Whoa that's nuts. Asian taxi driver in Leeds this morning thinks Sunak will do a good job but face problems "because of the colour of his skin".
Some posters on PB don't want to face up to the baseline petty racism in our society, but it is there. Some of the callers into LBC yesterday were pretty gonzo, dancing around Sunak's ethnicity without wanting to explicitly name it.
The narrative is pretty simple. Sunak isn't "one of us". Sunak cheated the British public / members by not facing a vote. Sunak doesn't share our values. Etc etc. Not "he's a paki" levels of racism, not overtly, but it is the driver for too many people in parts of our society. And taxi drivers will hear it all the time, hence the comment. Sadly.
Like Johnson and Truss, Sunak has a Braverman, Rees Mogg and Patel test to pass. One which his two predecessors failed totally. Put any of them in his Cabinet and we’ll know he has no integrity whatsoever. Leave them where their talents belong and there is a chance we’ll see a government focused first and foremost on the national interest for the first time since the fall of Theresa May.
Whoa that's nuts. Asian taxi driver in Leeds this morning thinks Sunak will do a good job but face problems "because of the colour of his skin".
He may face one or two. But I think he will face far fewer problems from his skin colour than some suspect. The number of people in this country who are reflexively prejudiced because of skin colour is vanishingly small. The number of people who are reflexively prejudiced because of someone's cultural appearance - for example, beard-without-moustache or hijab - is rather larger, though most of those people will thej internally correct themselves. But Rishi doesn't fall into that category. Withthe minor exception of the teetotalism, Rishi looks entirely British. He is culturally unthreatening.
Yes, it will be a factor, but a small way - not much worse than, say, Starmer's 'posh North-Londoner' handicap.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
I agree we need immigration, and choosing who comes is a key plank of Brexit. I think you might be wise to realise that racism is not restricted to white people, whatever crt might say.
I heard that - I guess he was kept awake by the wind at Ocean House last night - he proceeded from the rather simplistic analysis that "the only way to make Brexit work was Singapore on Thames" and went downhill from there......
Mr Hands made headlines at the weekend by claiming that he would have voted for Jeremy Corbyn at the last election, precisely because he would have been ‘ineffectual on Brexit’.
‘They would never have got a majority, but they might have got enough to stop everything,’ he said.
‘I don’t think it’s irrecoverable yet, but it’s getting very close.’
Mr Hands, who would have wished to become a Conservative MP but was stopped by his wife Julia
Braverman’s endorsement of Sunak surprised even some of her allies, with one speculating about whether she had been offered the chance to return as home secretary. “She wouldn’t have settled for much less,” said one.
[...] But Braverman actually believes in deporting people to Rwanda. [...].
DREAMS of it indeed
Yes, she is completely out of her depth. People like Farage are far more careful with their language. She is being used by the Conservative party to boost their position with a certain type of voter, but is likely to be brutally discarded when she is no longer a net positive.
Another chance to watch a very recent great Commons moment that has been overlooked amid the PM crisis - well worth three minutes of your time:
If the conservatives have any sense, they will have an immediate vote of confidence in the commons to confirm the new PM.
I think it should be a constitutional requirement when the PM changes. OK it would be mainly symbolic, but important to remind everyone that it is absolutely up to MPs (and not eg the membership of any political party) to choose the PM. And that is where any government's mandate comes from - from elected MPs. The "mandate" from members of a party (that Truss claimed to have) is bullshit, in terms of running the country.
It would also offer any Conservative MPs who really believe that anyone except Johnson becoming PM is "Banana Republic 'democracy'" to stand up for what they believe in, and then lose the whip, if they have any guts.
This is such a routine thing in other Parliamentary democracies, such as Ireland, that it took me a moment to realise why we don't do this already, and the answer is the Monarchy.
Although in practice the PM is the individual who has the confidence of the House, and is therefore chosen by the Commons, in form the PM is chosen by the Monarch, to form their government. I presume it would be seen as something of a snub to the Monarch for the House to decide it had to test whether the Monarch's choice was valid.
During the Brexit impasse in 2019, the device of a Humble Address to the Monarch was suggested, where the Commons could pass a simple motion in favour of supporting a new individual as PM. I think that would be better than having a vote of confidence after the appointment, because it would avoid the embarrassment of voting no confidence immediately after an appointment by the Monarch.
Braverman’s endorsement of Sunak surprised even some of her allies, with one speculating about whether she had been offered the chance to return as home secretary. “She wouldn’t have settled for much less,” said one.
Pretty feeble critique, given he spent months doing so over the summer.
A better one is the pass the parcel habit the Tories have developed with the office of PM.
It is quite amusing though. Endless leadership contest which ended in failure for Sunak as the membership chose another candidate then before you know it Sunak is pronounced PM.
I mean I'm no fan of the Conservative Party or its members but if you were an anti-Sunak process driven party member you might be forgiven for being a tad miffed.
Honestly, sod them. They chose someone who it transpired didn’t have the skills needed to run the country last time so perfectly fair that MPs choose someone they have more faith in this time, particularly given that we are now in crisis in no small part because of Truss’ failings. It shouldn’t be the job of that narrow electorate to choose our PM when the Tories are in government.
Yes and no. As we are all only too well aware on here you can't just pick at an isolated thread of our political system. Because that way ends up in complete reform ending at PR or somesuch.
We have the system we have with all its idiosyncrasies; voters from the beginning of time have made the wrong decision.
And the Conservative Party has just ripped that all up because it felt like it.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
The reason immigration is unpopular isn't the "furriners", it's the infrastructure.
Yes, you're right. Britain needs immigration, we're an ageing population and we need young people to wipe bottoms, and we need people to do the jobs us Brits are either too lazy or feckless or simply think it's beneath us to do.
The problem is we also need the infrastructure support that immigration. We need new houses built. New schools. New hospitals. People see expanding class sizes, inability to get a GP's appointment for weeks, rents going up and up and semi-correctly diagnose immigration as the problem. The problem isn't the immigration, it's the lack of infrastructure to keep up with immigration.
Can’t speak for the rest of it, but immigration isn’t the cause of increasing class sizes. Funding not keeping pace with costs is the cause.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
I agree we need immigration, and choosing who comes is a key plank of Brexit. I think you might be wise to realise that racism is not restricted to white people, whatever crt might say.
Yes very true, albeit a touch patronising
In my lecturing days I used to point out that some of the worst examples of racism I have witnessed have been in Africa by Africans. And many were complicit in the slave trade.
A deeply unpopular view in some Leftie circles but completely true.
Braverman’s endorsement of Sunak surprised even some of her allies, with one speculating about whether she had been offered the chance to return as home secretary. “She wouldn’t have settled for much less,” said one.
[...] But Braverman actually believes in deporting people to Rwanda. [...].
DREAMS of it indeed
Yes, she is completely out of her depth. People like Farage are far more careful with their language. She is being used by the Conservative party to boost their position with a certain type of voter, but is likely to be brutally discarded when she is no longer a net positive.
Another chance to watch a very recent great Commons moment that has been overlooked amid the PM crisis - well worth three minutes of your time:
Braverman’s endorsement of Sunak surprised even some of her allies, with one speculating about whether she had been offered the chance to return as home secretary. “She wouldn’t have settled for much less,” said one.
"Half of all primary schools in England are trying to feed children in poverty who are ineligible for free school meals because their parents’ income does not meet the threshold. But there are 800,000 of them. It can be hard sometimes to grasp the scale of the problem through bare statistics, but vivid and haunting details can flesh them out. Children are eating school rubbers to line their stomachs and dull the ache and nausea of hunger. Others are bringing in empty lunchboxes then pretending to dine on their phantom food away from classmates, too ashamed to reveal that they have nothing to eat."
This is the challenge that Sunak inherits. There is now grinding, crushing poverty out there. Despite his right wing perspective I believe Sunak has shown understanding (as has Hunt) so I hope that despite the austerity to come that he can do something to relieve this.
If nothing else, the previous two iterations of Tory government would sneer and belittle, blaming the kids who are starving. If Sunak can act like a human being it will make a change from the last two.
The covid meals for children debacle is perhaps not a happy harbinger, though I am not quite sure of the details of that particular affair which now seems an age ago.
Whoa that's nuts. Asian taxi driver in Leeds this morning thinks Sunak will do a good job but face problems "because of the colour of his skin".
Some posters on PB don't want to face up to the baseline petty racism in our society, but it is there. Some of the callers into LBC yesterday were pretty gonzo, dancing around Sunak's ethnicity without wanting to explicitly name it.
The narrative is pretty simple. Sunak isn't "one of us". Sunak cheated the British public / members by not facing a vote. Sunak doesn't share our values. Etc etc. Not "he's a paki" levels of racism, not overtly, but it is the driver for too many people in parts of our society. And taxi drivers will hear it all the time, hence the comment. Sadly.
