrong moment, with inflation out of control, and so they will only succeed in pushing up inflation and interest rates.
    Euro area growth was low because of their sovereign debt crisis and because they followed similar austerity policies to us, and because they had lower population growth.
  • Sean_F said:

    FPT, I quite like this :

    "Tory politicians have backed a campaign which has been launched to give the late Queen the title of 'Elizabeth the Faithful' because 'the Great' is rather common and has been used by despots and conquerors."

    No danger of it being applied to the present incumbent, either ante or post mortem.
    Maybe Charles The Scourge of God.
    Charle the Bald already taken, the Pious and the Fat also. The Fat Fingered maybe?
  • state_go_awaystate_go_away Posts: 5,415
    edited September 2022

    HYUFD said:

    Sandpit said:

    HYUFD said:

    The latest polls show Truss has not got much bounce at all relative to what the Tories were polling under Johnson.

    Now she has made some good moves on cost of living and acted like a stateswoman after the Queen's death.

    However the decision of Truss and Kwarteng to end the cap on bankers' bonuses at a time of cost of living crisis and with a big deficit is politically tin eared even if economically there is the argument it will attract talent to the City and boost revenues longer term. It might go down well in the City of London and Home counties but it will not help Truss at all to retain the redwall. It is a further sign her government will be a more economically libertarian one than Boris' was

    Taking more tax revenue from the City, and less tax revenue from the income of ordinary people, should go down a storm in the Red Wall. RW voters are not obsessed by the politics of envy, they just want their own taxes to come down.
    We will see if it actually leads to big tax cuts for redwall voters and more revenue overall for the Treasury. If not Truss will be in trouble
    I really find your comments at times strange to say the least

    Truss has just 2 years to become electable back to government and if you think the red wall voters will see any change in that timeframe then you at not thinking it through

    It may well be the right thing to do, but the optics are dreadful
    Optics be damned, the right thing to do is good governance and should be done.

    Certain people will hate the Tories and think they are on the side of bankers/business etc no matter what they do.

    Certain people will like the Tories and be ultra loyal to them no matter what they do.

    Most people just want good governance. Stop worrying whether every single thing is good or bad optics, and start thinking about what is actually good for the country. Making some unpopular decisions, if they are the right thing to do, is not the end of the world or a bad thing for any responsible government to be doing.
    yes optics is the most irritating trending phrase in politics , especially when you really think what it means - ie doing things (or not doing them ) to get instant approval and therefore the definition of shallow
  • DynamoDynamo Posts: 651
    edited September 2022
    IshmaelZ said:

    Dynamo said:

    Morning
    Truss is going nowhere before the Coronation. The biggest world spectacle in decades, not a chance the Tories put it all at risk by infighting. After that we are in the home straight. Shes leader at the next election.

    You write as if it's a certainty there's going to be a coronation, and in addition that if there is then billions around the world will eagerly lap it up. Have you examined the assumptions?

    In 1953 the prime ministerial declaration that "You've never had it so good" may have lain a few years in the future, but by that year there was already a general atmosphere of progress in the country, and also there was the spread of TV (which personally I wouldn't call progress of any kind, but many others would).

    This time, what is there? What will they do? Give every child in the country a bag of sweets with a picture of the "king and queen consort" on the front, the cost to be added to their "student loan" when they reach 18?

    There could easily be prolonged widespread power cuts this winter, and rampant inflation not just of domestic energy, and who knows what will happen in the war? What are the chances of another lockdown? Or of an "overwhelming" of the NHS?

    For that matter, who can be sure that the mentally and emotionally retarded gullible syphilitic idiot of a "God-sent" bully on the throne will still have his a*se on it in a few months' time?

    Has Harry agreed not to bring his book out? :-)
    How you do go on, Dynie. Chill.
    I'm warm-blooded :-) But this is a betting site, and a fellow contributor was saying it was a near-certainty that the PM will still be PM at the next GE, making assumptions that I feel (for reasons stated) are highly questionable - that's all.
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 35,765
    Dynamo said:

    Morning
    Truss is going nowhere before the Coronation. The biggest world spectacle in decades, not a chance the Tories put it all at risk by infighting. After that we are in the home straight. Shes leader at the next election.

    You write as if it's a certainty there's going to be a coronation, and in addition that if there is then billions around the world will eagerly lap it up. Have you examined the assumptions?

    In 1953 the prime ministerial declaration that "You've never had it so good" may have lain a few years in the future, but by that year there was already a general atmosphere of progress in the country, and also there was the spread of TV (which personally I wouldn't call progress of any kind, but many others would).

    This time, what is there? What will they do? Give every child in the country a bag of sweets with a picture of the "king and queen consort" on the front, the cost to be added to their "student loan" when they reach 18?

    There could easily be prolonged widespread power cuts this winter, and rampant inflation not just of domestic energy, and who knows what will happen in the war? What are the chances of another lockdown? Or of an "overwhelming" of the NHS?

    For that matter, who can be sure that the mentally and emotionally retarded gullible syphilitic idiot of a "God-sent" bully on the throne will still have his a*se on it in a few months' time?

    Has Harry agreed not to bring his book out? :-)
    The standard of living in 1953 was about one third of what it is today.
  • RobDRobD Posts: 58,941
    Dynamo said:

    Carnyx said:
    "Steve Owens, an astronomer and science communicator at the Glasgow Science Centre, said (...) 'The one last night might have been the size of a golf ball or maybe a cricket ball, maybe bigger than that'."

    No way was that object as small as a cricket ball.
    They don’t have to be big, just moving fast.
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 7,254

    Selebian said:

    Great thread on “Tales from the Queue”

    https://twitter.com/robertrea/status/1570310245465083906

    It is. This kind of thing happens anywhere you're trapped for a long time. I was in A&E for 7 hours a couple of weeks ago (was supposed to be a direct emergency admission, but the ward was full, so I and several others were dumped in the ED to wait).

    Two strangers became, I'm pretty sure, a couple (they certainly swapped numbers). I got chatting to an elderly Welsh guy who, it turned out, went to school with one of my former bosses (professor, now dead). There was a weird noise every few minutes for about half an hour, which turned out to be santiser dispenser hidden behind a lady sitting on a chair (she ended up with a coat covered down the back in hand sanitiser). We swapped tales of waits, then and in the past. We compared notes on the biscuits available.
    Wait, they give you free biscuits in the queue?
    I managed to nab some ginger nuts and even some squash. Mind you, that was only in the second 'majors' waiting room. You had to show your grit with four hours of stoic waiting in the first waiting room before getting admitted to the waiting room with treats.

    This of course led to a further frission of excitement, seeing your new friends slowly disappear from the first waiting room, only to be reunited with them when you, too, made it to the second waiting room. (Actually, partly due to being reunited, perhaps, the second waiting room was far more social than the first.)
  • Dynamo said:

    Carnyx said:
    "Steve Owens, an astronomer and science communicator at the Glasgow Science Centre, said (...) 'The one last night might have been the size of a golf ball or maybe a cricket ball, maybe bigger than that'."

