"Vibeshift update", the header title, seems to have been taken literally today. From the vibe of "not a bad deal, who cares about E-gates or fishing", to "a terrible deal, rubbish on E-gates and fishing" in twelve hours.
I see the usual right wing whoppers don’t understand that less trade red tape is good for business. The closer we are to the EU the better
And you don't seem to understand that we've just traded in regulatory freedom for not very much in return. The sum total of the deal seems to be the ability export an additional £3-4bn in low margin agricultural goods to the EU. It's not very clear what, if any, other benefits there are. Even the e-gates "deal" seems to be a fiction.
Less red tape is good for business, you're right, yet this isn't less red tape it's just red tape written in Brussels over which we will have little to no say. If anything this will be a net increase in regulation and we may find that the higher cost structure imposed by EU regulations will far outweigh any additional exports, this is my expectation.
The alignment is only on food and drink . It’s not clear whether the UK will legislate its own equivalent rules or whether it will be a copy and paste of EU rules into UK law .
It's dynamic alignment so they will necessarily have to be written into UK law. I'm not particularly sold on the idea that the additional direct exports gained from this deal won't be offset by losses in exports elsewhere due to being less competitive globally and by a higher cost structure. Indeed, the treasury analysis says it's worth £9bn on GDP over a 15 year period which is laughably tiny so it probably means that they don't expect a surge in our net global exports, we may just be shifting our exports to the EU from other countries and the total volume of production stays pretty much the same.
I guess we need to add all of Sean's sockpuppets to the right hand column
This is actually the important post, as this billboard is from the next General Election campaign, isn’t it?
This isn’t a one off bit of Brexit Salami slicing either, these “summits” are scheduled for next year and the year after - and if they bring things the voters and business and industry like, Reform will General Election campaign on ripping it all up and snatching those things away.
this is exactly how the Conservative Party had so many more years in office over the last century, when it came to the General Elections, billboards like the one above.
“Vote Conservative for strong economy and looking after the pounds in your pocket. Labour, for all their good intentions will wreck the economy, they have huge black holes in their economic plans they can’t explain.”
Labour want the next election to be “Vote Labour for strong economy and looking after the pounds in your pocket. Reform will wreck the economy, they have huge black holes in their economic plans they can’t explain.”
Exactly like Labour struggled in 20th century, Reform will have a huge problem rebutting this.
Voters still remember when Conservative governments managed the economy well, is why to peel away from the Conservative Party to Reform right now, is hasty and stupid - Reform have zero credibility for being trusted with the UK economy going into the next General Election.
Keir Starmer has tonight told his MPs: “The Conservatives are not our principal opponent. Reform are our main rivals for power. We have a moral responsibility to make sure Farage never wins.”
And PM takes off gloves: “We have to be clear that every opportunity he has had in this Parliament to back working people he’s voted against. Telling the workers at Jaguar Land Rover they deserve to go bust. A state-slashing, NHS-privatising, Putin apologist. Without a single patriotic bone in his body. We will take to fight to him. We will fight as Labour.”
I’m happy to hear that. Farage is a fraud and it’s time he was held to account . Labour need to stop messing around and go for the jugular .
Labour very, very particularly need to mention Farage's responsibility for the huge post-Brexit rise in immigration, if they're finally going to say the truth.
Boris owns the Boriswave. It would be difficult to pin it on Farage.
I wouldn't agree there. Farage would have had no choice but to do the same, had been in power then, or watch the economy go into a depressing.
It shouldn't be too diffucult to highlight the actual figures of the number of sectors left dangerously short after Brexit , as referenced in detail in past discussions on here.
Nonsense, those sectors could have put up pay instead of bringing in people for minimum wage.
And importing people doesn't solve shortages as lump of labour is a fallacy.
We had a detailed discussion on all this on here, about a year ago, with figures from the Migration Observatory about the number of sectors struggling after Brexit.
Farage will well know that he would have faced exactly the same problem as Johnson, and the Tory Brexit ideologues around him ; to retran enougb workers from home is a long-term project , whereas economic danage and recession comes tomorrow.
Was Trudeau also dealing with Brexit? The same policy mistake of massively opening the floodgates was made simultaneously by several Anglosphere countries, which suggests something deeper than Brexit as a root cause.
This is a year later than the British big rise in 2020, suggesting a different cause. I will dig out some of the graphs.
2020 was Covid when there was a drop.
Genuine question, @williamglenn - you've indentified a definite pattern. in Anglosphere countries. Might be a Gazette article in it, for the Butt Plug Supplement, which focuses a lot on global migration, and stone butt plugs
What's your take? Why did this happen?
I’d previously assumed it was groupthink driven by economic policymakers but looking at the graph of visas being issued throughout the lockdowns maybe it was simply bureaucratic incompetence because the system carried on issuing visas and then everyone arrived at once when the pandemic was over.
In every developed country there was a crunch in labour costs post COVID.
In a number of places, such as the US and the U.K., I think this relates to people in shitty jobs being forced to find new ones during COVID. Normally not adventurous, they had to find new jobs - or retire early and drop out of the labour force.
Whatever the reason, the result was a massive inflationary shock. Governments were desperate to hold down wages. Enter immigration as the fix….
There was clearlt a post-Covid effect in many places. But the stats showing the UK figures changing earlier, a few months after Brexit while lockdown was still going on, than the example given of Canada, are real.
The other interesting thing there is that arrivals from family and dependents allowed in in 2020 seemed to be almost exactly making up for the decline of family and dependents coming at 2019. Sehr interesisch.
You do know that's a line chart, right? The data points are clearly marked and that is a rise in 2021 with a connection then drawn between 2020 and 2021 as is drawn between the data points of every year.
2020 is well below the trend. 2021 is above it. So the rise happened in 2021, as I said and as demonstrated by the other chart you linked to before.
You're not very good at reading your own charts.
That's simply a lack of detail, not the evidence you've interpreted from it. The beginning of the year would obviously have been below trend because of Brexit.
On yet another more detailed graph here, for instance, the rise starts again in mid-2020 during lockdown, not 2021. The government were scrabbling around to fill gaps in other sectors by bringing in dependents of health workers, as discussed earlier.
The rise in the figures for non-EU migrants for the second half of 2020, not just 2021, will be even clearer from this graph, as it's from June to June, and January 2021 wasn't a unique moment of change of visa regime.
Keir Starmer has tonight told his MPs: “The Conservatives are not our principal opponent. Reform are our main rivals for power. We have a moral responsibility to make sure Farage never wins.”
And PM takes off gloves: “We have to be clear that every opportunity he has had in this Parliament to back working people he’s voted against. Telling the workers at Jaguar Land Rover they deserve to go bust. A state-slashing, NHS-privatising, Putin apologist. Without a single patriotic bone in his body. We will take to fight to him. We will fight as Labour.”
I’m happy to hear that. Farage is a fraud and it’s time he was held to account . Labour need to stop messing around and go for the jugular .
Labour very, very particularly need to mention Farage's responsibility for the huge post-Brexit rise in immigration, if they're finally going to say the truth.
Boris owns the Boriswave. It would be difficult to pin it on Farage.
I wouldn't agree there. Farage would have had no choice but to do the same, had been in power then, or watch the economy go into a depressing.
It shouldn't be too diffucult to highlight the actual figures of the number of sectors left dangerously short after Brexit , as referenced in detail in past discussions on here.
Nonsense, those sectors could have put up pay instead of bringing in people for minimum wage.
And importing people doesn't solve shortages as lump of labour is a fallacy.
We had a detailed discussion on all this on here, about a year ago, with figures from the Migration Observatory about the number of sectors struggling after Brexit.
Farage will well know that he would have faced exactly the same problem as Johnson, and the Tory Brexit ideologues around him ; to retran enougb workers from home is a long-term project , whereas economic danage and recession comes tomorrow.
Was Trudeau also dealing with Brexit? The same policy mistake of massively opening the floodgates was made simultaneously by several Anglosphere countries, which suggests something deeper than Brexit as a root cause.
This is a year later than the British big rise in 2020, suggesting a different cause. I will dig out some of the graphs.
2020 was Covid when there was a drop.
Genuine question, @williamglenn - you've indentified a definite pattern. in Anglosphere countries. Might be a Gazette article in it, for the Butt Plug Supplement, which focuses a lot on global migration, and stone butt plugs
What's your take? Why did this happen?
I’d previously assumed it was groupthink driven by economic policymakers but looking at the graph of visas being issued throughout the lockdowns maybe it was simply bureaucratic incompetence because the system carried on issuing visas and then everyone arrived at once when the pandemic was over.
In every developed country there was a crunch in labour costs post COVID.
In a number of places, such as the US and the U.K., I think this relates to people in shitty jobs being forced to find new ones during COVID. Normally not adventurous, they had to find new jobs - or retire early and drop out of the labour force.
Whatever the reason, the result was a massive inflationary shock. Governments were desperate to hold down wages. Enter immigration as the fix….
There was clearlt a post-Covid effect in many places. But the stats showing the UK figures changing earlier, a few months after Brexit while lockdown was still going on, than the example given of Canada, are real.
The other interesting thing there is that arrivals from family and dependents allowed in in 2020 seemed to be almost exactly making up for the decline of family and dependents coming at 2019. Sehr interesisch.
You do know that's a line chart, right? The data points are clearly marked and that is a rise in 2021 with a connection then drawn between 2020 and 2021 as is drawn between the data points of every year.
2020 is well below the trend. 2021 is above it. So the rise happened in 2021, as I said and as demonstrated by the other chart you linked to before.
You're not very good at reading your own charts.
That's simply a lack of detail, not the evidence you've interpreted from it. The beginning of the year would obviously have been below trend because of Brexit.
On yet another more detailed graph here, for instance, the rise starts again in mid-2020 during lockdown, not 2021. The government were scrabbling around to fill gaps in other sectors by bringing in dependents of health workers, as discussed earlier.
The rise in the figures for non-EU migrants for the second half of 2020, not just 2021, will be even clearer from this graph, as it's from June to June, and January 2021 wasn't a unique moment of change of visa regime.
On the more detailed first graph you link to there's a dip especially in Q3 2020 thanks to lockdowns, a reversion in Q4 2020 (but still below Q4 2019) then the surge above pre-Covid numbers happens in Q3 2021 onwards.
Your more detailed graph demonstrates conclusively the surge above pre-Covid numbers happened from Q3 2021 onwards and not 2020 as you claimed.
A recovery from a trough, to still below pre-Covid numbers, is not a surge. You seem to be viewing any upwards movement in the chart as a surge rather than a reversion to the mean.
Your second graph doesn't even show pre-Covid numbers, but clearly shows a surge occurring in 2021, again, like all other charts.
UK weather forecast more accurate with Met Office supercomputer
The new supercomputer, which can perform more than four times the number of calculations per second than its predecessor, contains 1.8m core processors.
While the exact location of the infrastructure is a secret, the Azure supercomputing service is physically located in the south of England and is split across two data centres.
UK weather forecast more accurate with Met Office supercomputer
The new supercomputer, which can perform more than four times the number of calculations per second than its predecessor, contains 1.8m core processors.
While the exact location of the infrastructure is a secret, the Azure supercomputing service is physically located in the south of England and is split across two data centres.
UK weather forecast more accurate with Met Office supercomputer
The new supercomputer, which can perform more than four times the number of calculations per second than its predecessor, contains 1.8m core processors.
While the exact location of the infrastructure is a secret, the Azure supercomputing service is physically located in the south of England and is split across two data centres.
UK weather forecast more accurate with Met Office supercomputer
The new supercomputer, which can perform more than four times the number of calculations per second than its predecessor, contains 1.8m core processors.
While the exact location of the infrastructure is a secret, the Azure supercomputing service is physically located in the south of England and is split across two data centres.
UK weather forecast more accurate with Met Office supercomputer
The new supercomputer, which can perform more than four times the number of calculations per second than its predecessor, contains 1.8m core processors.
While the exact location of the infrastructure is a secret, the Azure supercomputing service is physically located in the south of England and is split across two data centres.
Keir Starmer has tonight told his MPs: “The Conservatives are not our principal opponent. Reform are our main rivals for power. We have a moral responsibility to make sure Farage never wins.”
And PM takes off gloves: “We have to be clear that every opportunity he has had in this Parliament to back working people he’s voted against. Telling the workers at Jaguar Land Rover they deserve to go bust. A state-slashing, NHS-privatising, Putin apologist. Without a single patriotic bone in his body. We will take to fight to him. We will fight as Labour.”
I’m happy to hear that. Farage is a fraud and it’s time he was held to account . Labour need to stop messing around and go for the jugular .
Labour very, very particularly need to mention Farage's responsibility for the huge post-Brexit rise in immigration, if they're finally going to say the truth.
Boris owns the Boriswave. It would be difficult to pin it on Farage.
I wouldn't agree there. Farage would have had no choice but to do the same, had been in power then, or watch the economy go into a depressing.
It shouldn't be too diffucult to highlight the actual figures of the number of sectors left dangerously short after Brexit , as referenced in detail in past discussions on here.
