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This explains so much – politicalbetting.com

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  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 126,352

    After Trump's victory, Labour ignore immigration (both legal and illegal) at their peril.

    However successfully Labour handle the small boats it won't be good enough for Farage. Even if Labour bring arrival numbers down considerably that doesn't resolve the issue that vexes Farage and his racist chums, namely "foreigners" who are already here. Although that doesn't necessarily assist the Tories.

    Perhaps when it comes down to immigration ("foreigners") the Tories need to out Farage, Farage. Is Badenoch capable of such performative cruelty? If she is not we have Jenrick, who would be quite comfortable with rounding "foreigners" up and packing them on buses to Dundalk, patiently waiting for his moment.
    Probably neither are. Opinium confirms Badenoch is just treading water and holding the Tory vote which voted for Rishi in July while it is Farage who is eating into the wwc Labour vote. Jenrick might have made a bit more progress winning back Boris voters now voting Reform but he was an ex Remainer Cameroon which put a ceiling on that.

    The only Tory leader who could really squeeze the Reform vote and reunite the Right is probably now Jacob Rees Mogg if he wins back his Somerset seat at the next GE (or moves to a more winnable prospect like the seat Liam Fox only just lost which is also in North Somerset). Assuming Boris doesn't return of course given he was the man who put Farage back in his box in the first place in 2019 when May was leaking voters massively to him
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,650
    MaxPB said:

    Yup, imagine going into the election now rather than July. Petrol prices at the lowest for over a year, economy would be growing much faster than it is now, immigration numbers would be coming down and people would have had a relatively relaxing summer to reflect on their situation. It would still have been a loss but I think the Tories would have scraped 200 seats and Labour a much smaller majority. Holding it around now so that Nige would have had to split his time between Reform and Trump would have been very beneficial to the Tories as well.

    Whataboutary at its finest.

    Firstly, if the US election has taught you anything it is that formal economic metrics count for zip when compared to the lived experience. Counterbalance petrol at £1.30 a litre with a four pint flagon of Cravendale at between £2.50 and three quid.

    Secondly, the small boats issue has largely been ignored by the media. Sunak lit that touch paper with his five pledges, and has been horsewhipped with it ever since. The numbers are still enormous and one flight to Rwanda would have highlighted the Conservative Government were just taking the piss.

    Thirdly, riding on the crest of a Trump victory wave is more likely to have assisted Reform than the Tories.
  • HYUFD said:

    Less so Maggie, she did not grow up rich and while Dennis was a millionaire she wasn't
    Margaret Thatcher had married Dennis some three decades before reaching Downing Street, where she started the fashion of turning down recommended pay increases.
  • boulayboulay Posts: 6,006
    HYUFD said:

    Less so Maggie, she did not grow up rich and while Dennis was a millionaire she wasn't
    You could argue that Rishi didn’t grow up “rich” either. His parents made sacrifices to cover his school fees and he wouldn’t have been considered rich with a doctor father and pharmacist mother compared to his peers at school.

    He had a privileged education but only became rich through his work and richer through his marriage.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,650
    edited November 2024
    HYUFD said:

    Probably neither are. Opinium confirms Badenoch is just treading water and holding the Tory vote which voted for Rishi in July while it is Farage who is eating into the wwc Labour vote. Jenrick might have made a bit more progress winning back Boris voters now voting Reform but he was an ex Remainer Cameroon which put a ceiling on that.

    The only Tory leader who could really squeeze the Reform vote and reunite the Right is probably now Jacob Rees Mogg if he wins back his Somerset seat at the next GE (or moves to a more winnable prospect like the seat Liam Fox only just lost which is also in North Somerset). Assuming Boris doesn't return of course given he was the man who put Farage back in his box in the first place in 2019 when May was leaking voters massively to him
    Meanwhile back on planet earth, the Rees Mogg led radical right Conservative party shed Centrist Dad votes to the Liberal Democrats.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 14,500

    I am sure I have heard it before. So surprised it is not appearing anywhere.
    AI tells me:

    The quote "better to be the enemy of the English than their friend. for they buy their enemies and sell their friends" is attributed to Lord Palmerston, a British statesman and Prime Minister from 1855–8 and 1859–65.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 126,352
    edited November 2024
    Fishing said:

    I agree with all that, though I would add that, when it came to persuading voters, Blair was such an off-the-scale genius that putting him in the same league as Boris or David Cameron is probably unfair.

    Sunak never really articulated why he wanted to be Prime Minister - there was no positive vision for the country that people could aspire to. The most successful politicians do that, but Sunak, for some baffling reason, hadn't grasped that a bit of technocratic competence isn't a substitute for inspirational leadership. Of course, as the electorate are now discovering, Starmer doesn't have either of those.
    Yes Starmer like Sunak is a technocrat elitist not a campaigner. It was the the divide between the Tories and Reform that got him his landslide, voteshare wise he did worse than Blair in all his 3 elections and worse than Corbyn in 2017 and even worse than Kinnock in 1992. Hence already Labour has fallen even further in the polls now in office and he has to take unpopular decisions and indeed as you say Starmer isn't even as good at being a competent technocrat in No 10 as Rishi was
  • eekeek Posts: 29,418

    Which it is.
    Why is creating the necessary capacity on the West Coast Mainline a problem that has existed since the 1980s a waste of money?

  • eekeek Posts: 29,418
    edited November 2024
    TimS said:

    AI tells me:

    The quote "better to be the enemy of the English than their friend. for they buy their enemies and sell their friends" is attributed to Lord Palmerston, a British statesman and Prime Minister from 1855–8 and 1859–65.
    AI is crap at facts - what it is really good at is looking for someone who made a number of similar quotes and attributing one that wasn't made by Lord Palmerston to him...