    No way was that object as small as a cricket ball.
    more a shot putt imho
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    Dynamo said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Dynamo said:

    Morning
    Truss is going nowhere before the Coronation. The biggest world spectacle in decades, not a chance the Tories put it all at risk by infighting. After that we are in the home straight. Shes leader at the next election.

    You write as if it's a certainty there's going to be a coronation, and in addition that if there is then billions around the world will eagerly lap it up. Have you examined the assumptions?

    In 1953 the prime ministerial declaration that "You've never had it so good" may have lain a few years in the future, but by that year there was already a general atmosphere of progress in the country, and also there was the spread of TV (which personally I wouldn't call progress of any kind, but many others would).

    This time, what is there? What will they do? Give every child in the country a bag of sweets with a picture of the "king and queen consort" on the front, the cost to be added to their "student loan" when they reach 18?

    There could easily be prolonged widespread power cuts this winter, and rampant inflation not just of domestic energy, and who knows what will happen in the war? What are the chances of another lockdown? Or of an "overwhelming" of the NHS?

    For that matter, who can be sure that the mentally and emotionally retarded gullible syphilitic idiot of a "God-sent" bully on the throne will still have his a*se on it in a few months' time?

    Has Harry agreed not to bring his book out? :-)
    How you do go on, Dynie. Chill.
    I'm warm-blooded :-) But this is a betting site, and a fellow contributor was saying it was a near-certainty that the PM will still be PM at the next GE, making assumptions that I feel (for reasons stated) are highly questionable - that's all.
    Fine. But the only way Charles doesn't get crowned is if he predeceases. There will be a coronation next year, of someone.
  • HYUFD said:

    Sandpit said:

    HYUFD said:

    The latest polls show Truss has not got much bounce at all relative to what the Tories were polling under Johnson.

    Now she has made some good moves on cost of living and acted like a stateswoman after the Queen's death.

    However the decision of Truss and Kwarteng to end the cap on bankers' bonuses at a time of cost of living crisis and with a big deficit is politically tin eared even if economically there is the argument it will attract talent to the City and boost revenues longer term. It might go down well in the City of London and Home counties but it will not help Truss at all to retain the redwall. It is a further sign her government will be a more economically libertarian one than Boris' was

    Taking more tax revenue from the City, and less tax revenue from the income of ordinary people, should go down a storm in the Red Wall. RW voters are not obsessed by the politics of envy, they just want their own taxes to come down.
    We will see if it actually leads to big tax cuts for redwall voters and more revenue overall for the Treasury. If not Truss will be in trouble
    I really find your comments at times strange to say the least

    Truss has just 2 years to become electable back to government and if you think the red wall voters will see any change in that timeframe then you at not thinking it through

    It may well be the right thing to do, but the optics are dreadful
    Optics be damned, the right thing to do is good governance and should be done.

    Certain people will hate the Tories and think they are on the side of bankers/business etc no matter what they do.

    Certain people will like the Tories and be ultra loyal to them no matter what they do.

    Most people just want good governance. Stop worrying whether every single thing is good or bad optics, and start thinking about what is actually good for the country. Making some unpopular decisions, if they are the right thing to do, is not the end of the world or a bad thing for any responsible government to be doing.
    yes optics is the most irritating trending phrase in politics , especially when you really think what it means - ie doing things (or not doing them ) to get instant approval and therefore the definition of shallow
    It always amazes me that people consider bankers pure evil but very average footballers who earn £250,000.00 per week are cheered.
  • My prediction is that Truss will turn out to be a lot better than many of us gave her credit for. Boris Johnson is a busted flush. He is yesterday's Clown; someone who achieved a great election victory against a ridiculously weedy opponent and managed very little else of note. His deranged supporters might want him back, but they will hopefully diminish in time, and before long it will be difficult to find anyone to admit they supported him.

    There will always be one won't there @HYUFD
    I do wonder whether even he has fallen out of love with "Boris" as he always affectionately referred to him.
    His posts do not indicate it so far, and I would be delighted if he would join those of us who want Truss to succeed and publicly accept Johnson is toxic and has damaged the party considerably
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    edited September 2022
    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    FPT

    MattW said:

    Carnyx said:

    Nigelb said:

    HYUFD said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Ben Judah in UnHerd

    "Queen Elizabeth’s death marks the latest step away from divinely ordained monarchy, towards something else. No longer sacred, the European monarch would rather be a pilot, or a country gentleman interested in urban planning. Another step along the path we have travelled since the laying of hands on His Majesty to cure disease was suspended after Queen Anne. It is no longer possible to suspend disbelief. The magic — or rather the mindset — was gone. There have been tears for the Queen this week, but can we imagine the same for Prince William decades from now?"

    https://unherd.com/2022/09/divine-monarchy-is-finished/

    The monarch will always be divinely ordained, whatever liberal intellectuals may wish
    Alternatively, you will always believe in fairies, and the Tory party.
    There's also the slight problem that, *on the monarchy's own evidence*, it supports two different religions, or at least two very different varieties of non-RC Christianity, one north and the other south of the border. The English variety of Catholic episcopalianism, subordinating Church to State, is completely incompatible with Calvinist Presbyterianism. As indeed the history of the High Kirk of St Giles reminds us.
    That seems to me to be a bit of a theological distinction, in both senses. There are far too many nuances and shades of grey.

    There is no established church in Scotland, so I don't see how particular religious requirements can be placed on the monarch or the nation.

    Secondly, it gets more interesting elsewhere' King Charles is also head of state of Papua New Guinea, for example. And that is a *very* interesting place for religion.

    And the links between CofS and CofE pointed out above imo suggest that 'completely incompatible' is an overstatement.
    Sorry I was out - so replying now. I had also thought that the Church of Scotland (strictly designated) was disestablished but it's not, in the sense that it remains the official church of Scotland [edit] as far as the state is concerned. Ydoethur pointed that out in a very interesting post a day or two back. And KCIII was swearing to protect the Protestant C of S at his proclamation-wotsit a few days ago. I don't *think* he did that for the Niugini religions, did he?
    Indeed, the Scottish Episcopal is the Anglican church in Scotland even if the Queen is not its Supreme Governor unlike the C of E. However as you say the Church of Scotland is the official national church in Scotland and effectively the established church there.

    To be even more specific, the SEC is not the Anglican Church = C of E in Scotland , but a member of the Anglican network. Not the same thing, not least because they are independently derived from different dioceses/groups of dioceses of the Roman Cahtolic Church (though in the case of the SEC via the Church of Scotland proper, most of which became and remained Presbyterian).
    The SEC is the Anglican church and a member of the Anglican communion. Same as the Church in Wales and the Church of Ireland, all who have the Archbishop of Canterbury as their ceremonial head even if they do not share the King as their Supreme Governor with the Church of England.

    Pre Reformation both England and Scotland were majority Roman Catholic. The Scottish Episcopal Church actually started as early as 1582 just over 20 years after the Church of Scotland was founded to preserve bishops
    "the Anglican church" - no, it isn't. That's the C of E if you are using those words. The SEC is quite different. It was never Anglican except in the sense that it joined the Anglican communion in recent years.

    The two churches have different Reformations, different histories, different Williamite settlements.
    Yes it is, every member of the Anglican communion including the SEC is an Anglican church.