Nonsense, those sectors could have put up pay instead of bringing in people for minimum wage.
And importing people doesn't solve shortages as lump of labour is a fallacy.
We had a detailed discussion on all this on here, about a year ago, with figures from the Migration Observatory about the number of sectors struggling after Brexit.
Farage will well know that he would have faced exactly the same problem as Johnson, and the Tory Brexit ideologues around him ; to retran enougb workers from home is a long-term project , whereas economic danage and recession comes tomorrow.
Was Trudeau also dealing with Brexit? The same policy mistake of massively opening the floodgates was made simultaneously by several Anglosphere countries, which suggests something deeper than Brexit as a root cause.
This is a year later than the British big rise in 2020, suggesting a different cause. I will dig out some of the graphs.
2020 was Covid when there was a drop.
Genuine question, @williamglenn - you've indentified a definite pattern. in Anglosphere countries. Might be a Gazette article in it, for the Butt Plug Supplement, which focuses a lot on global migration, and stone butt plugs
What's your take? Why did this happen?
I’d previously assumed it was groupthink driven by economic policymakers but looking at the graph of visas being issued throughout the lockdowns maybe it was simply bureaucratic incompetence because the system carried on issuing visas and then everyone arrived at once when the pandemic was over.
In every developed country there was a crunch in labour costs post COVID.
In a number of places, such as the US and the U.K., I think this relates to people in shitty jobs being forced to find new ones during COVID. Normally not adventurous, they had to find new jobs - or retire early and drop out of the labour force.
Whatever the reason, the result was a massive inflationary shock. Governments were desperate to hold down wages. Enter immigration as the fix….
There was clearlt a post-Covid effect in many places. But the stats showing the UK figures changing earlier, a few months after Brexit while lockdown was still going on, than the example given of Canada, are real.
The other interesting thing there is that arrivals from family and dependents allowed in in 2020 seemed to be almost exactly making up for the decline of family and dependents coming at 2019. Sehr interesisch.
You do know that's a line chart, right? The data points are clearly marked and that is a rise in 2021 with a connection then drawn between 2020 and 2021 as is drawn between the data points of every year.
2020 is well below the trend. 2021 is above it. So the rise happened in 2021, as I said and as demonstrated by the other chart you linked to before.
You're not very good at reading your own charts.
That's simply a lack of detail, not the evidence you've interpreted from it. The beginning of the year would obviously have been below trend because of Brexit.
On yet another more detailed graph here, for instance, the rise starts again in mid-2020 during lockdown, not 2021. The government were scrabbling around to fill gaps in other sectors by bringing in dependents of health workers, as discussed earlier.
The rise in the figures for non-EU migrants for the second half of 2020, not just 2021, will be even clearer from this graph, as it's from June to June, and January 2021 wasn't a unique moment of change of visa regime.
On the more detailed first graph you link to there's a dip especially in Q3 2020 thanks to lockdowns, a reversion in Q4 2020 (but still below Q4 2019) then the surge above pre-Covid numbers happens in Q3 2021 onwards.
Your more detailed graph demonstrates conclusively the surge above pre-Covid numbers happened from Q3 2021 onwards and not 2020 as you claimed.
A recovery from a trough, to still below pre-Covid numbers, is not a surge. You seem to be viewing any upwards movement in the chart as a surge rather than a reversion to the mean.
Your second graph doesn't even show pre-Covid numbers, but clearly shows a surge occurring in 2021, again, like all other charts.
Most of this is simply your owm partial interpretation of which long-term trends are relevant, as well as generalising from yearly data points rather than monthly. The more relevant points, before I head to bed, are as following:
-Brexit was advertised as a *reduction in immigration irrespective of context*.
-All the graphs I've posted illustrate that this was false.
-Several, including those posted by others, indicate that this change in direction began in 2020, not 2021.
-Some posted by others illustrate that this change in direction *happened at the beginning of 2020*, before Covid.
It's really time to move on from the language of traitors and quislings?
Do people need to surrender the use of those terms ;-)
I just can't get excited about it any more.
For me, the outrage was the way the 2017-2019 Parliament refused to implement the instruction given to it by the British people, despite saying it would... Not only did it refuse to implement those instructions, it even connived to try and overturn it.
But...
Boris, whatever else anyone else thinks about him, got Brexit done and the will of the people was implemented. But going forwards, that doesn't mean Brexit can't be revisited, deals can't be done, we can't align closer and maybe one day, even rejoin, if there is a fresh instruction from the British public to do so at some point...
It's really time to move on from the language of traitors and quislings?
No, it isn't. If anything - with this Labour government - the language of "traitors" is more relevant and timely than ever
How else would you describe the Chagos deal? Handing over strategically vital British territory, for no good reason, to a meaningless foreign power allied to our greatest enemy? AND PAYING BILLIONS TO DO THIS?
That is treachery. No more, no less. The conjugations spring therefrom
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
Let's see
Earlier today I predicted this might boost Labour in the polls
Now I am much less sure. It may simply be more divisive, driving more floaters to Reform and attracting a few (but not many) Remainers back to Labour
More importantly, it is ideal for Reform. "Labour are traitors who sell us out at every opportunity". This latest news is a sublime affirmation of that Reform contention. Because Starmer really did fuck up this negotiation
I can see this shunting Reform over 30% into the low-mid 30s
And Starmer, crucially. remains an inept liability. He can't negotiate deals, he can't sell policies on TV, he can't do speeches or ideas. He's a dud
The Guardian report on him tonight, talking to Labour MPs, is fiercely negative. Talks of him being constantly criticised from left and right. Good
It's really time to move on from the language of traitors and quislings?
No, it isn't. If anything - with this Labour government - the language of "traitors" is more relevant and timely than ever
How else would you describe the Chagos deal? Handing over strategically vital British territory, for no good reason, to a meaningless foreign power allied to our greatest enemy? AND PAYING BILLIONS TO DO THIS?
That is treachery. No more, no less. The conjugations spring therefrom
It's just mind-bogglingly bad deal after mind-bogglingly bad deal. It's as if they don't understand their job is to represent British interests.
"Almost half of young people would prefer a world without internet, UK study finds Half of 16- to 21-year-olds support ‘digital curfew’ and nearly 70% feel worse after using social media"
From a betting point of view (next Labour leader/next PM), I think the paragraphs below were the more relevant takeaways from the meeting of Labour MP's where Starmer said that he would aggressively fight Farage:
MPs leaving the PLP meeting said Starmer was peppered with hostile questions from those present. One said of the 26 questions “none were positive” and criticism came on a range of different issues where MPs were angry – including cuts to disability benefits and Starmer’s migration speech, as well inaction on Gaza, the anger of the LGBT community and general concerns about the party’s electoral strategy, particularly for elections next year. A new MP in a northern English seat said she feared from her experience knocking on doors in the local elections that the party was losing more voters to the Greens and Lib Dems than to Reform.
Because it can't be integrated into the F35 without the US doing the work, and they don't seem to be very interested in helping us out.
The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that the planned in-service date for the Spear Capability 3 air-to-surface weapon has been pushed to the early 2030s, according to a draft timeline. https://x.com/UKDefJournal/status/1924457217689817133
Should have been in service this year, but the program is being "rebaselined".
I can see the F-35B getting orphaned as LM develop F-35A into F-35 5.5 having missed out on NGAD. One of the objectives for '5.5' will be greater range and there is very little scope for expanding internal fuel carriage in the B. There will be a very healthy market for an upgraded F-35 in the coming decades as existing European F-35A operators re-arm.
It doesn't help that the B is a USMC aircraft and they don't particularly care for it. They've already adjusted their F-35 buy from 85:15 B:C to 65:35 B:C.
From a betting point of view (next Labour leader/next PM), I think the paragraphs below were the more relevant takeaways from the meeting of Labour MP's where Starmer said that he would aggressively fight Farage:
MPs leaving the PLP meeting said Starmer was peppered with hostile questions from those present. One said of the 26 questions “none were positive” and criticism came on a range of different issues where MPs were angry – including cuts to disability benefits and Starmer’s migration speech, as well inaction on Gaza, the anger of the LGBT community and general concerns about the party’s electoral strategy, particularly for elections next year. A new MP in a northern English seat said she feared from her experience knocking on doors in the local elections that the party was losing more voters to the Greens and Lib Dems than to Reform.
Starmer is a lawyer, not a politician: we know that. Trouble is, whoever is advising him is either out of touch (because they are out of the country, like Blair or Mandelson) or just wrong.
Just as Kemi is undermined by CCHQ so Starmer is by, well, whoever. Why on earth turn Labour's guns on Farage when Reform is knocking seven bells out of the Conservatives? It makes no sense.
From a betting point of view (next Labour leader/next PM), I think the paragraphs below were the more relevant takeaways from the meeting of Labour MP's where Starmer said that he would aggressively fight Farage:
MPs leaving the PLP meeting said Starmer was peppered with hostile questions from those present. One said of the 26 questions “none were positive” and criticism came on a range of different issues where MPs were angry – including cuts to disability benefits and Starmer’s migration speech, as well inaction on Gaza, the anger of the LGBT community and general concerns about the party’s electoral strategy, particularly for elections next year. A new MP in a northern English seat said she feared from her experience knocking on doors in the local elections that the party was losing more voters to the Greens and Lib Dems than to Reform.
Starmer is a lawyer, not a politician: we know that. Trouble is, whoever is advising him is either out of touch (because they are out of the country, like Blair or Mandelson) or just wrong.
Just as Kemi is undermined by CCHQ so Starmer is by, well, whoever. Why on earth turn Labour's guns on Farage when Reform is knocking seven bells out of the Conservatives? It makes no sense.
I think Starmer's problem is an inability to understand the feelings of a pensioner or a working class voter, who is struggling to make ends meet. He has never personally faced a situation of having to budget essentials on a very limited income, and just cannot understand or empathise with a person in that situation.
Alistair Campbell said in one of his recent podcasts that people voted Labour because they wanted "change", but benefit cuts was not the "change" they were expecting from a Labour government. Campbell said that a Labour MP told him that once the disabled benefit cuts are implemented, up to 2/3rd of his constituents would be impacted.
The Labour leadership has managed to simultaneously anger Labour activists who are both supportive and opposed to the Supreme Court judgement.
Labour is set to indefinitely postpone its national women’s conference and limit women’s officer roles and all-women shortlists to biological women while it reviews its policies in the wake of the Supreme Court judgement, sparking attacks from trans and gender-critical activists alike.
The gender-critical campaign group Labour Women’s Declaration, which welcomed the Supreme Court ruling, said shelving the conference would be “wrongheaded”, shortsighted”, “exceptionally disappointing” and a “knee-jerk reaction”.
Meanwhile LGBT+ Labour’s trans officer Georgia Meadows and two Labour trans rights campaign groups said they “unreservedly condemn” the wider party changes, warning limiting trans people’s participation will exacerbate trans people’s under-representation in politics more widely.
The Labour leadership has managed to simultaneously anger Labour activists who are both supportive and opposed to the Supreme Court judgement.
Labour is set to indefinitely postpone its national women’s conference and limit women’s officer roles and all-women shortlists to biological women while it reviews its policies in the wake of the Supreme Court judgement, sparking attacks from trans and gender-critical activists alike.
The gender-critical campaign group Labour Women’s Declaration, which welcomed the Supreme Court ruling, said shelving the conference would be “wrongheaded”, shortsighted”, “exceptionally disappointing” and a “knee-jerk reaction”.
Meanwhile LGBT+ Labour’s trans officer Georgia Meadows and two Labour trans rights campaign groups said they “unreservedly condemn” the wider party changes, warning limiting trans people’s participation will exacerbate trans people’s under-representation in politics more widely.
It is always amusing to see feminists and trans - two aggressive, entitled and staggeringly intolerant minority groups - knocking the crap out of each other and particularly delicious to see their woke, socialist enablers caught in the middle.
Some more commentary on the Labour MP's meeting with Starmer:
During the meeting, the Prime Minister took 26 questions, of which I am told he answered three. One Lancashire MP pointed out that the party is on its knees in the county after the locals (Reform now control Lancashire County Council). There is little they can do to coax voters back from Reform, and so asked why the party doesn’t stick to its traditional values anyway. .... Many MPs used their questions to ask Starmer directly – what do you stand for?
Though criticism from the left of the party following last week’s speech was inevitable (particularly those elected pre-2024), it is becoming increasingly clear that even newbie Starmer loyalists are feeling disaffected (a few tell me they didn’t even go to Monday’s meeting).
Because it can't be integrated into the F35 without the US doing the work, and they don't seem to be very interested in helping us out.
The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that the planned in-service date for the Spear Capability 3 air-to-surface weapon has been pushed to the early 2030s, according to a draft timeline. https://x.com/UKDefJournal/status/1924457217689817133
Should have been in service this year, but the program is being "rebaselined".
I can see the F-35B getting orphaned as LM develop F-35A into F-35 5.5 having missed out on NGAD. One of the objectives for '5.5' will be greater range and there is very little scope for expanding internal fuel carriage in the B. There will be a very healthy market for an upgraded F-35 in the coming decades as existing European F-35A operators re-arm.