    What Lord Palmerston is actually known for is "No eternal allies, no perpetual enemies" i.e. your interests can change...
  • TimSTimS Posts: 14,500
    eek said:

    Why is creating the necessary capacity on the West Coast Mainline a problem that has existed since the 1980s a waste of money?

    It’s the great British asset sweat-off isn’t it. Don’t build, and somehow they’ll come anyway. Or not.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 14,500
    eek said:

    AI is crap at facts - what it is really good at is looking for someone who made a number of similar quotes and attributing one that wasn't made by Lord Palmerston to him...

    What Lord Palmerston is actually known for is "No eternal allies, no perpetual enemies" i.e. your interests can change...
    Who did say that quote then?
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 13,968

    You are wrong.

    Firstly, and to be fair to you, it’s hard to compute how having an election was a reset on the mood. Things like record boat crossings, covid reports, murders in kindergarten by terrorist, are a counterfactual how they would have been received by an electorate and played out by fever pitched media on war footing awaiting an imminent General Election. But it’s likely the election and government change a reset button was pressed on mood - meaning Labour didn’t get the degree of flak for these bad news stories Sunak’s government would have done.

    To be unfair to you, you should realise the economy didn’t leap into election saving sunlit uplands, it was never going to, and the way people were going to vote the Tories down to 120 MPs was already baked in and decided a long time ago, regardless of little ticks in economic upturn.

    Inflation in US is lower on November 1st 2024 was lower, nearly halved from what Trump left Biden, but people didn’t rejoice at that news. To laugh at the highly paid Spad who wrote that memo, if they couldn’t see there would be no second hand punching due to fantastic news in economy, then they shouldn’t have been highly paid in first place. Alternatively they created the memo simply to cover their own professional arse - we shouldn’t listen to it but know they were actually pleased to cash the cheque and move on from a shit hole that theoretically could still be in place this week and everyday since July 4th.

    At turn of year it should have been obvious to all political bettors, the election was never going to be this side of the summer recess.

    The next question in front of us as political bettors, is what is going to happen next, what will be the next big thing in UK politics that helps us be ahead of the game on UK politics.

    Firstly, the next General Election date I am 100% certain is May 3rd 2029. And it will be dominated by Brexit.

    May 3rd 2029 The Conservative Party will be United around, and comfortably way ahead in the polls, thanks to Brexit 2.0.

    Brexit 2 - now let’s use Brexit Freedoms & Opportunities to diverge from the failed European Socialist model, and make UK Great Again! The EU model the failed Labour government clearly tied themselves to, as they failed to provide growth, better incomes, lower taxes, economic productivity, and better living standards. Now, by embracing our Brexit Freedoms and Opportunities, run down area’s of UK will be rejuvenated, and £XXXM of investment will flow into the NHS.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 126,352

    Meanwhile back on planet earth, the Rees Mogg led radical right Conservative party shed Centrist Dad votes to the Liberal Democrats.
    Not really, centrist dads already largely voted LD or for Starmer in July anyway. Yet the combined Tory and Reform vote was still bigger than the Labour vote then and in most seats the LDs gained from the Tories the Tory and Reform combined vote was also bigger than the LD vote
  • eekeek Posts: 29,418

    Whataboutary at its finest.

    Firstly, if the US election has taught you anything it is that formal economic metrics count for zip when compared to the lived experience. Counterbalance petrol at £1.30 a litre with a four pint flagon of Cravendale at between £2.50 and three quid.

    Secondly, the small boats issue has largely been ignored by the media. Sunak lit that touch paper with his five pledges, and has been horsewhipped with it ever since. The numbers are still enormous and one flight to Rwanda would have highlighted the Conservative Government were just taking the piss.

    Thirdly, riding on the crest of a Trump victory wave is more likely to have assisted Reform than the Tories.
    Can you imagine how gung-ho Farage would be if the election was this Thursday..

    And the boats issue definitely hasn't been fixed - Farage would have been equally happy to highlight it every day.

    I can easily see alternative histories where the Tories got 200 seats and ones where they got 70...
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 126,352
    boulay said:

    You could argue that Rishi didn’t grow up “rich” either. His parents made sacrifices to cover his school fees and he wouldn’t have been considered rich with a doctor father and pharmacist mother compared to his peers at school.

    He had a privileged education but only became rich through his work and richer through his marriage.
    His GP father would certainly have been richer than Thatcher's grocer father
  • eekeek Posts: 29,418
    TimS said:

    It’s the great British asset sweat-off isn’t it. Don’t build, and somehow they’ll come anyway. Or not.
    We can't sweat it anymore and parts of it are now falling apart - see for example the current boarding problems at Euston...
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 54,061

    See if I was PM and in a similar funk the only thing that would get me out of that funk would be to nuke France.

    The French are lucky I didn't choose a career in politics.
    I seem to recall Nostrodamus predicting that Paris would be nuked.

    So maybe your time is yet to come...
  • TimSTimS Posts: 14,500
    HYUFD said:

    Not really, centrist dads already largely voted LD or for Starmer in July anyway. Yet the combined Tory and Reform vote was still bigger than the Labour vote then and in most seats the LDs gained from the Tories the Tory and Reform combined vote was also bigger than the LD vote
    The Trump experience of the next 4 years will have a big effect on whether Reform make progress and/or the Tories go full MAGA.

    The next US presidential election, if it happens, is due before the likely next UK general election date. That’s 4 years of water under the bridge.
  • eekeek Posts: 29,418
    TimS said:

    Who did say that quote then?
    Google doesn't know - and that's the difference

    Google - turns round and says Googlewhack - but here are some alternatives.
    AI - says has to be someone so let's guess and pretend we are correct.