    Apart from not having the King as its SG there is little difference between the SEC and Church of England in service style or structure
  • TOPPING said:

    Cookie said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    ping said:

    Wow.

    Analyst on R5L’s wake up to money - tracking a basket of essential goods says price difference between Morrissons and Aldi is now 40%. Explained by Morrisons having to service a gigantic debt.

    Shop at Aldi, people.

    Good morning

    I heard that report as well and it is astonishing that Morrisons apparently have a 7 billion debt

    Shop anywhere but Morrisons would be the message

    5live also discussed Kwarteng's proposal to abolish city bonuses and it really does make you wonder if the conservative party have lost all it's instincts to govern

    It may be the right thing from a business sense, but the optics are shocking and hands yet another gift to labour

    It is the right thing from city workers sense. It is a bad thing for shareholders and really bad for government and taxpayers who will eventually have to fund another bailout with years of austerity.
    I'm curious about this idea that bankers bonuses caused the subprime mortgage crisis.

    I am even more curious about the idea that there will ever be another bank bailout.
    Extreme bankers bonuses create incentives for bankers to gamble with the banks money. If they win, fantastic, if they lose its not their money and as long as you can talk the talk and know some of the right people, it is still easy to get another job.

    That culture feeds through to the banks to gamble, notionally with their money, but knowing they have a government funded back stop as they are too big to fail.

    Take away the controls and regulation and sooner or later we shall be back to bail outs.
    Well, it's too bad the Labour government didn't do something about it then...
    Of course. Not sure why you think that is relevant when they have not been in power for a long time and it is the current governments policies that will matter.
    Well, the view of Labour supporters on the GFC is "it started in America".
    That's not the view of Labour supporters, it is a statement of fact.
    The global [key word, there] financial crisis started in America.
    Britain was very poorly placed to weather it because Gordon Brown had spent the previous 6 years [after an admirable initial period of restraint] pissing money up the wall, spending more than he raked in even during times of relative financial health.
    Personally I couldn't give a fig how big bankers' bonuses are. I don't care at all about the optics, I care about the gap between what we spend and what we earn. That should be the #1 issue for a chancellor of the exchequer to worry about. If this measure narrows that gap (and I am at best agnostic about whether it will) it should be welcomed.
    Britain was hit badly because we have a large globally exposed financial sector and one of our biggest banks was in the midst of an ill-advised over-leveraged buying spree at the top of the market. Running a structural deficit of 4% of GDP in 2007 compared to a G7 average of 3% is unlikely to have been a significant factor in explaining why we were hit worse than others, no matter how much people want it to be Gordon Brown's fault.
    Running a structural deficit of 4% during pre-crash times is utterly catastrophic as when the crash inevitably comes and you inevitably need countercyclical spending to go with it, then you have nowhere to go.

    The fact that some other countries were nearly as bad as the UK doesn't justify or excuse what Brown did.
    But it is hard to blame Brown's fiscal policy for us being hit *much worse than others* when Brown's fiscal policy was *pretty much the same as others'*. That was the point I was responding to.
    Also worth noting that our debt to GDP ratio in 2007 was 41% (down from 43% in 1997) compared to a G7 average of 81%. So we had plenty of space to run countercyclical fiscal policy, certainly compared to other countries, and indeed the increase in our debt to GDP ratio between 2007 and 2010 (33pp) was almost identical to the G7 average (32pp), suggesting that we were indeed able to run a countercyclical fiscal policy just like other economies.
    Except it wasn't the same as others, it was via your own figures worse than others. And of course its worth noting that the G7 average includes the UK so the G7 average was itself getting dragged down by Brown's terrible performance.

    Debt to GDP isn't the relevant figure, the deficit is, although its worth noting via your own figures again in the span of three years Brown nearly doubled our debt-to-GDP figure whereas G7 nations debt-to-GDP increased by much less than half.
    Gordon Brown's peak debt to GDP being around 3% iirc which was on a par with preceding Conservative governments. It was not significant and did not cause or exacerbate the GFC.

    Also, aiui Team Truss has determined, as Cheney said of Reagan, that deficits don't matter and that George Osborne's austerity was a mistake that hobbled Britain's economy.
    Except....this was a time of unprecedented receipts. The housing market was going bananas, profits were high, and it was a time where debt to GDP didn't need to be as high given the circumstances in the economy. Simply, we were spending too much. I don't think anyone disputes that, no matter what they think the answer (austerity/non-austerity) should have been.
    Yes, there is a good deal in that. But as it happened, the GFC came along and rendered it all moot. Then Osborne came along and flatlined the nascent recovery inherited from Labour, and here we are.
    The GFC didn't just "come along and render it moot", the GFC was a crash that the Government should have been preparing for as it was overdue. Crashes happen, and the GFC was a classic crash, not some exogenous and unforeseeable shock.

    And you repeat the myth that Osborne flatlined the recovery. Don't you realise the UK in the 2010s grew faster than the Eurozone did, both in nominal terms and in per capita terms. "Despite Brexit" supposedly harming the UK during that decade.

    If Brexit and Osborne "flatlined" or harmed the UK, then how come the UK grew faster than the Eurozone or the rest of the EU? Just how much faster than them would we have grown in your eyes were it not for Osborne or Brexit, and why?
    Osborne's austerity was a mistake as even the current vintage of Tories now acknowledge. The problem is that they have pivoted to pro-growth fiscal policies at precisely the wrong moment, with inflation out of control, and so they will only succeed in pushing up inflation and interest rates.
    Euro area growth was low because of their sovereign debt crisis and because they followed similar austerity policies to us, and because they had lower population growth.
    It was not a mistake, because the deficit was out of control.

    Pro-growth policies are good now because the deficit was brought under control prior to the crash, unlike in Brown's time, and so we're in a much better fiscal position than we were then.

    The UK grew faster than Europe on a per capita basis too, again despite "austerity" and "Brexit" being both accused of "flatlining" growth. We had our own sovereign debt crisis caused by Brown's borrowing too, which is why Osborne needed to clean up Brown's mess.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,733
    Sean_F said:

    Dynamo said:

    Morning
    Truss is going nowhere before the Coronation. The biggest world spectacle in decades, not a chance the Tories put it all at risk by infighting. After that we are in the home straight. Shes leader at the next election.

    You write as if it's a certainty there's going to be a coronation, and in addition that if there is then billions around the world will eagerly lap it up. Have you examined the assumptions?

    In 1953 the prime ministerial declaration that "You've never had it so good" may have lain a few years in the future, but by that year there was already a general atmosphere of progress in the country, and also there was the spread of TV (which personally I wouldn't call progress of any kind, but many others would).

    This time, what is there? What will they do? Give every child in the country a bag of sweets with a picture of the "king and queen consort" on the front, the cost to be added to their "student loan" when they reach 18?

    There could easily be prolonged widespread power cuts this winter, and rampant inflation not just of domestic energy, and who knows what will happen in the war? What are the chances of another lockdown? Or of an "overwhelming" of the NHS?

    For that matter, who can be sure that the mentally and emotionally retarded gullible syphilitic idiot of a "God-sent" bully on the throne will still have his a*se on it in a few months' time?

