Streeting overtakes Farage as the favourite to be next PM – politicalbetting.com
Streeting overtakes Farage as the favourite to be next PM – politicalbetting.com
This usually is a market where laying the favourite is profitable but in this instance I am not so sure given the clown car comedy act Starmer’s premiership has become.
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I'm not so sure. If Starmer does go, people would want more of a change of direction.
Angela Rayner might be the one.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2025/nov/12/keir-starmer-wes-streeting-labour-leadership-pmqs-kemi-badenoch-conservatives-uk-politics-live-news
Say Starmer just goes and Streeting replaces him.
What then?
There's still a very difficult economic picture and there's still an army of backbench Labour MPs who think their job is to fling money at people to make themselves feel better, rather than manage the public finances.
Still, the reputation of Sunak and Hunt is only improving each day this nonsense continues. We'll see (eventually) if Starmer and Reeves can get a grip.
My suspicion is it'll go something like this: taxes rise on the evil private sector, more money flung at the virtuous public sector, the economy is harmed so tax receipts don't match expectations, meaning more steps are needed at the next Budget which then harms the economy more, rinse and repeat.
Hopefully I'll be wrong.
The MP War Crimes website describes him as "clearly anti-Palestinian"
Surely he deserves to suffer in pain for that?
https://www.mpwarcrimes.co.uk/parliament/wes-streeting
And Labour will happily wave them off at Heathrow.
Then start closing NHS hospitals.
https://news.sky.com/story/economy-grew-by-0-1-in-third-quarter-official-figures-show-13469133
I just wonder if the Labour mechanisms for choosing a new leader, while perfectly suited to a post election period in opposition, are going to be less than practical for choosing the leader of a Government in office.
Brown had a coronation in 2007 when taking over from Blair and in the 1970s, when Wilson stepped down, only the MPs had a say. The Conservatives do things slightly differently but while Truss and Sunak went to the membership, Sunak himself, as I recall, had a coronation just a few weeks later.
Perhaps Streeting will accumulate enough nominations to forego a contest and the handover would be swift but I'm far from convinced.
Under the current arrangement, Lucy Powell would be Acting PM until the new leader was elected (and of course Labour's first woman Prime Minister).
This is why I'm dubious about Starmer being in any way forced out - a managed coronation as with Blair and Brown is one thing but a contested leadership campaign over several weeks, well, it could work but would it be a good idea?
In any case, while there are also arcane meanderings about being Party leader as distinct from being leader of the Parliamentary Party (doesn't have to be the same individual), the truth, as always, is it's up to the incumbent. We saw plenty of defiance from May, Johnson and Truss right up to the point when they were told (and then realised - it takes time for the pain to reach the brain in many creatures) they couldn't go on.
Starmer is nowhere near that point in my view and he has the consoling truth there's little evidence anyone else from Labour in No.10 would be doing any better. There's an old adage that says if you don't hang together you'll all hang separately and that's probably Labour and Starmer's best advice for now.
Governing party gets ansty. PM is in political trouble, my majority isn't very big, we need a change. Step up someone with a big opinion of themself who is good at organising support.
The Tories got the Trusster. Labour will get Streeting. And he won't last very long and be replaced by someone truly dull like Pat McFadden.
What I would like though is for Labour not to rest on their laurels. The 2017 parliament had 2 Prime Ministers. The 2019 Parliament had 3 Prime Ministers. Come on Labour, go for the record!!!
Karim Beguir — who sold his AI company to BioNTech for £562m — has moved residency to Switzerland, following other entrepreneurs out of Britain
https://www.thetimes.com/business-money/companies/article/instadeep-founder-leaves-uk-as-fears-grow-over-wealth-drain-9jl0f7wm2
Herman Narula, the chief executive of the £2.5bn tech company Improbable, said he was preparing to emigrate to the United Arab Emirates over reports that Ms Reeves intended to unleash a so-called settling-up charge on entrepreneurs.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/11/11/britains-richest-young-entrepreneur-prepares-to-quit-uk/
Streeting is generally failing because of his arrogance. He doesn't listen to people and is convinced of his own brilliance.
Probably better than Starmer, but could well prove to be a Truss like figure. Tories love Thatcher cosplay in leadership contenders, Labour loves Blair cosplay, but both need to realise that times have changed. Theres no "putting the band back together".
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/nov/12/judges-set-to-decide-fate-of-police-chief-constable-guilty-of-contempt-of-court
The court of appeal ruled on Tuesday that Northamptonshire police were in contempt and had been “willfully disobedient” for repeatedly failing to obey rulings to hand over video to a woman who complained she had been wrongly arrested by three officers.
Nadine Buzzard-Quashie was arrested by Northamptonshire police in September 2021, triggering a four-year saga.