He is an "other" floating above us - a member of the global elite with tremendous wealth and power dictating how we live.
It works be a poor racist who couldn't construct a compelling attack line on that basis.
Whoa that's nuts. Asian taxi driver in Leeds this morning thinks Sunak will do a good job but face problems "because of the colour of his skin".
He may face one or two. But I think he will face far fewer problems from his skin colour than some suspect. The number of people in this country who are reflexively prejudiced because of skin colour is vanishingly small. The number of people who are reflexively prejudiced because of someone's cultural appearance - for example, beard-without-moustache or hijab - is rather larger, though most of those people will thej internally correct themselves. But Rishi doesn't fall into that category. Withthe minor exception of the teetotalism, Rishi looks entirely British. He is culturally unthreatening.
East African Asians like the Sunaks do tend to integrate very well, partly through being more middle class, but also from having lived as a minority community before migrating. I don't think racism will be a big problem for him.
With the cash he has it will be the least of his worries. Money talks.
Braverman’s endorsement of Sunak surprised even some of her allies, with one speculating about whether she had been offered the chance to return as home secretary. “She wouldn’t have settled for much less,” said one.
Whoa that's nuts. Asian taxi driver in Leeds this morning thinks Sunak will do a good job but face problems "because of the colour of his skin".
He may face one or two. But I think he will face far fewer problems from his skin colour than some suspect. The number of people in this country who are reflexively prejudiced because of skin colour is vanishingly small. The number of people who are reflexively prejudiced because of someone's cultural appearance - for example, beard-without-moustache or hijab - is rather larger, though most of those people will thej internally correct themselves. But Rishi doesn't fall into that category. Withthe minor exception of the teetotalism, Rishi looks entirely British. He is culturally unthreatening.
Well said, at least for younger people. For modern people discriminating based on skin colour is as absurd and alien a concept as discriminating based upon hair colour. Viewing people differently based on skin colour, when you grow up amongst people of all colours, is not "natural".
@Leon has said before that contrasting hair colour with skin colour is absurd, but its really not and thinks that just because he's old.
My daughter (6) has a number of t-shirts and dolls featuring black children that she loves because "they look like her". The reason is she has very distinctive and really beautiful black, curly hair. Ever since she was a toddler her hair is the one thing even strangers have commented upon and she really identifies with it. That hair style is more common amongst black children than white children in general, so there are lots of eg girls t-shirts featuring black girls with that hair style and if we go shopping and she sees them she says that it looks like her and can we get it?
For her, she feels she looks closer to a black girl with her hair colour and style, than she does a white girl, with straight, blonde hair. Because she's never had any reason to think skin colour is 'special' but her hair is special.
Pretty feeble critique, given he spent months doing so over the summer.
A better one is the pass the parcel habit the Tories have developed with the office of PM.
It is quite amusing though. Endless leadership contest which ended in failure for Sunak as the membership chose another candidate then before you know it Sunak is pronounced PM.
I mean I'm no fan of the Conservative Party or its members but if you were an anti-Sunak process driven party member you might be forgiven for being a tad miffed.
Honestly, sod them. They chose someone who it transpired didn’t have the skills needed to run the country last time so perfectly fair that MPs choose someone they have more faith in this time, particularly given that we are now in crisis in no small part because of Truss’ failings. It shouldn’t be the job of that narrow electorate to choose our PM when the Tories are in government.
Yes and no. As we are all only too well aware on here you can't just pick at an isolated thread of our political system. Because that way ends up in complete reform ending at PR or somesuch.
We have the system we have with all its idiosyncrasies; voters from the beginning of time have made the wrong decision.
And the Conservative Party has just ripped that all up because it felt like it.
You could have a motion welcoming the Kings decision
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
Up to a point. We need immigration of skilled individuals who don't hate us. And while population decline would be bad news, the unprecedented population expolsion of the past 25 years has also brought a lot of challenges and is not sustainable.
I don't know what makes you think those who come to this country hates us. Just a bizarre thing to write. Most of them love to be here and bring huge amounts of energy and work.
And, no, we don't just need "skilled" immigration. We need people who are prepared to roll up their sleeves and pick the fruit, dig the potatoes on those dark winter mornings, mop the floors and clean the loos of our hotels, wait on tables etc.
Sorry but your post is off-beam.
Most don't hate us. But it would seem a good idea to keep out those who do and might like to, for example, blow up our teenagers or go a bit stabby in our cities' gay districts. And while there is some room for the unskilled but hardworking, letting these people in unreservedly is somewhat inimical to the interests of the native unskilled and to productivity in general.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
I agree we need immigration, and choosing who comes is a key plank of Brexit. I think you might be wise to realise that racism is not restricted to white people, whatever crt might say.
Yes very true, albeit a touch patronising
In my lecturing days I used to point out that some of the worst examples of racism I have witnessed have been in Africa by Africans. And many were complicit in the slave trade.
A deeply unpopular view in some Leftie circles but completely true.
I grew up in Rochdale and went to college in Oldham. Two neighbouring towns with ghettoisation policies from their councils during migration phases.
At one point the riots in Oldham were different ethnic groups from different areas warring with each other in the town centre. Growing up dumb whiteys (most of my mum's family as an example sadly) referred to all of them with the p-word which I won't repeat. Which demonstrated their ignorance as so many were Indian, Bangladeshi, Kashmiri etc etc.
There remains so much petty jingoism out there. Culture, religion, resources - if you aren't us we don't like you. Very easy for them to attack Rishi, and yet instead of going after the obvious - his vast wealth, his wife's tax arrangements, him being a US green card holder whilst Chancellor etc - they go after his ethnicity. Because racism is dumb and racists are dumb.
Whoa that's nuts. Asian taxi driver in Leeds this morning thinks Sunak will do a good job but face problems "because of the colour of his skin".
He may face one or two. But I think he will face far fewer problems from his skin colour than some suspect. The number of people in this country who are reflexively prejudiced because of skin colour is vanishingly small. The number of people who are reflexively prejudiced because of someone's cultural appearance - for example, beard-without-moustache or hijab - is rather larger, though most of those people will thej internally correct themselves. But Rishi doesn't fall into that category. Withthe minor exception of the teetotalism, Rishi looks entirely British. He is culturally unthreatening.
Well said, at least for younger people. For modern people discriminating based on skin colour is as absurd and alien a concept as discriminating based upon hair colour. Viewing people differently based on skin colour, when you grow up amongst people of all colours, is not "natural".
@Leon has said before that contrasting hair colour with skin colour is absurd, but its really not and thinks that just because he's old.
My daughter (6) has a number of t-shirts and dolls featuring black children that she loves because "they look like her". The reason is she has very distinctive and really beautiful black, curly hair. Ever since she was a toddler her hair is the one thing even strangers have commented upon and she really identifies with it. That hair style is more common amongst black children than white children in general, so there are lots of eg girls t-shirts featuring black girls with that hair style and if we go shopping and she sees them she says that it looks like her and can we get it?
For her, she feels she looks closer to a black girl with her hair colour and style, than she does a white girl, with straight, blonde hair. Because she's never had any reason to think skin colour is 'special' but her hair is special.
Whoa that's nuts. Asian taxi driver in Leeds this morning thinks Sunak will do a good job but face problems "because of the colour of his skin".
Some posters on PB don't want to face up to the baseline petty racism in our society, but it is there. Some of the callers into LBC yesterday were pretty gonzo, dancing around Sunak's ethnicity without wanting to explicitly name it.
The narrative is pretty simple. Sunak isn't "one of us". Sunak cheated the British public / members by not facing a vote. Sunak doesn't share our values. Etc etc. Not "he's a paki" levels of racism, not overtly, but it is the driver for too many people in parts of our society. And taxi drivers will hear it all the time, hence the comment. Sadly.
He is an "other" floating above us - a member of the global elite with tremendous wealth and power dictating how we live.
It works be a poor racist who couldn't construct a compelling attack line on that basis.
Whoa that's nuts. Asian taxi driver in Leeds this morning thinks Sunak will do a good job but face problems "because of the colour of his skin".
He may face one or two. But I think he will face far fewer problems from his skin colour than some suspect. The number of people in this country who are reflexively prejudiced because of skin colour is vanishingly small. The number of people who are reflexively prejudiced because of someone's cultural appearance - for example, beard-without-moustache or hijab - is rather larger, though most of those people will thej internally correct themselves. But Rishi doesn't fall into that category. Withthe minor exception of the teetotalism, Rishi looks entirely British. He is culturally unthreatening.
Well said, at least for younger people. For modern people discriminating based on skin colour is as absurd and alien a concept as discriminating based upon hair colour. Viewing people differently based on skin colour, when you grow up amongst people of all colours, is not "natural".
@Leon has said before that contrasting hair colour with skin colour is absurd, but its really not and thinks that just because he's old.