    Has Harry agreed not to bring his book out? :-)
    The standard of living in 1953 was about one third of what it is today.
    Depends where you live...
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,132
    https://twitter.com/UKMeteorNetwork/status/1570330933684994049?cxt=HHwWgoDQocHq98orAAAA

    Nice prelim graphic of the trajectory of the portent. No Harriers reported.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,569
    (FPT) This somewhat improves the Democrats' chances in November.

    https://twitter.com/AP/status/1570344365712879619
    President Joe Biden says a tentative railway labor agreement has been reached, averting a strike that could've damaged the economy before the midterms.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709

    My prediction is that Truss will turn out to be a lot better than many of us gave her credit for. Boris Johnson is a busted flush. He is yesterday's Clown; someone who achieved a great election victory against a ridiculously weedy opponent and managed very little else of note. His deranged supporters might want him back, but they will hopefully diminish in time, and before long it will be difficult to find anyone to admit they supported him.

    There will always be one won't there @HYUFD
    I do wonder whether even he has fallen out of love with "Boris" as he always affectionately referred to him.
    His posts do not indicate it so far, and I would be delighted if he would join those of us who want Truss to succeed and publicly accept Johnson is toxic and has damaged the party considerably
    I support her as leader but she is still 10% behind on the latest poll and this end bankers' bonuses cap now was her decision not Boris'. She and Kwarteng own it
  • CyclefreeCyclefree Posts: 25,074
    edited September 2022

    Selebian said:

    Great thread on “Tales from the Queue”

    https://twitter.com/robertrea/status/1570310245465083906

    It is. This kind of thing happens anywhere you're trapped for a long time. I was in A&E for 7 hours a couple of weeks ago (was supposed to be a direct emergency admission, but the ward was full, so I and several others were dumped in the ED to wait).

    Two strangers became, I'm pretty sure, a couple (they certainly swapped numbers). I got chatting to an elderly Welsh guy who, it turned out, went to school with one of my former bosses (professor, now dead). There was a weird noise every few minutes for about half an hour, which turned out to be santiser dispenser hidden behind a lady sitting on a chair (she ended up with a coat covered down the back in hand sanitiser). We swapped tales of waits, then and in the past. We compared notes on the biscuits available.
    Wait, they give you free biscuits in the queue?
    I was once in a very long queue to go through passport control at JFK. Anyway I got chatting with the man in front, a very interesting and, as it happened, rather handsome man. We talked about what we were in NY for etc. All very pleasant and helped pass the time.

    He went through passport control and then it was my turn. The grim faced officer (who must have seen us chatting) asked me if I was visiting on my own. I said yes. She replied: "Are you sure?" (I am not joking.)

    I was so tempted to reply that the wait had been so bloody long that I had had time to meet someone, get to know them, have an affair and break up with them. But thought better of it.

    It would be rather sweet if a few romances came out of the queue for HMQ.
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 35,765

    TOPPING said:

    Cookie said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    ping said:

    Wow.

    Analyst on R5L’s wake up to money - tracking a basket of essential goods says price difference between Morrissons and Aldi is now 40%. Explained by Morrisons having to service a gigantic debt.

    Shop at Aldi, people.

    Good morning

    I heard that report as well and it is astonishing that Morrisons apparently have a 7 billion debt

    Shop anywhere but Morrisons would be the message

    5live also discussed Kwarteng's proposal to abolish city bonuses and it really does make you wonder if the conservative party have lost all it's instincts to govern

    It may be the right thing from a business sense, but the optics are shocking and hands yet another gift to labour

    It is the right thing from city workers sense. It is a bad thing for shareholders and really bad for government and taxpayers who will eventually have to fund another bailout with years of austerity.
    I'm curious about this idea that bankers bonuses caused the subprime mortgage crisis.

    I am even more curious about the idea that there will ever be another bank bailout.
    Extreme bankers bonuses create incentives for bankers to gamble with the banks money. If they win, fantastic, if they lose its not their money and as long as you can talk the talk and know some of the right people, it is still easy to get another job.

    That culture feeds through to the banks to gamble, notionally with their money, but knowing they have a government funded back stop as they are too big to fail.

    Take away the controls and regulation and sooner or later we shall be back to bail outs.
    Well, it's too bad the Labour government didn't do something about it then...
    Of course. Not sure why you think that is relevant when they have not been in power for a long time and it is the current governments policies that will matter.
    Well, the view of Labour supporters on the GFC is "it started in America".
    That's not the view of Labour supporters, it is a statement of fact.
    The global [key word, there] financial crisis started in America.
    Britain was very poorly placed to weather it because Gordon Brown had spent the previous 6 years [after an admirable initial period of restraint] pissing money up the wall, spending more than he raked in even during times of relative financial health.
    Personally I couldn't give a fig how big bankers' bonuses are. I don't care at all about the optics, I care about the gap between what we spend and what we earn. That should be the #1 issue for a chancellor of the exchequer to worry about. If this measure narrows that gap (and I am at best agnostic about whether it will) it should be welcomed.
    Britain was hit badly because we have a large globally exposed financial sector and one of our biggest banks was in the midst of an ill-advised over-leveraged buying spree at the top of the market. Running a structural deficit of 4% of GDP in 2007 compared to a G7 average of 3% is unlikely to have been a significant factor in explaining why we were hit worse than others, no matter how much people want it to be Gordon Brown's fault.
    Running a structural deficit of 4% during pre-crash times is utterly catastrophic as when the crash inevitably comes and you inevitably need countercyclical spending to go with it, then you have nowhere to go.

    The fact that some other countries were nearly as bad as the UK doesn't justify or excuse what Brown did.
    But it is hard to blame Brown's fiscal policy for us being hit *much worse than others* when Brown's fiscal policy was *pretty much the same as others'*. That was the point I was responding to.
    Also worth noting that our debt to GDP ratio in 2007 was 41% (down from 43% in 1997) compared to a G7 average of 81%. So we had plenty of space to run countercyclical fiscal policy, certainly compared to other countries, and indeed the increase in our debt to GDP ratio between 2007 and 2010 (33pp) was almost identical to the G7 average (32pp), suggesting that we were indeed able to run a countercyclical fiscal policy just like other economies.
    Except it wasn't the same as others, it was via your own figures worse than others. And of course its worth noting that the G7 average includes the UK so the G7 average was itself getting dragged down by Brown's terrible performance.

    Debt to GDP isn't the relevant figure, the deficit is, although its worth noting via your own figures again in the span of three years Brown nearly doubled our debt-to-GDP figure whereas G7 nations debt-to-GDP increased by much less than half.
    Gordon Brown's peak debt to GDP being around 3% iirc which was on a par with preceding Conservative governments. It was not significant and did not cause or exacerbate the GFC.

    Also, aiui Team Truss has determined, as Cheney said of Reagan, that deficits don't matter and that George Osborne's austerity was a mistake that hobbled Britain's economy.
    Except....this was a time of unprecedented receipts. The housing market was going bananas, profits were high, and it was a time where debt to GDP didn't need to be as high given the circumstances in the economy. Simply, we were spending too much. I don't think anyone disputes that, no matter what they think the answer (austerity/non-austerity) should have been.
    Yes, there is a good deal in that. But as it happened, the GFC came along and rendered it all moot. Then Osborne came along and flatlined the nascent recovery inherited from Labour, and here we are.
    The GFC didn't just "come along and render it moot", the GFC was a crash that the Government should have been preparing for as it was overdue. Crashes happen, and the GFC was a classic crash, not some exogenous and unforeseeable shock.