…
The judgment said: “Her account of her arrest … was that she was physically assaulted by the officers who arrested her, she was physically thrown to the ground and had her face pushed into stinging nettles.”
She wanted video footage of her arrest, including from police body-worn cameras, which the force did not provide.
She complained to the Information Commissioner’s Office which made an order that all video should be handed over, which the force ignored, then a county court judge made another order, which the force failed to obey again.
The force told courts it did not have any more video to hand over, then reversed its position at a hearing in October. The court of appeal judgment said: “This means that all the statements made to the court on behalf of the police force prior to mid-October 2025 were false.”
On Tuesday three appeal court judges issued a blistering and unanimous ruling.
Lady Justice Asplin, Lord Justice Coulson, and Lord Justice Fraser said “misleading and untrue statements … have been made to the court on behalf of the chief constable, both to the county court … and also to the court of appeal in relation to the application for permission to appeal and the appeal itself. To list every single statement made on behalf of the chief constable that has proved to be inaccurate over this lengthy period would lengthen this judgment considerably.”
Probably, yes.
If he ever got the job (and it's a bit unclear to me how that's likely to happen), it would not be because he's ideologically aligned with the party membership, but rather because he would be seen (correctly or not) as more competent in actually getting things done that the current sub-par incumbent.
And in the event of his actually getting the job, I seriously doubt that he'd quite so rapidly implode, and it wouldn't in any case be from the same disconnection with reality.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjLU9_Hr7k0
UK's first small nuclear power station to be built in north Wales
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c051y3d7myzo
Is this the adapted RR submarine reactors idea?
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/11/11/britains-richest-young-entrepreneur-prepares-to-quit-uk/
A 37-year-old technology entrepreneur worth more than £700m is preparing to quit Britain for Dubai ahead of Rachel Reeves’s planned tax raid on wealthy emigrants.
Herman Narula, the chief executive of the £2.5bn tech company Improbable, said he was preparing to emigrate to the United Arab Emirates over reports that Ms Reeves intended to unleash a so-called settling-up charge on entrepreneurs.
Mr Narula, who is Britain’s richest self-made entrepreneur aged under 40, told The Telegraph: “I don’t particularly want to leave the UK – but I might want to one day and I don’t want to be banned from that option.”
Mr Narula called introducing an exit tax “irresponsible” and warned it threatened to drive out entrepreneurs ahead of the Budget.
I presume you'd like to see taxes cut and spending cut - I suspect spending will be cut in the Budget but presumably you want to see some serious reductions? I presume it'll be the services people actually depend on which will bear the brunt rather than, let's say, defence which is sacrosanct.
Which services and whose benefits would you cut? Would you cut pensions (or just those in the public sector)?
As always, those advocating spending cuts are usually unaffected by any such cuts and it's not unreasonable of those who will be affected to ask why they should take the pain.
Return to purdah, and stop chasing people and businesses away.
(One suggestion is that that tweet from 2015 has acted as a curse that will only be broken by giving him the job.)
People are already restructuring companies and changing residency, knowing that even if the “exit tax” isn’t in the Budget this year, it’s still an indication of the thinking of government and the direction of travel.
Even more than a few HMWs leaving is the investment not undertaken, the people and businesses deciding not to invest in the UK but to go elsewhere.
Agree wholeheartedly with Purdah, there should be nothing in the media leaked out of the Treasury until the Chancellor sits down after delivering the statement.
Let's have more please!
(PS I recognise I am probably about to find out I'm the sole poster on PB who doesn't know what you are talking about.)
Our democracy is at stake here. We have had a succession of outrages:
Musical chairs in the Tory party - 5 leaders in 8 years
Illegal shut down of parliament
Government minister roaring from the dispatch box that the parliament was a disgrace and should disband
Leader of the House lying on the Treasury Bench in disdain
Johnson's government falls apart despite large majority, to be replaced by Truss whose government implodes practically as it begins despite large majority
3 Prime Ministers in one parliament, each claiming both to be legitimately holding an electoral mandate and to be a new government
Starmer's government elected with a gargantuan majority off a small vote
Starmer's government battling internally not to implode despite gargantuan majority
And so it looks we then get to look forward to a Farage government with all the fun that comes with that.