My daughter (6) has a number of t-shirts and dolls featuring black children that she loves because "they look like her". The reason is she has very distinctive and really beautiful black, curly hair. Ever since she was a toddler her hair is the one thing even strangers have commented upon and she really identifies with it. That hair style is more common amongst black children than white children in general, so there are lots of eg girls t-shirts featuring black girls with that hair style and if we go shopping and she sees them she says that it looks like her and can we get it?
For her, she feels she looks closer to a black girl with her hair colour and style, than she does a white girl, with straight, blonde hair. Because she's never had any reason to think skin colour is 'special' but her hair is special.
Holy crap that is a load of cobblers
So says an old fart, dependant upon a pension he thinks England will pay him even after Scotland goes independent.
Sorry but the world has moved on from your racism, old man.
He'll just do what he thinks is right for the country and ignore the nutters. He can do nothing else and there is no advantage in trying to do otherwise. We should see a bounce in Tory poll ratings now. My guess is they will get back to within 20 points of Labour immediately. After that he could, given a fair wind, carry the Tories to an honourable defeat at the next GE, retaining something like 200/250 Parliamentary seats.
Will he get a fair wind? Well we know the economic storms that are coming but he should be able to ride them on the not unreasonable basis that they were not of his making and most other countries are suffering them too. The home-brewed political storms are a different matter though.
Boris's curmudgeonly withdrawal letter and the angry noises from The Defeated suggest that civil strife within The Party will continue. In that case I downgrade my prediction to less than 100 seats, and an Extinction Event far from impossible. If the dissidents manage to contrive a 2023 GE, then the EE becomes more likely than not.
I didn't think the eliminaton of the Conservative Party was possible in my lifetime, but the fact it can even be sensibly discussed now is an indication of the pass things have come to.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
The reason immigration is unpopular isn't the "furriners", it's the infrastructure.
Yes, you're right. Britain needs immigration, we're an ageing population and we need young people to wipe bottoms, and we need people to do the jobs us Brits are either too lazy or feckless or simply think it's beneath us to do.
The problem is we also need the infrastructure support that immigration. We need new houses built. New schools. New hospitals. People see expanding class sizes, inability to get a GP's appointment for weeks, rents going up and up and semi-correctly diagnose immigration as the problem. The problem isn't the immigration, it's the lack of infrastructure to keep up with immigration.
Can’t speak for the rest of it, but immigration isn’t the cause of increasing class sizes. Funding not keeping pace with costs is the cause.
Far too many people in the country is the problem.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
The reason immigration is unpopular isn't the "furriners", it's the infrastructure.
Yes, you're right. Britain needs immigration, we're an ageing population and we need young people to wipe bottoms, and we need people to do the jobs us Brits are either too lazy or feckless or simply think it's beneath us to do.
The problem is we also need the infrastructure support that immigration. We need new houses built. New schools. New hospitals. People see expanding class sizes, inability to get a GP's appointment for weeks, rents going up and up and semi-correctly diagnose immigration as the problem. The problem isn't the immigration, it's the lack of infrastructure to keep up with immigration.
Can’t speak for the rest of it, but immigration isn’t the cause of increasing class sizes. Funding not keeping pace with costs is the cause.
Two problems with quoting reality: 1. Too many people refuse to accept that the Tories have gutted public services. They voted for them and they can't have been taken for a fool. And besides 2. They had already decided the other was responsible for all their problems. Can't get a good enough job? School overrun and broke? Hospitals overflowing and falling down? Can't be the fault of people like you, must be the other.
There is grinding crushing poverty out there, and it is rising up the income chain to affect even people with middle ground jobs. We either spend money as investment to save other money wasted on crisis payments, or we face the societal and cultural damage this is already causing.
If we want the rise of a hard right neo-fascist like they have just elected in Italy, or the one in Hungary, then keep having governments which cut resources then blame the poor sods they make suffer.
Braverman’s endorsement of Sunak surprised even some of her allies, with one speculating about whether she had been offered the chance to return as home secretary. “She wouldn’t have settled for much less,” said one.
Braverman’s endorsement of Sunak surprised even some of her allies, with one speculating about whether she had been offered the chance to return as home secretary. “She wouldn’t have settled for much less,” said one.
[...] But Braverman actually believes in deporting people to Rwanda. [...].
DREAMS of it indeed
Yes, she is completely out of her depth. People like Farage are far more careful with their language. She is being used by the Conservative party to boost their position with a certain type of voter, but is likely to be brutally discarded when she is no longer a net positive.
Another chance to watch a very recent great Commons moment that has been overlooked amid the PM crisis - well worth three minutes of your time:
I'm guessing that Braverman's ruination of the Indian trade bill means that Rishi is unlikely to put her anywhere near a position of responsibility.
I suspect he will appoint Kemi Badenoch to something. And Steve Baker may well keep the NI position.
Given the state of the gene pool he will struggle to get enough humans to make a cabinet. The Tories are full of dross as we have seen over the last 12 years, though they have skills at filling their own pockets.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
The reason immigration is unpopular isn't the "furriners", it's the infrastructure.
Yes, you're right. Britain needs immigration, we're an ageing population and we need young people to wipe bottoms, and we need people to do the jobs us Brits are either too lazy or feckless or simply think it's beneath us to do.
The problem is we also need the infrastructure support that immigration. We need new houses built. New schools. New hospitals. People see expanding class sizes, inability to get a GP's appointment for weeks, rents going up and up and semi-correctly diagnose immigration as the problem. The problem isn't the immigration, it's the lack of infrastructure to keep up with immigration.
Can’t speak for the rest of it, but immigration isn’t the cause of increasing class sizes. Funding not keeping pace with costs is the cause.
Far too many people in the country is the problem.
Large parts of the country are empty. There is plenty of room.
He'll just do what he thinks is right for the country and ignore the nutters. He can do nothing else and there is no advantage in trying to do otherwise. We should see a bounce in Tory poll ratings now. My guess is they will get back to within 20 points of Labour immediately. After that he could, given a fair wind, carry the Tories to an honourable defeat at the next GE, retaining something like 200/250 Parliamentary seats.
Will he get a fair wind? Well we know the economic storms that are coming but he should be able to ride them on the not unreasonable basis that they were not of his making and most other countries are suffering them too. The home-brewed political storms are a different matter though.
Boris's curmudgeonly withdrawal letter and the angry noises from The Defeated suggest that civil strife within The Party will continue. In that case I downgrade my prediction to less than 100 seats, and an Extinction Event far from possible. If the dissidents manage to contrive a 2023 GE, then the EE becomes more likely than not.
I didn't think the eliminaton of the Conservative Party was possible in my lifetime, but the fact it can even be sensibly discussed now is an indication of the pass things have come to.
Sunak’s disastrous budget earlier this year helped to create the conditions for where we are now. But I think you’re right that he is by far the Tories’ best hope. That said, if we end up with any of Patel, Braverman or Rees Mogg in the Cabinet, we’ll know Sunak is not putting the country first.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
The reason immigration is unpopular isn't the "furriners", it's the infrastructure.
Yes, you're right. Britain needs immigration, we're an ageing population and we need young people to wipe bottoms, and we need people to do the jobs us Brits are either too lazy or feckless or simply think it's beneath us to do.
The problem is we also need the infrastructure support that immigration. We need new houses built. New schools. New hospitals. People see expanding class sizes, inability to get a GP's appointment for weeks, rents going up and up and semi-correctly diagnose immigration as the problem. The problem isn't the immigration, it's the lack of infrastructure to keep up with immigration.
Can’t speak for the rest of it, but immigration isn’t the cause of increasing class sizes. Funding not keeping pace with costs is the cause.
Far too many people in the country is the problem.
Large parts of the country are empty. There is plenty of room.
Especially in Malcolm's part of the world! But even in England too.
Restricting house-building and infrastructure development in general is the problem. Open immigration should be the policy, but combined with open construction, unfortunately the potentially sane pro-migration parties like the Lib Dems tend to whore themselves out to attract NIMBY voters.
There is a very real chance Penny Mordaunt will one day lead her party, and very possibly the country. But the next few hours represent an important test of her political maturity. Britain doesn’t need another hour of Tory psychodrama, never mind another week.
The Nick Robinson interview with Robert Chope showed that Boris is prepared to be a wrecking ball. The Tories '....rejection of Boris Johnson was such an act of betrayal that there would now have to be an election because Sunak had no legitimate support' says Chope.
That he is a piece of work goes without saying. The Party is ungovernable while Johnson's malign stink is lingering in the background
Whoa that's nuts. Asian taxi driver in Leeds this morning thinks Sunak will do a good job but face problems "because of the colour of his skin".