It doesn't help that the B is a USMC aircraft and they don't particularly care for it. They've already adjusted their F-35 buy from 85:15 B:C to 65:35 B:C.
The increasingly short development times for new weapons that we see in UA is making these inflexible and incredibly expensive systems look completely obsolete. The time may be coming where we need to go for huge numbers of drone systems rather than one centralized mega system, which is what the F-35 has become. If interoperability with US systems is a point of vulnerability, we have to move to a lower risk strategy.
The US has given us all the risks of a supposedly co-developed system without the benefits.
It's really time to move on from the language of traitors and quislings?
No, it isn't. If anything - with this Labour government - the language of "traitors" is more relevant and timely than ever
How else would you describe the Chagos deal? Handing over strategically vital British territory, for no good reason, to a meaningless foreign power allied to our greatest enemy? AND PAYING BILLIONS TO DO THIS?
That is treachery. No more, no less. The conjugations spring therefrom
What, exactly, is the British interest in hosting a US base in the Indian Ocean?
If you are looking for traitors, maybe those on the right who took money in various ways from Russia might be more relevant?
Because it can't be integrated into the F35 without the US doing the work, and they don't seem to be very interested in helping us out.
The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that the planned in-service date for the Spear Capability 3 air-to-surface weapon has been pushed to the early 2030s, according to a draft timeline. https://x.com/UKDefJournal/status/1924457217689817133
Should have been in service this year, but the program is being "rebaselined".
Do we have it clearly stated that this is an integration timeline in the USA (LM) issue, or related to development by MBDA?
How much of this is international arms politics to protect US weapons use on European aircraft?
Because it can't be integrated into the F35 without the US doing the work, and they don't seem to be very interested in helping us out.
The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that the planned in-service date for the Spear Capability 3 air-to-surface weapon has been pushed to the early 2030s, according to a draft timeline. https://x.com/UKDefJournal/status/1924457217689817133
Should have been in service this year, but the program is being "rebaselined".
I can see the F-35B getting orphaned as LM develop F-35A into F-35 5.5 having missed out on NGAD. One of the objectives for '5.5' will be greater range and there is very little scope for expanding internal fuel carriage in the B. There will be a very healthy market for an upgraded F-35 in the coming decades as existing European F-35A operators re-arm.
It doesn't help that the B is a USMC aircraft and they don't particularly care for it. They've already adjusted their F-35 buy from 85:15 B:C to 65:35 B:C.
I doubt the B would have been built but for us, and it risks becoming an orphaned system. It can't carry our best missiles - so both it and its armaments are severely range limited.
The carriers are only as useful as their air complement, don't have decent airborne AEW, and have insufficient escorts.
Would we be better off treating them as unmanned aircraft platforms (as Turkey seems to be planning) and scrapping the F35 - which is extraordinarily expensive to maintain in active service ? Or just selling them ?
I trust all the "impartial" commentators who welcomed this vile government's EU Surrender Deal will take the time to listen to this morning's Farming Today for a fair commentary. I don't think the trolls who publish Labour Material will be publicising the last five minutes on the fishing industry.
As with the Inheritance Tax Changes this will have to be repealed the day this evil government falls and the rules concerning Malfeasance in Public Office amended so such an attack on an industry can never happen again.
The Trump administration has agreed to pay a $5m (£3.7m) settlement to the family of Ashli Babbitt, a US Air Force veteran who was shot and killed by a Capitol police officer while breaching the US Congress on 6 January 2021.
Capitol Police Chief Tom Manger told CBS, the BBC's US partner, he is "extremely disappointed" with the decision. The officer involved in her shooting has been cleared of any wrongdoing.
Because it can't be integrated into the F35 without the US doing the work, and they don't seem to be very interested in helping us out.
The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that the planned in-service date for the Spear Capability 3 air-to-surface weapon has been pushed to the early 2030s, according to a draft timeline. https://x.com/UKDefJournal/status/1924457217689817133
Should have been in service this year, but the program is being "rebaselined".
Do we have it clearly stated that this is an integration timeline in the USA (LM) issue, or related to development by MBDA?
How much of this is international arms politics to protect US weapons use on European aircraft?
It's partly that the software upgrade for the aircraft is Monty years behind schedule. But if it were a priority for the US then the UK missiles might be independent of the huge upgrade. It clearly isn't.
The Meteor has been in service for some time. It's our best air to air missile. The F35 can't carry it.
Because it can't be integrated into the F35 without the US doing the work, and they don't seem to be very interested in helping us out.
The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that the planned in-service date for the Spear Capability 3 air-to-surface weapon has been pushed to the early 2030s, according to a draft timeline. https://x.com/UKDefJournal/status/1924457217689817133
Should have been in service this year, but the program is being "rebaselined".
I can see the F-35B getting orphaned as LM develop F-35A into F-35 5.5 having missed out on NGAD. One of the objectives for '5.5' will be greater range and there is very little scope for expanding internal fuel carriage in the B. There will be a very healthy market for an upgraded F-35 in the coming decades as existing European F-35A operators re-arm.
It doesn't help that the B is a USMC aircraft and they don't particularly care for it. They've already adjusted their F-35 buy from 85:15 B:C to 65:35 B:C.
The increasingly short development times for new weapons that we see in UA is making these inflexible and incredibly expensive systems look completely obsolete. The time may be coming where we need to go for huge numbers of drone systems rather than one centralized mega system, which is what the F-35 has become. If interoperability with US systems is a point of vulnerability, we have to move to a lower risk strategy.
The US has given us all the risks of a supposedly co-developed system without the benefits.
I'm not sure the future lies with drones. Remember during ww2 that torpedo-armed biplanes sank battleships whose AA guns were set for faster-moving aircraft. I expect it is the same now with drones that fly too low and too slow for conventional defences but the latter will evolve.
Starmer's EU deal is, indeed, a piece of excrement. He succeeded in fooling me because i was blind. It's bad, possibly terrible
He didn't even get e-gates. Fuck him, let Reform destroy him and his party, forever
Wait, he didn't even get passport queues? What?
And they haven't even allowed us to be considered for this defence fund, they have said they will 'explore ways in which we might be considered'
I mean the utter pillock.
And he's told his suicidal lemming MPs to 'take the fight to Reform!' on this basis.
What's the betting by the time all the exploration has been conducted a vast chunk of the money has already been allocated to the likes of the big German military contractors.
You don't need to be former head of the CPS to know an agreement to explore an agreement legally isn't worth the paper it is written on.
M Macron's cunning plan no doubt involves spending lots of German Euros in French arms factories.
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail, the BBC's Farming Today. Sometime perhaps you just have to maybe let the thought enter your head that Keir Starmer really is the most unhinged evil leader this country has had since James II.
F1: Verstappen now shorter than Norris in the title betting on Ladbrokes. Piastri's evens, Verstappen 3.25, Norris 3.75.
Similar shift on Betfair. Piastri 2.02, Verstappen 3.7, Norris 4.
As I mentioned yesterday, I slightly modified my title position by putting a little on Verstappen (having previously backed and then [prematurely, alas] hedged Piastri each way). If you backed Piastri and are all green then I'd say 3.7 on Verstappen is still worth backing at the moment.
My guess is McLaren will 1-2 Monaco, but I was wary of waiting in case that doesn't happen. Remember there are two stops this year.
Would we be better off treating them as unmanned aircraft platforms (as Turkey seems to be planning) and scrapping the F35 - which is extraordinarily expensive to maintain in active service ? Or just selling them ?
To the limited extent that the UK needs carriers then a 100% RPAS fixed wing air wing make a lot of sense and is the next logical evolution.
However, it'd take a great deal of cash that probably wouldn't be forthcoming to develop such a capability. It's all very well plonking an MQ-9 on the deck for PR purposes as the PoW did in the Western Atlantic but developing that into an effective, deployable system is something else altogether. There would be many, doubtless expensive, complications with marinising such as corrosion, EM environment, aircraft handling, etc., etc. The QE class would also need an angled flight deck to make it viable but at least that's just steel and a load of big lads in a shipyard staring at it while scratching their hairy arses.
In short, yes, but it's a huge investment for an ill-defined result.
Because it can't be integrated into the F35 without the US doing the work, and they don't seem to be very interested in helping us out.
The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that the planned in-service date for the Spear Capability 3 air-to-surface weapon has been pushed to the early 2030s, according to a draft timeline. https://x.com/UKDefJournal/status/1924457217689817133
Should have been in service this year, but the program is being "rebaselined".
Do we have it clearly stated that this is an integration timeline in the USA (LM) issue, or related to development by MBDA?
How much of this is international arms politics to protect US weapons use on European aircraft?
It's partly that the software upgrade for the aircraft is Monty years behind schedule. But if it were a priority for the US then the UK missiles might be independent of the huge upgrade. It clearly isn't.
The Meteor has been in service for some time. It's our best air to air missile. The F35 can't carry it.
Because it can't be integrated into the F35 without the US doing the work, and they don't seem to be very interested in helping us out.
The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that the planned in-service date for the Spear Capability 3 air-to-surface weapon has been pushed to the early 2030s, according to a draft timeline. https://x.com/UKDefJournal/status/1924457217689817133
Should have been in service this year, but the program is being "rebaselined".
Do we have it clearly stated that this is an integration timeline in the USA (LM) issue, or related to development by MBDA?
How much of this is international arms politics to protect US weapons use on European aircraft?
It's partly that the software upgrade for the aircraft is Monty years behind schedule. But if it were a priority for the US then the UK missiles might be independent of the huge upgrade. It clearly isn't.
The Meteor has been in service for some time. It's our best air to air missile. The F35 can't carry it.
The last 13 British F-35s (ZM170-ZM182) will have the hardware to support the TR-3 software so they will, in theory and eventually, be Meteor (and Spear-3) shooters.
You can see this coming a (nautical) mile off. Ten years hence these last 13 will be the only combat coded F-35s that can employ the full range of modern weapons.
Keir Starmer has tonight told his MPs: “The Conservatives are not our principal opponent. Reform are our main rivals for power. We have a moral responsibility to make sure Farage never wins.”
And PM takes off gloves: “We have to be clear that every opportunity he has had in this Parliament to back working people he’s voted against. Telling the workers at Jaguar Land Rover they deserve to go bust. A state-slashing, NHS-privatising, Putin apologist. Without a single patriotic bone in his body. We will take to fight to him. We will fight as Labour.”
I’m happy to hear that. Farage is a fraud and it’s time he was held to account . Labour need to stop messing around and go for the jugular .
Labour very, very particularly need to mention Farage's responsibility for the huge post-Brexit rise in immigration, if they're finally going to say the truth.
Boris owns the Boriswave. It would be difficult to pin it on Farage.
I wouldn't agree there. Farage would have had no choice but to do the same, had been in power then, or watch the economy go into a depressing.
It shouldn't be too diffucult to highlight the actual figures of the number of sectors left dangerously short after Brexit , as referenced in detail in past discussions on here.
Nonsense, those sectors could have put up pay instead of bringing in people for minimum wage.
And importing people doesn't solve shortages as lump of labour is a fallacy.
We had a detailed discussion on all this on here, about a year ago, with figures from the Migration Observatory about the number of sectors struggling after Brexit.
Farage will well know that he would have faced exactly the same problem as Johnson, and the Tory Brexit ideologues around him ; to retran enougb workers from home is a long-term project , whereas economic danage and recession comes tomorrow.
Was Trudeau also dealing with Brexit? The same policy mistake of massively opening the floodgates was made simultaneously by several Anglosphere countries, which suggests something deeper than Brexit as a root cause.
This is a year later than the British big rise in 2020, suggesting a different cause. I will dig out some of the graphs.
2020 was Covid when there was a drop.
Genuine question, @williamglenn - you've indentified a definite pattern. in Anglosphere countries. Might be a Gazette article in it, for the Butt Plug Supplement, which focuses a lot on global migration, and stone butt plugs
What's your take? Why did this happen?
I’d previously assumed it was groupthink driven by economic policymakers but looking at the graph of visas being issued throughout the lockdowns maybe it was simply bureaucratic incompetence because the system carried on issuing visas and then everyone arrived at once when the pandemic was over.
In every developed country there was a crunch in labour costs post COVID.
In a number of places, such as the US and the U.K., I think this relates to people in shitty jobs being forced to find new ones during COVID. Normally not adventurous, they had to find new jobs - or retire early and drop out of the labour force.
Whatever the reason, the result was a massive inflationary shock. Governments were desperate to hold down wages. Enter immigration as the fix….
There was clearlt a post-Covid effect in many places. But the stats showing the UK figures changing earlier, a few months after Brexit while lockdown was still going on, than the example given of Canada, are real.
The other interesting thing there is that arrivals from family and dependents allowed in in 2020 seemed to be almost exactly making up for the decline of family and dependents coming at 2019. Sehr interesisch.
You do know that's a line chart, right? The data points are clearly marked and that is a rise in 2021 with a connection then drawn between 2020 and 2021 as is drawn between the data points of every year.