1) Stop this insanity of increasing benefit spending by ending the 2 child cap
2) Give nothing to the WASPI graspers
3) Thoroughly kibosh the rarely mentioned but still floating around 'discussion' about reparations
4) Increase the pension age (not immediately but pencil it in)
5) End the triple lock, it's unsustainable as well as being unfair on the working population of the country
6) Commit to a long term reduction of the deficit with a goal of eventually turning it into a small (few percent of GDP) surplus and seek consensus from other parties to maintain that goal, even if the specific path of reaching it might change
7) End all talk of the madness of wealth or exit taxes. Rich people spend a lot, and when they do, they pay VAT. It's never been easier to leave and work elsewhere
8) Increase income tax. I'm not a fan of tax rises, I instinctively prefer lower taxes, but we do need to raise more money and this seems both more straightforward and less harmful than other measures
9) Embark on a simplification of regulations, include taxation and building regulations, to make things easier for individuals and businesses to get things moving
10) Try and find a way to keep new innovations here. Encourage this with tax breaks (in a time-limited period) for setting up factories and the like in the fields of emerging technology. Re-introduce the golden share so we can retain leading innovations and the workers and businesses pay tax here. Perhaps have extra incentives for locating factories etc in the north of England
11) Collaborate closely with Ukraine to encourage both their and our own drone facilities to be built here. Essential for defence with excellent prospects for export
Evens on Starmer going in 2026 still looks the safer bet.
I notice the small reactor announcement has pissed off the US ambassador, which is a plus in my book.
The idea is that it's a pilot for refining the manufacturing techniques for making the things on something like an assembly line.
And it does mean that it's likely to be producing power in the next decade rather than the one after.
Amusing that the nimbys are already out opposing it as "unproven technology", which is complete bollocks.
What's unproven are the economics of the whole idea.
Decouple Electricity Pricing from Gas.
The cost of living is so high and inflation keeps coming back. Electric prices are at the heart of much of this. When Spain decoupled prices they saw rapid significant falls in prices.
Whatever else gets announced, if they don't smash the glass then they may as well not bother.
Maybe Streeting will be a better messenger than Starmer and maybe he would effect change in that area but it has to be just as likely he doubles down on high-tax high-spend policies to shore up the left flank.
It’s hard to see things being worse for Labour from a PR standpoint so on that point alone maybe they should go with him, but the cause of the next fiscal crisis isn’t going away.
But it remains the case that Starmer simply doesn't seem to be up to the job.
Usually lists of demands focus on what money should be spent on. We can all do that. What money should not be spent on is the much more pressing concern.
He had been urging ministers to commit to a large-scale plant, with US firm Westinghouse having reportedly presented plans to build a new gigawatt station at the site."
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c051y3d7myzo
There’s also huge export potential to the first company getting their production line up and running, the three companies competing so far are in UK, US, and China.
The Americans are struggling to find a buyer for the prototypes, which is going to have to be a state or federal government because of the risk, and the West has no interest in the Chinese one and vice-versa.
If we can beat the Americans to mass production, there’s a huge first-mover advantage in the commercial market.
My first thought when I saw his name was that it was just like the footballer Wanyama's name with some extra letters
Then I saw that he's called Victor, as is Wanyama
This morning the Beeb has a story about his team, the San Antonio Spurs, losing. I didn't know before this that he played for the Spurs
Wanyama played for Tottenham
But none of the problems are going to change, and Streeting hardly commands support across the party either.
Rich tech entrepeneurs pile up vast fortunes, with the earnings coming mostly from developed countries like our own, but shield their profits abroad via shell companies in low tax jurisdictions. They want all the advantages of the developed country lifestyle but are not willing to contribute their fair share.
It is something that does need to be addressed, and not just in the UK. Otherwise we have the sort of situation of the nobility in Pre-revolutionary France of an untaxed class exempt from the laws. Sooner or later the tumbrils will have to roll.
I am not convinced that an exit tax is the best way, but there does need to be an answer.
Notable that the legal firm behind the equal pay grift, Leigh Day, were in attendance.
It’s not going away and we can expect legal challenges coming in due course.
Starmer has said he won’t pay reparations but it is something that many in Labour, and some in other parties, support.
https://www.appg-ar.org/uk-reparations-conference-2025-register
Except:
7) I would have some sort way of increasing taxes on the wealthy, maybe through land or property tax. Let's also make sure UK citizens pay their appropriate share of taxes wherever they live. Sure, if they love their country so much less than money, they can give up their UK citizenship.
8) Roll NI into ICT to increase the tax take there rather than just up ICT. Or up ICT and reduce NI as has been mooted.
I'd also add:
12) Tighten the criteria for PIP, especially around mental health (as opposed to mental disabilities like learning difficulties) - use some of the money saved to invest in mental health care services.
The rest is spot on imo.
A good friend of mne - English as cream tea and cricket, but married an Egyptian, so not an English surname - was the victim of similar outrageous behaviour by police in Wales.
https://news.sky.com/story/investigation-demanded-into-keir-starmers-comms-chiefs-lobbying-links-13469229
Where we differ, is that I would argue for carrots rather than sticks for entrepreneurs, who are more than ever mobile individuals who can choose where to live and work.