He may face one or two. But I think he will face far fewer problems from his skin colour than some suspect. The number of people in this country who are reflexively prejudiced because of skin colour is vanishingly small. The number of people who are reflexively prejudiced because of someone's cultural appearance - for example, beard-without-moustache or hijab - is rather larger, though most of those people will thej internally correct themselves. But Rishi doesn't fall into that category. Withthe minor exception of the teetotalism, Rishi looks entirely British. He is culturally unthreatening.
East African Asians like the Sunaks do tend to integrate very well, partly through being more middle class, but also from having lived as a minority community before migrating. I don't think racism will be a big problem for him.
With the cash he has it will be the least of his worries. Money talks.
I am sure that he has experienced racism, but a middle class background and immense wealth is a great insulator.
Here's a possible way forward for the nutcases like Dorries, Chope, Heaton-Harris and the Moggster.
Make them all peers. That frees up several safe seats (in those cases, Mid Bedfordshire, Christchurch, Daventry and North East Somerset) that he can have non-crazy candidates put in for. They should be reasonably straightforward holds as if there are enough of them the LDs won't be able to target as effectively with their quite small organisation.
It also removes them from the Commons to the Lords, where they can't challenge him directly.
Then, immediately after this has been done, invite the leaders of all UK parties, plus Khan and Drakeford, to a Speaker's Conference on replacing the Lords with an elected Senate of the Nations, to begin functioning from the time of the next election.
I'm sure they'd lap that up, although coming up with a voting system might be difficult (obvious solution is PR based on the votes in general elections with a 5% threshold in a minimum of constituencies in a particular area, but I know others will argue passionately for other solutions).
Then, these nutters will be out of public life for good with no way back and the more they attack him, the happier everyone is.
Except them.
But that will just make the rest of us happier still.
Whoa that's nuts. Asian taxi driver in Leeds this morning thinks Sunak will do a good job but face problems "because of the colour of his skin".
Some posters on PB don't want to face up to the baseline petty racism in our society, but it is there. Some of the callers into LBC yesterday were pretty gonzo, dancing around Sunak's ethnicity without wanting to explicitly name it.
The narrative is pretty simple. Sunak isn't "one of us". Sunak cheated the British public / members by not facing a vote. Sunak doesn't share our values. Etc etc. Not "he's a paki" levels of racism, not overtly, but it is the driver for too many people in parts of our society. And taxi drivers will hear it all the time, hence the comment. Sadly.
It is certainly revealing that every Asian person I have come across who has expressed an opinion thinks it will be an issue, while every person who says it won't be is white. I wonder which group might be better informed on the issue?
"Another Penny Mordaunt backer, former minister Damien Green, has reiterated that she is confident of reaching the threshold needed to further contest the leadership race.
Mordaunt has until 14:00 to garner the support of at least 100 MPs and build upon her current 25 backers to get her name on the ballot paper alongside Rishi Sunak.
Green says her team are confident she'll get the 100 names she needs, adding that her supporters are actually "way, way above" the current number of public endorsements.
"Penny is now looking to make sure she's above the 100 mark of nominations needed to go forward and then we can proceed to what will be a civilised discussion between Penny and Rishi to see who wins this election," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.
He added: "Penny is the person best positioned to unify the party.""
🚨The Conservatives face oblivion if they do not fully break with Trussonomics and pick a leader who understands how to rebuild the election-winning 2019 coalition.
How about telling us where you are on the Kwasi Kwarteng budget now instead? How many u-turns have you performed? What would YOU be doing to stabilise the pound, bring down inflation, keep interest rates lower?
Once we know all that, then maybe an election will the right call.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
The reason immigration is unpopular isn't the "furriners", it's the infrastructure.
Yes, you're right. Britain needs immigration, we're an ageing population and we need young people to wipe bottoms, and we need people to do the jobs us Brits are either too lazy or feckless or simply think it's beneath us to do.
The problem is we also need the infrastructure support that immigration. We need new houses built. New schools. New hospitals. People see expanding class sizes, inability to get a GP's appointment for weeks, rents going up and up and semi-correctly diagnose immigration as the problem. The problem isn't the immigration, it's the lack of infrastructure to keep up with immigration.
Can’t speak for the rest of it, but immigration isn’t the cause of increasing class sizes. Funding not keeping pace with costs is the cause.
Far too many people in the country is the problem.
I thought a key plank of Scottish independence is so that Scotland can throw open its doors to the dispossessed of the world and gift them all a free umbrella?
The Nick Robinson interview with Robert Chope showed that Boris is prepared to be a wrecking ball. The Tories '....rejection of Boris Johnson was such an act of betrayal that there would now have to be an election because Sunak had no legitimate support' says Chope.
That he is a piece of work goes without saying. The Party is ungovernable while Johnson's malign stink is lingering in the background
Hence why the privileges committee should right now be sharpening up a garlic-infused stake of wood…
He'll just do what he thinks is right for the country and ignore the nutters. He can do nothing else and there is no advantage in trying to do otherwise. We should see a bounce in Tory poll ratings now. My guess is they will get back to within 20 points of Labour immediately. After that he could, given a fair wind, carry the Tories to an honourable defeat at the next GE, retaining something like 200/250 Parliamentary seats.
Will he get a fair wind? Well we know the economic storms that are coming but he should be able to ride them on the not unreasonable basis that they were not of his making and most other countries are suffering them too. The home-brewed political storms are a different matter though.
Boris's curmudgeonly withdrawal letter and the angry noises from The Defeated suggest that civil strife within The Party will continue. In that case I downgrade my prediction to less than 100 seats, and an Extinction Event far from possible. If the dissidents manage to contrive a 2023 GE, then the EE becomes more likely than not.
I didn't think the eliminaton of the Conservative Party was possible in my lifetime, but the fact it can even be sensibly discussed now is an indication of the pass things have come to.
Sunak’s disastrous budget earlier this year helped to create the conditions for where we are now. But I think you’re right that he is by far the Tories’ best hope. That said, if we end up with any of Patel, Braverman or Rees Mogg in the Cabinet, we’ll know Sunak is not putting the country first.
Sunak has to unite all wings of the party if he is going to be able to govern. Therefore, he will absolutely have to bring some in from the cold from that wing of the party - and Braverman is a strong likelihood.
No, I'd rather he didn't either but it's the sensible thing to do. It's politics. It does not mean he's got "no integrity" or is "not putting the country first". It means he is trying to be magnanimous and unite all wings of the parliamentary party to form a stable government.
You're simply trying to set up an attack line for what you know is probably inevitable and, if he doesn’t do what he asks, the party risks splitting so there's an unstable government and you can then call for an immediate GE and Labour due to the chaos. Either way, you've got a great spin angle.
"Another Penny Mordaunt backer, former minister Damien Green, has reiterated that she is confident of reaching the threshold needed to further contest the leadership race.
Mordaunt has until 14:00 to garner the support of at least 100 MPs and build upon her current 25 backers to get her name on the ballot paper alongside Rishi Sunak.
Green says her team are confident she'll get the 100 names she needs, adding that her supporters are actually "way, way above" the current number of public endorsements.
"Penny is now looking to make sure she's above the 100 mark of nominations needed to go forward and then we can proceed to what will be a civilised discussion between Penny and Rishi to see who wins this election," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.
He added: "Penny is the person best positioned to unify the party.""
You can feel Labour searching for the right attack lines on Sunak this morning, can't you?
They are worried.
He's a harder target than Truss, for sure. I still don't understand why they chose Truss over him. The Tories should get a bounce in the polls. But "better than Truss" is a low bar. I really doubt that Labour are worried. A squillionaire finance guy pushing through brutal austerity amid an unprecedented cost of living crisis? Yeah, hard to see them landing any punches there. I think, for all his obvious faults, Johnson would have been a tougher opponent. But even the Tories seem to have tired of his bullsh*t now. General election in the spring, Labour win a two figure majority, would be my prediction.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
The reason immigration is unpopular isn't the "furriners", it's the infrastructure.
Yes, you're right. Britain needs immigration, we're an ageing population and we need young people to wipe bottoms, and we need people to do the jobs us Brits are either too lazy or feckless or simply think it's beneath us to do.
The problem is we also need the infrastructure support that immigration. We need new houses built. New schools. New hospitals. People see expanding class sizes, inability to get a GP's appointment for weeks, rents going up and up and semi-correctly diagnose immigration as the problem. The problem isn't the immigration, it's the lack of infrastructure to keep up with immigration.
Can’t speak for the rest of it, but immigration isn’t the cause of increasing class sizes. Funding not keeping pace with costs is the cause.
Far too many people in the country is the problem.
Large parts of the country are empty. There is plenty of room.
Especially in Malcolm's part of the world! But even in England too.
Restricting house-building and infrastructure development in general is the problem. Open immigration should be the policy, but combined with open construction, unfortunately the potentially sane pro-migration parties like the Lib Dems tend to whore themselves out to attract NIMBY voters.