2020 is well below the trend. 2021 is above it. So the rise happened in 2021, as I said and as demonstrated by the other chart you linked to before.
You're not very good at reading your own charts.
That's simply a lack of detail, not the evidence you've interpreted from it. The beginning of the year would obviously have been below trend because of Brexit.
On yet another more detailed graph here, for instance, the rise starts again in mid-2020 during lockdown, not 2021. The government were scrabbling around to fill gaps in other sectors by bringing in dependents of health workers, as discussed earlier.
The rise in the figures for non-EU migrants for the second half of 2020, not just 2021, will be even clearer from this graph, as it's from June to June, and January 2021 wasn't a unique moment of change of visa regime.
On the more detailed first graph you link to there's a dip especially in Q3 2020 thanks to lockdowns, a reversion in Q4 2020 (but still below Q4 2019) then the surge above pre-Covid numbers happens in Q3 2021 onwards.
Your more detailed graph demonstrates conclusively the surge above pre-Covid numbers happened from Q3 2021 onwards and not 2020 as you claimed.
A recovery from a trough, to still below pre-Covid numbers, is not a surge. You seem to be viewing any upwards movement in the chart as a surge rather than a reversion to the mean.
Your second graph doesn't even show pre-Covid numbers, but clearly shows a surge occurring in 2021, again, like all other charts.
Most of this is simply your owm partial interpretation of which long-term trends are relevant, as well as generalising from yearly data points rather than monthly. The more relevant points, before I head to bed, are as following:
-Brexit was advertised as a *reduction in immigration irrespective of context*.
-All the graphs I've posted illustrate that this was false.
-Several, including those posted by others, indicate that this change in direction began in 2020, not 2021.
-Some posted by others illustrate that this change in direction *happened at the beginning of 2020*, before Covid.
Night, 'all !
-Some posted by others have also
Boris and Vote Leave didn't advertise Brexit as a reduction in immigration, merely the ability to control it.
Future Home Secretary Patel said during the Referendum that control could make migration from the subcontinent easier. Which she then did.
Nobody denies that immigration did not fall due to Brexit.
Everybody agrees it did fall, in 2020, due to lockdown.
It has been pointed out to you that it rose then in the UK, Canada and Australia post lockdown.
This rise happened in all 3 countries, in 2021.
You claimed that the rise in the UK happened earlier, in 2020.
That was categorically false. Even in Q4 2020 it was lower than Q4 2019.
The rise beyond pre-Covid (and pre-Brexit) figures happened in 2021 in the UK, just as it did in Australia, Canada etc
Because it can't be integrated into the F35 without the US doing the work, and they don't seem to be very interested in helping us out.
The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that the planned in-service date for the Spear Capability 3 air-to-surface weapon has been pushed to the early 2030s, according to a draft timeline. https://x.com/UKDefJournal/status/1924457217689817133
Should have been in service this year, but the program is being "rebaselined".
I can see the F-35B getting orphaned as LM develop F-35A into F-35 5.5 having missed out on NGAD. One of the objectives for '5.5' will be greater range and there is very little scope for expanding internal fuel carriage in the B. There will be a very healthy market for an upgraded F-35 in the coming decades as existing European F-35A operators re-arm.
It doesn't help that the B is a USMC aircraft and they don't particularly care for it. They've already adjusted their F-35 buy from 85:15 B:C to 65:35 B:C.
The increasingly short development times for new weapons that we see in UA is making these inflexible and incredibly expensive systems look completely obsolete. The time may be coming where we need to go for huge numbers of drone systems rather than one centralized mega system, which is what the F-35 has become. If interoperability with US systems is a point of vulnerability, we have to move to a lower risk strategy.
The US has given us all the risks of a supposedly co-developed system without the benefits.
Yes, the risk as spending on defence rises across Europe is that we repeat the history of buying expensive stuff to fight the previous war. Hopefully some serious research and analysis of the current conflict is going on before the MoD clicks on 'buy'.
Keir Starmer has tonight told his MPs: “The Conservatives are not our principal opponent. Reform are our main rivals for power. We have a moral responsibility to make sure Farage never wins.”
And PM takes off gloves: “We have to be clear that every opportunity he has had in this Parliament to back working people he’s voted against. Telling the workers at Jaguar Land Rover they deserve to go bust. A state-slashing, NHS-privatising, Putin apologist. Without a single patriotic bone in his body. We will take to fight to him. We will fight as Labour.”
I’m happy to hear that. Farage is a fraud and it’s time he was held to account . Labour need to stop messing around and go for the jugular .
Labour very, very particularly need to mention Farage's responsibility for the huge post-Brexit rise in immigration, if they're finally going to say the truth.
Boris owns the Boriswave. It would be difficult to pin it on Farage.
I wouldn't agree there. Farage would have had no choice but to do the same, had been in power then, or watch the economy go into a depressing.
It shouldn't be too diffucult to highlight the actual figures of the number of sectors left dangerously short after Brexit , as referenced in detail in past discussions on here.
Nonsense, those sectors could have put up pay instead of bringing in people for minimum wage.
And importing people doesn't solve shortages as lump of labour is a fallacy.
We had a detailed discussion on all this on here, about a year ago, with figures from the Migration Observatory about the number of sectors struggling after Brexit.
Farage will well know that he would have faced exactly the same problem as Johnson, and the Tory Brexit ideologues around him ; to retran enougb workers from home is a long-term project , whereas economic danage and recession comes tomorrow.
Was Trudeau also dealing with Brexit? The same policy mistake of massively opening the floodgates was made simultaneously by several Anglosphere countries, which suggests something deeper than Brexit as a root cause.
This is a year later than the British big rise in 2020, suggesting a different cause. I will dig out some of the graphs.
2020 was Covid when there was a drop.
Genuine question, @williamglenn - you've indentified a definite pattern. in Anglosphere countries. Might be a Gazette article in it, for the Butt Plug Supplement, which focuses a lot on global migration, and stone butt plugs
What's your take? Why did this happen?
I’d previously assumed it was groupthink driven by economic policymakers but looking at the graph of visas being issued throughout the lockdowns maybe it was simply bureaucratic incompetence because the system carried on issuing visas and then everyone arrived at once when the pandemic was over.
In every developed country there was a crunch in labour costs post COVID.
In a number of places, such as the US and the U.K., I think this relates to people in shitty jobs being forced to find new ones during COVID. Normally not adventurous, they had to find new jobs - or retire early and drop out of the labour force.
Whatever the reason, the result was a massive inflationary shock. Governments were desperate to hold down wages. Enter immigration as the fix….
There was clearlt a post-Covid effect in many places. But the stats showing the UK figures changing earlier, a few months after Brexit while lockdown was still going on, than the example given of Canada, are real.
The other interesting thing there is that arrivals from family and dependents allowed in in 2020 seemed to be almost exactly making up for the decline of family and dependents coming at 2019. Sehr interesisch.
You do know that's a line chart, right? The data points are clearly marked and that is a rise in 2021 with a connection then drawn between 2020 and 2021 as is drawn between the data points of every year.
2020 is well below the trend. 2021 is above it. So the rise happened in 2021, as I said and as demonstrated by the other chart you linked to before.
You're not very good at reading your own charts.
That's simply a lack of detail, not the evidence you've interpreted from it. The beginning of the year would obviously have been below trend because of Brexit.
On yet another more detailed graph here, for instance, the rise starts again in mid-2020 during lockdown, not 2021. The government were scrabbling around to fill gaps in other sectors by bringing in dependents of health workers, as discussed earlier.
The rise in the figures for non-EU migrants for the second half of 2020, not just 2021, will be even clearer from this graph, as it's from June to June, and January 2021 wasn't a unique moment of change of visa regime.
On the more detailed first graph you link to there's a dip especially in Q3 2020 thanks to lockdowns, a reversion in Q4 2020 (but still below Q4 2019) then the surge above pre-Covid numbers happens in Q3 2021 onwards.
Your more detailed graph demonstrates conclusively the surge above pre-Covid numbers happened from Q3 2021 onwards and not 2020 as you claimed.
A recovery from a trough, to still below pre-Covid numbers, is not a surge. You seem to be viewing any upwards movement in the chart as a surge rather than a reversion to the mean.
Your second graph doesn't even show pre-Covid numbers, but clearly shows a surge occurring in 2021, again, like all other charts.
Most of this is simply your owm partial interpretation of which long-term trends are relevant, as well as generalising from yearly data points rather than monthly. The more relevant points, before I head to bed, are as following:
-Brexit was advertised as a *reduction in immigration irrespective of context*.
-All the graphs I've posted illustrate that this was false.
-Several, including those posted by others, indicate that this change in direction began in 2020, not 2021.
-Some posted by others illustrate that this change in direction *happened at the beginning of 2020*, before Covid.
Night, 'all !
-Some posted by others have also
Boris and Vote Leave didn't advertise Brexit as a reduction in immigration, merely the ability to control it.
Future Home Secretary Patel said during the Referendum that control could make migration from the subcontinent easier. Which she then did.
Nobody denies that immigration did not fall due to Brexit.
Everybody agrees it did fall, in 2020, due to lockdown.
It has been pointed out to you that it rose then in the UK, Canada and Australia post lockdown.
This rise happened in all 3 countries, in 2021.
You claimed that the rise in the UK happened earlier, in 2020.
That was categorically false. Even in Q4 2020 it was lower than Q4 2019.
The rise beyond pre-Covid (and pre-Brexit) figures happened in 2021 in the UK, just as it did in Australia, Canada etc
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
It was the Remainers Cameron and May who came up with the tens of thousands pledge.
Boris always opposed that pledge and he dropped it as leader, before he became PM, and before he liberalised migration rules.
If anyone was lying about tens of thousands it was Cameron and May who created that pledge, put it repeatedly into their manifestos, and had absolutely zero intention or ability to deliver on it.
Less honest on this matter than Boris Johnson. What a record to hold.
From a betting point of view (next Labour leader/next PM), I think the paragraphs below were the more relevant takeaways from the meeting of Labour MP's where Starmer said that he would aggressively fight Farage:
MPs leaving the PLP meeting said Starmer was peppered with hostile questions from those present. One said of the 26 questions “none were positive” and criticism came on a range of different issues where MPs were angry – including cuts to disability benefits and Starmer’s migration speech, as well inaction on Gaza, the anger of the LGBT community and general concerns about the party’s electoral strategy, particularly for elections next year. A new MP in a northern English seat said she feared from her experience knocking on doors in the local elections that the party was losing more voters to the Greens and Lib Dems than to Reform.
Starmer is a lawyer, not a politician: we know that. Trouble is, whoever is advising him is either out of touch (because they are out of the country, like Blair or Mandelson) or just wrong.
Just as Kemi is undermined by CCHQ so Starmer is by, well, whoever. Why on earth turn Labour's guns on Farage when Reform is knocking seven bells out of the Conservatives? It makes no sense.
I think Starmer's problem is an inability to understand the feelings of a pensioner or a working class voter, who is struggling to make ends meet. He has never personally faced a situation of having to budget essentials on a very limited income, and just cannot understand or empathise with a person in that situation.
Alistair Campbell said in one of his recent podcasts that people voted Labour because they wanted "change", but benefit cuts was not the "change" they were expecting from a Labour government. Campbell said that a Labour MP told him that once the disabled benefit cuts are implemented, up to 2/3rd of his constituents would be impacted.
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
It was the Remainers Cameron and May who came up with the tens of thousands pledge.
Boris always opposed that pledge and he dropped it as leader, before he became PM, and before he liberalised migration rules.
If anyone was lying about tens of thousands it was Cameron and May who created that pledge, put it repeatedly into their manifestos, and had absolutely zero intention or ability to deliver on it.
Less honest on this matter than Boris Johnson. What a record to hold.
For Johnson, immigration was simply a handy stick he could use on the way to the top. Once he got there, he hadn't the slightest interest in doing anything about it; indeed it's probable that he deliberately loosened the rules, using the cover of repeated reference to the superficially popular 'Australian points-based system', in a panic that if all the EU workers left, sectors of our economy and public services could be left high and dry.
Keir Starmer has tonight told his MPs: “The Conservatives are not our principal opponent. Reform are our main rivals for power. We have a moral responsibility to make sure Farage never wins.”
And PM takes off gloves: “We have to be clear that every opportunity he has had in this Parliament to back working people he’s voted against. Telling the workers at Jaguar Land Rover they deserve to go bust. A state-slashing, NHS-privatising, Putin apologist. Without a single patriotic bone in his body. We will take to fight to him. We will fight as Labour.”
I’m happy to hear that. Farage is a fraud and it’s time he was held to account . Labour need to stop messing around and go for the jugular .
Labour very, very particularly need to mention Farage's responsibility for the huge post-Brexit rise in immigration, if they're finally going to say the truth.
Boris owns the Boriswave. It would be difficult to pin it on Farage.
I wouldn't agree there. Farage would have had no choice but to do the same, had been in power then, or watch the economy go into a depressing.
It shouldn't be too diffucult to highlight the actual figures of the number of sectors left dangerously short after Brexit , as referenced in detail in past discussions on here.