    And you repeat the myth that Osborne flatlined the recovery. Don't you realise the UK in the 2010s grew faster than the Eurozone did, both in nominal terms and in per capita terms. "Despite Brexit" supposedly harming the UK during that decade.

    If Brexit and Osborne "flatlined" or harmed the UK, then how come the UK grew faster than the Eurozone or the rest of the EU? Just how much faster than them would we have grown in your eyes were it not for Osborne or Brexit, and why?
    Osborne's austerity was a mistake as even the current vintage of Tories now acknowledge. The problem is that they have pivoted to pro-growth fiscal policies at precisely the wrong moment, with inflation out of control, and so they will only succeed in pushing up inflation and interest rates.
    Euro area growth was low because of their sovereign debt crisis and because they followed similar austerity policies to us, and because they had lower population growth.
    Growth has been slow in every Western country (compared to the 1950-2000 period) for at least a generation, apart from the commodity producers. If governments could pull a lever, and restore pre-2000 growth rates, they would do so.
  • paulyork64paulyork64 Posts: 2,461
    Back of The Queue now beyond Tower Bridge.
  • CyclefreeCyclefree Posts: 25,074

    HYUFD said:

    Sandpit said:

    HYUFD said:

    The latest polls show Truss has not got much bounce at all relative to what the Tories were polling under Johnson.

    Now she has made some good moves on cost of living and acted like a stateswoman after the Queen's death.

    However the decision of Truss and Kwarteng to end the cap on bankers' bonuses at a time of cost of living crisis and with a big deficit is politically tin eared even if economically there is the argument it will attract talent to the City and boost revenues longer term. It might go down well in the City of London and Home counties but it will not help Truss at all to retain the redwall. It is a further sign her government will be a more economically libertarian one than Boris' was

    Taking more tax revenue from the City, and less tax revenue from the income of ordinary people, should go down a storm in the Red Wall. RW voters are not obsessed by the politics of envy, they just want their own taxes to come down.
    We will see if it actually leads to big tax cuts for redwall voters and more revenue overall for the Treasury. If not Truss will be in trouble
    I really find your comments at times strange to say the least

    Truss has just 2 years to become electable back to government and if you think the red wall voters will see any change in that timeframe then you at not thinking it through

    It may well be the right thing to do, but the optics are dreadful
    The substance is dreadful not just the optics.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,132
    edited September 2022
    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    FPT

    MattW said:

    Carnyx said:

    Nigelb said:

    HYUFD said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Ben Judah in UnHerd

    "Queen Elizabeth’s death marks the latest step away from divinely ordained monarchy, towards something else. No longer sacred, the European monarch would rather be a pilot, or a country gentleman interested in urban planning. Another step along the path we have travelled since the laying of hands on His Majesty to cure disease was suspended after Queen Anne. It is no longer possible to suspend disbelief. The magic — or rather the mindset — was gone. There have been tears for the Queen this week, but can we imagine the same for Prince William decades from now?"

    https://unherd.com/2022/09/divine-monarchy-is-finished/

    The monarch will always be divinely ordained, whatever liberal intellectuals may wish
    Alternatively, you will always believe in fairies, and the Tory party.
    There's also the slight problem that, *on the monarchy's own evidence*, it supports two different religions, or at least two very different varieties of non-RC Christianity, one north and the other south of the border. The English variety of Catholic episcopalianism, subordinating Church to State, is completely incompatible with Calvinist Presbyterianism. As indeed the history of the High Kirk of St Giles reminds us.
    That seems to me to be a bit of a theological distinction, in both senses. There are far too many nuances and shades of grey.

    There is no established church in Scotland, so I don't see how particular religious requirements can be placed on the monarch or the nation.

    Secondly, it gets more interesting elsewhere' King Charles is also head of state of Papua New Guinea, for example. And that is a *very* interesting place for religion.

    And the links between CofS and CofE pointed out above imo suggest that 'completely incompatible' is an overstatement.
    Sorry I was out - so replying now. I had also thought that the Church of Scotland (strictly designated) was disestablished but it's not, in the sense that it remains the official church of Scotland [edit] as far as the state is concerned. Ydoethur pointed that out in a very interesting post a day or two back. And KCIII was swearing to protect the Protestant C of S at his proclamation-wotsit a few days ago. I don't *think* he did that for the Niugini religions, did he?
    Indeed, the Scottish Episcopal is the Anglican church in Scotland even if the Queen is not its Supreme Governor unlike the C of E. However as you say the Church of Scotland is the official national church in Scotland and effectively the established church there.

    To be even more specific, the SEC is not the Anglican Church = C of E in Scotland , but a member of the Anglican network. Not the same thing, not least because they are independently derived from different dioceses/groups of dioceses of the Roman Cahtolic Church (though in the case of the SEC via the Church of Scotland proper, most of which became and remained Presbyterian).
    The SEC is the Anglican church and a member of the Anglican communion. Same as the Church in Wales and the Church of Ireland, all who have the Archbishop of Canterbury as their ceremonial head even if they do not share the King as their Supreme Governor with the Church of England.

    Pre Reformation both England and Scotland were majority Roman Catholic. The Scottish Episcopal Church actually started as early as 1582 just over 20 years after the Church of Scotland was founded to preserve bishops
    "the Anglican church" - no, it isn't. That's the C of E if you are using those words. The SEC is quite different. It was never Anglican except in the sense that it joined the Anglican communion in recent years.

    The two churches have different Reformations, different histories, different Williamite settlements.
    Yes it is, every member of the Anglican communion including the SEC is an Anglican church.

    Apart from not having the Kingas its SG there is little difference between the SEC and Church of England in service style or structure
    The Anglican Communion is not the Anglican Church. Different levels, altogether. It's like confusing England and the United Kingdom.

    And the SEC and C of E use different prayer books.

  • HYUFD said:

    My prediction is that Truss will turn out to be a lot better than many of us gave her credit for. Boris Johnson is a busted flush. He is yesterday's Clown; someone who achieved a great election victory against a ridiculously weedy opponent and managed very little else of note. His deranged supporters might want him back, but they will hopefully diminish in time, and before long it will be difficult to find anyone to admit they supported him.