The problem is uncontrolled house building. Developers can build what they want where they want, and that puts enormous pressure on roads and schools. Far too many of these developments are in places where it is very difficult to add more roads and schools and shops.
What we need are new towns. Plan developments which enable people to live and work. When people have easy access to resources and can move about, they complain less about the other squeezing them out.
You can feel Labour searching for the right attack lines on Sunak this morning, can't you?
They are worried.
This Labour supporter is quite a fan of Rishi. He's far and away the best candidate and always has been. Since he separated himself from Johnson's Jimmy Saville comments and didn't complain about his ticket for partying in Downing St when he clearly wasn't part of it -he's teetotal-I thought he showed a lot of class.
I fear his problems won't come from Labour supporters but from the malign influence of his ex boss.
He'll just do what he thinks is right for the country and ignore the nutters. He can do nothing else and there is no advantage in trying to do otherwise. We should see a bounce in Tory poll ratings now. My guess is they will get back to within 20 points of Labour immediately. After that he could, given a fair wind, carry the Tories to an honourable defeat at the next GE, retaining something like 200/250 Parliamentary seats.
Will he get a fair wind? Well we know the economic storms that are coming but he should be able to ride them on the not unreasonable basis that they were not of his making and most other countries are suffering them too. The home-brewed political storms are a different matter though.
Boris's curmudgeonly withdrawal letter and the angry noises from The Defeated suggest that civil strife within The Party will continue. In that case I downgrade my prediction to less than 100 seats, and an Extinction Event far from possible. If the dissidents manage to contrive a 2023 GE, then the EE becomes more likely than not.
I didn't think the eliminaton of the Conservative Party was possible in my lifetime, but the fact it can even be sensibly discussed now is an indication of the pass things have come to.
Sunak’s disastrous budget earlier this year helped to create the conditions for where we are now. But I think you’re right that he is by far the Tories’ best hope. That said, if we end up with any of Patel, Braverman or Rees Mogg in the Cabinet, we’ll know Sunak is not putting the country first.
Sunak has to unite all wings of the party if he is going to be able to govern. Therefore, he will absolutely have to bring some in from the cold from that wing of the party - and Braverman is a strong likelihood.
No, I'd rather he didn't either but it's the sensible thing to do. It's politics. It does not mean he's got "no integrity" or is "not putting the country first". It means he is trying to be magnanimous and unite all wings of the parliamentary party to form a stable government.
You're simply trying to set up an attack line for what you know is probably inevitable and, if he doesn’t do what he asks, the party risks splitting so there's an unstable government and you can then call for an immediate GE and Labour due to the chaos. Either way, you've got a great spin angle.
I can read you like a book.
Braverman is too iconic - the friction it would cause is not worth the signalling.
Kemi, Baker, Cleverly would be sufficient from the right.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
Up to a point. We need immigration of skilled individuals who don't hate us. And while population decline would be bad news, the unprecedented population expolsion of the past 25 years has also brought a lot of challenges and is not sustainable.
I don't know what makes you think those who come to this country hates us. Just a bizarre thing to write. Most of them love to be here and bring huge amounts of energy and work.
And, no, we don't just need "skilled" immigration. We need people who are prepared to roll up their sleeves and pick the fruit, dig the potatoes on those dark winter mornings, mop the floors and clean the loos of our hotels, wait on tables etc.
Sorry but your post is off-beam.
Most don't hate us. But it would seem a good idea to keep out those who do and might like to, for example, blow up our teenagers or go a bit stabby in our cities' gay districts. And while there is some room for the unskilled but hardworking, letting these people in unreservedly is somewhat inimical to the interests of the native unskilled and to productivity in general.
It's also irresponsible.
Most people come here looking for a better life, largely because the country is stable, safe and far wealthier, but there are lots of shades of grey within that.
If we took all the brakes off immigration you could probably measure it in the millions annually and we'd have shanty towns popping up outside virtually everywhere in the south-east.
For another example, look at the problems Sweden now has in several of its major cities with its very open attitude to migration over the last 20 years.
Lloyd George was teetotal. There were possibly others but can’t be arsed looking them up.
Bonar Law, as well.
He concealed it by only drinking from a hip flask containing lime juice.
This actually led people to assume he was an inveterate alcoholic, who was saving the best stuff for himself...
Why did he conceal being teetotal?
Because most of the Unionist party MPs had close links to the brewing and distilling industry, who were also major party donors.
He thought added to his background as an iron master and his Canadian birth it would mark him out as a total eccentric and mean he wasn't considered for higher office.
The career of William Joynson-Hicks, who really was an eccentric and AFAIK the only avowed temperance activist in the Unionist party in the Law era, suggests he thought correctly. Law rose to be party leader in eleven years while Joynson-Hicks had to wait 14 years for even junior ministerial office.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
The reason immigration is unpopular isn't the "furriners", it's the infrastructure.
Yes, you're right. Britain needs immigration, we're an ageing population and we need young people to wipe bottoms, and we need people to do the jobs us Brits are either too lazy or feckless or simply think it's beneath us to do.
The problem is we also need the infrastructure support that immigration. We need new houses built. New schools. New hospitals. People see expanding class sizes, inability to get a GP's appointment for weeks, rents going up and up and semi-correctly diagnose immigration as the problem. The problem isn't the immigration, it's the lack of infrastructure to keep up with immigration.
Can’t speak for the rest of it, but immigration isn’t the cause of increasing class sizes. Funding not keeping pace with costs is the cause.
Far too many people in the country is the problem.
Large parts of the country are empty. There is plenty of room.
England is choc a bloc and deliberately there is F all in most of Scotland to be able to support people
You can feel Labour searching for the right attack lines on Sunak this morning, can't you?
They are worried.
He's a harder target than Truss, for sure. I still don't understand why they chose Truss over him. The Tories should get a bounce in the polls. But "better than Truss" is a low bar. I really doubt that Labour are worried. A squillionaire finance guy pushing through brutal austerity amid an unprecedented cost of living crisis? Yeah, hard to see them landing any punches there. I think, for all his obvious faults, Johnson would have been a tougher opponent. But even the Tories seem to have tired of his bullsh*t now. General election in the spring, Labour win a two figure majority, would be my prediction.
OK, I hear a lot about this early General Election stuff when the FTPA has been repealed, and the Tories have a solid majority.
Football's looking like two bad results in a row for me (one bet still to come). Hmm. First season trying this (I did dabble earlier but not in quite the same way). Think I might be neglecting recent form too much in favour of considering overall results, might be leading me astray.
He'll just do what he thinks is right for the country and ignore the nutters. He can do nothing else and there is no advantage in trying to do otherwise. We should see a bounce in Tory poll ratings now. My guess is they will get back to within 20 points of Labour immediately. After that he could, given a fair wind, carry the Tories to an honourable defeat at the next GE, retaining something like 200/250 Parliamentary seats.
Will he get a fair wind? Well we know the economic storms that are coming but he should be able to ride them on the not unreasonable basis that they were not of his making and most other countries are suffering them too. The home-brewed political storms are a different matter though.
Boris's curmudgeonly withdrawal letter and the angry noises from The Defeated suggest that civil strife within The Party will continue. In that case I downgrade my prediction to less than 100 seats, and an Extinction Event far from possible. If the dissidents manage to contrive a 2023 GE, then the EE becomes more likely than not.
I didn't think the eliminaton of the Conservative Party was possible in my lifetime, but the fact it can even be sensibly discussed now is an indication of the pass things have come to.
Sunak’s disastrous budget earlier this year helped to create the conditions for where we are now. But I think you’re right that he is by far the Tories’ best hope. That said, if we end up with any of Patel, Braverman or Rees Mogg in the Cabinet, we’ll know Sunak is not putting the country first.
Sunak has to unite all wings of the party if he is going to be able to govern. Therefore, he will absolutely have to bring some in from the cold from that wing of the party - and Braverman is a strong likelihood.
No, I'd rather he didn't either but it's the sensible thing to do. It's politics. It does not mean he's got "no integrity" or is "not putting the country first". It means he is trying to be magnanimous and unite all wings of the parliamentary party to form a stable government.
You're simply trying to set up an attack line for what you know is probably inevitable and, if he doesn’t do what he asks, the party risks splitting so there's an unstable government and you can then call for an immediate GE and Labour due to the chaos. Either way, you've got a great spin angle.
I can read you like a book.
This is an internet message board, not Parliament. What any of us anonymous posters says on here is not of the slightest consequence to the national discourse. We’re all just people of no import who happen to have opinions. My opinion is you can’t claim to have integrity and be focused on the national interest and then put people like Braverman, Patel and Rees Mogg in your Cabinet. You disagree. That’s all that’s happening here. The world turns.