Nonsense, those sectors could have put up pay instead of bringing in people for minimum wage.
And importing people doesn't solve shortages as lump of labour is a fallacy.
We had a detailed discussion on all this on here, about a year ago, with figures from the Migration Observatory about the number of sectors struggling after Brexit.
Farage will well know that he would have faced exactly the same problem as Johnson, and the Tory Brexit ideologues around him ; to retran enougb workers from home is a long-term project , whereas economic danage and recession comes tomorrow.
Was Trudeau also dealing with Brexit? The same policy mistake of massively opening the floodgates was made simultaneously by several Anglosphere countries, which suggests something deeper than Brexit as a root cause.
This is a year later than the British big rise in 2020, suggesting a different cause. I will dig out some of the graphs.
2020 was Covid when there was a drop.
Genuine question, @williamglenn - you've indentified a definite pattern. in Anglosphere countries. Might be a Gazette article in it, for the Butt Plug Supplement, which focuses a lot on global migration, and stone butt plugs
What's your take? Why did this happen?
I’d previously assumed it was groupthink driven by economic policymakers but looking at the graph of visas being issued throughout the lockdowns maybe it was simply bureaucratic incompetence because the system carried on issuing visas and then everyone arrived at once when the pandemic was over.
In every developed country there was a crunch in labour costs post COVID.
In a number of places, such as the US and the U.K., I think this relates to people in shitty jobs being forced to find new ones during COVID. Normally not adventurous, they had to find new jobs - or retire early and drop out of the labour force.
Whatever the reason, the result was a massive inflationary shock. Governments were desperate to hold down wages. Enter immigration as the fix….
There was clearlt a post-Covid effect in many places. But the stats showing the UK figures changing earlier, a few months after Brexit while lockdown was still going on, than the example given of Canada, are real.
The other interesting thing there is that arrivals from family and dependents allowed in in 2020 seemed to be almost exactly making up for the decline of family and dependents coming at 2019. Sehr interesisch.
You do know that's a line chart, right? The data points are clearly marked and that is a rise in 2021 with a connection then drawn between 2020 and 2021 as is drawn between the data points of every year.
2020 is well below the trend. 2021 is above it. So the rise happened in 2021, as I said and as demonstrated by the other chart you linked to before.
You're not very good at reading your own charts.
That's simply a lack of detail, not the evidence you've interpreted from it. The beginning of the year would obviously have been below trend because of Brexit.
On yet another more detailed graph here, for instance, the rise starts again in mid-2020 during lockdown, not 2021. The government were scrabbling around to fill gaps in other sectors by bringing in dependents of health workers, as discussed earlier.
The rise in the figures for non-EU migrants for the second half of 2020, not just 2021, will be even clearer from this graph, as it's from June to June, and January 2021 wasn't a unique moment of change of visa regime.
On the more detailed first graph you link to there's a dip especially in Q3 2020 thanks to lockdowns, a reversion in Q4 2020 (but still below Q4 2019) then the surge above pre-Covid numbers happens in Q3 2021 onwards.
Your more detailed graph demonstrates conclusively the surge above pre-Covid numbers happened from Q3 2021 onwards and not 2020 as you claimed.
A recovery from a trough, to still below pre-Covid numbers, is not a surge. You seem to be viewing any upwards movement in the chart as a surge rather than a reversion to the mean.
Your second graph doesn't even show pre-Covid numbers, but clearly shows a surge occurring in 2021, again, like all other charts.
Most of this is simply your owm partial interpretation of which long-term trends are relevant, as well as generalising from yearly data points rather than monthly. The more relevant points, before I head to bed, are as following:
-Brexit was advertised as a *reduction in immigration irrespective of context*.
-All the graphs I've posted illustrate that this was false.
-Several, including those posted by others, indicate that this change in direction began in 2020, not 2021.
-Some posted by others illustrate that this change in direction *happened at the beginning of 2020*, before Covid.
Night, 'all !
-Some posted by others have also
Boris and Vote Leave didn't advertise Brexit as a reduction in immigration, merely the ability to control it.
Future Home Secretary Patel said during the Referendum that control could make migration from the subcontinent easier. Which she then did.
Nobody denies that immigration did not fall due to Brexit.
Everybody agrees it did fall, in 2020, due to lockdown.
It has been pointed out to you that it rose then in the UK, Canada and Australia post lockdown.
This rise happened in all 3 countries, in 2021.
You claimed that the rise in the UK happened earlier, in 2020.
That was categorically false. Even in Q4 2020 it was lower than Q4 2019.
The rise beyond pre-Covid (and pre-Brexit) figures happened in 2021 in the UK, just as it did in Australia, Canada etc
Hope that helps!
Brexit happened on 1 Jan 2021.
Brexit happened on 31 Jan 2020.
But if you want to claim 2021, then it is axiomatic that any changes in 2020 happened pre Brexit, unlike what he was falsely claiming, and post Brexit changes happened in 2021, as is true anyway.
Either way, he was wrong. Completely factually wrong.
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail, the BBC's Farming Today. Sometime perhaps you just have to maybe let the thought enter your head that Keir Starmer really is the most unhinged evil leader this country has had since James II.
I dislike Starmer, but this just reads as you being unhinged.
You're coming across as a parody, its that extreme.
From a betting point of view (next Labour leader/next PM), I think the paragraphs below were the more relevant takeaways from the meeting of Labour MP's where Starmer said that he would aggressively fight Farage:
MPs leaving the PLP meeting said Starmer was peppered with hostile questions from those present. One said of the 26 questions “none were positive” and criticism came on a range of different issues where MPs were angry – including cuts to disability benefits and Starmer’s migration speech, as well inaction on Gaza, the anger of the LGBT community and general concerns about the party’s electoral strategy, particularly for elections next year. A new MP in a northern English seat said she feared from her experience knocking on doors in the local elections that the party was losing more voters to the Greens and Lib Dems than to Reform.
Starmer is a lawyer, not a politician: we know that. Trouble is, whoever is advising him is either out of touch (because they are out of the country, like Blair or Mandelson) or just wrong.
Just as Kemi is undermined by CCHQ so Starmer is by, well, whoever. Why on earth turn Labour's guns on Farage when Reform is knocking seven bells out of the Conservatives? It makes no sense.
I think Starmer's problem is an inability to understand the feelings of a pensioner or a working class voter, who is struggling to make ends meet. He has never personally faced a situation of having to budget essentials on a very limited income, and just cannot understand or empathise with a person in that situation.
Alistair Campbell said in one of his recent podcasts that people voted Labour because they wanted "change", but benefit cuts was not the "change" they were expecting from a Labour government. Campbell said that a Labour MP told him that once the disabled benefit cuts are implemented, up to 2/3rd of his constituents would be impacted.
If 2/3rds of his constituents are on disabled benefits then something is well and truly broken and that does need reforming.
Because it can't be integrated into the F35 without the US doing the work, and they don't seem to be very interested in helping us out.
The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that the planned in-service date for the Spear Capability 3 air-to-surface weapon has been pushed to the early 2030s, according to a draft timeline. https://x.com/UKDefJournal/status/1924457217689817133
Should have been in service this year, but the program is being "rebaselined".
I can see the F-35B getting orphaned as LM develop F-35A into F-35 5.5 having missed out on NGAD. One of the objectives for '5.5' will be greater range and there is very little scope for expanding internal fuel carriage in the B. There will be a very healthy market for an upgraded F-35 in the coming decades as existing European F-35A operators re-arm.
It doesn't help that the B is a USMC aircraft and they don't particularly care for it. They've already adjusted their F-35 buy from 85:15 B:C to 65:35 B:C.
The increasingly short development times for new weapons that we see in UA is making these inflexible and incredibly expensive systems look completely obsolete. The time may be coming where we need to go for huge numbers of drone systems rather than one centralized mega system, which is what the F-35 has become. If interoperability with US systems is a point of vulnerability, we have to move to a lower risk strategy.
The US has given us all the risks of a supposedly co-developed system without the benefits.
Yes, the risk as spending on defence rises across Europe is that we repeat the history of buying expensive stuff to fight the previous war. Hopefully some serious research and analysis of the current conflict is going on before the MoD clicks on 'buy'.
That truly is the triumph of hope over experience.
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail, the BBC's Farming Today. Sometime perhaps you just have to maybe let the thought enter your head that Keir Starmer really is the most unhinged evil leader this country has had since James II.
From a betting point of view (next Labour leader/next PM), I think the paragraphs below were the more relevant takeaways from the meeting of Labour MP's where Starmer said that he would aggressively fight Farage:
MPs leaving the PLP meeting said Starmer was peppered with hostile questions from those present. One said of the 26 questions “none were positive” and criticism came on a range of different issues where MPs were angry – including cuts to disability benefits and Starmer’s migration speech, as well inaction on Gaza, the anger of the LGBT community and general concerns about the party’s electoral strategy, particularly for elections next year. A new MP in a northern English seat said she feared from her experience knocking on doors in the local elections that the party was losing more voters to the Greens and Lib Dems than to Reform.
Starmer is a lawyer, not a politician: we know that. Trouble is, whoever is advising him is either out of touch (because they are out of the country, like Blair or Mandelson) or just wrong.
Just as Kemi is undermined by CCHQ so Starmer is by, well, whoever. Why on earth turn Labour's guns on Farage when Reform is knocking seven bells out of the Conservatives? It makes no sense.
I think Starmer's problem is an inability to understand the feelings of a pensioner or a working class voter, who is struggling to make ends meet. He has never personally faced a situation of having to budget essentials on a very limited income, and just cannot understand or empathise with a person in that situation.
Alistair Campbell said in one of his recent podcasts that people voted Labour because they wanted "change", but benefit cuts was not the "change" they were expecting from a Labour government. Campbell said that a Labour MP told him that once the disabled benefit cuts are implemented, up to 2/3rd of his constituents would be impacted.
That "2/3 of constituents" seems a strange number, unless there is an interesting definition of "impacted". There are 3.7 million recipients of PIP across the country, eligibility for which is iirc Reeves' target (not imo necessarily the right target), and to parlay that to 2/3 in a single constituency is a hell of a concentration, even if it includes all household members.
Normally I think Bad Al has a decent feel for the gut of the Labour Party. If he said exactly that I think he should be a touch more skeptical.
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
It was the Remainers Cameron and May who came up with the tens of thousands pledge.
Boris always opposed that pledge and he dropped it as leader, before he became PM, and before he liberalised migration rules.
If anyone was lying about tens of thousands it was Cameron and May who created that pledge, put it repeatedly into their manifestos, and had absolutely zero intention or ability to deliver on it.
Less honest on this matter than Boris Johnson. What a record to hold.
For Johnson, immigration was simply a handy stick he could use on the way to the top. Once he got there, he hadn't the slightest interest in doing anything about it; indeed it's probable that he deliberately loosened the rules, using the cover of repeated reference to the superficially popular 'Australian points-based system', in a panic that if all the EU workers left, sectors of our economy and public services could be left high and dry.
Johnson had a long record of pro-immigration lobbying in the decade before Brexit.
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail, the BBC's Farming Today. Sometime perhaps you just have to maybe let the thought enter your head that Keir Starmer really is the most unhinged evil leader this country has had since James II.
Was James II not the one who returned the Great Seal to it's natural habitat of a riverine Estuary?
Keir Starmer has tonight told his MPs: “The Conservatives are not our principal opponent. Reform are our main rivals for power. We have a moral responsibility to make sure Farage never wins.”
And PM takes off gloves: “We have to be clear that every opportunity he has had in this Parliament to back working people he’s voted against. Telling the workers at Jaguar Land Rover they deserve to go bust. A state-slashing, NHS-privatising, Putin apologist. Without a single patriotic bone in his body. We will take to fight to him. We will fight as Labour.”
I’m happy to hear that. Farage is a fraud and it’s time he was held to account . Labour need to stop messing around and go for the jugular .
Labour very, very particularly need to mention Farage's responsibility for the huge post-Brexit rise in immigration, if they're finally going to say the truth.
Boris owns the Boriswave. It would be difficult to pin it on Farage.
I wouldn't agree there. Farage would have had no choice but to do the same, had been in power then, or watch the economy go into a depressing.
It shouldn't be too diffucult to highlight the actual figures of the number of sectors left dangerously short after Brexit , as referenced in detail in past discussions on here.
Nonsense, those sectors could have put up pay instead of bringing in people for minimum wage.
And importing people doesn't solve shortages as lump of labour is a fallacy.
We had a detailed discussion on all this on here, about a year ago, with figures from the Migration Observatory about the number of sectors struggling after Brexit.
Farage will well know that he would have faced exactly the same problem as Johnson, and the Tory Brexit ideologues around him ; to retran enougb workers from home is a long-term project , whereas economic danage and recession comes tomorrow.
Was Trudeau also dealing with Brexit? The same policy mistake of massively opening the floodgates was made simultaneously by several Anglosphere countries, which suggests something deeper than Brexit as a root cause.