    One is the answer of an librarian the other that of a 4 year old child trying to please mummy / daddy..
  • Given how often he crosses the Atlantic, he has a lot of direct experience of border control.
    Though finding his way to Clacton is more challenging.
    At least with surprising self-awareness he’s realised that his presence would in no way Make Clacton Great Again, rather the reverse in fact.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 14,500
    eek said:

    We can't sweat it anymore and parts of it are now falling apart - see for example the current boarding problems at Euston...
    That won’t stop some people being reflexively anti any kind of major infrastructure investment. Penny pinching is in the country’s genes.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,650
    HYUFD said:

    His GP father would certainly have been richer than Thatcher's grocer father
    Your analysis of psephological data is exemplary. Your grasp of what is important to the man on the Clapham Omnibus is not.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 126,352
    edited November 2024
    TimS said:

    The Trump experience of the next 4 years will have a big effect on whether Reform make progress and/or the Tories go full MAGA.

    The next US presidential election, if it happens, is due before the likely next UK general election date. That’s 4 years of water under the bridge.
    Even if it doesn't go well the GOP vote is still likely to be well over 40% even with Vance and even if the Democrats win the midterms and 2028 presidential election. The Tory and Reform combined vote in polls is over 40%, divided both are under 30%. The next GE will likely be in spring 2028 so just before the next US presidential election even if after the 2026 midterms
  • TimS said:

    AI tells me:

    The quote "better to be the enemy of the English than their friend. for they buy their enemies and sell their friends" is attributed to Lord Palmerston, a British statesman and Prime Minister from 1855–8 and 1859–65.
    Sadly AI is wrong. It wasn't Palmerston.
  • darkagedarkage Posts: 5,398
    https://twitter.com/DCBMEP/status/1857937786013106591

    Beginning to think it’s not fanciful that this Government might collapse. Rumours whirling around Starmer; allegations Rachel Reeve not even an economist; 100 days of Government so chaotic it was not even celebrated; furious farmers about to stop food and petrol; debt heading towards IMF visit levels; business up in arms; big taxpayers leaving country. The Opposition better get its act together. May not have years to think about it.
  • I bet he was getting contrary advice as well: that going sooner was better.

    I really cannot see a delay as having improved things for the Tories - their problems were far more structural than just people feeling better off or not. The changes there would have been tiny, and would have been dwarfed by the fact that people simply wanted change.

    So if he had delayed, we would see a threader with other stories about the contrary advice: that going earlier would have been better,

    The Tories were doomed.

    edit: and first with an on-topic post!

    Perhaps Sunak also accepted that delaying the election would be bad for the country.

    The last months of bedraggled governments are rarely good for anyone.

    And given the rate that Conservative MPs were disgracing themselves the 'time for a change' feeling was only going to get stronger.
  • It’s a stealth tax in the sense of not being immediately apparent to the person in the street.

    This is why it was picked as a tax to raise.

    And, once again, we have the amusing populism of “they will just have to take it out of profits”.
    Re taking it out of profits.... a company i work with has now implemented a policy of reducing pay rises from what they would otherwise have been to fully compensate for the employer NI increase over the next 2 years. I'm sure lots of other companies will do something similar or find other ways to cope.

    It might not be an increase in employee NI but it has just the same effect in terms of reducing spending...
  • TimS said:

    That won’t stop some people being reflexively anti any kind of major infrastructure investment. Penny pinching is in the country’s genes.
    Shouldn't really be though. What happened to the country of the industrial revolution? Lost an empire to pay for it I guess.
  • TresTres Posts: 2,755
    MattW said:

    Further note:

    For people who feel somewhat marginal on Twitter, and want to build a community, now is probably a creative time to be starting on Bluesky; I have one friend working for a charity I support who has built her followers from 500 to nearly 2k+ in the time I have gone from 0 to 100+. She is well-respected with a platform, high quality material, and separate network via the small charity, but has clearly been doing some deliberate promotion to put herself in a position to get things into the more general debate beyond her niche more effectively. In 12 months time that will be more difficult to build die to the sheer number of accounts - if Bluesky gets traction.

    If I were someone like @RochdalePioneers , who I think is trying to build himself up as a local influencer / community hub person (who also happens to be a LibDem) in order to be a 'semi-independent' local councillor with a strong personal mandate, I would take a careful look at this point. It's like people who created Internet Forums (Grant Shapps), Facebook Groups, Blogs, or Twitter Accounts early received some advantage from being a first mover; they get to help write the agenda.

    On numbers, aiui Twitter is smaller than we might think - 300m to 400m monthly active users. Threads is about 250 million, driven by the Meta ecosystem. Bluesky is currently heading towards 20m, so has some way to go in weight. Compare those numbers again in a fortnight or on Christmas day.

    Bluesky's account counter is here (different metric, but not that different):
    https://bsky-users.theo.io/

    There may also be differences by geographical territory, depending on what happens to Twitter. eg Twitter was clamped down on by Brazil. Could it happen in Europe?

    HTH.
    I met up with a friend of mine who is blind the other evening. He had to quit Twitter because Musk sacked all the accessibility staff who made Twitter work for blind people and then banned all the third party suppliers that tried to replicate the tools that got binned.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 126,352
    darkage said:

    https://twitter.com/DCBMEP/status/1857937786013106591

    Beginning to think it’s not fanciful that this Government might collapse. Rumours whirling around Starmer; allegations Rachel Reeve not even an economist; 100 days of Government so chaotic it was not even celebrated; furious farmers about to stop food and petrol; debt heading towards IMF visit levels; business up in arms; big taxpayers leaving country. The Opposition better get its act together. May not have years to think about it.