Boris's brief statement still managed to do the following:
Make an almost certainly untrue claim (102 firm nominees)
Clearly imply that the failure of his 'reaching out' is the fault of others.
Fail to state the obvious - that 'reaching out' was about Boris being PM and everyone else falling into line.
State that he would fully support whoever won, while his supporters go round social media and the studios to say the opposite.
Claim that his position was all about what was good for the country.
This is genius of a sort.
Final note: it seems clear that either Boris or Rishi as PM will in fact not meet with acceptance by a significant number of the other side. I doubt if we are in fact in for boring meritocratic sober political times.
Unpopular this may be but we NEED immigration. Brexit and covid drove away workers who helped our country function. Right now there's a labour shortage.
It goes deeper than that. Whatever some nasty white Brits might like to believe, this country has been an island nation with an outward facing attitude. For good or ill we have been a global nation, not an insular one. This country has benefitted phenomenally from the rich legacy of that outlook, right down to having our first Asian heritage Prime Minister.
I celebrate that fact. We all should.
The reason immigration is unpopular isn't the "furriners", it's the infrastructure.
Yes, you're right. Britain needs immigration, we're an ageing population and we need young people to wipe bottoms, and we need people to do the jobs us Brits are either too lazy or feckless or simply think it's beneath us to do.
The problem is we also need the infrastructure support that immigration. We need new houses built. New schools. New hospitals. People see expanding class sizes, inability to get a GP's appointment for weeks, rents going up and up and semi-correctly diagnose immigration as the problem. The problem isn't the immigration, it's the lack of infrastructure to keep up with immigration.
Can’t speak for the rest of it, but immigration isn’t the cause of increasing class sizes. Funding not keeping pace with costs is the cause.
Far too many people in the country is the problem.
I thought a key plank of Scottish independence is so that Scotland can throw open its doors to the dispossessed of the world and gift them all a free umbrella?
I was talking about England, we have plenty of space in Scotland just not the powers to enable immigration and be able to spend money planning it properly.
As I’m incredibly lazy and can’t be bothered to research it is there any indication from Baker what his views are over immigration etc as to his suitability as Home Sec?
He seems to have surprised on the upside in NI and if he was a less toxic ERG alternative to Suella in the home office would that be a good way for Sunak to keep the ERG close with a big position for one of their big names?
Penny for FS if she drops out at 13.55 today.
Kemi for education.
Gove Duchy of Lancaster so he can have a roving brief. Or Hague.
Tugenhadt or Elwood to armed forces minister (was thinking - do we know if Wallace is actually doing a great job at MOD or is it that they are just getting on doing what they would be doing for Ukraine under any half decent minister) so they have military backgrounds and can keep an eye on Wallace.
Hunt CofEx
Health he needs someone seriously capable but might have to outsource it to Lords as can’t think of anyone in the Commons suitable…
🚨The Conservatives face oblivion if they do not fully break with Trussonomics and pick a leader who understands how to rebuild the election-winning 2019 coalition.
He'll just do what he thinks is right for the country and ignore the nutters. He can do nothing else and there is no advantage in trying to do otherwise. We should see a bounce in Tory poll ratings now. My guess is they will get back to within 20 points of Labour immediately. After that he could, given a fair wind, carry the Tories to an honourable defeat at the next GE, retaining something like 200/250 Parliamentary seats.
Will he get a fair wind? Well we know the economic storms that are coming but he should be able to ride them on the not unreasonable basis that they were not of his making and most other countries are suffering them too. The home-brewed political storms are a different matter though.
Boris's curmudgeonly withdrawal letter and the angry noises from The Defeated suggest that civil strife within The Party will continue. In that case I downgrade my prediction to less than 100 seats, and an Extinction Event far from possible. If the dissidents manage to contrive a 2023 GE, then the EE becomes more likely than not.
I didn't think the eliminaton of the Conservative Party was possible in my lifetime, but the fact it can even be sensibly discussed now is an indication of the pass things have come to.
Sunak’s disastrous budget earlier this year helped to create the conditions for where we are now. But I think you’re right that he is by far the Tories’ best hope. That said, if we end up with any of Patel, Braverman or Rees Mogg in the Cabinet, we’ll know Sunak is not putting the country first.
Sunak has to unite all wings of the party if he is going to be able to govern. Therefore, he will absolutely have to bring some in from the cold from that wing of the party - and Braverman is a strong likelihood.
No, I'd rather he didn't either but it's the sensible thing to do. It's politics. It does not mean he's got "no integrity" or is "not putting the country first". It means he is trying to be magnanimous and unite all wings of the parliamentary party to form a stable government.
You're simply trying to set up an attack line for what you know is probably inevitable and, if he doesn’t do what he asks, the party risks splitting so there's an unstable government and you can then call for an immediate GE and Labour due to the chaos. Either way, you've got a great spin angle.
I can read you like a book.
This is an internet message board, not Parliament. What any of us anonymous posters says on here is not of the slightest consequence to the national discourse. We’re all just people of no import who happen to have opinions. My opinion is you can’t claim to have integrity and be focused on the national interest and then put people like Braverman, Patel and Rees Mogg in your Cabinet. You disagree. That’s all that’s happening here. The world turns.
Bollocks. I will continue to call you out for those who do read the comments here who do have influence in the national discourse.
You're a transparent spinner. It's a shame because you'd be much more interesting if you engaged objectively with the subject, rather than seagulling in here two or three times a day, dropping your spin, and then leaving again.
Like you used to do before you went off the rails.
You can feel Labour searching for the right attack lines on Sunak this morning, can't you?
They are worried.
He's a harder target than Truss, for sure. I still don't understand why they chose Truss over him. The Tories should get a bounce in the polls. But "better than Truss" is a low bar. I really doubt that Labour are worried. A squillionaire finance guy pushing through brutal austerity amid an unprecedented cost of living crisis? Yeah, hard to see them landing any punches there. I think, for all his obvious faults, Johnson would have been a tougher opponent. But even the Tories seem to have tired of his bullsh*t now. General election in the spring, Labour win a two figure majority, would be my prediction.
OK, I hear a lot about this early General Election stuff when the FTPA has been repealed, and the Tories have a solid majority.
Can someone please explain the mechanism to me?
Defections, byelections, breakdown in discipline, confidence vote on some particularly unpopular plank of austerity, troublemaking by Johnsonites, economic and markets turmoil, I think can all combine to force an election. Sunak has no mandate, will have to do a lot of very difficult and unpopular stuff, and lots of his party don't like him. I think it is rather unlikely his government lasts full term. Paradoxically, if the polls do narrow materially he becomes much more vulnerable.
Mordaunt needs to pull out tbh. Boris had the support of 60 or so in the end of his candidates, it's actually a reasonable number to take it to a contest if you like considering the noms process is secret and there are plenty of undeclared MPs. 27 is ludicrous though up against 160 or so publicly declared for Rishi. As Mordaunt (You'd hope) is a more rational actor than Boris you'd have thought she'd withdraw and save her fire for the next leadership contest. If she doesn't then she's probably out from that one too with what would be an amazing lack of self awareness.
Whoa that's nuts. Asian taxi driver in Leeds this morning thinks Sunak will do a good job but face problems "because of the colour of his skin".
He may face one or two. But I think he will face far fewer problems from his skin colour than some suspect. The number of people in this country who are reflexively prejudiced because of skin colour is vanishingly small. The number of people who are reflexively prejudiced because of someone's cultural appearance - for example, beard-without-moustache or hijab - is rather larger, though most of those people will thej internally correct themselves. But Rishi doesn't fall into that category. Withthe minor exception of the teetotalism, Rishi looks entirely British. He is culturally unthreatening.
East African Asians like the Sunaks do tend to integrate very well, partly through being more middle class, but also from having lived as a minority community before migrating. I don't think racism will be a big problem for him.
With the cash he has it will be the least of his worries. Money talks.
I am sure that he has experienced racism, but a middle class background and immense wealth is a great insulator.
Poor white people suffer racism but we get told that is impossible, it is a great insulator for all colours of skin.
So I guess today it comes down to whether Rishi is concerned about a ballot or not. He god lend Mordaunt names. But he might prefer not to take the risk and be appointed rather than endorsed by the members. It would not be a great look not even have an MP vote.
I notice that Rishi is gaining more votes from former Boris supporters this morning, and as I said last night I expect him to become PM early this afternoon not least because I just do not see Penny achieving nearly 50% of the undeclared mps
So I guess today it comes down to whether Rishi is concerned about a ballot or not. He god lend Mordaunt names. But he might prefer not to take the risk and be appointed rather than endorsed by the members. It would not be a great look not even have an MP vote.
He would be utterly mad to lend her votes to enable a membership vote he would lose.
You can feel Labour searching for the right attack lines on Sunak this morning, can't you?
They are worried.