This is a year later than the British big rise in 2020, suggesting a different cause. I will dig out some of the graphs.
2020 was Covid when there was a drop.
Genuine question, @williamglenn - you've indentified a definite pattern. in Anglosphere countries. Might be a Gazette article in it, for the Butt Plug Supplement, which focuses a lot on global migration, and stone butt plugs
What's your take? Why did this happen?
I’d previously assumed it was groupthink driven by economic policymakers but looking at the graph of visas being issued throughout the lockdowns maybe it was simply bureaucratic incompetence because the system carried on issuing visas and then everyone arrived at once when the pandemic was over.
In every developed country there was a crunch in labour costs post COVID.
In a number of places, such as the US and the U.K., I think this relates to people in shitty jobs being forced to find new ones during COVID. Normally not adventurous, they had to find new jobs - or retire early and drop out of the labour force.
Whatever the reason, the result was a massive inflationary shock. Governments were desperate to hold down wages. Enter immigration as the fix….
There was clearlt a post-Covid effect in many places. But the stats showing the UK figures changing earlier, a few months after Brexit while lockdown was still going on, than the example given of Canada, are real.
The other interesting thing there is that arrivals from family and dependents allowed in in 2020 seemed to be almost exactly making up for the decline of family and dependents coming at 2019. Sehr interesisch.
You do know that's a line chart, right? The data points are clearly marked and that is a rise in 2021 with a connection then drawn between 2020 and 2021 as is drawn between the data points of every year.
2020 is well below the trend. 2021 is above it. So the rise happened in 2021, as I said and as demonstrated by the other chart you linked to before.
You're not very good at reading your own charts.
That's simply a lack of detail, not the evidence you've interpreted from it. The beginning of the year would obviously have been below trend because of Brexit.
On yet another more detailed graph here, for instance, the rise starts again in mid-2020 during lockdown, not 2021. The government were scrabbling around to fill gaps in other sectors by bringing in dependents of health workers, as discussed earlier.
The rise in the figures for non-EU migrants for the second half of 2020, not just 2021, will be even clearer from this graph, as it's from June to June, and January 2021 wasn't a unique moment of change of visa regime.
On the more detailed first graph you link to there's a dip especially in Q3 2020 thanks to lockdowns, a reversion in Q4 2020 (but still below Q4 2019) then the surge above pre-Covid numbers happens in Q3 2021 onwards.
Your more detailed graph demonstrates conclusively the surge above pre-Covid numbers happened from Q3 2021 onwards and not 2020 as you claimed.
A recovery from a trough, to still below pre-Covid numbers, is not a surge. You seem to be viewing any upwards movement in the chart as a surge rather than a reversion to the mean.
Your second graph doesn't even show pre-Covid numbers, but clearly shows a surge occurring in 2021, again, like all other charts.
Most of this is simply your owm partial interpretation of which long-term trends are relevant, as well as generalising from yearly data points rather than monthly. The more relevant points, before I head to bed, are as following:
-Brexit was advertised as a *reduction in immigration irrespective of context*.
-All the graphs I've posted illustrate that this was false.
-Several, including those posted by others, indicate that this change in direction began in 2020, not 2021.
-Some posted by others illustrate that this change in direction *happened at the beginning of 2020*, before Covid.
Night, 'all !
-Some posted by others have also
Boris and Vote Leave didn't advertise Brexit as a reduction in immigration, merely the ability to control it.
Future Home Secretary Patel said during the Referendum that control could make migration from the subcontinent easier. Which she then did.
Nobody denies that immigration did not fall due to Brexit.
Everybody agrees it did fall, in 2020, due to lockdown.
It has been pointed out to you that it rose then in the UK, Canada and Australia post lockdown.
This rise happened in all 3 countries, in 2021.
You claimed that the rise in the UK happened earlier, in 2020.
That was categorically false. Even in Q4 2020 it was lower than Q4 2019.
The rise beyond pre-Covid (and pre-Brexit) figures happened in 2021 in the UK, just as it did in Australia, Canada etc
Hope that helps!
Brexit happened on 1 Jan 2021.
Brexit happened on 31 Jan 2020.
But if you want to claim 2021, then it is axiomatic that any changes in 2020 happened pre Brexit, unlike what he was falsely claiming, and post Brexit changes happened in 2021, as is true anyway.
Either way, he was wrong. Completely factually wrong.
Yes, you're right that the UK left the EU on 31 Jan 2020, but left the single market and customs union on 31 Dec 2020 with 1 Jan 2021 being the first day of full separation. In reality therefore, 2020 was the transition year - as indeed it was described.
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail, the BBC's Farming Today. Sometime perhaps you just have to maybe let the thought enter your head that Keir Starmer really is the most unhinged evil leader this country has had since James II.
Was James II not the one who returned the Great Seal to its natural habitat of a riverine Estuary?
Is the connection that @Leon feels he's been sold a pup?
Keir Starmer has tonight told his MPs: “The Conservatives are not our principal opponent. Reform are our main rivals for power. We have a moral responsibility to make sure Farage never wins.”
And PM takes off gloves: “We have to be clear that every opportunity he has had in this Parliament to back working people he’s voted against. Telling the workers at Jaguar Land Rover they deserve to go bust. A state-slashing, NHS-privatising, Putin apologist. Without a single patriotic bone in his body. We will take to fight to him. We will fight as Labour.”
I’m happy to hear that. Farage is a fraud and it’s time he was held to account . Labour need to stop messing around and go for the jugular .
Labour very, very particularly need to mention Farage's responsibility for the huge post-Brexit rise in immigration, if they're finally going to say the truth.
Boris owns the Boriswave. It would be difficult to pin it on Farage.
I wouldn't agree there. Farage would have had no choice but to do the same, had been in power then, or watch the economy go into a depressing.
It shouldn't be too diffucult to highlight the actual figures of the number of sectors left dangerously short after Brexit , as referenced in detail in past discussions on here.
Nonsense, those sectors could have put up pay instead of bringing in people for minimum wage.
And importing people doesn't solve shortages as lump of labour is a fallacy.
We had a detailed discussion on all this on here, about a year ago, with figures from the Migration Observatory about the number of sectors struggling after Brexit.
Farage will well know that he would have faced exactly the same problem as Johnson, and the Tory Brexit ideologues around him ; to retran enougb workers from home is a long-term project , whereas economic danage and recession comes tomorrow.
Was Trudeau also dealing with Brexit? The same policy mistake of massively opening the floodgates was made simultaneously by several Anglosphere countries, which suggests something deeper than Brexit as a root cause.
This is a year later than the British big rise in 2020, suggesting a different cause. I will dig out some of the graphs.
2020 was Covid when there was a drop.
Genuine question, @williamglenn - you've indentified a definite pattern. in Anglosphere countries. Might be a Gazette article in it, for the Butt Plug Supplement, which focuses a lot on global migration, and stone butt plugs
What's your take? Why did this happen?
I’d previously assumed it was groupthink driven by economic policymakers but looking at the graph of visas being issued throughout the lockdowns maybe it was simply bureaucratic incompetence because the system carried on issuing visas and then everyone arrived at once when the pandemic was over.
In every developed country there was a crunch in labour costs post COVID.
In a number of places, such as the US and the U.K., I think this relates to people in shitty jobs being forced to find new ones during COVID. Normally not adventurous, they had to find new jobs - or retire early and drop out of the labour force.
Whatever the reason, the result was a massive inflationary shock. Governments were desperate to hold down wages. Enter immigration as the fix….
There was clearlt a post-Covid effect in many places. But the stats showing the UK figures changing earlier, a few months after Brexit while lockdown was still going on, than the example given of Canada, are real.
The other interesting thing there is that arrivals from family and dependents allowed in in 2020 seemed to be almost exactly making up for the decline of family and dependents coming at 2019. Sehr interesisch.
You do know that's a line chart, right? The data points are clearly marked and that is a rise in 2021 with a connection then drawn between 2020 and 2021 as is drawn between the data points of every year.
2020 is well below the trend. 2021 is above it. So the rise happened in 2021, as I said and as demonstrated by the other chart you linked to before.
You're not very good at reading your own charts.
That's simply a lack of detail, not the evidence you've interpreted from it. The beginning of the year would obviously have been below trend because of Brexit.
On yet another more detailed graph here, for instance, the rise starts again in mid-2020 during lockdown, not 2021. The government were scrabbling around to fill gaps in other sectors by bringing in dependents of health workers, as discussed earlier.
The rise in the figures for non-EU migrants for the second half of 2020, not just 2021, will be even clearer from this graph, as it's from June to June, and January 2021 wasn't a unique moment of change of visa regime.
On the more detailed first graph you link to there's a dip especially in Q3 2020 thanks to lockdowns, a reversion in Q4 2020 (but still below Q4 2019) then the surge above pre-Covid numbers happens in Q3 2021 onwards.
Your more detailed graph demonstrates conclusively the surge above pre-Covid numbers happened from Q3 2021 onwards and not 2020 as you claimed.
A recovery from a trough, to still below pre-Covid numbers, is not a surge. You seem to be viewing any upwards movement in the chart as a surge rather than a reversion to the mean.
Your second graph doesn't even show pre-Covid numbers, but clearly shows a surge occurring in 2021, again, like all other charts.
Most of this is simply your owm partial interpretation of which long-term trends are relevant, as well as generalising from yearly data points rather than monthly. The more relevant points, before I head to bed, are as following:
-Brexit was advertised as a *reduction in immigration irrespective of context*.
-All the graphs I've posted illustrate that this was false.
-Several, including those posted by others, indicate that this change in direction began in 2020, not 2021.
-Some posted by others illustrate that this change in direction *happened at the beginning of 2020*, before Covid.
Night, 'all !
-Some posted by others have also
Boris and Vote Leave didn't advertise Brexit as a reduction in immigration, merely the ability to control it.
Future Home Secretary Patel said during the Referendum that control could make migration from the subcontinent easier. Which she then did.
Nobody denies that immigration did not fall due to Brexit.
Everybody agrees it did fall, in 2020, due to lockdown.
It has been pointed out to you that it rose then in the UK, Canada and Australia post lockdown.
This rise happened in all 3 countries, in 2021.
You claimed that the rise in the UK happened earlier, in 2020.
That was categorically false. Even in Q4 2020 it was lower than Q4 2019.
The rise beyond pre-Covid (and pre-Brexit) figures happened in 2021 in the UK, just as it did in Australia, Canada etc
Hope that helps!
Brexit happened on 1 Jan 2021.
Brexit happened on 31 Jan 2020.
But if you want to claim 2021, then it is axiomatic that any changes in 2020 happened pre Brexit, unlike what he was falsely claiming, and post Brexit changes happened in 2021, as is true anyway.
Either way, he was wrong. Completely factually wrong.
Yes, you're right that the UK left the EU on 31 Jan 2020, but left the single market and customs union on 31 Dec 2020 with 1 Jan 2021 being the first day of full separation. In reality therefore, 2020 was the transition year - as indeed it was described.
Either way, the UK's rise in migration from pre-Brexit figures happened in 2021.
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail, the BBC's Farming Today. Sometime perhaps you just have to maybe let the thought enter your head that Keir Starmer really is the most unhinged evil leader this country has had since James II.
Was James II not the one who returned the Great Seal to its natural habitat of a riverine Estuary?
Is the connection that @Leon feels he's been sold a pup?
The issue is that alcoholic over-indulgence appears to reduce the time between his reading something on X and typing it straight in here, with added hyperbole.
(1) Starmer is crap at negotiating. It's a standard EU tactic to come back at the 11th hour to ask for more as part of their gamesmanship. They love sequencing. It's normally billed as a "crisis moment in the talks"/"talks could collapse", etc. It looks very much like he acquiesced on the grounds that it's not in our interests to "shout and scream" at the EU. (2) All this "move rapidly" and "accelerated focus" stuff on the rest of the deal will mean many more concessions will be needed to agree anything concrete. At the moment it's just some nice words with no teeth. It's very similar to how they negotiated with Theresa May. Sequencing with key concessions heavily in their interests being secured each time. (3) To some extent the EU have decided it's OK to "cherrypick" - they certainly wouldn't have done anything like this with Theresa May, and Tusk would have tweeted a lot about it - but if they can outmanoeuvre the UK they will, and they are.
He needs to stop believing the Remainer/ Rejoiner propaganda that the EU naturally hold all the cards and learn how to play the game better.
It's really time to move on from the language of traitors and quislings?
No, it isn't. If anything - with this Labour government - the language of "traitors" is more relevant and timely than ever
How else would you describe the Chagos deal? Handing over strategically vital British territory, for no good reason, to a meaningless foreign power allied to our greatest enemy? AND PAYING BILLIONS TO DO THIS?
That is treachery. No more, no less. The conjugations spring therefrom
It's just mind-bogglingly bad deal after mind-bogglingly bad deal. It's as if they don't understand their job is to represent British interests.
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
It was the Remainers Cameron and May who came up with the tens of thousands pledge.
Boris always opposed that pledge and he dropped it as leader, before he became PM, and before he liberalised migration rules.