    There will always be one won't there @HYUFD
    I do wonder whether even he has fallen out of love with "Boris" as he always affectionately referred to him.
    His posts do not indicate it so far, and I would be delighted if he would join those of us who want Truss to succeed and publicly accept Johnson is toxic and has damaged the party considerably
    I support her as leader but she is still 10% behind on the latest poll and this end bankers' bonuses cap now was her decision not Boris'. She and Kwarteng own it
    You demonstrate my point perfectly and until you condemn Johnson then you are part of his toxic legacy
  • state_go_awaystate_go_away Posts: 5,415
    edited September 2022

    Back of The Queue now beyond Tower Bridge.

    queuing in East London may put a few off. Seriously it quite humbling to me (as I cannot be very bothered to do anything different to what I would have done anyway this week and will probably do something on Monday that will give me pleasure ) that so many have queued for so long and the dignity they then show when by the coffin
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,132
    edited September 2022

    Back of The Queue now beyond Tower Bridge.

    queuing in East London may put a few off
    The queue is planned to 'begin' in Bermondsey ...
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,733
    Cyclefree said:

    Selebian said:

    Great thread on “Tales from the Queue”

    https://twitter.com/robertrea/status/1570310245465083906

    It is. This kind of thing happens anywhere you're trapped for a long time. I was in A&E for 7 hours a couple of weeks ago (was supposed to be a direct emergency admission, but the ward was full, so I and several others were dumped in the ED to wait).

    Two strangers became, I'm pretty sure, a couple (they certainly swapped numbers). I got chatting to an elderly Welsh guy who, it turned out, went to school with one of my former bosses (professor, now dead). There was a weird noise every few minutes for about half an hour, which turned out to be santiser dispenser hidden behind a lady sitting on a chair (she ended up with a coat covered down the back in hand sanitiser). We swapped tales of waits, then and in the past. We compared notes on the biscuits available.
    Wait, they give you free biscuits in the queue?
    I was once in a very long queue to go through passport control at JFK. Anyway I got chatting with the man in front, a very interesting and, as it happened, rather handsome man. We talked about what we were in NY for etc. All very pleasant and helped pass the time.

    He went through passport control and then it was my turn. The grim faced officer (who must have seen us chatting) asked me if I was visiting on my own. I said yes. She replied: "Are you sure?" (I am not joking.)

    I was so tempted to reply that the wait had been so bloody long that I had had time to meet someone, get to know them, have an affair and break up with them. But thought better of it.

    It would be rather sweet if a few romances came out of the queue for HMQ.
    Firstborn to be called either Elizabeth or Elias, depending on gender?
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709

    HYUFD said:

    My prediction is that Truss will turn out to be a lot better than many of us gave her credit for. Boris Johnson is a busted flush. He is yesterday's Clown; someone who achieved a great election victory against a ridiculously weedy opponent and managed very little else of note. His deranged supporters might want him back, but they will hopefully diminish in time, and before long it will be difficult to find anyone to admit they supported him.

    There will always be one won't there @HYUFD
    I do wonder whether even he has fallen out of love with "Boris" as he always affectionately referred to him.
    His posts do not indicate it so far, and I would be delighted if he would join those of us who want Truss to succeed and publicly accept Johnson is toxic and has damaged the party considerably
    I support her as leader but she is still 10% behind on the latest poll and this end bankers' bonuses cap now was her decision not Boris'. She and Kwarteng own it
    You demonstrate my point perfectly and until you condemn Johnson then you are part of his toxic legacy
    I won't condemn the party's most successful leader since Thatcher. Truss is now leader, fair enough but she now owns what her government does not Boris
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    edited September 2022
    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    FPT

    MattW said:

    Carnyx said:

    Nigelb said:

    HYUFD said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Ben Judah in UnHerd

    "Queen Elizabeth’s death marks the latest step away from divinely ordained monarchy, towards something else. No longer sacred, the European monarch would rather be a pilot, or a country gentleman interested in urban planning. Another step along the path we have travelled since the laying of hands on His Majesty to cure disease was suspended after Queen Anne. It is no longer possible to suspend disbelief. The magic — or rather the mindset — was gone. There have been tears for the Queen this week, but can we imagine the same for Prince William decades from now?"

    https://unherd.com/2022/09/divine-monarchy-is-finished/

    The monarch will always be divinely ordained, whatever liberal intellectuals may wish
    Alternatively, you will always believe in fairies, and the Tory party.
    There's also the slight problem that, *on the monarchy's own evidence*, it supports two different religions, or at least two very different varieties of non-RC Christianity, one north and the other south of the border. The English variety of Catholic episcopalianism, subordinating Church to State, is completely incompatible with Calvinist Presbyterianism. As indeed the history of the High Kirk of St Giles reminds us.
    That seems to me to be a bit of a theological distinction, in both senses. There are far too many nuances and shades of grey.

    There is no established church in Scotland, so I don't see how particular religious requirements can be placed on the monarch or the nation.

    Secondly, it gets more interesting elsewhere' King Charles is also head of state of Papua New Guinea, for example. And that is a *very* interesting place for religion.

    And the links between CofS and CofE pointed out above imo suggest that 'completely incompatible' is an overstatement.
    Sorry I was out - so replying now. I had also thought that the Church of Scotland (strictly designated) was disestablished but it's not, in the sense that it remains the official church of Scotland [edit] as far as the state is concerned. Ydoethur pointed that out in a very interesting post a day or two back. And KCIII was swearing to protect the Protestant C of S at his proclamation-wotsit a few days ago. I don't *think* he did that for the Niugini religions, did he?
    Indeed, the Scottish Episcopal is the Anglican church in Scotland even if the Queen is not its Supreme Governor unlike the C of E. However as you say the Church of Scotland is the official national church in Scotland and effectively the established church there.

    To be even more specific, the SEC is not the Anglican Church = C of E in Scotland , but a member of the Anglican network. Not the same thing, not least because they are independently derived from different dioceses/groups of dioceses of the Roman Cahtolic Church (though in the case of the SEC via the Church of Scotland proper, most of which became and remained Presbyterian).
    The SEC is the Anglican church and a member of the Anglican communion. Same as the Church in Wales and the Church of Ireland, all who have the Archbishop of Canterbury as their ceremonial head even if they do not share the King as their Supreme Governor with the Church of England.

    Pre Reformation both England and Scotland were majority Roman Catholic. The Scottish Episcopal Church actually started as early as 1582 just over 20 years after the Church of Scotland was founded to preserve bishops
    "the Anglican church" - no, it isn't. That's the C of E if you are using those words. The SEC is quite different. It was never Anglican except in the sense that it joined the Anglican communion in recent years.

    The two churches have different Reformations, different histories, different Williamite settlements.
    Yes it is, every member of the Anglican communion including the SEC is an Anglican church.

    Apart from not having the Kingas its SG there is little difference between the SEC and Church of England in service style or structure
    The Anglican Communion is not the Anglican Church. Different levels, altogether. It's like confusing England and the United Kingdom.

    And the SEC and C of E use different prayer books.

    Yes it is, the global Anglican communion is a denomination no different to the global Roman Catholic Church or Methodist Church etc and also more aligned than say Baptist or Pentecostal churches.

    We went to a Church of Ireland service last week which was virtually identical to our Church of England services except absent mention of the monarch, even if prayers for the late Queen at the end.

    It is nothing like the UK and US which are completely separate countries
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,733
    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    My prediction is that Truss will turn out to be a lot better than many of us gave her credit for. Boris Johnson is a busted flush. He is yesterday's Clown; someone who achieved a great election victory against a ridiculously weedy opponent and managed very little else of note. His deranged supporters might want him back, but they will hopefully diminish in time, and before long it will be difficult to find anyone to admit they supported him.