No you can’t compete directly against an oil state with no personal income or capital gains taxes, but what you can do as the UK government is aim to take a smaller slice of a larger pie.
I do disagree with the idea of overseas and wealth taxes, though. It'd become widely reciprocated and reduce global labour mobility and encourage the wealthy to dwell or move elsewhere.
Interesting that there's broad agreement, though, given we have a different general perspective (left/right) politically.
Their nuclear plants are now built to a standard pattern, often with three or four next to each other on a site - and they're building a lot of them (29 under construction). That, and the absence of anything like our decades long planning nightmares, will make them rather cheaper to build.
The economics of SMRs - and their export potential - are still pretty unclear.
Labour appear to have looked across the Dispatch Box for 14 years - and learned nothing. Their current polling flatters them.
SMRs are fuelled by Hopium.
Of course he’s giving the contract to the British company, what did anyone else expect?
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/nov/11/china-co2-emissions-flat-or-falling-for-past-18-months-analysis-finds?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
Lee Turnage, 46, injured cyclist riding in World Naked Bike Ride before also assaulting two arresting police officers
A binman punched a naked cyclist taking part in a charity event after mistaking him for a “pervert”.
Lee Turnage, 46, injured the cyclist who was riding in the World Naked Bike Ride event on August 9, a court heard.
He was also found with a knife and attacked two police officers who tried to arrest him outside The Leather Bottle pub in Colchester, Essex.
One of the officers needed medical treatment to glue part of his ear back on as a result of the attack, Ipswich Crown Court was told.
Steven Dyble, mitigating, said the incident began when Turnage “encountered a number of middle-aged men cycling in the nude”.
“That is not to the defendant’s taste, but he reacted very badly to what he thought of, to use the vernacular, as perverts cycling naked in what was a residential area,” Mr Dyble said.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/11/12/binman-punched-naked-charity-cyclist-mistaking-pervert/?recomm_id=ebd5c3d1-e51a-46c1-8727-90266e276e26
I'm not sure some of the points would make that much difference when you are borrowing £150 billion per annum and the sheer vitriol directed toward the WASPI women from some on here is hard to believe - you'd almost think they had invaded Ukraine.
We are still in the post-COVID era - to be honest, I suspect a Labour Chancellor would have done exactly what Sunak did in 2020 but the ramifications of £300 billion or so of extra borrowing live with us. Had Sunak instigated a one off COVID tax in 2022 or 2023 to redress the balance that might have helped but that's water under the proverbial for now.
I can agree on the Triple Lock but the "sell" of that to an ageing population is likely to be the political equivalent of putting your head in a bucketful of scorpions.
I accept the need to simplify taxation (no argument) but I'm less convinced about planning regulations. They do serve a purpose and people should have the right to object to developments which, while economically advantageous, are disadvantageous for them in their community. The key is to ensure all applications provide and budget for sufficient infrastructure to deal with the population increase in a given area - that means extra medical centres, schools (perhaps), and transport as well as utilities and waste.
This year's Budget is more about slowing the borrowing train than stopping it and throwing it into reverse. Many post-industrial countries face the same issues we do and irrespective of the political stripe of their Government and the competence of their Finance/Treasury Ministers are struggling to come up with meaningful solutions.
I'd also offer the not unreasonable and cynical thought if there were a simple solution or solutions, Hunt and Sunak would have instigated them but they didn't. Rather like the "small boats", the economy is proving an intractable problem where oft-touted "radical" solutions would prove electorally or legally impossible to implement.
Anyway it's not like he's had a beer and a curry.
Entertainingly the plastic patriot starts talking about how taking their flag down would be "theft". No luv, you're putting it up illegally. Taking it down is not "theft".
And of course the patriot is cable tying the flag to the lamppost upside down. Because of course he is.
I think you'd be forgiven for assuming that this stuff was going on to at least the same extent under the Conservatives, just that they were better a suppressing/ignoring it.
Presumably the man himself is now going to have to show up at the court of appeal, to explain his force’s behaviour in the case?
Dave Lammy lied, Rachel Reeves lied, Big Ange lied, that is how they got into trouble. Again no opening up there. Certainly true the last lot did, but the new lot, same as the old lot, just hide a bit more behind legalise of the process.
What, in your opinion is “their appropriate share of taxes”?
Are you suggesting that the UK would just tax people at the UK rate wherever they are living and paying tax? Why would people keep uk citizenship if they have to pay tax for services they do not remotely use just because the UK can’t manage its spending properly?
So if they do introduce taxation on UK citizens abroad it’s not remotely going to raise the sort of sums you think.
https://bsky.app/profile/joniaskola.bsky.social/post/3m5hoh3gvrk2f