    It will stay in office given its vast majority, its approval rating though can still fall much further
  • pm215pm215 Posts: 1,199

    And if Rishi had waited another three months, or even till January, then Conservatives would have enjoyed an extra three or six months in office, with jobs and wages to pay their mortgages. That many Conservative colleagues are not very well off and depend on their salaries is often lost on millionaire Conservative leaders from Mrs Thatcher through David Cameron to Rishi Sunak.
    That might be true, but I think a Prime Minister who decides the timing of the election based on what is most financially beneficial to their MPs is one who does not deserve to be running the country, because their priorities would be wildly out of line with what we the public expect.
  • darkagedarkage Posts: 5,398
    My best guess is the current Labour government will last for 1 or 2 years before it collapses. It is incapable of dealing with the problems it is going to encounter and the only thing going for it is its large majority, but the latter will rapidly erode as MP's flake out.
  • EPGEPG Posts: 6,729
    darkage said:

    My best guess is the current Labour government will last for 1 or 2 years before it collapses. It is incapable of dealing with the problems it is going to encounter and the only thing going for it is its large majority, but the latter will rapidly erode as MP's flake out.

    Plenty of betting opportunities out there. My kneejerk response is that incapacity to deal with problems has rarely stopped other governments going the full term.
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 34,282
    HYUFD said:

    His GP father would certainly have been richer than Thatcher's grocer father
    Having grown up among grocers and doctors, and indeed pharmacists, I would say there's no certainty about that. The doctor and the pharmacist might have looked 'richer' but there it would have ended.
    AIUI Alderman Roberts had a successful business in Grantham.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 14,500

    Getting a heavy 'move over Leon, there's a new hystericist in town' vibe.
    It’s a form of fan fiction.
  • As I proposed here on PB a week or two ago.

    Maybe he is a lurker???


    "why not just say that APR only applies to estates left by individuals who can demonstrate at least a 10 or 15-year track record of active, daily engagement with agriculture."

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/11/17/reevess-tax-on-farmers-carries-a-strong-whiff-of-class/
  • FrankBoothFrankBooth Posts: 10,022
    Will Hutton makes a good argument for the changes to farming death duties in The Observer. I hadn't realised Thatcher had introduced it in 1984. So long as the wealthy prioritise and are incentivised to prioritise land ownership we will be a country in decline.
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 44,908
    Tres said:

    I met up with a friend of mine who is blind the other evening. He had to quit Twitter because Musk sacked all the accessibility staff who made Twitter work for blind people and then banned all the third party suppliers that tried to replicate the tools that got binned.
    This really boils my piss. Accessibility matters.

    And if you think it doesn't, it may to you one day. Or if not, one of your family or friends.

    (Accessibility can also be *really* difficult to do, and impossible if you don't care about it.)
  • TimS said:

    That won’t stop some people being reflexively anti any kind of major infrastructure investment. Penny pinching is in the country’s genes.
    Suggest building more roads.

    And you'll see many of those demanding more infrastructure investment rapidly change their mind.
  • darkagedarkage Posts: 5,398

    Getting a heavy 'move over Leon, there's a new hystericist in town' vibe.
    I think I am right in the centre ground of politics, and it is everyone else who is out at the extremes. IE the position I took on the US election was an absolutely centrist position (Both very bad options, Trump very slightly preferable).

    The assumption now that 'everything will carry on as normal, order will be restored' is flawed. We are going through structural change, and I think the likelihood that Labour (who I voted for, again evidence of my 'centrism') will be able to successfully deal with it is minimal. Not impossible but minimal. As cited in the quote above, they have done almost nothing in the first 100 days, despite its massive majority.

  • TresTres Posts: 2,755

    Having grown up among grocers and doctors, and indeed pharmacists, I would say there's no certainty about that. The doctor and the pharmacist might have looked 'richer' but there it would have ended.
    AIUI Alderman Roberts had a successful business in Grantham.
    They both had the good fortune of finding spouses who were considerably richer than them.
  • Looking at the looming further farmer protests, I am now wondering whether Reeves will still even be CoE by the end of next year.

    Unforced political error after unforced error.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 75,353

    Which it is.
    As designed, yes it was.
    Cancelling it at this late stage was an even bigger waste.
  • FrankBoothFrankBooth Posts: 10,022
    Was anyone prosecuted during the fuel protests in 2000? Are the farmers aware of the sentences (perhaps draconian) handed out to the JSO people.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 25,807
    edited November 2024
    On the quote, this seems to be a fair explanation.

    It was the "then" clause of a conditional statement:

    Word should be gotten to Nixon that if Thieu meets the same fate as Diem, the word will go out to the nations of the world that it may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal.

    Sources: Kissinger's War, 1957-1975 and United Nations Journal: A Delegate's Odyssey

    Kissinger said this in late November 1968 after Nixon was elected president, but before Nixon was inaugurated.

    It wasn't a public statement, just a statement to William F. Buckley Jr. in a phone call, with Buckley taking notes, so it isn't verifiable beyond Buckley (author of United Nations Journal: A Delegate's Odyssey).


    Source and fuller conversation:
    https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/56470/did-henry-kissinger-say-it-may-be-dangerous-to-be-americas-enemy-but-to-be-am

    Suggesting that it is based on the quote of a Russian fighting the British in the Boer War:

    Kissinger was not the first who said this words, but he repeated them.

    The author of this words was russian(Empire) general-major Aleksey Efimovich Vandam(Edrikhin), the intelligencer, the writer of strategic and geopolitical works. He was a participant in the Boer War on the opposite side to Britain Empire, after Russian-Soviet revolt he switched the side to German, not to Entente. He supported the politic course to an ally between Russian, German and France without Britain.

    The citaite is from the book "Наше положение"(~Our circumstance) chap XXI(real XXVI-wrong dating) p. 123

    Наконец наступает очередь и Китая, который после своих разнообразных опытов с англичанами и американцами смело мог бы сказать теперь — «плохо иметь англосакса врагом, но не дай Бог иметь его другом!».