He's a harder target than Truss, for sure. I still don't understand why they chose Truss over him. The Tories should get a bounce in the polls. But "better than Truss" is a low bar. I really doubt that Labour are worried. A squillionaire finance guy pushing through brutal austerity amid an unprecedented cost of living crisis? Yeah, hard to see them landing any punches there. I think, for all his obvious faults, Johnson would have been a tougher opponent. But even the Tories seem to have tired of his bullsh*t now. General election in the spring, Labour win a two figure majority, would be my prediction.
OK, I hear a lot about this early General Election stuff when the FTPA has been repealed, and the Tories have a solid majority.
Can someone please explain the mechanism to me?
PM goes to monarch, says Please dissolve parliament
Monarch dissolves parliament
GE happens
Except in very rare edge cases where Lascelles principles come into play.
Mordaunt needs to pull out tbh. Boris had the support of 60 or so in the end of his candidates, it's actually a reasonable number to take it to a contest if you like considering the noms process is secret and there are plenty of undeclared MPs. 27 is ludicrous though up against 160 or so publicly declared for Rishi. As Mordaunt (You'd hope) is a more rational actor than Boris you'd have thought she'd withdraw and save her fire for the next leadership contest. If she doesn't then she's probably out from that one too with what would be an amazing lack of self awareness.
Damian Green is creating room for her to have a negotiating meeting with Rishi first thing this morning so she can get the best deal she can.
So I guess today it comes down to whether Rishi is concerned about a ballot or not. He god lend Mordaunt names. But he might prefer not to take the risk and be appointed rather than endorsed by the members. It would not be a great look not even have an MP vote.
It would be a great look - the Tory membership should be nowhere near the appointment of a new PM.
After all their choice is the reason we have to find £65bn in extra interest costs - personally I think there should be an August 2022 Tory membership tax of 100% of assets. to cover those costs.
The Nick Robinson interview with Robert Chope showed that Boris is prepared to be a wrecking ball. The Tories '....rejection of Boris Johnson was such an act of betrayal that there would now have to be an election because Sunak had no legitimate support' says Chope.
That he is a piece of work goes without saying. The Party is ungovernable while Johnson's malign stink is lingering in the background
Hence why the privileges committee should right now be sharpening up a garlic-infused stake of wood…
Its like when Buffy stakes Dracula. The first time is not enough.
In these difficult times for our country we must unite by putting public service first and work together. We care about our country and with the enormous challenges upon us we must put political differences aside to give @RishiSunak the best chance of succeeding.
You can feel Labour searching for the right attack lines on Sunak this morning, can't you?
They are worried.
He's a harder target than Truss, for sure. I still don't understand why they chose Truss over him. The Tories should get a bounce in the polls. But "better than Truss" is a low bar. I really doubt that Labour are worried. A squillionaire finance guy pushing through brutal austerity amid an unprecedented cost of living crisis? Yeah, hard to see them landing any punches there. I think, for all his obvious faults, Johnson would have been a tougher opponent. But even the Tories seem to have tired of his bullsh*t now. General election in the spring, Labour win a two figure majority, would be my prediction.
OK, I hear a lot about this early General Election stuff when the FTPA has been repealed, and the Tories have a solid majority.
Can someone please explain the mechanism to me?
Defections, byelections, breakdown in discipline, confidence vote on some particularly unpopular plank of austerity, troublemaking by Johnsonites, economic and markets turmoil, I think can all combine to force an election. Sunak has no mandate, will have to do a lot of very difficult and unpopular stuff, and lots of his party don't like him. I think it is rather unlikely his government lasts full term. Paradoxically, if the polls do narrow materially he becomes much more vulnerable.
OK, so it hinges on him losing his effective majority in Parliament.
That's about 40 MPs he's got to lose and John Major still managed to soldier on for the last year from 1996-97 without really having one.
It's possible but I wouldn't want to be backing spring 2023.
So I guess today it comes down to whether Rishi is concerned about a ballot or not. He god lend Mordaunt names. But he might prefer not to take the risk and be appointed rather than endorsed by the members. It would not be a great look not even have an MP vote.
He would be utterly mad to lend her votes to enable a membership vote he would lose.
All very technocratic. You can only run away from elections for so long.
Comments
The narrative is pretty simple. Sunak isn't "one of us". Sunak cheated the British public / members by not facing a vote. Sunak doesn't share our values. Etc etc. Not "he's a paki" levels of racism, not overtly, but it is the driver for too many people in parts of our society. And taxi drivers will hear it all the time, hence the comment. Sadly.
I think you might be wise to realise that racism is not restricted to white people, whatever crt might say.
Mr Hands made headlines at the weekend by claiming that he would have voted for Jeremy Corbyn at the last election, precisely because he would have been ‘ineffectual on Brexit’.
‘They would never have got a majority, but they might have got enough to stop everything,’ he said.
‘I don’t think it’s irrecoverable yet, but it’s getting very close.’
Mr Hands, who would have wished to become a Conservative MP but was stopped by his wife Julia
https://guernseypress.com/news/2021/10/28/brexit-is-doomed---guy-hands/
I'm guessing that Braverman's ruination of the Indian trade bill means that Rishi is unlikely to put her anywhere near a position of responsibility.
I suspect he will appoint Kemi Badenoch to something. And Steve Baker may well keep the NI position.
Although in practice the PM is the individual who has the confidence of the House, and is therefore chosen by the Commons, in form the PM is chosen by the Monarch, to form their government. I presume it would be seen as something of a snub to the Monarch for the House to decide it had to test whether the Monarch's choice was valid.
During the Brexit impasse in 2019, the device of a Humble Address to the Monarch was suggested, where the Commons could pass a simple motion in favour of supporting a new individual as PM. I think that would be better than having a vote of confidence after the appointment, because it would avoid the embarrassment of voting no confidence immediately after an appointment by the Monarch.
We have the system we have with all its idiosyncrasies; voters from the beginning of time have made the wrong decision.
And the Conservative Party has just ripped that all up because it felt like it.
In my lecturing days I used to point out that some of the worst examples of racism I have witnessed have been in Africa by Africans. And many were complicit in the slave trade.
A deeply unpopular view in some Leftie circles but completely true.
It works be a poor racist who couldn't construct a compelling attack line on that basis.
@Leon has said before that contrasting hair colour with skin colour is absurd, but its really not and thinks that just because he's old.
My daughter (6) has a number of t-shirts and dolls featuring black children that she loves because "they look like her". The reason is she has very distinctive and really beautiful black, curly hair. Ever since she was a toddler her hair is the one thing even strangers have commented upon and she really identifies with it. That hair style is more common amongst black children than white children in general, so there are lots of eg girls t-shirts featuring black girls with that hair style and if we go shopping and she sees them she says that it looks like her and can we get it?
For her, she feels she looks closer to a black girl with her hair colour and style, than she does a white girl, with straight, blonde hair. Because she's never had any reason to think skin colour is 'special' but her hair is special.
Says Sunak has to realise "respect is a mutual thing" with his backbenchers.
https://twitter.com/paulwaugh/status/1584438609847123968
And while there is some room for the unskilled but hardworking, letting these people in unreservedly is somewhat
inimical to the interests of the native unskilled and to productivity in general.
At one point the riots in Oldham were different ethnic groups from different areas warring with each other in the town centre. Growing up dumb whiteys (most of my mum's family as an example sadly) referred to all of them with the p-word which I won't repeat. Which demonstrated their ignorance as so many were Indian, Bangladeshi, Kashmiri etc etc.
There remains so much petty jingoism out there. Culture, religion, resources - if you aren't us we don't like you. Very easy for them to attack Rishi, and yet instead of going after the obvious - his vast wealth, his wife's tax arrangements, him being a US green card holder whilst Chancellor etc - they go after his ethnicity. Because racism is dumb and racists are dumb.
Disturbing that some of them seem to have gone full nihilist though.
Cumulatively now Rishi 13, Penny 1 since Boris withdrew.
Of which 8-1 have switched from Boris.
Sorry but the world has moved on from your racism, old man.
He'll just do what he thinks is right for the country and ignore the nutters. He can do nothing else and there is no advantage in trying to do otherwise. We should see a bounce in Tory poll ratings now. My guess is they will get back to within 20 points of Labour immediately. After that he could, given a fair wind, carry the Tories to an honourable defeat at the next GE, retaining something like 200/250 Parliamentary seats.
Will he get a fair wind? Well we know the economic storms that are coming but he should be able to ride them on the not unreasonable basis that they were not of his making and most other countries are suffering them too. The home-brewed political storms are a different matter though.
Boris's curmudgeonly withdrawal letter and the angry noises from The Defeated suggest that civil strife within The Party will continue. In that case I downgrade my prediction to less than 100 seats, and an Extinction Event far from impossible. If the dissidents manage to contrive a 2023 GE, then the EE becomes more likely than not.