    There will always be one won't there @HYUFD
    I do wonder whether even he has fallen out of love with "Boris" as he always affectionately referred to him.
    His posts do not indicate it so far, and I would be delighted if he would join those of us who want Truss to succeed and publicly accept Johnson is toxic and has damaged the party considerably
    I support her as leader but she is still 10% behind on the latest poll and this end bankers' bonuses cap now was her decision not Boris'. She and Kwarteng own it
    You demonstrate my point perfectly and until you condemn Johnson then you are part of his toxic legacy
    I won't condemn the party's most successful leader since Thatcher
    Leaving aside the question as to whether he was more successful than either Cameron or Major, looking at the rest of them that isn't exactly a high bar, is it?
  • HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    My prediction is that Truss will turn out to be a lot better than many of us gave her credit for. Boris Johnson is a busted flush. He is yesterday's Clown; someone who achieved a great election victory against a ridiculously weedy opponent and managed very little else of note. His deranged supporters might want him back, but they will hopefully diminish in time, and before long it will be difficult to find anyone to admit they supported him.

    There will always be one won't there @HYUFD
    I do wonder whether even he has fallen out of love with "Boris" as he always affectionately referred to him.
    His posts do not indicate it so far, and I would be delighted if he would join those of us who want Truss to succeed and publicly accept Johnson is toxic and has damaged the party considerably
    I support her as leader but she is still 10% behind on the latest poll and this end bankers' bonuses cap now was her decision not Boris'. She and Kwarteng own it
    You demonstrate my point perfectly and until you condemn Johnson then you are part of his toxic legacy
    I won't condemn the party's most successful leader since Thatcher. Truss is now leader, fair enough but she now owns what her government does not Boris
    Seems you confirm my point to @TOPPING

    Last man standing baked in
  • TOPPING said:

    Cookie said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    ping said:

    Wow.

    Analyst on R5L’s wake up to money - tracking a basket of essential goods says price difference between Morrissons and Aldi is now 40%. Explained by Morrisons having to service a gigantic debt.

    Shop at Aldi, people.

    Good morning

    I heard that report as well and it is astonishing that Morrisons apparently have a 7 billion debt

    Shop anywhere but Morrisons would be the message

    5live also discussed Kwarteng's proposal to abolish city bonuses and it really does make you wonder if the conservative party have lost all it's instincts to govern

    It may be the right thing from a business sense, but the optics are shocking and hands yet another gift to labour

    It is the right thing from city workers sense. It is a bad thing for shareholders and really bad for government and taxpayers who will eventually have to fund another bailout with years of austerity.
    I'm curious about this idea that bankers bonuses caused the subprime mortgage crisis.

    I am even more curious about the idea that there will ever be another bank bailout.
    Extreme bankers bonuses create incentives for bankers to gamble with the banks money. If they win, fantastic, if they lose its not their money and as long as you can talk the talk and know some of the right people, it is still easy to get another job.

    That culture feeds through to the banks to gamble, notionally with their money, but knowing they have a government funded back stop as they are too big to fail.

    Take away the controls and regulation and sooner or later we shall be back to bail outs.
    Well, it's too bad the Labour government didn't do something about it then...
    Of course. Not sure why you think that is relevant when they have not been in power for a long time and it is the current governments policies that will matter.
    Well, the view of Labour supporters on the GFC is "it started in America".
    That's not the view of Labour supporters, it is a statement of fact.
    The global [key word, there] financial crisis started in America.
    Britain was very poorly placed to weather it because Gordon Brown had spent the previous 6 years [after an admirable initial period of restraint] pissing money up the wall, spending more than he raked in even during times of relative financial health.
    Personally I couldn't give a fig how big bankers' bonuses are. I don't care at all about the optics, I care about the gap between what we spend and what we earn. That should be the #1 issue for a chancellor of the exchequer to worry about. If this measure narrows that gap (and I am at best agnostic about whether it will) it should be welcomed.
    Britain was hit badly because we have a large globally exposed financial sector and one of our biggest banks was in the midst of an ill-advised over-leveraged buying spree at the top of the market. Running a structural deficit of 4% of GDP in 2007 compared to a G7 average of 3% is unlikely to have been a significant factor in explaining why we were hit worse than others, no matter how much people want it to be Gordon Brown's fault.
    Running a structural deficit of 4% during pre-crash times is utterly catastrophic as when the crash inevitably comes and you inevitably need countercyclical spending to go with it, then you have nowhere to go.

    The fact that some other countries were nearly as bad as the UK doesn't justify or excuse what Brown did.
    But it is hard to blame Brown's fiscal policy for us being hit *much worse than others* when Brown's fiscal policy was *pretty much the same as others'*. That was the point I was responding to.
    Also worth noting that our debt to GDP ratio in 2007 was 41% (down from 43% in 1997) compared to a G7 average of 81%. So we had plenty of space to run countercyclical fiscal policy, certainly compared to other countries, and indeed the increase in our debt to GDP ratio between 2007 and 2010 (33pp) was almost identical to the G7 average (32pp), suggesting that we were indeed able to run a countercyclical fiscal policy just like other economies.
    Except it wasn't the same as others, it was via your own figures worse than others. And of course its worth noting that the G7 average includes the UK so the G7 average was itself getting dragged down by Brown's terrible performance.

    Debt to GDP isn't the relevant figure, the deficit is, although its worth noting via your own figures again in the span of three years Brown nearly doubled our debt-to-GDP figure whereas G7 nations debt-to-GDP increased by much less than half.
    Gordon Brown's peak debt to GDP being around 3% iirc which was on a par with preceding Conservative governments. It was not significant and did not cause or exacerbate the GFC.

    Also, aiui Team Truss has determined, as Cheney said of Reagan, that deficits don't matter and that George Osborne's austerity was a mistake that hobbled Britain's economy.
    Except....this was a time of unprecedented receipts. The housing market was going bananas, profits were high, and it was a time where debt to GDP didn't need to be as high given the circumstances in the economy. Simply, we were spending too much. I don't think anyone disputes that, no matter what they think the answer (austerity/non-austerity) should have been.
    Yes, there is a good deal in that. But as it happened, the GFC came along and rendered it all moot. Then Osborne came along and flatlined the nascent recovery inherited from Labour, and here we are.
    The GFC didn't just "come along and render it moot", the GFC was a crash that the Government should have been preparing for as it was overdue. Crashes happen, and the GFC was a classic crash, not some exogenous and unforeseeable shock.

    And you repeat the myth that Osborne flatlined the recovery. Don't you realise the UK in the 2010s grew faster than the Eurozone did, both in nominal terms and in per capita terms. "Despite Brexit" supposedly harming the UK during that decade.

    If Brexit and Osborne "flatlined" or harmed the UK, then how come the UK grew faster than the Eurozone or the rest of the EU? Just how much faster than them would we have grown in your eyes were it not for Osborne or Brexit, and why?
    Osborne's austerity was a mistake as even the current vintage of Tories now acknowledge. The problem is that they have pivoted to pro-growth fiscal policies at precisely the wrong moment, with inflation out of control, and so they will only succeed in pushing up inflation and interest rates.
    Euro area growth was low because of their sovereign debt crisis and because they followed similar austerity policies to us, and because they had lower population growth.
    It was not a mistake, because the deficit was out of control.