    Finally, it is the turn of China, which, after its various experiences with the British and Americans , could safely say now — "it is bad to have an Anglo-Saxon as an enemy, but God forbid to have him as a friend!".
  • eekeek Posts: 29,418
    darkage said:

    My best guess is the current Labour government will last for 1 or 2 years before it collapses. It is incapable of dealing with the problems it is going to encounter and the only thing going for it is its large majority, but the latter will rapidly erode as MP's flake out.

    Where on earth would 140 labour MPs decamp to..

    I can see a whole set of problems while the MPs continue to just vote for everything the Government tells them to vote on...
  • darkage said:

    My best guess is the current Labour government will last for 1 or 2 years before it collapses. It is incapable of dealing with the problems it is going to encounter and the only thing going for it is its large majority, but the latter will rapidly erode as MP's flake out.

    So a guy who voted Labour thinks it's going to collapse within a couple of years seems as surreal/barmy a prediction as you could ever make..🤨🥴
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 75,353
    MaxPB said:

    Yup, imagine going into the election now rather than July. Petrol prices at the lowest for over a year, economy would be growing much faster than it is now, immigration numbers would be coming down and people would have had a relatively relaxing summer to reflect on their situation. It would still have been a loss but I think the Tories would have scraped 200 seats and Labour a much smaller majority. Holding it around now so that Nige would have had to split his time between Reform and Trump would have been very beneficial to the Tories as well.

    Had the Tories had leaders capable of making better decisions, we wouldn't be where we are.
    So it's a pretty fruitless counterfactual.
  • eekeek Posts: 29,418

    This really boils my piss. Accessibility matters.

    And if you think it doesn't, it may to you one day. Or if not, one of your family or friends.

    (Accessibility can also be *really* difficult to do, and impossible if you don't care about it.)
    It's also very expensive but I think Bluesky is arriving at the point when you can get an AI to describe a photo 49 times out of 50.
  • Will Hutton makes a good argument for the changes to farming death duties in The Observer. I hadn't realised Thatcher had introduced it in 1984. So long as the wealthy prioritise and are incentivised to prioritise land ownership we will be a country in decline.

    The disaster of the 1974 changes to the Farming Industry were obvious within weeks, just as they are now. If allowed to continue they would have totally destroyed the rented sector. Mrs T had other fish to fry in her first term. Her actions in 1984 transformed agriculture for the better and allowed the wealth to improve Rural Britain as a whole.

    The logical conclusion would have been to have abolished all wealth taxation by 1990 but the recession put an end to that possibility.

    If Labour were wise they would withdraw all the IHT proposals now, sadly for the country but a godsend for their opponents they are not wise.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 25,807

    Whataboutary at its finest.

    Firstly, if the US election has taught you anything it is that formal economic metrics count for zip when compared to the lived experience. Counterbalance petrol at £1.30 a litre with a four pint flagon of Cravendale at between £2.50 and three quid.

    Secondly, the small boats issue has largely been ignored by the media. Sunak lit that touch paper with his five pledges, and has been horsewhipped with it ever since. The numbers are still enormous and one flight to Rwanda would have highlighted the Conservative Government were just taking the piss.

    Thirdly, riding on the crest of a Trump victory wave is more likely to have assisted Reform than the Tories.
    "Lived Experience" KLAXON.

    Palpitations incoming for @MaxPB :smile:
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 39,696
    edited November 2024

    Looking at the looming further farmer protests, I am now wondering whether Reeves will still even be CoE by the end of next year.

    Unforced political error after unforced error.

    And there is one group of people that everyone in the country agrees are worthy of being protected - farmers. They grow our food, often in almost impossible conditions. This tax feels vindictive coming from Labour. A punishment against the countryside who voted for Brexit.

    The worst part is that it doesn't even raise very much money. It's a rounding error in the OBR report. The budget proposed £150bn of additional borrowing over 5 years, if they'd kept the exemption then it would be about £152bn over 5 years.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 14,500
    edited November 2024

    Suggest building more roads.

    And you'll see many of those demanding more infrastructure investment rapidly change their mind.
    Oh God we’re not culture warring infrastructure now are we? Is that why people are anti HS2, because it’s woke?
  • FrankBoothFrankBooth Posts: 10,022
    I thought the point of opposing HS2 was saying other infrastructure projects would be prioritised. Well what were they?
  • eekeek Posts: 29,418

    I thought the point of opposing HS2 was saying other infrastructure projects would be prioritised. Well what were they?

    Um the money was going on pot holes in London wasn't it....
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 39,696
    eek said:

    Um the money was going on pot holes in London wasn't it....
    As someone who lives in London the money definitely hasn't been spent on fixing potholes.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,650
    MattW said:

    "Lived Experience" KLAXON.

    Palpitations incoming for @MaxPB :smile:
    Well Max used his own "lived experience" to demonstrate why Sunak should have waited. Cheap petrol prices since July indicate to Max, 200 and climbing Tory seats.

    Of course he may be right.
  • eekeek Posts: 29,418
    MaxPB said:

    As someone who lives in London the money definitely hasn't been spent on fixing potholes.
    Yep - because the money didn't exist - Rishi took non budgeted money (to be spent on infrastructure) and pretended it would be spent on pot holes and similar day to day spending without actually budgeting for it..
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 75,353

    Does Shipman explain the real mystery of the July election: why Rishi stood in the pouring rain without an umbrella?

    Relied on Treasury forecasting ?
  • darkagedarkage Posts: 5,398
    edited November 2024
    eek said:

    Where on earth would 140 labour MPs decamp to..