I didn't think the eliminaton of the Conservative Party was possible in my lifetime, but the fact it can even be sensibly discussed now is an indication of the pass things have come to.
1. Too many people refuse to accept that the Tories have gutted public services. They voted for them and they can't have been taken for a fool. And besides
2. They had already decided the other was responsible for all their problems. Can't get a good enough job? School overrun and broke? Hospitals overflowing and falling down? Can't be the fault of people like you, must be the other.
There is grinding crushing poverty out there, and it is rising up the income chain to affect even people with middle ground jobs. We either spend money as investment to save other money wasted on crisis payments, or we face the societal and cultural damage this is already causing.
If we want the rise of a hard right neo-fascist like they have just elected in Italy, or the one in Hungary, then keep having governments which cut resources then blame the poor sods they make suffer.
Brexit is a festival of nihilism.
Burn down the house to "be free"...
Restricting house-building and infrastructure development in general is the problem. Open immigration should be the policy, but combined with open construction, unfortunately the potentially sane pro-migration parties like the Lib Dems tend to whore themselves out to attract NIMBY voters.
https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1584441385435901953
The Tories '....rejection of Boris Johnson was such an act of betrayal that there would now have to be an election because Sunak had no legitimate support' says Chope.
That he is a piece of work goes without saying. The Party is ungovernable while Johnson's malign stink is lingering in the background
https://twitter.com/jamescleverly/status/1584441263457116161
Here's a possible way forward for the nutcases like Dorries, Chope, Heaton-Harris and the Moggster.
Make them all peers. That frees up several safe seats (in those cases, Mid Bedfordshire, Christchurch, Daventry and North East Somerset) that he can have non-crazy candidates put in for. They should be reasonably straightforward holds as if there are enough of them the LDs won't be able to target as effectively with their quite small organisation.
It also removes them from the Commons to the Lords, where they can't challenge him directly.
Then, immediately after this has been done, invite the leaders of all UK parties, plus Khan and Drakeford, to a Speaker's Conference on replacing the Lords with an elected Senate of the Nations, to begin functioning from the time of the next election.
I'm sure they'd lap that up, although coming up with a voting system might be difficult (obvious solution is PR based on the votes in general elections with a 5% threshold in a minimum of constituencies in a particular area, but I know others will argue passionately for other solutions).
Then, these nutters will be out of public life for good with no way back and the more they attack him, the happier everyone is.
Except them.
But that will just make the rest of us happier still.
Implied interest rate on 10yr UK govt bond down from 4.1% to 3.8% https://twitter.com/EdConwaySky/status/1584442271172173826/photo/1
They'll vote for anything with a blue rosette in Chichester.
There is no reasonable case whatsoever for a Tory MP to want a general election now having not supported one when Truss took over.
Mordaunt has until 14:00 to garner the support of at least 100 MPs and build upon her current 25 backers to get her name on the ballot paper alongside Rishi Sunak.
Green says her team are confident she'll get the 100 names she needs, adding that her supporters are actually "way, way above" the current number of public endorsements.
"Penny is now looking to make sure she's above the 100 mark of nominations needed to go forward and then we can proceed to what will be a civilised discussion between Penny and Rishi to see who wins this election," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.
He added: "Penny is the person best positioned to unify the party.""
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-politics-63327087
New research by Onward's @Will_Tanner and @jim_blagden. https://www.ukonward.com/reports/after-the-fall-where-conservatives-went-wrong
Sorry Doc, but there ain't no such thing as a safe Tory seat at the moment.
The situation for the Conservatives is bad. Two thirds of voters say they would not even consider voting for the party. https://twitter.com/ukonward/status/1584420376716931072/photo/1
He concealed it by only drinking from a hip flask containing lime juice.
This actually led people to assume he was an inveterate alcoholic, who was saving the best stuff for himself...
They are worried.
"General election...general election...general election..."
How about telling us where you are on the Kwasi Kwarteng budget now instead? How many u-turns have you performed? What would YOU be doing to stabilise the pound, bring down inflation, keep interest rates lower?
Once we know all that, then maybe an election will the right call.
Nobody respects him.
To be fair, he doesn't deserve respect.
https://www.northern-scot.co.uk/news/laird-whose-dad-burned-a-prime-minister-on-lossiemouths-east-beach-223601/
*Not a complete correlation by any means. But it was not unusual.
No, I'd rather he didn't either but it's the sensible thing to do. It's politics. It does not mean he's got "no integrity" or is "not putting the country first". It means he is trying to be magnanimous and unite all wings of the parliamentary party to form a stable government.
You're simply trying to set up an attack line for what you know is probably inevitable and, if he doesn’t do what he asks, the party risks splitting so there's an unstable government and you can then call for an immediate GE and Labour due to the chaos. Either way, you've got a great spin angle.
I can read you like a book.
But "better than Truss" is a low bar. I really doubt that Labour are worried. A squillionaire finance guy pushing through brutal austerity amid an unprecedented cost of living crisis? Yeah, hard to see them landing any punches there.
I think, for all his obvious faults, Johnson would have been a tougher opponent. But even the Tories seem to have tired of his bullsh*t now.
General election in the spring, Labour win a two figure majority, would be my prediction.
What we need are new towns. Plan developments which enable people to live and work. When people have easy access to resources and can move about, they complain less about the other squeezing them out.
I fear his problems won't come from Labour supporters but from the malign influence of his ex boss.
Kemi, Baker, Cleverly would be sufficient from the right.
Most people come here looking for a better life, largely because the country is stable, safe and far wealthier, but there are lots of shades of grey within that.
If we took all the brakes off immigration you could probably measure it in the millions annually and we'd have shanty towns popping up outside virtually everywhere in the south-east.
For another example, look at the problems Sweden now has in several of its major cities with its very open attitude to migration over the last 20 years.
I’ll just leave it there
He thought added to his background as an iron master and his Canadian birth it would mark him out as a total eccentric and mean he wasn't considered for higher office.
The career of William Joynson-Hicks, who really was an eccentric and AFAIK the only avowed temperance activist in the Unionist party in the Law era, suggests he thought correctly. Law rose to be party leader in eleven years while Joynson-Hicks had to wait 14 years for even junior ministerial office.
Can someone please explain the mechanism to me?
Make an almost certainly untrue claim (102 firm nominees)
Clearly imply that the failure of his 'reaching out' is the fault of others.
Fail to state the obvious - that 'reaching out' was about Boris being PM and everyone else falling into line.
State that he would fully support whoever won, while his supporters go round social media and the studios to say the opposite.
Claim that his position was all about what was good for the country.
This is genius of a sort.
Final note: it seems clear that either Boris or Rishi as PM will in fact not meet with acceptance by a significant number of the other side. I doubt if we are in fact in for boring meritocratic sober political times.
Bet accordingly on date of next GE
He seems to have surprised on the upside in NI and if he was a less toxic ERG alternative to Suella in the home office would that be a good way for Sunak to keep the ERG close with a big position for one of their big names?
Penny for FS if she drops out at 13.55 today.
Kemi for education.
Gove Duchy of Lancaster so he can have a roving brief. Or Hague.
Tugenhadt or Elwood to armed forces minister (was thinking - do we know if Wallace is actually doing a great job at MOD or is it that they are just getting on doing what they would be doing for Ukraine under any half decent minister) so they have military backgrounds and can keep an eye on Wallace.
Hunt CofEx
Health he needs someone seriously capable but might have to outsource it to Lords as can’t think of anyone in the Commons suitable…
Which does kind of illustrate why bringing back Leon’s hero-clown really wouldn’t have been the brightest move!
You're a transparent spinner. It's a shame because you'd be much more interesting if you engaged objectively with the subject, rather than seagulling in here two or three times a day, dropping your spin, and then leaving again.
Like you used to do before you went off the rails.
27 is ludicrous though up against 160 or so publicly declared for Rishi.
As Mordaunt (You'd hope) is a more rational actor than Boris you'd have thought she'd withdraw and save her fire for the next leadership contest. If she doesn't then she's probably out from that one too with what would be an amazing lack of self awareness.
I notice that Rishi is gaining more votes from former Boris supporters this morning, and as I said last night I expect him to become PM early this afternoon not least because I just do not see Penny achieving nearly 50% of the undeclared mps
Monarch dissolves parliament
GE happens
Except in very rare edge cases where Lascelles principles come into play.
Then, she'll pull out.
After all their choice is the reason we have to find £65bn in extra interest costs - personally I think there should be an August 2022 Tory membership tax of 100% of assets. to cover those costs.
https://youtu.be/7rvx0PrEHsU?t=203
https://twitter.com/pritipatel/status/1584449747070652416
That's about 40 MPs he's got to lose and John Major still managed to soldier on for the last year from 1996-97 without really having one.
It's possible but I wouldn't want to be backing spring 2023.