    Pro-growth policies are good now because the deficit was brought under control prior to the crash, unlike in Brown's time, and so we're in a much better fiscal position than we were then.

    The UK grew faster than Europe on a per capita basis too, again despite "austerity" and "Brexit" being both accused of "flatlining" growth. We had our own sovereign debt crisis caused by Brown's borrowing too, which is why Osborne needed to clean up Brown's mess.
    UK 10y yields were under 4% when Brown left office. That does not look like a sovereign debt crisis to me. Greek yields peaked at over 30%. That is what a sovereign debt crisis looks like.
  • Sean_F said:

    TOPPING said:

    Cookie said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    tlg86 said:

    ping said:

    Wow.

    Analyst on R5L’s wake up to money - tracking a basket of essential goods says price difference between Morrissons and Aldi is now 40%. Explained by Morrisons having to service a gigantic debt.

    Shop at Aldi, people.

    Good morning

    I heard that report as well and it is astonishing that Morrisons apparently have a 7 billion debt

    Shop anywhere but Morrisons would be the message

    5live also discussed Kwarteng's proposal to abolish city bonuses and it really does make you wonder if the conservative party have lost all it's instincts to govern

    It may be the right thing from a business sense, but the optics are shocking and hands yet another gift to labour

    It is the right thing from city workers sense. It is a bad thing for shareholders and really bad for government and taxpayers who will eventually have to fund another bailout with years of austerity.
    I'm curious about this idea that bankers bonuses caused the subprime mortgage crisis.

    I am even more curious about the idea that there will ever be another bank bailout.
    Extreme bankers bonuses create incentives for bankers to gamble with the banks money. If they win, fantastic, if they lose its not their money and as long as you can talk the talk and know some of the right people, it is still easy to get another job.

    That culture feeds through to the banks to gamble, notionally with their money, but knowing they have a government funded back stop as they are too big to fail.

    Take away the controls and regulation and sooner or later we shall be back to bail outs.
    Well, it's too bad the Labour government didn't do something about it then...
    Of course. Not sure why you think that is relevant when they have not been in power for a long time and it is the current governments policies that will matter.
    Well, the view of Labour supporters on the GFC is "it started in America".
    That's not the view of Labour supporters, it is a statement of fact.
    The global [key word, there] financial crisis started in America.
    Britain was very poorly placed to weather it because Gordon Brown had spent the previous 6 years [after an admirable initial period of restraint] pissing money up the wall, spending more than he raked in even during times of relative financial health.
    Personally I couldn't give a fig how big bankers' bonuses are. I don't care at all about the optics, I care about the gap between what we spend and what we earn. That should be the #1 issue for a chancellor of the exchequer to worry about. If this measure narrows that gap (and I am at best agnostic about whether it will) it should be welcomed.
    Britain was hit badly because we have a large globally exposed financial sector and one of our biggest banks was in the midst of an ill-advised over-leveraged buying spree at the top of the market. Running a structural deficit of 4% of GDP in 2007 compared to a G7 average of 3% is unlikely to have been a significant factor in explaining why we were hit worse than others, no matter how much people want it to be Gordon Brown's fault.
    Running a structural deficit of 4% during pre-crash times is utterly catastrophic as when the crash inevitably comes and you inevitably need countercyclical spending to go with it, then you have nowhere to go.

    The fact that some other countries were nearly as bad as the UK doesn't justify or excuse what Brown did.
    But it is hard to blame Brown's fiscal policy for us being hit *much worse than others* when Brown's fiscal policy was *pretty much the same as others'*. That was the point I was responding to.
    Also worth noting that our debt to GDP ratio in 2007 was 41% (down from 43% in 1997) compared to a G7 average of 81%. So we had plenty of space to run countercyclical fiscal policy, certainly compared to other countries, and indeed the increase in our debt to GDP ratio between 2007 and 2010 (33pp) was almost identical to the G7 average (32pp), suggesting that we were indeed able to run a countercyclical fiscal policy just like other economies.
    Except it wasn't the same as others, it was via your own figures worse than others. And of course its worth noting that the G7 average includes the UK so the G7 average was itself getting dragged down by Brown's terrible performance.

    Debt to GDP isn't the relevant figure, the deficit is, although its worth noting via your own figures again in the span of three years Brown nearly doubled our debt-to-GDP figure whereas G7 nations debt-to-GDP increased by much less than half.
    Gordon Brown's peak debt to GDP being around 3% iirc which was on a par with preceding Conservative governments. It was not significant and did not cause or exacerbate the GFC.

    Also, aiui Team Truss has determined, as Cheney said of Reagan, that deficits don't matter and that George Osborne's austerity was a mistake that hobbled Britain's economy.
    Except....this was a time of unprecedented receipts. The housing market was going bananas, profits were high, and it was a time where debt to GDP didn't need to be as high given the circumstances in the economy. Simply, we were spending too much. I don't think anyone disputes that, no matter what they think the answer (austerity/non-austerity) should have been.
    Yes, there is a good deal in that. But as it happened, the GFC came along and rendered it all moot. Then Osborne came along and flatlined the nascent recovery inherited from Labour, and here we are.
    The GFC didn't just "come along and render it moot", the GFC was a crash that the Government should have been preparing for as it was overdue. Crashes happen, and the GFC was a classic crash, not some exogenous and unforeseeable shock.

    And you repeat the myth that Osborne flatlined the recovery. Don't you realise the UK in the 2010s grew faster than the Eurozone did, both in nominal terms and in per capita terms. "Despite Brexit" supposedly harming the UK during that decade.

    If Brexit and Osborne "flatlined" or harmed the UK, then how come the UK grew faster than the Eurozone or the rest of the EU? Just how much faster than them would we have grown in your eyes were it not for Osborne or Brexit, and why?
    Osborne's austerity was a mistake as even the current vintage of Tories now acknowledge. The problem is that they have pivoted to pro-growth fiscal policies at precisely the wrong moment, with inflation out of control, and so they will only succeed in pushing up inflation and interest rates.
    Euro area growth was low because of their sovereign debt crisis and because they followed similar austerity policies to us, and because they had lower population growth.
    Growth has been slow in every Western country (compared to the 1950-2000 period) for at least a generation, apart from the commodity producers. If governments could pull a lever, and restore pre-2000 growth rates, they would do so.
    Apparently all you have to do is make bankers richer and trickle down will take care of the rest.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,569
    edited September 2022

    FPT

    As one of the replies says, “He at least helpfully lists all the other countries that Germany would happily give up to Russian aggression…”
    A small reminder of German armed forces leadership.

    Here’s the video that led to the resignation of the German navy chief
    https://twitter.com/mathieuvonrohr/status/1484998437317844996

    Former commanding general of US forces in Europe:
    https://twitter.com/general_ben/status/1570330220674306048
    Stunningly poor analysis of Russian capabilities that unfortunately reflects much of the German “elite” thinking.

    Finland alone would crush Russian forces. Lithuania/Poland would smother Kaliningrad in a week. Russian Navy hiding behind Crimea even though Ukraine has no Navy.
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