    I can see a whole set of problems while the MPs continue to just vote for everything the Government tells them to vote on...
    There are so many MP's - they have the critical mass to set up a new party that could hold the balance of power. There are many ways this can evolve.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 39,696
    Something that also bothers me at the moment is how Labour are using the treasury to protect Rachel Reeves against allegations of CV fluffing. This is nothing to do with the treasury, it's a political issue and the denials need to come from a Labour source, treasury officials should point people in the direction of the chancellor or the Labour party press office.
  • MaxPB said:

    As someone who lives in London the money definitely hasn't been spent on fixing potholes.
    I think its been spent on cycle lanes, wider pavements and 20mph markings in Yorkshire.
  • eekeek Posts: 29,418
    MaxPB said:

    Something that also bothers me at the moment is how Labour are using the treasury to protect Rachel Reeves against allegations of CV fluffing. This is nothing to do with the treasury, it's a political issue and the denials need to come from a Labour source, treasury officials should point people in the direction of the chancellor or the Labour party press office.

    The problem is she is guilty as charged - She claims to have been working in Halifax and the economists were London based..
  • darkagedarkage Posts: 5,398

    So a guy who voted Labour thinks it's going to collapse within a couple of years seems as surreal/barmy a prediction as you could ever make..🤨🥴
    Why? The vote was just a pragmatic one looking at the situation at the time. It is 4 months on and Labour have demonstrated that a) they are being completely led by the 'blob' and b) they are unlikely to be able to deal with Trump. Right now, if I was to vote, it would probably be for Conservative or Reform. If things seem surreal/barmy, that is because the world is rapidly changing.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 25,807

    What if Musk buys Bluesky ?
    It's incorporated as a Public Benefit Corporation - I think a UK Company Limited by Guarantee is perhaps our closest comparison.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 26,428
    MaxPB said:

    Something that also bothers me at the moment is how Labour are using the treasury to protect Rachel Reeves against allegations of CV fluffing. This is nothing to do with the treasury, it's a political issue and the denials need to come from a Labour source, treasury officials should point people in the direction of the chancellor or the Labour party press office.

    If it were a Tory, it would be a big scandal. But it isn't so it isn't.
  • FrankBoothFrankBooth Posts: 10,022
    MaxPB said:

    And there is one group of people that everyone in the country agrees are worthy of being protected - farmers. They grow our food, often in almost impossible conditions. This tax feels vindictive coming from Labour. A punishment against the countryside who voted for Brexit.

    The worst part is that it doesn't even raise very much money. It's a rounding error in the OBR report. The budget proposed £150bn of additional borrowing over 5 years, if they'd kept the exemption then it would be about £152bn over 5 years.
    Are most country folk mulitmillionaires? Notice how Ed Davey has also come out against the changes. Re-enforces the idea that his party are now just soft southern Tories. And it isn't about the money is it? It's about the incentives for investment. Do we want to be a declining country where wealthy people put the bulk of their resources into landownership? It might actually lead to lower land values, new entrants into farming and cheaper food. I'm starting to think this government has got something right.
  • TimS said:

    Oh God we’re not culture warring infrastructure now are we? Is that why people are anti HS2, because it’s woke?
    You mentioned culture wars and woke.

    I mentioned building roads.

    Roads are infrastructure, one of the few types of infrastructure this country can do pretty well.

    And infrastructure which allows further investment in new housing, new industrial estates, new business parks, new leisure facilities.

    So do you support building new roads or are you an example of the point I initially made.
  • TresTres Posts: 2,755
    edited November 2024
    MaxPB said:

    Something that also bothers me at the moment is how Labour are using the treasury to protect Rachel Reeves against allegations of CV fluffing. This is nothing to do with the treasury, it's a political issue and the denials need to come from a Labour source, treasury officials should point people in the direction of the chancellor or the Labour party press office.

    CV fluffing? How absurd, she's been an MP since 2010. Do you think you have to submit a CV when being appointed to the cabinet?
  • darkagedarkage Posts: 5,398
    eek said:

    The problem is she is guilty as charged - She claims to have been working in Halifax and the economists were London based..
    I have to say I personally have no interest at all in the fact Reeves CV is a slight misrepresentation of what she actually did. This is a highly trivial matter in the current circumstances.
  • TheScreamingEaglesTheScreamingEagles Posts: 121,239
    edited November 2024
    tlg86 said:

    If it were a Tory, it would be a big scandal. But it isn't so it isn't.
    Andrea Leadsom's CV fluffing should have been a big story but then she shat the bed in an even bigger level a few days later.

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/andrea-leadsom-accused-of-misleading-claims-on-her-cv-a7122296.html

    Leadsom admits ‘misleading’ claims on CV for top job

    https://www.thetimes.com/article/leadsom-admits-misleading-claims-on-cv-for-top-job-n80lgc2rj
  • FlatlanderFlatlander Posts: 4,861
    edited November 2024

    I think its been spent on cycle lanes, wider pavements and 20mph markings in Yorkshire.
    Our wider pavement/cycle lane has been dug up again by CityFibre only 2 weeks after it was completed and is now coned off.

    Potholes are 99% a heavier car problem.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 14,500

    You mentioned culture wars and woke.

    I mentioned building roads.

    Roads are infrastructure, one of the few types of infrastructure this country can do pretty well.

    And infrastructure which allows further investment in new housing, new industrial estates, new business parks, new leisure facilities.

    So do you support building new roads or are you an example of the point I initially made.
    I absolutely support building roads. Roads, railways, houses, business parks, skyscrapers, trams, cycle lanes. Just bloody build them.

    So you are culture warring infrastructure then.
  • Syed taking the art of banal, reductive observations to new, well they wouldn't be heights, plateaus?

