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If this becomes a long term trend then Tory MPs will become antsy about Badenoch
If this becomes a long term trend then Tory MPs will become antsy about Badenoch politicalbetting.com
We tend to focus on individual polls which look interesting – but much more significant and easily missed – I think this is the first week when *every* poll released (from across 7 pollsters) has had the Reform ahead of the Conservatives.
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Drat, second unlike Kemi either...
This time around Donny is the figurehead, Elon is the guy doing all the shit behind the scenes
He sacked the head of the FAA
The tragic events of yesterday are not his first crash...
https://x.com/townhallcom/status/1885081609604370513
Financial Times
@FT
Breaking news: AstraZeneca is pulling out of its plans to build a £450mn UK vaccine manufacturing plant after months of wrangling with British officials about state investment for the Merseyside project. https://on.ft.com/4aWYs37
@Jeremy_Hunt
This is an absolute tragedy. The government have reneged on a deal I negotiated in 2023 and the UK has lost a factory and many jobs in one of our most promising industries.
@RachelReevesMP
should pick up the phone to Sir Pascal Soriot: if she believes in growth short term penny pinching cannot be the answer
However crap Labour turn out to be isn’t going to change that much, and Reform present an alternative on the right, uncontaminated by those memories. They might insufficiently palatable to command a majority in a general election (though that’s still possible thanks to the bizarre operation of FPTP), but as the polls show, they could quite readily kill the Tories.
Who best changes that ?
I’m not sure, but I’m pretty certain it isn’t Badenoch.
If he can control his ego and play nicely, he really could do it.
Syria’s New Comedy Scene
The Styria collective in Damascus is testing the boundaries of free speech
https://newlinesmag.com/spotlight/syrias-new-comedy-scene/
https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html
As the Conservatives have 0 MPs in Wales and have never been in power in the Senedd or Holyrood I doubt the results of next year's Holyrood elections make much difference, though PR ensures the Tories have a solid presence still in both
And the target location was very close to Runcorn...
Which is why we need them in the first place ...
Labour can't be said to have actually done that, closing down. But they're not helping.
23 FDP MPs didn't vote for the bill (out of 90)
AZ: we have you over a barrel on big investment amid high interest rates so we're speccing down the deal, you still give us the same cash or you look like idiots.
Treasury: no. AZ: OK.
While it's clearly not great that they're behind Reform, except for those of you who secretly desire a more racist right wing party, they'll still win far more seats than Reform due to vote concentration.
{Editor : that’s quite enough}
Trump approval poll
🟢 Approve 49% (+8)
🟤 Disapprove 41%
🟤 Last Biden approval - 37% (-14)
Emerson #A - 1000 RV - 1/28
https://x.com/ppollingnumbers/status/1885381097917231433
52% of Americans think the country is heading in the right direction, up from 39% in November (Emerson)
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/live-blog/trump-administration-tariff-canada-mexico-dei-plane-crash-live-updates-rcna190078
Unless it’s close to where they live (London) and makes their life better - in which case it’s essential that it’s implemented.
York Minster in trouble.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/jan/31/york-minster-protest-plague-of-angels-concert
The 800-year-old cathedral is facing an uprising from members of its congregation after announcing a “shocking and deeply inappropriate” concert by the English rockers Plague of Angels.
Churchgoers have expressed outrage that two of the band’s members had previously performed with an extreme-metal group that sold what Rolling Stone described as “the most controversial shirt in rock history”. The T-shirt featured a topless nun masturbating and the words “Jesus is a c*nt"
But that would require the Labour leaders to admit that much of what they have believed about modern economies all their lives is wrong. If that stray thought contains some truth, one can understand why they find it hard to come to any decisions.
I don't believe this is the truth, but I'm reasonably convinced that there's a grain or two in there.
Parts of the UK can do quite a bit as to their relative success/failure.
He said Plague of Angels was “its own entity, distinct” from that band, and added: “We apologise for this and can confirm that the two band members deeply regret their involvement with Cradle of Filth.”'