If anyone was lying about tens of thousands it was Cameron and May who created that pledge, put it repeatedly into their manifestos, and had absolutely zero intention or ability to deliver on it.
Less honest on this matter than Boris Johnson. What a record to hold.
For Johnson, immigration was simply a handy stick he could use on the way to the top. Once he got there, he hadn't the slightest interest in doing anything about it; indeed it's probable that he deliberately loosened the rules, using the cover of repeated reference to the superficially popular 'Australian points-based system', in a panic that if all the EU workers left, sectors of our economy and public services could be left high and dry.
Johnson had a long record of pro-immigration lobbying in the decade before Brexit.
Are you saying that Johnson sold everyone their own personal version of Brexit and then implemented his own by allowing 1 million immigrants to arrive in 2021?
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail, the BBC's Farming Today. Sometime perhaps you just have to maybe let the thought enter your head that Keir Starmer really is the most unhinged evil leader this country has had since James II.
Was James II not the one who returned the Great Seal to it's natural habitat of a riverine Estuary?
It makes me laugh he thought that'd be decisive in preventing the conduct of any form of government in England.
(1) Starmer is crap at negotiating. It's a standard EU tactic to come back at the 11th hour to ask for more as part of their gamesmanship. They love sequencing. It's normally billed as a "crisis moment in the talks"/"talks could collapse", etc. It looks very much like he acquiesced on the grounds that it's not in our interests to "shout and scream" at the EU. (2) All this "move rapidly" and "accelerated focus" stuff on the rest of the deal will mean many more concessions will be needed to agree anything concrete. At the moment it's just some nice words with no teeth. It's very similar to how they negotiated with Theresa May. Sequencing with key concessions heavily in their interests being secured each time. (3) To some extent the EU have decided it's OK to "cherrypick" - they certainly wouldn't have done anything like this with Theresa May, and Tusk would have tweeted a lot about it - but if they can outmanoeuvre the UK they will, and they are.
He needs to stop believing the Remainer/ Rejoiner propaganda that the EU naturally hold all the cards and learn how to play the game better.
Starmer was a Remainder who opposed even May's Brexit terms let alone Johnson's. The only reason he doesn't want to rejoin the EEA now is to try and keep the red wall seats and a Labour majority.
On current polls though the likely choice at the next general election is between a Labour minority government propped up by the LDs and maybe SNP and Greens too offering more EU integration. Or a Reform majority or Reform minority government propped up by the Tories committed to a hard Brexit
Some people like the deal and some hate it . What’s new .
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
Sunak though tightened visa wage requirements and the ability of dependents to come in before he left office
Would we be better off treating them as unmanned aircraft platforms (as Turkey seems to be planning) and scrapping the F35 - which is extraordinarily expensive to maintain in active service ? Or just selling them ?
To the limited extent that the UK needs carriers then a 100% RPAS fixed wing air wing make a lot of sense and is the next logical evolution.
However, it'd take a great deal of cash that probably wouldn't be forthcoming to develop such a capability. It's all very well plonking an MQ-9 on the deck for PR purposes as the PoW did in the Western Atlantic but developing that into an effective, deployable system is something else altogether. There would be many, doubtless expensive, complications with marinising such as corrosion, EM environment, aircraft handling, etc., etc. The QE class would also need an angled flight deck to make it viable but at least that's just steel and a load of big lads in a shipyard staring at it while scratching their hairy arses.
In short, yes, but it's a huge investment for an ill-defined result.
I trust all the "impartial" commentators who welcomed this vile government's EU Surrender Deal will take the time to listen to this morning's Farming Today for a fair commentary. I don't think the trolls who publish Labour Material will be publicising the last five minutes on the fishing industry.
As with the Inheritance Tax Changes this will have to be repealed the day this evil government falls and the rules concerning Malfeasance in Public Office amended so such an attack on an industry can never happen again.
Always nice to start the day with a big bowl of hyperbole.
I see that even minor changes to mitigate the economic damage of Brexit are getting a completely unhinged reaction.
Brexit simply meant leaving the EU, it didn't require any other post Brexit arrangement. All are compatible with the vote from EEA downwards to absolute autarky.
Just catching up on the FT. Yes, I see European countries reserve the right to maintain e-gates for European citizens. So that so-called new freedom doesn’t amount to much of anything.
I note that Britain also failed to solve the touring musicians problem, which is v disappointing. Nobody could seriously think that maintaining the status quo is anything more than a pissy, mean-spirited stance by the EU.
4 years more fish was mooted. Then 10 years was briefed out as some sort of maximalist worst case scenario. Starmer has given them (or fondly imagines he has) another 12 YEARS.
Does he literally like every other country in the world more than the UK? I feel we should be told.
I actually think that component is good. It unhooks fisheries from SPS, and is no worse on fisheries than the status quo?
No, you don't understand
The fisheries deal was regarded as terrible for Britain when Boris made it, But we were desperate and Boris argued we could come back and change it in five years and demand total 100% fishing rights if we wanted - and everyone in the EU was well aware of this. They were fearful of what we would do, we had real leverage (as I explained earlier today, from getting to know the Breton fishing industry)
The best case scenario for the EU then was - for them - keep this shit deal (from the UK's perspective) going for another few years, Pressure us into 4 years more if poss. The EU keeps 75% of the take from UK waters for four more years....
Starmer has given them twelve more years
It is bewilderingly, staggeringly bad
I fully understand.
I posted this morning about how the current fisheries agreement is a world away from, say, Norway’s. However, it is actually better than that which pertained inside the CFP, and Britain retains the ability to improve it in the future, even if 12 years hence.
It return it gets to restore agricultural exports, which have fallen a full third to the EU since Brexit.
The French were absolutely terrified of losing these fishing rights (as I explained yesterday). If you think fishing is stupidly totemic in the UK (it is) then fishing and farming are even stupidly bigger in French politics. We had massive leverage. We could have extracted a much better deal for four more years..... but we got fuck all.... for twelve???
Starmer is either howlingly inept or a weird quasi-traitor. Chagos suggests both
Starmer, like Dave, has the inability to walk away from a bad deal. He is too wedded to the European project to see that the nation is being fucked over and instead of doing what good negotiators do and walk away from it he caved when the demand for 12 years arrived. He should have just told them "nah mate, we agreed four so it's four or nothing" and just let it expire at the end of this year. The rest of the TCA would have stayed in place anyway.
No.
Counter offer time.
“You get four years. If at that point SPS is running smooth, passport systems are integrated (beyond eGates) and we have some orders for the European defence fund, then we can extend to 12 years on a yearly basis.
If after 4 years, the agreed item haven’t happened, then, automatically, the fishing deal becomes one flounder. Every six months.”
It's really time to move on from the language of traitors and quislings?
What else should one call what keeps happening with Starmer?
He's someone with different beliefs and principles to you?
Argue with those beliefs and principles if you dislike them.
I dislike many of his too. They don't make him a traitor.
The constantly evolving nature of Starmer’s beliefs and principles means he’s often disagreeing with previous Starmers, though I accept he’s unlikely to call himself a traitor. I’d call him an empty vessel, and those who voted for him (which includes PB’s loudest j’accuser) were naive to expect much different.
I trust all the "impartial" commentators who welcomed this vile government's EU Surrender Deal will take the time to listen to this morning's Farming Today for a fair commentary. I don't think the trolls who publish Labour Material will be publicising the last five minutes on the fishing industry.
As with the Inheritance Tax Changes this will have to be repealed the day this evil government falls and the rules concerning Malfeasance in Public Office amended so such an attack on an industry can never happen again.
Always nice to start the day with a big bowl of hyperbole.
Millionaire landowners reaching for their wallets. What's new?
I see that even minor changes to mitigate the economic damage of Brexit are getting a completely unhinged reaction.
Brexit simply meant leaving the EU, it didn't require any other post Brexit arrangement. All are compatible with the vote from EEA downwards to absolute autarky.
It appears that all those Brexiteers who pointed and laughed at Remoaners for not moving on from Brexit have not in fact moved on from Brexit.
I see that even minor changes to mitigate the economic damage of Brexit are getting a completely unhinged reaction.
Brexit simply meant leaving the EU, it didn't require any other post Brexit arrangement. All are compatible with the vote from EEA downwards to absolute autarky.
Absolutely.
The more hysterical voices on here need to learn what 'losing an election' means. The other side gets to make deals and shape our trading relations as they see fit.
Anyone claiming this deal amounts to being a traitor can, frankly, be ignored in terms of their political commentary. Because they've lost all sense of perspective.
While it was a very good race, with Verstappen clearly faster than the McLarens, Ferrari recovering well, and Alonso continuing his atrocious luck (three DNFs and three 11th places from eight starts), I think my favourite part of making the podcast might be sarcastically mocking MBS in the news section.
Oh, and there are lovely graphs in the transcript.
I see that even minor changes to mitigate the economic damage of Brexit are getting a completely unhinged reaction.
Brexit simply meant leaving the EU, it didn't require any other post Brexit arrangement. All are compatible with the vote from EEA downwards to absolute autarky.
Absolutely.
The more hysterical voices on here need to learn what 'losing an election' means. The other side gets to make deals and shape our trading relations as they see fit.
Anyone claiming this deal amounts to being a traitor can, frankly, be ignored in terms of their political commentary. Because they've lost all sense of perspective.
In one way, nothing has changed since 2016-19. Same old voices with the same old tropes.
Difference is that, last time, they were significant voices on the government side, with at least a blocking minority on anything they didn't like. Now, they are significant voices on His Majesty's Tiny Opposition.
Would we be better off treating them as unmanned aircraft platforms (as Turkey seems to be planning) and scrapping the F35 - which is extraordinarily expensive to maintain in active service ? Or just selling them ?
To the limited extent that the UK needs carriers then a 100% RPAS fixed wing air wing make a lot of sense and is the next logical evolution.
However, it'd take a great deal of cash that probably wouldn't be forthcoming to develop such a capability. It's all very well plonking an MQ-9 on the deck for PR purposes as the PoW did in the Western Atlantic but developing that into an effective, deployable system is something else altogether. There would be many, doubtless expensive, complications with marinising such as corrosion, EM environment, aircraft handling, etc., etc. The QE class would also need an angled flight deck to make it viable but at least that's just steel and a load of big lads in a shipyard staring at it while scratching their hairy arses.
In short, yes, but it's a huge investment for an ill-defined result.
Comments
“Vote Conservative for strong economy and looking after the pounds in your pocket. Labour, for all their good intentions will wreck the economy, they have huge black holes in their economic plans they can’t explain.”
Labour want the next election to be “Vote Labour for strong economy and looking after the pounds in your pocket. Reform will wreck the economy, they have huge black holes in their economic plans they can’t explain.”
Exactly like Labour struggled in 20th century, Reform will have a huge problem rebutting this.
Voters still remember when Conservative governments managed the economy well, is why to peel away from the Conservative Party to Reform right now, is hasty and stupid - Reform have zero credibility for being trusted with the UK economy going into the next General Election.
There’s your problem
This shitty shitty deal revives Brexit all over again and the trouble this time is that - from the start - you Remainers are in the minority
On yet another more detailed graph here, for instance, the rise starts again in mid-2020 during lockdown, not 2021. The government were scrabbling around to fill gaps in other sectors by bringing in dependents of health workers, as discussed earlier.
https://images.app.goo.gl/DLSgz
The rise in the figures for non-EU migrants for the second half of 2020, not just 2021, will be even clearer from this graph, as it's from June to June, and January 2021 wasn't a unique moment of change of visa regime.
https://images.app.goo.gl/YUaxa
On the more detailed first graph you link to there's a dip especially in Q3 2020 thanks to lockdowns, a reversion in Q4 2020 (but still below Q4 2019) then the surge above pre-Covid numbers happens in Q3 2021 onwards.
Your more detailed graph demonstrates conclusively the surge above pre-Covid numbers happened from Q3 2021 onwards and not 2020 as you claimed.
A recovery from a trough, to still below pre-Covid numbers, is not a surge. You seem to be viewing any upwards movement in the chart as a surge rather than a reversion to the mean.
Your second graph doesn't even show pre-Covid numbers, but clearly shows a surge occurring in 2021, again, like all other charts.
The new supercomputer, which can perform more than four times the number of calculations per second than its predecessor, contains 1.8m core processors.
While the exact location of the infrastructure is a secret, the Azure supercomputing service is physically located in the south of England and is split across two data centres.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyg4ygerpjo
Well you have just told everybody where it is.
The new cloud-based system, which was launched on Monday, can perform 60 quadrillion calculations per second.
It is being operated by Microsoft's cloud-based Azure, making it the first system the Met Office is not running by itself.
And it ends a long wait for the weather prediction tech, which was first announced in 2020 and originally slated for 2022.
According to the Met Office, this is the world's first cloud-based supercomputer dedicated to weather and climate science.
-Brexit was advertised as a *reduction in immigration irrespective of context*.
-All the graphs I've posted illustrate that this was false.
-Several, including those posted by others, indicate that this change in direction began in 2020, not 2021.