    Matthew Syed
    @matthewsyed
    The Tories - Johnson, Truss, etc - were not “right wing”. They increased welfare, tax, immigration & debt to new records and vastly expanded bailouts, regulations & money printing

    Isn’t this called socialism?

    https://x.com/matthewsyed/status/1858064615881470040
  • HYUFD said:

    His GP father would certainly have been richer than Thatcher's grocer father
    Thatcher's father did not even have a mobile phone. Her mother might have done: Mrs T never spoke much about her.
  • This really boils my piss. Accessibility matters.

    And if you think it doesn't, it may to you one day. Or if not, one of your family or friends.

    (Accessibility can also be *really* difficult to do, and impossible if you don't care about it.)
    Probably a small but telling example of how Musk's DOGE will operate.
  • Syed taking the art of banal, reductive observations to new, well they wouldn't be heights, plateaus?

    Matthew Syed
    @matthewsyed
    The Tories - Johnson, Truss, etc - were not “right wing”. They increased welfare, tax, immigration & debt to new records and vastly expanded bailouts, regulations & money printing

    Isn’t this called socialism?

    https://x.com/matthewsyed/status/1858064615881470040

    Well they weren't book balancing, small government types.

    But few voters and even fewer politicians are.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 25,807
    edited November 2024

    I think its been spent on cycle lanes, wider pavements and 20mph markings in Yorkshire.
    It would need some rabbit holing to find the exact numbers, however in England the amount spent on active travel from transport expenditure is around 2%, if that. And that's on everything not just your 3 items.

    London may be slightly higher, but still a rounding error.

    That's not where it's gone :smile: .

    But if you find any cash they've lost, we can use it.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 14,500

    Probably a small but telling example of how Musk's DOGE will operate.
    It’s majoritarianism. A tool of despots through the ages.

    I’m not sure it works so well when focused on things like disability rather than ethnic groups or sexuality, because there’s not the same ability to drive support through fear of the other.
  • Tres said:

    CV fluffing? How absurd, she's been an MP since 2010. Do you think you have to submit a CV when being appointed to the cabinet?
    You do, as part of the enhanced vetting procedures.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 25,807

    Probably a small but telling example of how Musk's DOGE will operate.
    DOGE isn't Medieval-Italian enough.

    It needs to be Borgia.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 26,428

    Andrea Leadsom's CV fluffing should have been a big story but then she shat the bed in an even bigger level a few days later.

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/andrea-leadsom-accused-of-misleading-claims-on-her-cv-a7122296.html

    Leadsom admits ‘misleading’ claims on CV for top job

    https://www.thetimes.com/article/leadsom-admits-misleading-claims-on-cv-for-top-job-n80lgc2rj
    And Jenrick's past would be coming to the fore were he now leader. Reeves is Chancellor.
  • tlg86 said:

    If it were a Tory, it would be a big scandal. But it isn't so it isn't.
    Define big scandal. CVgate has been all over the papers but so far no-one in the real world gives a damn (not even her Labour colleagues who want Reeves' job).
  • MattW said:

    It would need some rabbit holing to find the exact numbers, however in England the amount spent on active travel from transport expenditure is around 2%, if that. And that's on everything not just your 3 items.

    London may be slightly higher, but still a rounding error.

    That's not where it's gone :smile: .
    Of course it hasn't.

    But the items in my comment are very noticeable and prompts the thought "what's that all about, I thought they had no money to spend".
  • You are wrong.

    Firstly, and to be fair to you, it’s hard to compute how having an election was a reset on the mood. Things like record boat crossings, covid reports, murders in kindergarten by terrorist, are a counterfactual how they would have been received by an electorate and played out by fever pitched media on war footing awaiting an imminent General Election. But it’s likely the election and government change a reset button was pressed on mood - meaning Labour didn’t get the degree of flak for these bad news stories Sunak’s government would have done.

    To be unfair to you, you should realise the economy didn’t leap into election saving sunlit uplands, it was never going to, and the way people were going to vote the Tories down to 120 MPs was already baked in and decided a long time ago, regardless of little ticks in economic upturn.

    Inflation in US is lower on November 1st 2024 was lower, nearly halved from what Trump left Biden, but people didn’t rejoice at that news. To laugh at the highly paid Spad who wrote that memo, if they couldn’t see there would be no second hand punching due to fantastic news in economy, then they shouldn’t have been highly paid in first place. Alternatively they created the memo simply to cover their own professional arse - we shouldn’t listen to it but know they were actually pleased to cash the cheque and move on from a shit hole that theoretically could still be in place this week and everyday since July 4th.

    At turn of year it should have been obvious to all political bettors, the election was never going to be this side of the summer recess.

    Gentle tip: I don't actually read your posts.

    They are a lot of waffle, and an unstructured braindump from your head.

    Maybe try brushing up on some basic comprehension skills first, and then I might find you interesting to engage with.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 25,807
    This is quite an interesting piece from BBC In Depth about Trump's appeal to American religious demographics, and his lack of appeal to other American religious demographics.

    According to the PPRI’s survey, external of 5,027 adults, white evangelical Protestant voters were the strongest backers of Trump over Harris by 72% to 13%. White Catholic voters also backed Trump, with 55% supporting him and 34% aligned with Harris. White “mainline” non-evangelical Protestants showed a similar split.

    By contrast 78% black Protestants supported Harris while just 9% backed Trump, according to the survey. Harris’s backers also included Jewish-Americans, the religiously unaffiliated and other non-Christian Americans, according to the PPRI.


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c20g1zvgj4do
  • Probably a small but telling example of how Musk's DOGE will operate.
    But is making Twitter accessible to blind people a once-off coding task or a maintenance job for life? It's easy to see how employer and employee would see things differently.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 25,807

    Of course it hasn't.