Labour's is that their only effective minister so far is Ed Miliband who has already been found wanting at the highest level.
It is pretty interesting really, as I do know some Tories who despise Reform, whilst there are others who seem to have no issues with them at all, so some spend their time worried and angry about Reform, and the others wanting to make friends with them.
See also: today's hoohhah in Germany.
Are there any examples of the mainstream right defeating a hard right party that has properly got off the ground? Boris in 2019 looked like it might have been one, but that looks a lot less convincing now.
I would also argue that what Cameron was selling pre-2010 (but not what he delivered) stopped a drift to the right.
See also the importing of the National Liberals way back when.
She needs to act and act now.
Any Tory, or ex-Tory like me, can't have failed to see the political wasteland as it was. Mostly as it still is.
It’s impossible to overstate just quite how crap a position the Tories find themselves in, deservedly in most cases.
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2025/jan/31/maro-itoje-six-nations-free-to-air-tv-rights-rugby-union-england
Feels like the Tories will go further right again with their next leader, in reaction. That’s The Hague-IDS and Miliband-Corbyn pattern. God knows whether they’ll ever decide to come back centrewards.
Elon Musk’s DOGE Wants Access to the Treasury’s Payment Systems: Report
A senior Treasury official is set to resign after Musk’s allies at DOGE repeatedly demanded access to sensitive government payment systems
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/elon-musk-doge-treasury-payment-systems-report-1235252444/
So why wait and delay the inevitable?
She can do a William Hague and come back later.
If we’re serious about growth, we need to reverse that.
BBC news
Nice one.
Sounds like the difference was ≈ £40m
FFS.
We were stupid enough to apply EU rules when so few others did and lost a lot of investment and output as a result. Hence our deficit and debt. We need to start looking after our own interests rather more. That means encouraging this kind of investment and at least matching what other countries are willing to offer in the form of incentives. Clinging to some ideological purity about the virtues of supposedly free trade is naïve and foolish.
Conservatives had offered a grant of £70m towards the £450m cost of the new plant (15.5% of construction cost) as well as £20m of national R&D contracts for the company.
Labour offered £40m towards the construction of the plant (8.9% of build cost).
The company certainly isnt short of money, its investing $3.5bn in the US, $1.5bn in Singapore and $560m in Canada production facilities and its just chasing grants, for example a $300m plant in Rockville to research stem cells that would employ 150 people is receiving $100m in state grants.
Presumably RFK will stop that the minute he gets into office!!!!
I think we're getting closer, it feels like some real thoughts are occurring on it now rather than just as a buzzword, but there's no consensus about what is needed, or even that growth should be the primary goal. Until that happens, we probably won't get it as one party will try, get punished, then the next will reverse/repositon, and lose any benefit.
And then divide the money per job estimate the length the factory will be open for and see if it still makes sense.
Unless and until we reverse that, we’re going to lose more of it, without such subsidies.
Public sector workers not bothering to turn up at the polls, letting a highly energised Reform vote win the red wall... now that is an interesting prospect. But only 18% of people work in the public sector, so the effect would be a tipping point, not the main cause of a Reform victory.
I agree though - an accusation that Labour are a London-only party could be genuinely fatal for their chances of winning the next election.
Republicans against Trump
@RpsAgainstTrump
BREAKING: White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt says that tomorrow, Donald Trump will impose a 25% tariff on Mexico, a 25% tariff on Canada, and a 10% tariff on China.
Get ready to pay more for avocados, tequila, vegetables and many more items
But it’s more so, it’s 1980s on steroids when you consider 6 parties nationally polling in double digits.
Without a doubt in my mind, July 24 LAB, Libdem, Green lent each other votes to a hugely strong impact on Parliamentary seats, whilst Con and Ref voters were not remotely interested in helping each other, those two parties fiercely trying to squeeze the vote of the other - classic scenario for helping someone else mop up all the seats.