-Some posted by others illustrate that this change in direction *happened at the beginning of 2020*, before Covid.
Night, 'all !
-Some posted by others have also
For me, the outrage was the way the 2017-2019 Parliament refused to implement the instruction given to it by the British people, despite saying it would... Not only did it refuse to implement those instructions, it even connived to try and overturn it.
But...
Boris, whatever else anyone else thinks about him, got Brexit done and the will of the people was implemented. But going forwards, that doesn't mean Brexit can't be revisited, deals can't be done, we can't align closer and maybe one day, even rejoin, if there is a fresh instruction from the British public to do so at some point...
Time will tell.
How else would you describe the Chagos deal? Handing over strategically vital British territory, for no good reason, to a meaningless foreign power allied to our greatest enemy? AND PAYING BILLIONS TO DO THIS?
That is treachery. No more, no less. The conjugations spring therefrom
The reporting around the deal from some of the right wing press has been unhinged . As for some of the ridiculous headlines .
The Daily Mail. “ The Day The Brexit Dream Died “ I mean really . Ironically the once poster boy of Leavers , Trump , has done his very best over the last few months to drive the UK and EU closer together.
The DT . “Kiss Goodbye to Brexit “.
For many it would be great and good riddance to it !
The public are more worried about paying the bills , flag waving and people droning on about rule taking just isn’t going to resonate as in 2016.
Brexit came , the Tories had full control of allegedly delivering the benefits of Brexit and fxcked up . Immigration which was an apparent national emergency in 2016 almost quadrupled under the “ tens of thousands brigade “ !
So the right wing press should really be aiming their fire at the Tories and the lying oaf Bozo .
Earlier today I predicted this might boost Labour in the polls
Now I am much less sure. It may simply be more divisive, driving more floaters to Reform and attracting a few (but not many) Remainers back to Labour
More importantly, it is ideal for Reform. "Labour are traitors who sell us out at every opportunity". This latest news is a sublime affirmation of that Reform contention. Because Starmer really did fuck up this negotiation
I can see this shunting Reform over 30% into the low-mid 30s
And Starmer, crucially. remains an inept liability. He can't negotiate deals, he can't sell policies on TV, he can't do speeches or ideas. He's a dud
The Guardian report on him tonight, talking to Labour MPs, is fiercely negative. Talks of him being constantly criticised from left and right. Good
Nighty night, PB
"Almost half of young people would prefer a world without internet, UK study finds
Half of 16- to 21-year-olds support ‘digital curfew’ and nearly 70% feel worse after using social media"
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/may/20/almost-half-of-young-people-would-prefer-a-world-without-internet-uk-study-finds
MPs leaving the PLP meeting said Starmer was peppered with hostile questions from those present.
One said of the 26 questions “none were positive” and criticism came on a range of different issues where MPs were angry – including cuts to disability benefits and Starmer’s migration speech, as well inaction on Gaza, the anger of the LGBT community and general concerns about the party’s electoral strategy, particularly for elections next year.
A new MP in a northern English seat said she feared from her experience knocking on doors in the local elections that the party was losing more voters to the Greens and Lib Dems than to Reform.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/may/19/starmer-tells-mps-he-will-fight-farage-as-labour-at-anxious-private-meeting
It doesn't help that the B is a USMC aircraft and they don't particularly care for it. They've already adjusted their F-35 buy from 85:15 B:C to 65:35 B:C.
Just as Kemi is undermined by CCHQ so Starmer is by, well, whoever. Why on earth turn Labour's guns on Farage when Reform is knocking seven bells out of the Conservatives? It makes no sense.
Alistair Campbell said in one of his recent podcasts that people voted Labour because they wanted "change", but benefit cuts was not the "change" they were expecting from a Labour government. Campbell said that a Labour MP told him that once the disabled benefit cuts are implemented, up to 2/3rd of his constituents would be impacted.
Labour is set to indefinitely postpone its national women’s conference and limit women’s officer roles and all-women shortlists to biological women while it reviews its policies in the wake of the Supreme Court judgement, sparking attacks from trans and gender-critical activists alike.
The gender-critical campaign group Labour Women’s Declaration, which welcomed the Supreme Court ruling, said shelving the conference would be “wrongheaded”, shortsighted”, “exceptionally disappointing” and a “knee-jerk reaction”.
Meanwhile LGBT+ Labour’s trans officer Georgia Meadows and two Labour trans rights campaign groups said they “unreservedly condemn” the wider party changes, warning limiting trans people’s participation will exacerbate trans people’s under-representation in politics more widely.
https://labourlist.org/2025/05/labour-women-policy-conference-shortlists-all-trans-rights-sex/
It is always amusing to see feminists and trans - two aggressive, entitled and staggeringly intolerant minority groups - knocking the crap out of each other and particularly delicious to see their woke, socialist enablers caught in the middle.
During the meeting, the Prime Minister took 26 questions, of which I am told he answered three. One Lancashire MP pointed out that the party is on its knees in the county after the locals (Reform now control Lancashire County Council). There is little they can do to coax voters back from Reform, and so asked why the party doesn’t stick to its traditional values anyway. .... Many MPs used their questions to ask Starmer directly – what do you stand for?
Though criticism from the left of the party following last week’s speech was inevitable (particularly those elected pre-2024), it is becoming increasingly clear that even newbie Starmer loyalists are feeling disaffected (a few tell me they didn’t even go to Monday’s meeting).
https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/the-staggers/2025/05/starmer-faces-his-unhappy-backbenchers
The US has given us all the risks of a supposedly co-developed system without the benefits.
If you are looking for traitors, maybe those on the right who took money in various ways from Russia might be more relevant?
How much of this is international arms politics to protect US weapons use on European aircraft?
It can't carry our best missiles - so both it and its armaments are severely range limited.
The carriers are only as useful as their air complement, don't have decent airborne AEW, and have insufficient escorts.
Would we be better off treating them as unmanned aircraft platforms (as Turkey seems to be planning) and scrapping the F35 - which is extraordinarily expensive to maintain in active service ?
Or just selling them ?
As with the Inheritance Tax Changes this will have to be repealed the day this evil government falls and the rules concerning Malfeasance in Public Office amended so such an attack on an industry can never happen again.
Capitol Police Chief Tom Manger told CBS, the BBC's US partner, he is "extremely disappointed" with the decision. The officer involved in her shooting has been cleared of any wrongdoing.
The settlement resolves a $30m wrongful death suit filed by Babbitt's family and the conservative activist group Judicial Watch.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gr3kdxkr7o
It clearly isn't.
The Meteor has been in service for some time. It's our best air to air missile.
The F35 can't carry it.
F1: Verstappen now shorter than Norris in the title betting on Ladbrokes. Piastri's evens, Verstappen 3.25, Norris 3.75.
Similar shift on Betfair. Piastri 2.02, Verstappen 3.7, Norris 4.
As I mentioned yesterday, I slightly modified my title position by putting a little on Verstappen (having previously backed and then [prematurely, alas] hedged Piastri each way). If you backed Piastri and are all green then I'd say 3.7 on Verstappen is still worth backing at the moment.
My guess is McLaren will 1-2 Monaco, but I was wary of waiting in case that doesn't happen. Remember there are two stops this year.
However, it'd take a great deal of cash that probably wouldn't be forthcoming to develop such a capability. It's all very well plonking an MQ-9 on the deck for PR purposes as the PoW did in the Western Atlantic but developing that into an effective, deployable system is something else altogether. There would be many, doubtless expensive, complications with marinising such as corrosion, EM environment, aircraft handling, etc., etc. The QE class would also need an angled flight deck to make it viable but at least that's just steel and a load of big lads in a shipyard staring at it while scratching their hairy arses.
In short, yes, but it's a huge investment for an ill-defined result.
You can see this coming a (nautical) mile off. Ten years hence these last 13 will be the only combat coded F-35s that can employ the full range of modern weapons.
Future Home Secretary Patel said during the Referendum that control could make migration from the subcontinent easier. Which she then did.
Nobody denies that immigration did not fall due to Brexit.
Everybody agrees it did fall, in 2020, due to lockdown.
It has been pointed out to you that it rose then in the UK, Canada and Australia post lockdown.
This rise happened in all 3 countries, in 2021.
You claimed that the rise in the UK happened earlier, in 2020.
That was categorically false. Even in Q4 2020 it was lower than Q4 2019.
The rise beyond pre-Covid (and pre-Brexit) figures happened in 2021 in the UK, just as it did in Australia, Canada etc
Hope that helps!
Argue with those beliefs and principles if you dislike them.
I dislike many of his too. They don't make him a traitor.
Boris always opposed that pledge and he dropped it as leader, before he became PM, and before he liberalised migration rules.
If anyone was lying about tens of thousands it was Cameron and May who created that pledge, put it repeatedly into their manifestos, and had absolutely zero intention or ability to deliver on it.
Less honest on this matter than Boris Johnson. What a record to hold.
But if you want to claim 2021, then it is axiomatic that any changes in 2020 happened pre Brexit, unlike what he was falsely claiming, and post Brexit changes happened in 2021, as is true anyway.
Either way, he was wrong. Completely factually wrong.
You're coming across as a parody, its that extreme.
Normally I think Bad Al has a decent feel for the gut of the Labour Party. If he said exactly that I think he should be a touch more skeptical.
(1) Starmer is crap at negotiating. It's a standard EU tactic to come back at the 11th hour to ask for more as part of their gamesmanship. They love sequencing. It's normally billed as a "crisis moment in the talks"/"talks could collapse", etc. It looks very much like he acquiesced on the grounds that it's not in our interests to "shout and scream" at the EU.
(2) All this "move rapidly" and "accelerated focus" stuff on the rest of the deal will mean many more concessions will be needed to agree anything concrete. At the moment it's just some nice words with no teeth. It's very similar to how they negotiated with Theresa May. Sequencing with key concessions heavily in their interests being secured each time.
(3) To some extent the EU have decided it's OK to "cherrypick" - they certainly wouldn't have done anything like this with Theresa May, and Tusk would have tweeted a lot about it - but if they can outmanoeuvre the UK they will, and they are.
He needs to stop believing the Remainer/ Rejoiner propaganda that the EU naturally hold all the cards and learn how to play the game better.
I’m (not at all) shocked
We just made another one.
On current polls though the likely choice at the next general election is between a Labour minority government propped up by the LDs and maybe SNP and Greens too offering more EU integration. Or a Reform majority or Reform minority government propped up by the Tories committed to a hard Brexit
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayraktar_Kızılelma
*a few countries in the West
I see that even minor changes to mitigate the economic damage of Brexit are getting a completely unhinged reaction.
Brexit simply meant leaving the EU, it didn't require any other post Brexit arrangement. All are compatible with the vote from EEA downwards to absolute autarky.
Counter offer time.
“You get four years. If at that point SPS is running smooth, passport systems are integrated (beyond eGates) and we have some orders for the European defence fund, then we can extend to 12 years on a yearly basis.
If after 4 years, the agreed item haven’t happened, then, automatically, the fishing deal becomes one flounder. Every six months.”
I’d call him an empty vessel, and those who voted for him (which includes PB’s loudest j’accuser) were naive to expect much different.
The more hysterical voices on here need to learn what 'losing an election' means. The other side gets to make deals and shape our trading relations as they see fit.
Anyone claiming this deal amounts to being a traitor can, frankly, be ignored in terms of their political commentary. Because they've lost all sense of perspective.
YouGov/Sky/Times:
Ref 29
Lab 22
LibDem 17
Con 16
Grn 10
18/19 May
Countdown to new thread...3, 2, 1...
Podbean: https://undercutters.podbean.com/e/f1-2025-imola-gp-prix-review-and-monaco-gp-predictions/
Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/f1-2025-imola-gp-prix-review-and-monaco-gp-predictions/id1786574257?i=1000709098687
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/5NEUjDqc4UGgvB0of2tL07
Amazon: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/bcfe213b-55fb-408a-a823-dc6693ee9f78/episodes/edaf9017-dc7d-4ad1-97e5-7ab0d039b620/undercutters---f1-podcast-f1-2025-imola-gp-prix-review-and-monaco-gp-predictions
Transcript: https://morrisf1.blogspot.com/2025/05/f1-2025-imola-gp-prix-review-and-monaco.html
While it was a very good race, with Verstappen clearly faster than the McLarens, Ferrari recovering well, and Alonso continuing his atrocious luck (three DNFs and three 11th places from eight starts), I think my favourite part of making the podcast might be sarcastically mocking MBS in the news section.
Oh, and there are lovely graphs in the transcript.
I’m curious to see when Labour makes it to third.
Difference is that, last time, they were significant voices on the government side, with at least a blocking minority on anything they didn't like. Now, they are significant voices on His Majesty's Tiny Opposition.
They lost in 2024, and haven't got over it.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/TAI_Anka-3
France/Germany a similar program via Airbus.
BAE flew a prototype a decade back, but do we have an existing program ?
Big putting together your outfit with a massive hangover vibe.
https://x.com/dieworkwear/status/1924521709715235179?s=61&t=LYVEHh2mqFy1oUJAdCfe-Q