    But the items in my comment are very noticeable and prompts the thought "what's that all about, I thought they had no money to spend".
    Yes, but have you found any of the missing? :
  • darkage said:

    My best guess is the current Labour government will last for 1 or 2 years before it collapses. It is incapable of dealing with the problems it is going to encounter and the only thing going for it is its large majority, but the latter will rapidly erode as MP's flake out.

    The first (only?) smart move I think it's done so far is to start to negotiate returns agreements with other countries. Offset by cancelling Rwanda so early, which I think was a mistake.

    Sunak did it with Albania, and that's a big reason the boat numbers for 2024 were down on 2023. Why he didn't do it for Vietnam and other places I don't know.

    If Labour do and crossings drop to just 10-15k a year the Conservatives will look incompetent.
  • MaxPB said:

    Something that also bothers me at the moment is how Labour are using the treasury to protect Rachel Reeves against allegations of CV fluffing. This is nothing to do with the treasury, it's a political issue and the denials need to come from a Labour source, treasury officials should point people in the direction of the chancellor or the Labour party press office.

    She was assistant to the Customer Complaints Manager.
  • MaxPB said:

    And there is one group of people that everyone in the country agrees are worthy of being protected - farmers. They grow our food, often in almost impossible conditions. This tax feels vindictive coming from Labour. A punishment against the countryside who voted for Brexit.

    The worst part is that it doesn't even raise very much money. It's a rounding error in the OBR report. The budget proposed £150bn of additional borrowing over 5 years, if they'd kept the exemption then it would be about £152bn over 5 years.
    I can see the Government being forced into a humiliating reverse on it.

    If protests start to hit transport and food supplies, and family farms start to be firesold to big agri-corporations, that isn't a battle the government will win.
  • MattW said:

    Yes, but have you found any of the missing? :
    Well if money has been spent elsewhere its usually a pretty good bet that's its been spent for the benefit of oldies.

    In fact I do wonder if the new wider pavements I've seen installed are for the benefit of oldies in wheelchairs.
  • darkage said:

    My best guess is the current Labour government will last for 1 or 2 years before it collapses. It is incapable of dealing with the problems it is going to encounter and the only thing going for it is its large majority, but the latter will rapidly erode as MP's flake out.

    Which 100 odd Labour MPs are going to vote against in the government in a confidence vote? Not even the Corbynite MPs would do it, nobody wants to unnecessarily lose their jobs.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 39,696

    She was assistant to the Customer Complaints Manager.
    I've been asking some people I know who worked at the Bank when she was there and the reports back of what she did vs what she says she did don't match either.

    As for people saying it's not a big deal, maybe it wouldn't be if she was just a functionary but she's not. She's the chancellor and has previously lied about being an economist for a private sector bank and seemingly misrepresented what she did at the Bank of England. She has used that reputation she cultivated as an "Economist for a bank" to get the role of chancellor, if Starmer had any balls he'd sack her for gross misconduct and get a better chancellor in, she's clearly useless anyway and this gives him the right cover to do it.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 30,243

    A cabinet minister said Truss became “massively emboldened”, getting a “head rush” combining “dangerous levels of self-confidence and a nagging insecurity that she didn’t have much time”. Truss decided to abolish the cap on bankers’ bonuses and cut stamp duty.

    One of Truss’s team suggested that what came over her was effectively the manic state of a mental breakdown: “She wasn’t depressed, but she had a breakdown. She was giddy with expectations. She developed a serious detachment from reality, she was more demanding and intolerant of people. She didn’t want to be challenged. Two things change people — power and money. Those are the two torches of life which tell you what a person is about. At the start of the leadership campaign, she listened to a lot of people because she was unsure of herself. When it dawned on her she was going to win, she jettisoned this approach and it made her psychologically unfit to be prime minister.”


    https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/liz-truss-psychologically-unfit-to-be-pm-say-aides-ttqgdfz8b

    All I get from this is that Truss's 'aides' were revolting little backbiters. She should have taken a lot more care to surround herself with better people.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 30,243
    MaxPB said:

    Yup, imagine going into the election now rather than July. Petrol prices at the lowest for over a year, economy would be growing much faster than it is now, immigration numbers would be coming down and people would have had a relatively relaxing summer to reflect on their situation. It would still have been a loss but I think the Tories would have scraped 200 seats and Labour a much smaller majority. Holding it around now so that Nige would have had to split his time between Reform and Trump would have been very beneficial to the Tories as well.

    Sunak could have made Farage the US Ambassador, completely neutralising Reform as a serious election threat.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 30,243
    edited November 2024
    HYUFD said:

    Probably neither are. Opinium confirms Badenoch is just treading water and holding the Tory vote which voted for Rishi in July while it is Farage who is eating into the wwc Labour vote. Jenrick might have made a bit more progress winning back Boris voters now voting Reform but he was an ex Remainer Cameroon which put a ceiling on that.

    The only Tory leader who could really squeeze the Reform vote and reunite the Right is probably now Jacob Rees Mogg if he wins back his Somerset seat at the next GE (or moves to a more winnable prospect like the seat Liam Fox only just lost which is also in North Somerset). Assuming Boris doesn't return of course given he was the man who put Farage back in his box in the first place in 2019 when May was leaking voters massively to him
    I don’t think Jenrick was disqualified by his past, any more than Boris would be by his comments on immigration (and indeed his policies on immigration). The electorate is interested in the future.
  • eekeek Posts: 29,418

    I can see the Government being forced into a humiliating reverse on it.

    If protests start to hit transport and food supplies, and family farms start to be firesold to big agri-corporations, that isn't a battle the government will win.
    The downside is that the purchasing of agricultural land for inheritance tax avoidance purposes is a known tax avoidance issue.

    And that needs to be sorted as it rightly annoys other people who aren't in the position to buy agricultural land
This discussion has been closed.